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The history of the settlement of the Chapada Diamantina, in central Bahia, is the story of a region that was settled late and gradually, always in step with its natural resources: cattle on the outskirts, gold in the 18th century, diamonds and carbonado from 1844 onwards, and, since the 1970s, tourism and environmental protection.

Broadly speaking, the settlement went through three phases: the Gold-bearing Plateau (18th century), the Diamond-bearing Plateau (from 1844 until the decline of the gold rush) and the  Chapada Turística (from the listing of Lençóis as a heritage site in 1973). Each phase has left behind towns, churches and houses that are now protected by IPHAN, as well as a landscape that the Chapada Diamantina National Park helps to preserve.

This guide brings together the dates, places and key figures from this history and highlights where the sources differ. To plan your trip, see also the Chapada Diamantina Tourist Guide.

As belezas da Chapada Diamantina - Guia Turístico

A chronological history of the settlement of the Chapada Diamantina

• 1701: the alluvial gold at Jacobina is officially reported to the Crown.
• 1720: King João V authorised mining in Bahia, subject to a one-fifth levy.
• 1723 and 1724: A royal charter established the town of Minas do Rio de Contas, which was founded in 1724 (some sources state 1725).
• 1844: The discovery of diamonds in the Mucugê region sparked the great rush.
• 1845: the settlement of Lençóis grew as gold mining intensified.
• 1856 and 1864: Lençóis was granted town status (under the 1856 Act) and city status (in 1864).
• 1871 and 1872: South African mines caused diamond prices to fall, and small-scale mining declined.
• 1973: IPHAN listed the Lençóis complex; Mucugê and Rio de Contas followed in 1980, and Igatu in 2000.
• 1985: establishment of the Chapada Diamantina National Park.
• 1994 to 1998: mechanised mining was banned and the mountain mining operations were closed down.

1. Chapada Aurífera: from the hinterland to gold

Before the gold rush: the hinterland, land grants and cattle

Since the founding of Salvador in 1549 by Tomé de Sousa, colonisation has progressed from the coast into the hinterland. Travelling by river and on foot, expeditions set out in search of land, indigenous people to enslave, and precious metals and gemstones, such as gold, silver and emeralds. To understand the starting point, see the history of the Captaincy of the Bay of All Saints.

Among these expeditions were those led by Gabriel Soares de Sousa, who, in 1591, set out from the Jiquiriçá estate and reached the headwaters of the Jacuípe River, according to the IBGE, and those led by Belchior Dias Moreira, who was involved in the search for silver mines. According to academic studies, Belchior died without revealing the location of these mines.

Sources differ on the dates: the IBGE in Gentio do Ouro dates his arrival to 1604. Those who reached the interior of Bahia encountered a landscape of rugged mountain ranges, deep valleys and vast plateaus: the Serra do Espinhaço, the northernmost part of which forms the Chapada Diamantina. The current name would only become established later, with the discovery of diamonds.

Before the gold rush, settlement in the surrounding area was linked to livestock farming. The Crown granted vast land grants, and large estates came to dominate the hinterland. The Casa da Ponte, belonging to the Guedes de Brito family, is described in historical studies as having lands stretching from Morro do Chapéu to the Rio das Velhas (160 leagues, according to a paper presented to ANPUH). The Casa da Torre, belonging to the Garcia d’Ávila family, took the north-eastern side, following an agreement between the two families.

The expansion of cattle farming took place amidst the wars against indigenous peoples of the hinterland, such as the Maracás and Payayás, as part of the series of conflicts known as the War of the Barbarians.

Jacobina and Rio de Contas: the gold rush

Gold changed this situation in the early 18th century. In 1701, Captain Antônio Álvares da Silva officially reported the discovery of alluvial gold in the Jacobina region, to the north of the Chapada. The Crown, anxious not to deplete the resources of Minas Gerais, kept the activity under control. On 5 August 1720, King João V authorised mining in Bahia, subject to a tax of one-fifth (20 per cent), payable per pan.

