Pre-colonial Brazil – The forgotten years

1. introduction

In this chapter we will study the pre-colonial period, also known as the “forgotten years” of Brazil’s colonisation.

The pre-colonial period in Brazil stretches from 1500, with the “discovery” of Brazil, to 1531, with the arrival of Martim Afonso de Sousa’s “civilising mission”.

These first years of Brazil’s history are particularly curious, as the Portuguese showed little interest in actually settling and colonising the colony, preferring to invest in the lucrative trade with the Far East.

It was a time when the main colonisers were smugglers, castaways and convicts, and it was also a time of peaceful coexistence with the natives.

The main economic activity during these first 30 years was the extraction of brazilwood, also known as “pau-de-tinta”.

This activity was usually carried out in partnership with the natives, who received ‘trinkets’ such as mirrors, hats, knives, axes, jewellery, clothes and other manufactured goods in exchange for cutting trees from the forest.

2. Portugal’s lack of interest in colonising Brazil

BRASIL - PERíODO PRÉ-COLONIAL (1500-1530)

The opening of a maritime trade route with India practically coincided with the “discovery” of Brazil.

Portugal, a country with few resources and a low demographic index, had to concentrate its colonisation efforts on just one of the geographical areas.

To make matters worse, at first no precious metals or other products were found to make the settlement and colonisation of the newly discovered lands economically viable.

It is well known that the Brazilian lands were rich in brazilwood, a wood that was used to make a red dye for dying cloth. “However, the profit to be made from the exploitation of this wood was less than the lucrative trade in African and Asian products” (COTRIM, 1999, p. 58).

According to Caio Prado Júnior (1987, p. 12):

The colonisation of Brazil presented Portugal with a problem that was difficult to solve.

With a population of little more than a million and its other overseas conquests in Africa and Asia to attend to, it had little left in terms of human and financial resources to devote to Cabral’s occasional find.

As Boris Fausto (2007, p. 42) tells us:

In those early years, between 1500 and 1535, the main economic activity was the extraction of brazilwood, obtained mainly through barter with the Indians.

The trees did not grow together in large areas, but were scattered.

When the wood on the coast became scarce, the Europeans turned to the Indians for supplies.

Collective work, especially felling trees, was a common task in Tupinambá society. It was therefore relatively easy to integrate the cutting of brazilwood into the traditional patterns of indigenous life.

The Indians supplied the wood and, to a lesser extent, manioc flour, which was exchanged for pieces of cloth, knives, penknives and trinkets, objects of little value to the Portuguese.

Thus, the “discovery” of Brazil did not arouse much enthusiasm in Portugal.

Brazil appeared to the Portuguese as a virgin and exotic land, home to strange birds and animals, and populated by people alien to the European gaze.

Radiograph of Pau-Brasil

• Name: Caesalpinia Echinata (Family Leguminosae).
• Indigenous names: ibïrapitanga and arabutã.
• Distribution: from Rio de Janeiro to Rio Grande do Norte.
• Average height of each tree: between 10 and 15 metres.
• Size and weight of the trunks: 1.5 metres and 30 kilos. Each ship carried an average of 5,000 logs to Europe. Felling and splitting each tree: about 4 hours with a stone axe and about 15 minutes with an iron axe.
• Distance from where they were brought: in 1558, 18 kilometres from the coast.
• In 1890, more than 150 km.
• of trees felled: 70 million trees. More than 3,000 tonnes a year for three centuries.
• A ship full of wood was worth seven times less than a ship full of spices. Nevertheless, a profit of 300 per cent was made (BUENO, 2003, p. 35).

The discovery of Brazil was nowhere near as exciting as Vasco da Gama’s arrival in India.

Brazil appeared to be a land whose exploration potential and geographical contours were unknown.

For several years it was thought to be nothing more than a large island.

The exotic attractions – Indians, parrots, macaws – prevailed to the point that some informants, particularly Italians, called it the land of parrots.

King Dom Manuel preferred to call it Vera Cruz and then Santa Cruz.

The name Brazil appeared in 1503.

It was associated with the main wealth of the country in the early days, Brazilwood (FAUSTO, 2007, p. 42).

As a result, Portugal took very little interest in its American colony during the first 30 years of colonisation.

Portuguese efforts were limited to sending a few expeditions to explore the coast and to repel visits from ships of other nationalities; this initiative was called “Coast Guard Expeditions”.

3. First expeditions to Brazil.

• Expedition probably led by Gaspar de Lemos (1501): explored much of the Brazilian coast and named the main geographical features found at the time (islands, capes, rivers, bays). A large amount of brazilwood was found along the coast. This observation was attributed to the Lorentian navigator Amerigo Vespucci, who was part of the expedition.
• Expedition probably commanded by Gonçalo Coelho (1503): organised on the basis of a contract signed between the King of Portugal and a group of merchants interested in the exploitation of Brazilwood. Among them was the wealthy merchant Fernão de Noronha.
• Expeditions led by Cristóvão Jacques (1516 and 1526): Two expeditions were organised to stop the smuggling of Brazilwood by other European traders, such as the French. They were called the Coast Guard Expeditions. However, these expeditions were unable to prevent smuggling due to the vastness of our coastline. SOURCE: Cotrim (1999, p. 58)

Although Portugal showed little interest in colonisation, many Europeans made contact with the natives in the first 30 years after the discovery, and these contacts were relatively healthy for both parties. This is the subject of the next section.

