Carlos Julião

[1] One of his first missions was at Mazagan in Morocco, the last Portuguese possession in northern Africa, which was taken by the Muslims in 1769, and where Julião, according to official documentation, risked his life under fire.

[2] After 1770, Julião served in a topographic assignment to Macao in China, as part of a reformation plan commanded by the Navy and Overseas minister, Martinho de Melo e Castro.

[6] Promoted for the last time in 1805 to coronel, and to inspector of the army arsenal where he substituted his colleague and friend Carlos Napione, Julião also served under the command of English Marshall Beresford during the second French invasion in 1809.

For six years, Julião served in India and illustrated a manuscript called "Noticia Summária do Gentilismo na Ásia", where with drawings and texts he reproduced Hindu beliefs of Brahman tradition.

The three groups of illustrations related to India, Brazil and Peru were published in 1960 by the National Library but they were already property of the institution since 1947, after they were acquired from an anonymous seller, residing in the United States.

Less known but also published that year in the exhibition catalogue "Engenharia Militar no Brasil e no Ultramar Português Antigo e Moderno",[11] are the two works preserved by the department of archaeological studies in military engineering at Lisbon.

The paintings show various figures representative of the populations of Portugal, Brazil, and Angola, and from such diverse social and racial classes as a metropolitan judge or an African captured slave with her baby in her arms.