The village of Santo Antônio da Jacobina was founded on 24 June 1722. According to the IBGE, a decree issued by the Overseas Council on 13 May 1726 ordered the establishment of the town’s foundry, which was set up in January 1727. In the south, gold was found in the bed of the River Brumado, and gold prospectors founded the settlement of Mato Grosso, according to the IBGE. Tradition attributes the discovery to Sebastião Pinheiro Raposo, around 1710, but academic studies point out that there is no exact date nor any confirmed first discoverer.

Mato Grosso became a parish in 1718. A royal charter dated 27 November 1723 established the town of Minas do Rio de Contas, which was founded in 1724, some 12 km from the former Creoulos inn. In 1745, a royal order mandated the transfer of the administrative centre to the site of the present-day town, which was completed in 1746, according to a study by UFBA. The two fronts, Jacobina and Rio de Contas, opened up routes and established settlements along the western side of the Chapada.

Studies on the enslaved population indicate that the late 1740s marked the peak of mining in Rio de Contas: in 1748 and 1749, around 90 per cent of the enslaved were African. Today, the architectural complex of Rio de Contas, listed by IPHAN in 1980, preserves this memory (Wikipedia mentions 287 buildings; I have not verified this figure with IPHAN). Read also the history of Rio de Contas.

The Decline of Gold

Alluvial gold production declined from the second half of the 18th century (the historian Kátia Mattoso cites a drop in 1765) and, by around 1800, only a few prospectors remained active. The region became depopulated. In 1818, the naturalists Spix and Martius described Rio de Contas and recorded around 900 residents in the village and 9,000 in the municipality (Viagem pelo Brasil, vol. II, cited in Topoi magazine). Shortly afterwards, however, a new mineral would change the history of the region.

2. Chapada Diamantífera: the 1844 bullfight

The first diamonds

Diamonds were mentioned in sources prior to 1844. Texts on mining refer to the Serra do Gagau in 1817 and 1818, with Captain-General Félix Ribeiro de Moraes likely being the first to discover them, and the authorisation of diamond mining in Bahia in 1832.

The IBGE office in Gentio do Ouro recorded, in 1836, the discovery of gold and diamonds in Assuruá. Reports also mention diamonds in the Serra das Aroeiras in March 1842, found by Father Queiroz.

Mucugê, 1844: the start of the great race

In 1844, diamonds were found in the Mucugê region. According to the IBGE, an employee of José Pereira do Prado, known as Cazuza do Prado, discovered the mines on the River Mucugê, and the settlement was founded that year. News reports offer a different account: Cristiano Pereira do Nascimento, Cazuza’s godson, is said to have found the first diamond by chance at the Riacho das Cumbucas, and oral tradition dates the discovery to 24 June 1844. See the Mucugê guide.

The news attracted prospectors and traders from various regions. The figures vary considerably: the Brazilian Geological Survey (SGB) cites 25,000 men in the Mucugê region over a six-month period, IPHAN puts the figure at over 30,000 people between 1844 and 1848, and researchers estimate there were around 20,000 miners in 1845.

The SGB itself records 58,800 people in 1856, not including enslaved people. For this reason, the previous figure of 50,000 people between 1844 and 1848 has been removed: I have found no source to confirm it.

Lençóis, the diamond capital

Settlement in Lençóis began around 1844 and intensified in 1845, following the discovery of gold deposits in the São José and Lençóis rivers. The  town of Lençóis was separated from Santa Isabel do Paraguaçu (which was not renamed Mucugê until 1917): it became a village under the provincial law of 18 December 1856 (which came into force in 1858) and a town on 20 May 1864.

For the full story, read about Lençóis, the Diamond Cycle and the heritage and about gold panning in the Chapada Diamantina. Nearby, Igatu, a district of Andaraí, also experienced gold mining, which was intense in the mid-19th century according to the SGB. Further north, mining left its mark on Vila do Ventura, in Morro do Chapéu, which was mined from around 1841 to 1932 (see the rock trail and Vila do Ventura).

Who were the gold prospectors?

The figure of the prospector first emerged in the mines of Arraial do Tijuco (now Diamantina, MG), where diamonds were officially reported in 1729 and where the Crown imposed strict control, eventually establishing the Real Extração monopoly in 1771. Many small-scale miners were forced to work clandestinely.

