The Young Bairrão Oleiro and the Building of an International Scientific Network

Abstract

In the late 1940s, João Manuel Bairrão Oleiro (1923–2000) left for Madrid with a scholarship from the Instituto para a Alta Cultura, a Portuguese state body that financed science and culture. The aim of the young graduate of the University of Coimbra was very clear: to specialize in classical art and archaeology in order to further develop this field in Portugal. This chapter examines the experience he gained during his first research stay in Spain, which allowed him to achieve his goal through the courses and the lectures he attended, the museums he visited, the collections he studied and the personal acquaintances he established with Spanish archaeologists and, through them, French and Italian ones. The chapter also discusses how the Spanish research stay equipped Bairrão Oleiro with knowledge that enabled him to build a wide international scientific network that would be expanded in later years, and on which he would build his own academic path.