The confraternities of Misericórdia and property transfers: the case of the Monteiro family, between Porto and Asia (1580-1640)

Abstract

This study focuses on two persons of the same family, Antonio e Domingos Monteiro, both involved in the Japan trade, whose way of life was marked by mobility within the coasts of South East Asia, trading in a wide variety of goods. Their network of contacts reveals the presence of members of their kin, especially nephews, as well as merchants from Porto, suggesting that the Portuguese model of emigration to Brazil during the nineteenth century was already at work in Asia. The purveyors of the dead and absentees were in charge of transmitting assets to inheritors in Portugal, but the misericordias also performed this role, even if in practice the interference of the representatives of the king was impossible to avoid. In spite of the intention of directing the money to mainland Portugal as soon as possible, long voyages, conveniences of maritime trade, royal bureaucracy and judicial litigations transformed transfer into a morose process.