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THE TEAM
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Silva Telles was regarded as a well-prepared scholar, despite his limited output, and was often credited as the pioneer of scientific geography in Portugal (Ribeiro, "Silva...", pp. 160-161). Another notable professor from the Curso Superior de Letras, although not strictly a historian, was Zófimo Consiglieri Pedroso. He considered history within the broader framework of social sciences: “Every historical fact is linked to biological, chemical, or physical phenomena through thousands of relationships. Humankind, as the fundamental unit and factor of history, is what establish es these connections. As individuals, they belong to the field of anthropology; as social beings, they belong to the field of sociology. The influences acting upon them as animals are reflected in the historical facts in which they participate as humans. Therefore, climates, races, diets, geographical position, altitude, soil composition, etc., all the circumstances that directly or indirectly affect the physical nature of humans, act as modifying elements in history” (Pedroso, Compendio [Compendium] pp. 1-2).
The creation of the degree in Historical Geography in 1911 (Amaral, "Geógrafos" ["Geographers"] p. 69) also prompted a reflection on the scientific nature of geography— as far as history was concerned, already steeped in knowledge and positivist theories, there was no doubt. History and geography had already been integrated in secondary education, where exams covered Geography, Chronology, and History. In 1915, Silva Telles published O conceito científico da geografia [The scientific concept of geography], followed in 1917 by Aristides de Amorim Girão’s A geografia moderna. Evolução – conceito – relação com as outras ciências (Ensaio de síntese) [Modern Geography: Evolution – Concept – Relationship with Other Sciences (A Synthesis Essay)]. Girão, newly graduated in History and Geography, argued that Portugal was lagging at least 50 years behind in developing the discipline: “There was little or almost nothing on geography in our country” (Boletim, p. 3). Both geographers aimed to outline a trajectory for the field and establish an explanatory geography—later termed i nterpretative geography by Leite de Vasconcellos (Vasconcellos, Etnografia [Ethnography] I, p. 61)—moving beyond the old descriptive geography (Girão, "A geografia" ["Geography"] p. 318). Silva Telles endeavoured to completely separate geography from history: “The geographer is essentially a naturalist, while the historian is concerned only with the place where history unfolds. For the historian, the place is merely a setting for human events, while for the geographer, it is the objective and the logical product of nature” (Telles, "O conceito" ["The concept"] p. 119).
