ts of the surrounding country are uncultivated, partly because
railway communication is lacking and the roads are bad. Except farming,
the chief local industry is silkworm-rearing and the manufacture of
silk. The administrative district of Braganza coincides with the eastern
part of Traz-os-Montes (q.v.). Pop. (1900) 185,162; area, 2513 sq. m.

The city gave its name to the family of Braganza, members of which were
rulers of Portugal from 1640 to 1853, and emperors of Brazil from 1822
to 1889. This family is descended from Alphonso (d. 1461), a natural son
of John I., king of Portugal (d. 1433), who was a natural son of King
Peter I., and consequently belonged to the Portuguese branch of the
Capetian family. Alphonso was made duke of Braganza in 1442, and in 1483
his grandson, Duke Ferdinand II., lost his life through heading an
insurrection against King John II. In spite of this Ferdinand's
descendants acquired great wealth, and several of them held high office
under the kings of Portugal. Duke John I. (d. 1583) married into the
royal family, and when King Henry II. died without direct heirs in 1580,
he claimed the crown of Portugal in opposition to Philip II. of Spain.
John, however, was unsuccessful, but, when the Portuguese threw off the
Spanish dominion in 1640, his grandson, John II., duke of Braganza,
became king as John IV. In 1807, when Napoleon declared the throne of
Portugal vacant, King John VI. fled to Brazil; but he regained his
inheritance after the fall of Napoleon in 1814, although he did not
return to Europe until 1821, when he left his elder son Peter to govern
Brazil. In 1822 a revolution established the independence of Brazil with
Peter as emperor. In 1826 Peter became king of Portugal on the death of
his father; but he at once resigned the crown to his young daughter
Maria, and appointed his brother Miguel to act as regent. Miguel soon
declared himself king, but after a stubborn struggle was driven from the
country in 1833, after which Maria became queen. Maria married for her
second husband Ferdinand (d. 1851), son of Francis, duke of Saxe-Coburg;
and when she died in 1853 the main Portuguese branch of the family
became extinct. Maria was succeeded by her son Louis I., father of
Charles I., who ascended the throne of Portugal in 1889. The empire of
Brazil descended on the death of Peter I. to his son Peter II., who was
expelled from the country in 1889. When Peter died in 1891 this branch
of the fa