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“Decadence and Decline: The Collapse of a Portuguese Mining Center in ”

Mary Karasch, Oakland University “Lost Colonies” Conference, March 26-27, 2004

(Please do not cite, quote, or circulate without written permission from the author)

European settlements that were not successful in colonial societies were often mining towns that depended on a gold or silver mining boom until the mineral wealth gave out, leading foreign miners to exit a colony. This paper intends to describe such a town in Central Brazil and examine the reasons why a rich mining town of the eighteenth century was abandoned by the Portuguese. The first part of the paper will focus on the mining town of São Félix before its collapse. A household census of 1783 permits a delineation of the population of the parish of the “Arraial de Santo Antônio, e Minas de São Félix de Carlos Marinho” by household size, color, occupation, and slave ownership.1 At that time, São Félix was the site of a Portuguese Smelting or Foundry House and full bureaucratic apparatus designed to capture the king’s share of gold for shipment to Lisbon, . It also served as the residence of the principal ecclesiastical authority for the North of the Captaincy of Goiás, the Vicar General of the Bishopric of Pará. Thus, I can document a significant Luso-Brazilian colonial administration in a small town in the interior of Brazil in the late colonial period. The second part of the paper will then introduce the principal actors in the fall of the mining town: the indigenous nations, the Xavante and the Canoeiro, who lived in the environs of the Tocantins River. These two nations had long been at war with the Luso- Brazilians based in São Félix. A third group were the fugitive slaves who inhabited the mountains near São Félix and raided ranches and mines on the outskirts of the mining

1 According to Padre Luiz Antônio da Silva e Souza, São Félix was first known as the arrayal de Carlos Marinho, for the man who had discovered it in 1736. The priest distinguished that arraial from the small arraial of Chapada de São Félix, which had its own chapel subject to the larger São Félix. When Silva e Souza wrote in 1812, he also recorded the parish of São Félix’s dependent churches as Santa Anna and Rosario. Rio de Janeiro, Biblioteca Nacional, Manuscript Section (henceforth RJBN), 9,2,10, “Memoria sobre of Descobrimento, Governo, População, e Cousas mais Notaveis Da Capitania de Goyaz,” f. 41. The manuscript copy of the 1783 census is also at RJBN, Cod. 16.3.2, Notícia Geral da Capitania de Goiás, 1783. This document records the date of discovery as 1734 rather than 1736.

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town. At this writing, it is uncertain what role they played in the decline of São Félix, but racialized animosities and conflicts between Portuguese masters and their enslaved Africans can be documented. After describing the groups at war with the Portuguese, the paper will conclude with an assessment of the reasons for the white abandonment of São Félix. Obviously, one reason was the decline of the Portuguese ability to capture the quinto, the tax on gold production. Was it due, however, to drops in gold output? Or, to corruption on the part of Portuguese officials, miners, merchants, and slaves who withheld their gold discoveries from royal officials? Contraband in gold via the Tocantins River or the backlands to the Bahian coast seems to have strengthened in the 1790s. Thus, my hypothesis is that less gold was counted in São Félix in part due to the contraband gold trade. Without sufficient gold to pay military forces, it began to be more difficult to defend the town in the face of hostile indigenous nations; and wealthy merchants and bureaucrats fled a dangerous town. The Xavante took up arms once again, forging alliances with former enemies, to wage war against local settlers. The Canoeiro, apparently sensing greater vulnerabilities, then struck the ranches and mines around São Félix in a series of attacks in the early nineteenth century. They were so successful that they nearly conquered the entire region, driving local whites and their slaves to seek refuge in the south. The once rich mining town slipped into decadence and abandonment, as the Canoeiro fought all Luso-Brazilian attempts to re-settle the region well into the twentieth century. In brief, this paper will hopefully contribute to an understanding of how gold smugglers, slaves, fugitives, and indigenous nations could shatter Portuguese ambitions of accumulating wealth based on gold mining. The colonial power was notably unsuccessful in this colonial town and its hinterland. Why they failed will be the subject of my paper, but I also hope to explicate the diverse social and political forces that led to the virtual abandonment of a Portuguese administrative center in Central Brazil.

São Félix in 1783 The mining town of São Félix was located 27 leagues from the mining town of Traíras. Founded by Carlos Marinho in 1734, São Félix, as it came to be called, grew up on a low hill surrounded by mountains, which may have been forested before the miners 337

