Bartolomeu Lourenço de Gusmão (December 1685 – 18 November 1724) was a Brazilian-born Portuguese

priest A priest is a religious leader authorized to perform the sacred rituals of a religion, especially as a mediatory agent between humans and one or more deities. They also have the authority or power to administer religious rites; in partic ...

and naturalist, who was a pioneer of lighter-than-air

airship An airship or dirigible balloon is a type of aerostat or lighter-than-air aircraft that can navigate through the air under its own power. Aerostats gain their lift from a lifting gas that is less dense than the surrounding air. In early ...

design.

Early life

Gusmão was born at Santos, then part of the Portuguese colony of Brazil. He began his novitiate in the

Society of Jesus , image = Ihs-logo.svg , image_size = 175px , caption = ChristogramOfficial seal of the Jesuits , abbreviation = SJ , nickname = Jesuits , formation = , founders ...

Bahia Bahia ( , , ; meaning "bay") is one of the 26 states of Brazil, located in the Northeast Region of the country. It is the fourth-largest Brazilian state by population (after São Paulo, Minas Gerais, and Rio de Janeiro) and the 5th-largest b ...

when he was about fifteen years old, but left the order in 1701. He went to

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic ( pt, República Portuguesa, links=yes ), is a country whose mainland is located on the Iberian Peninsula of Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Atlantic archipelagos of ...

and found a patron at Lisbon in the person of the Marquis of Abrantes. He completed his course of study at the

University of Coimbra The University of Coimbra (UC; pt, Universidade de Coimbra, ) is a public research university in Coimbra, Portugal. First established in Lisbon in 1290, it went through a number of relocations until moving permanently to Coimbra in 1537. The u ...

, devoting his attention principally to

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and mathematics, but received the title of Doctor of Canon Law (related to Theology). He is said to have had a remarkable memory and a great command of languages.

Airship

In 1709 he presented a petition to King

João V of Portugal João is the Portuguese equivalent of the given name John. The diminutive is Joãozinho and the feminine is Joana. It is widespread in Portuguese-speaking countries. Notable people with the name are enumerated in the sections below. Kings * ...

, seeking royal favour for his invention of an airship, in which he expressed the greatest confidence. The contents of this petition have been preserved, together with a picture and description of his

. Developing the ideas of

Francesco Lana de Terzi Francesco Lana de Terzi (1631 in Brescia, Lombardy – 22 February 1687, in Brescia, Lombardy) was an Italian Jesuit priest, mathematician, naturalist and aeronautics pioneer. Having been professor of physics and mathematics at Brescia, he first ...

, S.J., Gusmão wanted to spread a huge sail over a boat-like body like the cover of a transport wagon; the boat itself was to contain tubes through which, when there was no wind, air would be blown into the sail by means of bellows. The vessel was to be propelled by the agency of magnets which were to be encased in two hollow metal balls. The public test of the machine, which was set for 24 June 1709, did not take place. It is known that Gusmão was working on this principle at the public exhibition he gave before the Court on 8 August 1709, in the hall of the

Casa da Índia The Casa da Índia (, English: ''India House'' or ''House of India'') was a Portuguese state-run commercial organization during the Age of Discovery. It regulated international trade and the Portuguese Empire's territories, colonies, and factor ...

in Lisbon, when he propelled a ball to the roof by combustion. The king rewarded the inventor by appointing him to a professorship at

Coimbra Coimbra (, also , , or ) is a city and a municipality in Portugal. The population of the municipality at the 2011 census was 143,397, in an area of . The fourth-largest urban area in Portugal after Lisbon, Porto, and Braga, it is the largest cit ...

and made him a

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. He was also one of the fifty selected as members of the ''Academia Real de História'', founded in 1720; and in 1722 he was made chaplain to the Court. Gusmão also busied himself with other inventions, but in the meantime continued his work on his airship schemes, the idea for which he is said to have conceived while a novice at Bahia. His designs included a ''ship to sail in the air'' consisting of a triangular gas-filled pyramid, but he died without making progress.

Persecution

One account of Gusmão's work suggests that the

Portuguese Inquisition The Portuguese Inquisition ( Portuguese: ''Inquisição Portuguesa''), officially known as the General Council of the Holy Office of the Inquisition in Portugal, was formally established in Portugal in 1536 at the request of its king, John III. ...

forbade him to continue his aeronautic investigations and persecuted him because of them, but this is probably a later invention. It dates, however, from at least the end of the 18th century, as the following article in the London ''Daily Universal Register'' (later ''The Times'') of 20 October 1786, makes clear: Contemporary documents do attest that information was laid before the Inquisition against Gusmão, but on quite another charge. The inventor fled to

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and fell ill of a fever, of which he died in Toledo. He wrote: ''Manifesto summário para os que ignoram poderse navegar pelo elemento do ar'' (''Short Manifesto for those who are unaware that is possible to sail through the element air'', 1709); and ''Vários modos de esgotar sem gente as naus que fazem água'' (''Several ways of draining, without people, ships that leak water'', 1710); some of his sermons also have been printed.

Legacy

In 1936, the Bartolomeu de Gusmão Airport was built in

Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro ( , , ; literally 'River of January'), or simply Rio, is the capital of the state of the same name, Brazil's third-most populous state, and the second-most populous city in Brazil, after São Paulo. Listed by the GaWC as a ...

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

, by the

Luftschiffbau Zeppelin Luftschiffbau Zeppelin GmbH is a German aircraft manufacturing company. It is perhaps best known for its leading role in the design and manufacture of rigid airships, commonly referred to as ''Zeppelins'' due to the company's prominence. The name ...

to operate with the

rigid airship A rigid airship is a type of airship (or dirigible) in which the Aerostat, envelope is supported by an internal framework rather than by being kept in shape by the pressure of the lifting gas within the envelope, as in blimps (also called pres ...

s Graf Zeppelin and Hindenburg. In 1941, it was taken over by the Brazilian Air Force and renamed Santa Cruz Air Force Base. Presently, the airport serving

Araraquara Araraquara ( or ) is a city in the state of São Paulo in Brazil. The population is 250.314 (2022 est.) in an area of . It is also known as "the abode of the sun," because of its impressive sunset and because of its hot atmosphere, especially in su ...

is named Bartolomeu de Gusmão Airport.

In popular culture

* ''Passarola Rising'' by

Azhar Abidi Azhar Ali Abidi (born 6 February 1968 in Wah, Pakistan) is a Pakistani Australian author and translator. He went to school in Pakistan and later studied electrical engineering at the Imperial College London and Master of Business Administration ...

* '' Baltasar and Blimunda'' by

José Saramago José de Sousa Saramago, GColSE ComSE GColCa (; 16 November 1922 – 18 June 2010), was a Portuguese writer and recipient of the 1998 Nobel Prize in Literature for his "parables sustained by imagination, compassion and irony ith which hec ...

References