Crises de Mortalidade e Dinamica Populacional nos Secs. XVII e XIX na Regiao de Castelo Branco

The object of this thesis is the study in depth of mortality and mortality crises as well as the undelying population dynamics. From the methodological point of view, this research stands at the crossroad between demography and historical demography, and takes the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries as its time span. The space scope is provided by the set of parishes that nowadays form the municipality of Castelo Branco, an inland town in the center of Portugal. The analysis of the population dynamics demanded a meticulous work in the formal and comparative critique of available sources, specially as far as the eighteenth century is concerned. As to the nineteenth century, better statistical sources are available, but the quality of these sources had to be tested all the same, and corrective techniques of population structures were essayed, so that a homogeneous analysis of their evolution along the century might be developed. The study of mortality crises, the focal point of this thesis, followed the general methodological guidelines developed in a set of works on this theme, namely thesis submitted for the degree of master or doctor in this faculty and in the universities of Evora and Oporto. However, other methodological orientations were also considered, which enable a comparative analysis of the results reached. The study in depth of so-called normal mortality was particularly focused on the second half of the nineteenth century. The methodology in use was, in this case, particular to contemporary demography, but special caution was taken as demanded by the nature of the statistical material of the period. The study of the spatial structure, from the point of view of death-rate variations, benefited from a long term analysis, which accowed the perception of the both geographical continuities and discontinuities as far as mortality is concerned. The analysis of mortality and its crises was placed in the context of the political and economic evolution which may have had affected the region during the two centuries under studyAvailable from Fundacao para a Ciencia e a Tecnologia, Servico de Informacao e Documentacao, Av. D. Carlos I, 126, 1200 Lisboa / FCT - Fundação para o Ciência e a TecnologiaSIGLEPTPortuga