Kenneth Maxwell and The Rebuilding of Three Major European Cities
Examining the reconstruction efforts of three major European cities was the daunting task undertaken by English historian Kenneth Maxwell in writing “The Tale of Three Cities — The Rebuilding of London, Paris, and Lisbon” (Robbin Laird, editor, Second Line of Defense, 2025), a work that has just been released in England and the United States with texts in English, Portuguese, and French. It is the result of the author’s reading at the opening of an international colloquium on Luso-Brazilian Art and Literature, held at Harvard University in September 2024.
In this document, entitled “Disaster & Reconstruction: The Challenge of Modernism,” Maxwell analyzes the effects of a major fire in London which occurred in 1668, and the plans of the notable architect Christopher Wren (1632-1723) to redesign the city; the reconstruction of Lisbon after the great earthquake of 1755, under the direction of the Marquis of Pombal (1699-1782); and the destruction of old Paris and its reconstruction under Napoleon III (1808-1873) and Baron Georges-Eugène Haussmann (1809-1891), prefect of the former department of the Seine between 1853 and 1870.
The reconstruction of London
The opening text discusses the transformation that London underwent during the 17th and 18th centuries, initially under the direction of Inigo Jones (1577-1652), considered the first English architect, the first also to study architecture in Italy, responsible for flawless works such as the Queen’s House (1616) in Greenwich, and the Banqueting House in Whitehall (1622). He also designed the piazza (square) of Covent Garden, as well as a church, of which little remains today, and designed a magnificent palace for King Charles I (1600-1649) that was never built.
As the author notes, the civil war of 1642 ended Jones’ career, but his influence, inspired by the classical architecture of Rome and Renaissance Italy, remained among the architects who designed the reconstruction of London after the great bubonic epidemic (Black Death) of 1665-1666, which killed about 100,000 people, i.e., a quarter of London’s population, and the great fire of 1666, which destroyed much of the city, from the Tower of London to Fleet Street. It was then that architect Christophen Wren created ambitious plans for the reconstruction of the city, submitting them to King Charles II (1630-1685) that same year.
The monarch, accompanied by his brother, James Stuart (1633-1701), the Duke of York, personally oversaw the demolition of entire streets of houses and the creation of a series of firebreaks (strips of land) to slow the spread of fire. He accepted Wren’s suggestions to replace medieval streets with wide avenues and squares, including a new cathedral to replace St. Paul’s Cathedral, which had been destroyed by the great fire, as well as the construction of brick and stone buildings. However, after much contention with the owners of the destroyed houses, the only element of Wren’s project that was implemented was the canalization of the River Fleet. Be that as it may, as the historian points out, 130 years later, Wren’s ideas would be used on the banks of the Potomac River for the construction of Washington DC, the new capital of the United States.
To give an idea of the disaster, the author recalls that before the fire, London was a jumble of wooden buildings. He also points out that, at the time, 200,000 people were left homeless in five days and more than 13,000 houses and buildings were destroyed.
The reconstruction of Lisbon
The remodeling of London ended up having a great influence on the reconstruction of Lisbon, which was hit by an earthquake on November 1, 1755, because Sebastião José de Carvalho e Melo, future Count of Oeiras and Marquis of Pombal, Secretary of State during the reign of King José I (1750-1777), had been Portugal’s ambassador to England between 1739 and 1743 and was able to contemplate daily the works built in the previous century. José I (1750-1777), had been Portugal’s ambassador to England between 1739 and 1743 and was able to contemplate the works built in the previous century on a daily basis, as he lived in two residences in Golden Square, in the west center of the capital, a favorite location of members of the aristocracy and diplomats.
The earthquake, followed by a tsunami, was the strongest ever to hit Europe, destroying around 45 convents and monasteries, many houses and the Royal Palace on the banks of the Tagus River, as well as sinking the riverside quay, reducing everything to a pile of rubble. More than 15,000 people died, but Pombal’s response was swift and effective, ordering the burial of the dead and even the removal of bodies to the high seas to prevent the spread of disease, as well as imposing strict measures to prevent price increases for essential foods. Not to mention the measures he took to prevent looting and pillaging, with offenders being summarily hanged.
As Maxwell recalls, with the help of architects Manuel da Maia (1677-1768), Eugênio dos Santos (1711-1760), and Carlos Mardel (c.1695-1763), Pombal had approved by King José I (1703-1756) a plan that provided for the total reinvention of the central core of Lisbon, “with the annulment of previous street patterns and property rights.” José I (1714-1777) a plan that provided for the total reinvention of the central core of Lisbon, “with the annulment of previous street patterns and property rights.”
The plan replaced the old royal square, known as Terreiro do Paço, with the current Praça do Comércio, which in 1775 received a bronze statue in honor of King José I, which can still be seen today.
The square would be a place for ministries and government departments, commerce, customs, and the stock exchange, replicating the plans of Christophen Wren for a merchant city in London and Inigo Jones for Covent Garden.
The reconstruction of Paris
Finally, Maxwell shows the new Paris that resulted from the futuristic vision of Napoleon III, an authoritarian ruler who maintained his reign for 18 years, until he led France into a catastrophic war with Bismarck’s Prussia (1815-1898).
The monarch supported Baron Haussmann, mayor of the Seine, with an iron fist in his persistence to destroy old Paris to introduce modern water and sewage systems, as well as wide avenues lined with uniform buildings, which would eventually bear his name, as they became known as “Haussmann buildings.”