4. Shipwrecked, Traffickers and Convicts

Studying the first 30 years of Brazilian colonisation is not an easy task, as there are few published studies on the subject. One interesting book is “Náufragos, Traficantes e Degredados” by the journalist Eduardo Bueno.

As the title suggests, this book tries to analyse these three social figures of European origin who, for various reasons, ended up living together with the Brazilian Indians during the pre-colonial period.

The pre-colonial period is, as we have said, the most obscure in Brazilian history, because there are few accounts of it.

During these first three decades of colonisation, many Europeans were abandoned in our territory by their own countrymen.

These people were convicts who had been sentenced in Portugal to serve their sentences in the colony. This was common, as the metropolis had a shortage of human resources and would even take advantage of criminals.

Convicts – these were people who had been exiled from their homeland or country of origin.

In addition to the convicts, many castaways and deserters from various expeditions came to live with the natives.

The interaction between these Europeans and the Indians took place practically all along the Brazilian coast.

Later, with the establishment of the General Government in 1549, these Europeans would be very useful in establishing more solid foundations for the colonisation of Brazil.

According to Eduardo Bueno (1998, p. 7):

What can be said with certainty is that from 1525, when Europeans began to land in Brazil more frequently, they encountered a gallery of enigmatic characters.

They were white men living among the natives: some had survived the sinking of their ships, others had deserted.

Many had committed crimes in Portugal and were sentenced to exile in Brazil; others had the temerity to disagree with their captains and were banished.

Some were married to the daughters of the most important indigenous chiefs, played a leading role in the tribe, knew their paths, customs and habits, and mediated between the various indigenous nations and representatives of the European powers.

Their presence at strategic points along the coast would determine the future direction of the country.

These individuals were very important in the early years of colonisation, as they were well integrated into the culture of the Brazilian Indians.

They were responsible for the knowledge of various indigenous skills, such as the location of Brazilwood reserves, water sources, indigenous trails and paths, knowledge of fauna and flora, and the technique of making manioc flour.

These Europeans also maintained good relations with the tribal chiefs. In many tribes, they ended up marrying the chiefs themselves. The fruit of this relationship with the Indians proved to be very beneficial for the future process of colonisation in Brazil.

It is ironic that the same people who were condemned as criminals in Portugal, or even deserters in the colony, ended up being considered important figures in the colonisation of Brazil.

The king himself wrote letters to these enigmatic figures, praising their achievements. At the time, this was considered a great honour.

One of these figures was Diogo Álvares, known to the natives as Caramuru, a Portuguese who was shipwrecked in the shallows of the Vermelho River in 1509 or 1510 in what is now Salvador, the capital of Bahia.

Caramuru received a letter from King João III, presented to him by Tomé de Sousa, the first governor-general of Brazil, which was undoubtedly a great sign of recognition and respect.

Eduardo Bueno (2006. p. 41) presents the letter from King João III in full.

Read it carefully.

Diogo Álvares: I, the King, send you my greetings.

I now send Tomé de Sousa, a nobleman of my house, to this Bahia de Todos os Santos, as captain and governor of it, for the said captaincy and others of this state of Brazil, to provide justice for it and the rest that my service fulfils; and I order that he make in the said Bahia a settlement and a great seat, and other things of my service: And because I have been informed that you will know how to help and reconcile him, because of the much practice and experience you have of these lands and their people and customs, I command you that when the said Tomé de Sousa arrives there, you shall go to him and help him in what you must fulfil and what he entrusts to you; for I shall be of great service in this.

And since the fulfilment and the time of his arrival, he will find it supplied with provisions from the land, to provide for the people who go with him, I am writing about it to Paulo Dias, your son-in-law.

Try to get them (the supplies) through the ports of the captaincy of Jorge de igueiredo (near Ilhéus). Since your company and help is needed, I ask you to help him (Tomé de Sousa) in any way you see fit, as I believe you will.

As we saw in the previous letter, figures like Caramuru were very important for the future colonisation of Brazil. To better understand this issue, we will present a fragment from the book “Náufragos, Traficantes e Degredados” by the journalist Eduardo Bueno (1999, pp. 8-9). Follow along.

The Gallery of Names is not limited to well-known names such as the mythological Caramuru, indirectly responsible for the founding of Salvador, or João Ramalho, virtual founder of the city of São Paulo.

Equally important was the mysterious Bacharel de Cananeia, Brazil’s first great slave trader, whose name is not even known.

But there are several others whose careers are even more obscure.

