A French author in a Brazilian library: Nerée Boubée (1806–1862) and his textbooks on geological sciences

Abstract

This paper discusses the book Géologie élémentaire appliquée à l'agriculture et à l'industrie, by Nerée Boubée (1806–1863), first released in French in 1833, and later translated and published in Brazil in 1846 with the support of lieutenant Frederico Burlamaque (1803–1866), a prominent Brazilian engineer and teacher. There is a particular focus on the appendices, editors inserted works previously released on the geology of Brazil, authored by José Bonifácio d'Andrada e Silva (1763–1838), Martim Francisco Ribeiro d'Andrada (1775–1844), Wilhelm Ludwig von Eschwege (1777–1855), Charles van Lede (1801–1875), and George Gardner (1810–1849). These insertions reveal the concern to ensure an education that incorporated contents explicitly about Brazil. It is well documented that French science significantly influenced scientific education in Brazil. Until the first decades of the 20th century French authors dominated the Brazilian market for textbooks on geoscientific topics, from elementary level to higher education. The selection of Nerée Boubée's book is unlikely to have been by chance. Boubée was a prolific, active author living and teaching open geoscientific courses in Paris, whose primary focus was the applied side of geology, which was a topic of great interest to the Brazilian élites who are likely to have played a role in its selection.