The central roles played by corporate governance and accounting in the 18th century Portuguese chartered trading companies founded by the Marquis of Pombal

The article explores three of the general trading companies founded by Marquis of  Pombal  – the  Companhia Geral do Grao-Para e Maranhao  ( Grao-Para  and  Maranhao  General Trading Company, 1755), the  Companhia Geral da Agricultura das Vinhas do Alto Douro  (Agriculture of  Alto Douro  Vineyards General Trading Company, 1756) and  Companhia Geral de Pernambuco e Paraiba  ( Pernambuco  and  Paraiba  General Trading Company, 1759) –, both in terms of accounting and corporate governance rules. In order to identify the similarities and differences between the founding documents of the three companies, this text adopts a qualitative research approach that uses primary and secondary research sources. This paper represents a contribution to a better understanding of 18 th  Portuguese accounting and a contribution to expand the knowledge of the governance model of 18 th  century Portuguese companies, providing, in this way, a systematization of the factors that contributed to the foundation of the three companies combined with the analysis of its internal functioning within the framework of its corporate governance rules.