In the Chapada Diamantina, history repeated itself: poor workers, many of whom were landless, sought to get rich quick, and few of those who ‘struck it rich’ managed to hold on to their fortune. The diamond trade also made dealers and mine owners wealthy.

From heyday to decline

Diamonds played a significant role in the province’s economy: in 1856, they accounted for 15.2 per cent of Bahia’s exports, ranking second behind sugar (49.4 per cent), according to data from Barickman cited in a study by the ABPHE. Between 1853 and 1860, their share fluctuated between 5.6 per cent and 15.2 per cent.

But the diamond industry in Bahia did not follow the same pattern as that in Minas Gerais: in nineteenth-century Brazil, it was coffee that underpinned exports, rising from 48.1 per cent of the total export value in 1850 to 56.6 per cent in 1870. The discovery of South African diamond fields in 1871 and 1872 caused diamond prices to plummet and marked the decline of the Bahia diamond mining industry. To give an idea, the number of miners fell from around 20,000 in 1845 to nearly 5,000 in 1901, according to Herold and Rines (2011).

Or carbonado, or the ‘black diamond’

A new phase began with the introduction of carbonado, the black diamond, which was used in drill bits. Leschot’s diamond-tipped drill bit dates from 1862, and by 1882 there were already reports of carbonado from Bahia being imported for this purpose. For decades, Bahia was virtually the sole commercial source of the mineral.

According to the SGB, the carbonado industry reached its peak around 1920. Research by Herold and Rines shows that the First World War severed links with Europe, and exports to the United States soared from around 20,000 dollars in 1913 to 1.194 million in 1918.

The decline came in the 1930s, with the advent of tungsten drill bits and synthetic diamonds. Read about diamond grading. The period was also marked by the politics of the ‘colonels’, such as Horácio de Matos (assassinated in 1931), and, according to the SGB, by the drought of 1932 and the malaria epidemic that followed. In Cascalho (1944), the writer Herberto Sales, born in Andaraí, depicted the life of the region’s gold prospectors.

The end of gold panning

From 1984 and 1985 onwards, manual mining gradually gave way to dredging. In 1985, Decree 91,655 established the Chapada Diamantina National Park (covering some 152,000 hectares, in the municipalities of Andaraí, Ibicoara, Itaetê, Lençóis, Mucugê and Palmeiras).

According to the SGB, this was followed by the drastic ban of 1994, the Federal Police crackdown on dredgers and river and ravine mining operations in 1996, and the end of mountain mining in 1998. Today, the history of gold mining lives on in the ruins of Igatu, in the houses and in the Santa Isabel Cemetery in Mucugê – the so-called ‘Byzantine cemetery’ – whose construction spanned the years 1854 to 1886, according to IPHAN.

3. Chapada Turística: from heritage to tourism

IPHAN’s listed buildings

Tourism began to gain momentum when the historic heritage was protected. IPHAN listed the historic centres of Lençóis in 1973 (570 properties), that of Mucugê and that of  Rio de Contas in 1980, and the village of Igatu, in Andaraí, in 2000.

For information on the architectural style of the buildings, read about the architecture of the Chapada Diamantina and the 11 listed towns in Bahia. With the creation of the National Park in 1985, the trails, waterfalls, caves and hills began to attract visitors from Brazil and abroad. Lençóis became the main gateway to the northern part of the park, and Mucugê to the southern part.

The Chapada Diamantina today (2026)

The Lençóis Airport has a 2,082-metre runway. In 2026, Azul will operate scheduled flights to Salvador and, since June, to Confins (Belo Horizonte) on two days a week, according to reports from August 2026.

In July 2026, the Ministry of Tourism included Lençóis amongst the seven Brazilian towns in the running for the UN World Tourism Organisation’s ‘Best Tourist Towns in the World’ award; the result is due to be announced in December 2026 in Buenos Aires and is still pending.

