Los pasaportes internos como fuente para el estudio de la emigración gallega al norte de Portugal (1700-1850)

Abstract

Since the 1990s, a growing - albeit reduced - number of Portuguese and Galician researchers have studied emigration flows from Galicia to north Portugal; there are certainly several explanations for this new impulse, one of which of undeniable influence was the extended and diversified body of documents retrieved from both Portuguese and Galician archives, until recently hardly used or largely unexplored. These resources include national passports which, although implemented late in history (1760), discontinuously maintained until their suppression (1863), and recorded in non-standardised fashion, are unquestionably the must plural and diversified documented source of information on Galician emigrants, including place of origin and destination, duration of journey or stay, professional activities, gender, age, status, etc. Consequently, the input of passports, alongside other sources of diversified nature (parish archives, hospital records, customs books, etc.), has turned out to be fundamental for the recent research on Galician emigration to Portugal, as well for the enlargement of the geographical coverage of the study from the coastal province of Minho to the provinces of Trás-os-Montes and Alto Douro.