Portrait of Luís I of Portugal

Birthday profile

Luís I of Portugal

Luís I of Portugal (died 1889)

Born
October 31, 1838
Died
October 19, 1889
Zodiac sign
Scorpio
Birth year
1838

About Luís I of Portugal

Dom Luís I (Anglicized: Louis I, Luís Filipe Maria Fernando Pedro de Alcântara António Miguel Rafael Gabriel Gonzaga Xavier Francisco de Assis João Augusto Júlio Valfando; 31 October 1838 – 19 October 1889), known as "the Popular" (Portuguese: o Popular) was King of Portugal from 1861 to 1889. Luís was a member of the ruling House of Braganza. The second son of Queen Maria II and her consort, King Ferdinand II, and born as the Duke of Porto, he acceded to the throne upon the death of his elder brother King Pedro V. == Infante of Portugal == Prince Luís was born on 31 October 1838, at 11.30pm. Although his status as second son did not suggest that Luís would ascend to the Portuguese throne, his education was meticulous and largely shared with his older brother, the Royal Prince Pedro: he was tutored by the counsellor Carl Andreas Dietz, who had been his father Fernando's preceptor until April 1847, when Dietz was forced to leave Portugal on charges of meddling in national politics associated with his Protestant religious affiliation, and was replaced by the Viscount of Carreira, assisted by Manuel Moreira Coelho. Pedro and Luís divided their time between the palaces of Mafra, Sintra and Vila Viçosa, as well as sporadic stays at the Palace of Belém. As the second-born son of the royal couple, Luís embarked on a naval career, having been appointed private in the Company of the Marine Guards and recognized in a ceremony at the Navy Arsenal on October 28, 1846, when he was only 8 years old. He would be promoted successively to second lieutenant (1851), lieutenant captain (1854), frigate captain (1858) and sea captain (1859). He had his first naval command in September 1857, on the brig Pedro Nunes, in which he made a cruise off the coast of Portugal and a trip to Gibraltar. He was appointed, by his brother King Pedro V, commander of the corvette Bartolomeu Dias, on June 21, 1858. Commanding the Bartolomeu Dias, he completed nine service missions between 1858 and 1860: he led the expedition to the archipelagos of Madeira and the Azores; he was responsible for transporting Prince George of Saxony to Lisbon, where he married Infanta Maria Ana, his sister; took the couple to England; traveled to Tangier; and, in 1860, Angola; he went to Madeira again on the orders of Empress Elisabeth of Austria; and brought Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen from Southampton, for his wedding with Infanta Antonia, then took the bride and groom to Anvers.

Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.

Career and life highlights

Luís I of Portugal timeline

  1. He had his first naval command in September 1857, on the brig Pedro Nunes, in which he made a cruise off the coast of Portugal and a trip to Gibraltar.
  2. On 1 June 1871, Luís was in Seixal (a town founded by his mother) to witness the founding of the Sociedade Filarmónica União Seixalense.

The world when Luís I of Portugal was born

Luís I of Portugal was born in 1838. The year snapshot below places that birthday in its cultural and historical setting: the music and films people were following, the headlines shaping public life, and the everyday prices families encountered.

Culture in 1838

  • Best-selling bookOliver Twist by Charles Dickens

Headlines and milestones

  • Top headlineTrail of Tears — forced removal of Cherokee
  • Technology milestoneFirst transatlantic steamship crossing (SS Great Western)
  • World population~1.18B

United States snapshot

  • U.S. leaderMartin Van Buren
  • U.S. population16.3M

1838 versus 2026

These figures put everyday life in Luís I of Portugal's birth year beside the site's latest United States snapshot.

Measure18382026
Population16.3M341 million

Sources and editorial standards

This profile combines a biographical source with structured birthday and historical context. Sources recorded for this profile: Wikipedia, Encyclopaedia Britannica, Library of Congress, Wikidata. See our editorial policy for sourcing, corrections, and review standards.

Read the source biography on Wikipedia. Wikipedia text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.