| Chapter 1: | Cherished Myths |
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Indeed, Angola could hardly be at the top of the agenda. Nonetheless, almost a century later, the contradiction undermining the Portuguese perception of its “new Brazil” was visible. Silva Correia, on the occasion of the 1930 National Colonial Congress organised by the Lisbon Geographic Society, presented a historical sketch of white colonisation in Angola. His report remarked that the first spontaneous settlers moved to the southern coast only in 1844. Soon after that, the Crown approved a decree establishing new penal colonies in the district. Sadly, the outcome was totally unsatisfactory, and this failure brought the region into discredit for a long time. In 1885 groups of settlers, Boer voortrekkers among them, moved to areas in the Moçâmedes highlands district, namely, Lubango Humpata, and Chibía. During the 1900s and 1910s, only a few isolated efforts can be mentioned, but their practical effect was pointless, due to the governors’ relatively short stay. Finally, in 1921, “thanks to Norton de Matos’ laudable initiative, colonization was splendidly incremented. The following High Commissioners, convinced of the immediate necessity to people Angola with Europeans and their descendants, strived to carry on their most important task: the Luso-colonization of the greatest and most Portuguese overseas possession”.3
Between Dream and Reality
As is typical of most nationalist ideologies, Portuguese national identity is constructed from a series of different ad hoc discourses that have been traced back to a number of symbolic relevant personalities and defining moments of national history: the revolt of the Lusitanian shepherd Viriato against the Romans in the second century BC; the independence achieved nine centuries ago; the long and eventually successful fight against the Moors; and the persistent historical and cultural rivalry with neighbouring Spain. However, without any doubt, modern and contemporary Portuguese national identity gravitates around the golden age of great discoveries and its promoters, the protagonists of classic maritime epic: Henry the Navigator, Bartolomeu Dias, Vasco da Gama, and Luís Vaz de Camões.