Alexandre Herculano shares with Almeida Garrett the title of most important writer of the first generation of Romanticism in Portugal. Poet, historian, novelist, polemist, essayist, and editor, Herculano was a key figure in nineteenth-century Portugal, not only because of his multiple and diverse works but also because of his active participation in the political events of the time.

Alexandre Herculano de Carvalho e Araújo was born on 28 March 1810, the year of the third French invasion of Portugal. He was the son of Teodoro Cândido de Araújo, a low-level administrative employee, and Maria do Carmo de São Boaventura. In 1820 Portugal was shocked and changed by the Liberal Revolution (a rebellion against the absolute monarchy that obliged King João VI to return from Brazil and to accept the progressive constitution written by the National Assembly in 1822). Herculano was ten years...