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Women of the resistance

Maria Guardiola

Maria Baptista dos Santos Guardiola

StudentsMathematics teacherheadmistress of the Liceu Maria Amália Vaz de Carvalho (1928–1946)deputy in the National Assemblyleader in the Mothers’ Work (Obra das Mães) and the Women’s Portuguese Youth (Mocidade Portuguesa Feminina)
Born
13 January 1895, Bragança (Sé)
Died
27 September 1987, Lisbon (São Sebastião da Pedreira)

A Mathematics teacher and headmistress of the Liceu Maria Amália Vaz de Carvalho, she was one of the first three women elected as deputies, in 1934, and a central figure in the women’s organisations of the Estado Novo (“New State”).

She was born in Bragança in 1895.2 She graduated in Mathematics in 1920 and taught at the country’s leading girls’ secondary schools (liceus); she was headmistress of the Liceu Maria Amália Vaz de Carvalho from 1928 to 1946.1

In the elections of 16 December 1934 she entered the National Assembly with Domitila de Carvalho and Maria Cândida Parreira: they were the first three women deputies in Portugal.13 She was a deputy in the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 5th legislatures and for many years held leading posts in the Mothers’ Work (Obra das Mães) and in the Women’s Portuguese Youth (Mocidade Portuguesa Feminina). The Dicionário no Feminino (Dictionary in the Feminine) calls her “one of the most important and emblematic women of the Estado Novo”.1

Her presence shows the other side of this story: it was not the Republic that opened the doors of parliament to women, it was the dictatorship, albeit in a very restricted way. For the researchers Susana Fontes and Sónia Coelho, this was a strategy of Salazar’s, who saw women as “a necessary means of building and spreading the ideology of the Estado Novo”.1 She died in Lisbon in 1987, aged 92.2

On the walks

Places

In the timeline

  1. 1933

    The first girls’ secondary school moves into a building of its own

  2. 16 Dec 1934

    The first three Portuguese women deputies are elected

  3. 11 Jan 1935

    The National Assembly opens, with the first three women deputies

  4. 15 Aug 1936

    Statutes of the Mothers’ Work for National Education approved

  5. 7 Mar 2025

    Parlamento evoca 50 anos do voto universal das mulheres

They crossed paths with her

  • Domitila de Carvalho

    1871–1966

    The first woman to attend the University of Coimbra, she graduated in Mathematics, Philosophy and Medicine and was a teacher and headmistress of the first girls’ secondary school (liceu). A monarchist and conservative who supported nascent Salazarism, she was one of the first three women deputies, elected in 1934 on the National Union lists.

  • Maria Cândida Parreira

    1877–1942

    A Lisbon lawyer who graduated in Law in 1919, she was one of the first three Portuguese women deputies, elected in 1934 on the National Union lists, under the Estado Novo.

  • Carolina Beatriz Ângelo

    1878–1911

    A doctor, the first Portuguese woman surgeon and a suffragist. A widow and “head of household”, she won in court the right to be registered as a voter and, on 28 May 1911, at the Clube Estefânia, became the first woman to vote in Portugal.

  • António de Oliveira Salazar

    1889–1970

    A Coimbra professor called in by the Military Dictatorship to take over the Ministry of Finance in 1928, he headed the Government from 1932 to 1968 and made the Estado Novo (“New State”), instituted by the 1933 Constitution, a dictatorship with power concentrated in the President of the Council.

  • Álvaro Cunhal

    1913–2005

    A communist leader, he was arrested in 1949 and escaped from Peniche Fortress in 1960. General secretary of the PCP, he returned from exile on 30 April 1974 and addressed the crowd at the airport from the top of a Chaimite armoured car.

  • Ana de Castro Osório

    1872–1935

    A writer, author of what is considered the first Portuguese feminist manifesto (1905), she launched the Republican League of Portuguese Women and founded, with Carolina Beatriz Ângelo, the Feminist Propaganda Association, which advocated the vote for educated women.

Notes on the sources1
  • The legislatures in which she was a deputy: the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 5th, according to the journal Faces de Eva; Wikipedia says she was one from 1935 to 1945.

Do you know more, or do you have a document? Tell us.

Sources

  1. 1Um olhar sobre a participação feminina na Assembleia Nacional: a deputada Virgínia Faria Gersão (Faces de Eva, n.º 47). Susana Fontes e Sónia Coelho / Faces de Eva (SciELO Portugal) — consulted on 2 October 2026
  2. 2Maria Baptista dos Santos Guardiola. Wikipédia (pt) — consulted on 2 October 2026
  3. 3O voto das mulheres em Portugal (Irene Flunser Pimentel, 29/9/2013). jugular (blogue, SAPO) — consulted on 2 October 2026
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