In September 2026, the town hosted the Lençóis Festival (27th edition). There is also news regarding heritage: in November 2025, IPHAN decided to list the Terreiro Palácio de Ogum e Caboclo Sete-Serra in Lençóis, considered the oldest active Jarê terreiro (founded in 1949); the listing was officially confirmed in February 2026. And a geopark project, involving Andaraí, Lençóis, Mucugê and Palmeiras, is still in the planning stages. Plan your itinerary with the top destinations in the Chapada Diamantina.

Geography, climate and landscape of the Chapada Diamantina

Where is it and how big is it?

The Chapada Diamantina is situated in the centre of Bahia, at the northernmost tip of the Serra do Espinhaço. Its size depends on how it is defined: around 38,000 km² according to Wikipedia; over 65,000 km² according to the Brazilian Journal of Geomorphology. The Chapada Diamantina Identity Territory comprises 24 municipalities, and the National Park covers six of them.

Clima

The climate varies greatly with altitude: it is milder and rainier in the mountains and drier in the surrounding areas. In Lençóis, the park’s Operational Plan indicates an average temperature of 22.9 °C and annual rainfall of 1,215 mm, with the rainy season running from November to March; however, the 1991–2020 averages indicate around 1,058 mm. In Rio de Contas, the SGB cites figures of around 21 °C and 821 mm. The driest period is concentrated between July and September, but this varies depending on the source.

Mountains and peaks on the western side

On the western side lie the highest peaks in the North-East. Pico do Barbado (2,033 m, between Abaíra and Rio do Pires) is the highest peak in Bahia and the North-East; it lies outside the National Park. Other notable peaks include Pico das Almas (around 1,950 m) and Pico do Itobira (around 1,970 m, although this figure varies depending on the source). The Serra do Barbado Environmental Protection Area (APA) was established by State Decree 2,183 of 7 June 1993, covering 63,652 hectares, according to the SGB. This stretch, which includes the Rio de Contas and Piatã, is listed as the ‘Circuito do Ouro’ (Gold Circuit) in tourist guides (see the tourist areas of Bahia).

The Serra do Sincorá, to the east

The Serra do Sincorá is home to the Chapada Diamantina National Park and towns such as Lençóis, Andaraí and Mucugê, on ridges reaching heights of around 1,700 m. Further east, at the confluence of the Santo Antônio and São José rivers, at an altitude of around 355 m, lies the Marimbus wetland area, within the Marimbus-Iraquara Environmental Protection Area (State Decree 2,216 of 14 June 1993). Between Andaraí and Mucugê lie the ruins of Igatu, a former gold-miners’ settlement; see Igatu.

Hills, waterfalls and caves

Morro do Pai Inácio (around 1,120 m, in Palmeiras) is one of the area’s most iconic sights; it is protected as a municipal nature reserve and is not part of the National Park.

Morrão, in the Vale do Capão, is another notable landmark. The Vale do Capão is also home to the Cachoeira da Fumaça, in Palmeiras: its height varies (around 380 m according to ICMBio, 340 m on Wikipedia and 420 m on SGB). Discover the waterfalls and trails of the Vale do Capão.

The caves of Iraquara (Lapa Doce, Torrinha and Pratinha, in the Marimbus-Iraquara Environmental Protection Area) are amongst the most visited; see the Iraquara caves. The Poço Encantado is in Itaetê and the Poço Azul is in Nova Redenção.

Sources consulted

• IBGE, municipal monographs on Rio de Contas, Jacobina, Mucugê, Lençóis and Gentio do Ouro.
• Brazilian Geological Survey, proposal for the Serra do Sincorá Geopark.
• Federal Senate, Decree 91.655/1985 (Chapada Diamantina National Park).
• IPHAN, tangible heritage in Bahia.
• Mundos do Trabalho (UFSC), Aham magazine and Topoi magazine on mining in Jacobina and Rio de Contas.
• Proceedings of the ANPUH (Casa da Ponte and the Jacobinas hinterland).
• Loyola (ABPHE), using data from Barickman on exports from Bahia; Herold and Rines (2011) on carbonate.
• ICMBio, visitor information for the Chapada Diamantina National Park.
• News from 2025 and 2026: Bahia Notícias (Jarê temple), CNN Brasil (UN Tourism seal) and  Movimento Econômico (Lençóis Airport).

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