What about the intrepid Aleixo Garcia, who in 1524 set out from Santa Catarina with a private army of two thousand Indians to attack the cities bordering the Inca Empire, more than two thousand kilometres away?

What about his companions Henrique Montes and Melchior Ramires – deserters and polygamists – who were nevertheless received at the court of the kings of Portugal and Spain and became the most important men in the exploration of the River Plate and the southern coast of Brazil?

The list of amazing characters from Brazil’s first 30 years doesn’t end there.

There’s also João Lopes de Carvalho, a Portuguese pilot who was exiled to Rio in 1511 and returned to Brazil in 1519 after being captured by the Spanish, only to be abandoned two years later in Borneo, Asia, in the company of his son, a seven-year-old native boy.

And what about Francisco del Puerto, a grumete who lived among the natives of the Plata for 14 years and then betrayed the Europeans who had taken him in by opening the gate of a fort to allow the Spanish and Portuguese to be massacred by the natives.

These are just some of the protagonists of Brazil’s first 30 years – the three lost decades.

Their personal histories and the history of their times can be reconstructed from letters, sparse references found in foreign archives, logbooks and travel reports.

The lack of official documents has hampered research into this period, and in most books on Brazilian history the period from 1500 to 1531 is generally reduced to two paragraphs.

Castaways and convicts therefore played an important role in the first fifty years of Brazil’s colonisation.

In the next unit we will study the actual process of colonisation in Brazil, starting with the hereditary captaincies, the general government, the monoculture of sugar cane and the use of slave labour with Indian and African workers.

4. Were the Brazilian Indians cannibals or good savages?

The European view of the Indians oscillated between two equally biased extremes.

Christopher Columbus and Pero Vaz de Caminha, for example, saw them as beautiful and innocent savages living in an almost endemic state.

Friar Vicente de Valverde, who accompanied Pizarro’s expedition to conquer the Inca Empire, saw them as evil, savage cannibals deserving of a thousand deaths.

None of this is, or ever was, true.

It is true that some indigenous tribes (but by no means the majority) were cannibals, but the cannibalism they practised was ritual, generally a gesture of respect to a brave or venerable opponent.

The oft-recorded horror of Europeans at this rite is even more difficult to understand when we consider that the main Catholic rite, the Communion or Eucharist, in which the body and blood of Christ are symbolically consumed, is also a ritual of cannibalism.

This fact perhaps helps to understand the backwardness of the European mentality of the time, the inability of many Europeans to understand other points of reference, other cultures, in order to evaluate moral problems.

And it is perhaps the only justification for the savagery that “civilised” Europeans practised against those they called savages.

One of the ironies of the voyages of discovery is the revelation of European, and especially Iberian, backwardness at the very moment when European superiority over the world began to be asserted.

Another is the role played by a large part of the Spanish Church, especially the Franciscan and Dominican orders, in defending the indigenous peoples from excessive exploitation by the colonisers.

The Church of the Inquisition, defender of absurd scientific dogmas that, if respected, would have made discoveries impossible, became the first institution to defend the Indians, recognising that they had souls and were “equal” to the Europeans, while constantly disregarding their right to deviate from its norms.

While the Indians were defended by the Church, African slaves were regarded as mere commodities.

The Dominican friar Bartolomeu de Lãs Casas, one of the most ardent defenders of the American Indians, even wrote a letter to the prior of the order asking that black slaves be sent to the colonies as soon as possible to put an end to the atrocities committed against the Indians.

In fact, since 1512 the Indians had been considered Spanish citizens, albeit with limited rights; the same was not true of the black slaves, who had no rights at all.

SOURCE: Migliacci (1997, p. 69)

5. In this chapter we have seen that:

• The first thirty years of Brazil’s history were a period of relative abandonment, because during this period the Portuguese were not interested in colonising Brazil, as it offered no possibility of profit for the crown.
• For the first thirty years, the only source of profit for Portugal was the trade in Brazilwood.
• During this period, a series of coastguard expeditions were organised to maintain possession of the country.

See the following periods in the history of colonial Brazil:

1. Brazilian Independence – Breakdown of colonial ties in Brazil
2. Portuguese Empire in Brazil – Portuguese royal family in Brazil
3. Transfer of the Portuguese court to Brazil
4. Foundation of the city of São Paulo and the Bandeirantes
5. Transition from colonial to imperial Brazil
6. Colonial sugar mills in Brazil
7. Monoculture, slave labour and latifundia in colonial Brazil
8. The establishment of the General Government in Brazil and the founding of Salvador
9. Portuguese maritime expansion and the conquest of Brazil
10. Occupation of the African coast, the Atlantic islands and the voyage of Vasco da Gama
11. Pedro Álvares Cabral’s expedition and the conquest of Brazil
12. Pre-colonial Brazil – The forgotten years
13. Establishment of the Portuguese Colony in Brazil
14. Periods in the history of colonial Brazil
15. Historical periods of Brazil

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