An Anti-Hagiography of “Ancient Virtues”

A Freira que Fazia Chagas (1868), by Camilo Castelo Branco

Abstract

As virtudes antigas ou A freira que fazia chagas e O frade que fazia reis (1868) is a collection of texts, by Camilo Castelo Branco (1825-1890), which thematizes the frauds and interventions of religious people in the Ancien Régime society, in Portugal. Such a work would be intended to denounce the vices of the past and should encourage reflection on the fantasies, in the midst of Liberalism, that the previous Regime was a model and more moralized. In this work, we are interested in the section A freira que fazia chagas, which describes the farce, discovery and condemnation of Soror Maria da Visitação (1551-?), prioress of the Dominican monastery of Anunciada, in Lisbon. We investigated the structure and possible framing of the literary genre of Camilo’s work, as well as how the narrator seized and interpreted the documentary sources referred to in the text. We verified these issues in dialogue, above all, with the studies of Antonio Augusto Nery (2023) and Eduardo Lourenço (1999).