The works he designed would last less than 20 years and result in a totally planned city with straight, wide boulevards that cut through medieval slums, using legislation to confiscate private property, which meant that thousands of buildings and houses were condemned and demolished.
This process, which included the confiscation of property based on the right of eminent domain, would later be confirmed during the legislature of Charles Auguste Louis Joseph, Count of Morny (1811-1865), Napoleon III’s half-brother.
Based on this draconian legislation, the works would eventually put an end to the slums that were a source of diseases such as cholera, responsible for the deaths of more than 30,000 people between the 1830s and 1860s. As a result of this redevelopment, in 1870, the city gained underground gas conduits, with the installation of 33,000 outlets for public lighting, public buildings, and private homes. From then on, modern, new, and spacious Paris, already known as the City of Light, would outshine the hitherto envied London.
Haussmann also commissioned major engineering works to bring water through new aqueducts and artesian wells. Many schools were also modernized, including the famous Sorbonne, the faculty of medicine. Not to mention the grand masked balls, diplomatic receptions, and the first Universal Exhibition in 1855, which Haussmann would organize.
Haussmann, at the behest of Napoleon III, also sought to create in Paris the great parks of London, such as Hyde Park and St. James Park, which the monarch had so admired during his exile in the English capital. This was the origin of the construction of the Bois de Boulogne and other large Parisian parks.
At the conclusion of his research, Maxwell observes that while today the streets of London remain as they were before the great fire, when Christopher Wren was denied the opportunity to redesign the city, Lisbon and Paris remain as the Marquis of Pombal (and Maia, Santos, and Mardel) and Napoleon III (and Haussmann) imagined them, both rebuilt to reflect modernity.
This is a study that will now become indispensable for anyone who wants to learn about or even write about the history of these three great and luminous cities.
Kenneth Maxwell: professor at Harvard and Yale
Kenneth Maxwell was director and founder of the Brazilian Studies Program at the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies (DRCLAS) at Harvard University (2006-2008) and professor in the Department of History at Harvard (2004-2008). From 1989 to 2004, he was director of the Latin America Program at the Council on Foreign Relations, and in 1995 he became the first holder of the Nelson and David Rockefeller Chair in Inter-American Studies. He served as vice president and director of studies for the Council in 1996. He previously taught at Yale, Princeton, Columbia, and Kansas universities.
He founded and was director of the Camões Center for the Portuguese-Speaking World at Columbia and was program director of the Tinker Foundation, Inc. From 1993 to 2004, he was book reviewer for the Western Hemisphere for Foreign Affairs. He is a regular contributor to the New York Review of Books and was a weekly columnist for the Folha de S. Paulo newspaper between 2007 and 2015 and has been a monthly columnist for O Globo since 2015.
He was also a Herodotus fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton and a Guggenheim fellow and member of the Board of Directors of The Tinker Foundation, Inc. and the Advisory Board of the Luso-American Foundation. He is also a member of the Advisory Boards of the Brazil Foundation and Human Rights Watch/Americas. He holds a bachelor’s and master’s degree from St. John’s College, Cambridge University, and a master’s and doctorate from Princeton University. He is a regular contributor to the Second Line of Defense website (www.sldinfo.com).
He has also published “A Devassa da Devassa – a Inconfidência Mineira: Brasil-Portugal 1750-1808” (Editora Paz e Terra, 1978), “Marquês de Pombal – Paradoxo do Iluminismo” (Editora Paz e Terra, 1996), “A Construção da Democracia em Portugal” (Editorial Presença, 1999), “Naked Tropics: essays on empire and other rogues” (Psychology Press, 2003), “Chocolate, piratas e outros malandros” (Editora Paz e Terra, 1999), “Mais malandros – ensaios tropicais e outros” (Editora Paz e Terra, 2005) and Kenneth Maxwell on Global Trends – an historian of the 18th century looks at the contemporary world (Robbin Laird, editor, Second Line of Defense, 2023), among others.
In May 2004, he resigned from his position as director of Latin American Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York for criticizing Henry Kissinger (1923-2023), former US Secretary of State (1973-1977), in a book review on the coup d’état led by Augusto Pinochet (1915-2006) in Chile in 1973, and for not having a response published in Foreign Affairs magazine.
Adelto Gonçalves, journalist, master’s degree in Spanish Language and Spanish and Hispanic American Literature, and PhD in Portuguese Literature from the University of São Paulo (USP), is the author of Gonzaga, um Poeta do Iluminismo (Rio de Janeiro, Nova Fronteira, 1999), Barcelona Brasileira (Lisbon, Nova Arrancada, 1999; São Paulo, Publisher Brasil, 2002), Fernando Pessoa: a Voz de Deus (Santos, Editora da Unisanta, 1997); Bocage – o Perfil Perdido (Lisbon, Caminho, 2003, São Paulo, Imprensa Oficial do Estado de São Paulo – Imesp, 2021), Tomás Antônio Gonzaga (Imesp/Academia Brasileira de Letras, 2012), Direito e Justiça em Terras d’El-Rei na São Paulo Colonial (Imesp, 2015), Os Vira-latas da Madrugada (Rio de Janeiro, Livraria José Olympio Editora, 1981; Taubaté-SP, Letra Selvagem, 2015), The Kingdom, the Colony, and Power: the Lorena government in the captaincy of São Paulo – 1788-1797 (Imesp, 2019), among others. Email: [email protected]
Published by the JORNAL OPÇÃO on May 24, 2025 in Portuguese.