arrived and built three churches and 200 houses. It was also close to access to the Tocantins River, the second longest river in Brazil. At the height of the mining boom, Sáo Félix was prosperous and populous. There was so much gold that the Portuguese established a complete fiscal structure to try and control the mining and export of the quinto, the royal tax on gold. They also built a Foundry or Smelting House, opened in 1754, to collect the quinto from throughout the northern part of the captaincy of Goiás and assay and record each miner’s gold production. The Portuguese obviously regarded São Félix as central to their efforts to secure the gold of the north of the captaincy of Goiás, and the Crown appointed an Intendent to supervise the assaying and shipment of the quinto to Lisbon. This Intendent, as well as another resident in the capital, were second in power only to the governor of Goiás. In other words, at its height São Félix was not just another mining town but the site of royal authority in the north of the captaincy of Goiás (now the state of Tocantins). Only Vila Boa, the capital of the captaincy of Goiás, had a larger bureaucracy and military presence. The census of 1783 for the Captaincy of Goiás permits an exceptional look at the town of São Félix and of the elite men who lived there and mined and counted gold. Described as the “first class,” thirteen married white men headed households that included wives, families, and slaves. They included the Intendant, the Judge of Orphans, one mine owner, and a skilled shoemaker. The other 33 white male heads of households were identified as single, including six priests and a sacristan. Other white men served as a treasurer, scribes, an assayer, smelters, a notary, a jail guard, and two lawyers. A second lieutenant was also resident. Another group of white men were merchants or businessmen, including a Spaniard; one had a store, while others owned slaves employed in mining. Two shoemakers and a carpenter completed the occupational categories for 85 white men. The inclusion of white tradesmen on the census indicates that the listing of heads of households was not done by wealth. Here the criterion for wealth was the number of slaves attached to each household (Table 1). Only one woman, Dona Leonarda Justina, a widow, headed a household, and she had only twelve slaves. Apparently, the wealthiest whites in São Félix were Manoel Ferreira Martins, his wife, and family. They owned 8 house slaves, 40 miners, and 24 field workers (roceiros). The second wealthiest man was 338

Captain José de Moura and six members of his family with a total of 48 slaves: 4 house slaves, 20 field slaves, 14 miners, and 10 on a cattle ranch. The other wealthy men owned between 40 and 44 slaves. According to Paulo Bertran, the greatest slaveowner of São Félix had been Caetano Pereira Cortes, once master of 93 slaves.2

All but five white men owned slaves, including the priests. In fact, Padre Francisco Alves Teixeira was one of the wealthiest men in town with 7 house slaves and 37 engaged in mining. Earlier quinto records reveal that priests, such as Padre Teixeira, regularly submitted gold to the Foundry House in the 1760s.3 Most likely their slave miners had actually done the mining and had turned over the gold dust to their clerical masters. Priests in the captaincy did not question slave ownership but viewed it as essential to pursuing a clerical career, since neither Church nor state provided regular salaries sufficient to meet their expenses. Given the town’s imperial significance, it is remarkable how few white men ran this bureaucratic and mining town and maintained social control over a restless slave population of 1,581 in its judicial district. One of the reasons for their ability to govern so many was that they turned to pardo (mulatto) men for assistance, especially military service. Thus, the census of 1783 included a number of pardo men who owned 74 slaves. Five married pardo men and seven single pardos headed households that included pessoas de obrigação (obligated persons) and slaves. Five parda women were married and two were widows. Only nine were single. Their male slaves worked in the fields (21), in mining (23), and in the house (4), while all 25 of their female slaves served in the house. Not one pardo possessed as many slaves as the wealthiest white men; but José Francisco da Conceição and his wife owned 20 slaves, João Barbosa and his wife nine slaves, and Marcelina Gonçalves dos Santos, a widow, 16 slaves. All other pardos owned less than five. They clearly

2 The list of the largest slaveowners in São Félix is in Notícia Geral da Capitania de Goiás em 1783, ed. Paulo Bertran, vol. 2 (Goiânia/Brasília: Editora da Universidade Católica de Goiás, 1997): 104. The manuscript copy listed in note one above was used to correct errors in the transcription of the 1783 census. 3 Lisbon, Arquivo Histórico Ultramarino (henceforth AHU), formerly caixa 11, June 14, 1766. Diz Francisco Joze Barretto, Homen de negocio e com Bóeiro [comboeiro] de Fazendas Secas e Escravos da Bahia para as minas de Nossa Senhora da Natividade Comarca de Goyaz . . ., June 14, 1766. This document records the total amount of gold he deposited at the Foundry House in São Félix along with the amounts registered by other priests.

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controlled less wealth in slaves than whites but more than blacks. These pardos apparently lived from the productivity of their dependent and enslaved miners and field workers. Notably no slave women owned by pardos did field work, suggesting that pardo men had the means to shelter them at home. Some pardo men pursued skilled trades as tailors (3), iron workers (3), and cattle raisers (1). Overall, free pardos counted by households numbered 54. However, the total of pardos resident in São Félix was 140, including 28 married and 112 single. The difference between the 54 pardos in the free status and the rest of the 140 is probably due to the accounting of captive pardos among the enslaved and obligated persons. Some of the pardos may also have been Indians, since so-called “civilized Indians” were often included in the pardo category in other parts of Brazil. Descending the eighteenth-century social order to the free black population, we find some unusual characteristics among the free black heads of households that are in sharp contrast to those of the pardos and whites. First, more free black men who headed households were married (10) versus only four single black men. They were married to other black women (10), but only four households had other family members living with them. The largest number of free black households were headed by black single women (22). Only two of these women had family members living with them. While none of the married blacks had obligated persons in their households, 16 single women had between one and six obligated persons in service to them. Were these Indians captured in frontier wars by the men of the black regiment, the Henriques? Since pardos also had obligated persons, and they too served in the frontier wars, they may also have acquired obligated persons as war captives. Besides controlling the labor of obligated persons, the free blacks also owned 74 slaves, although not in the numbers of the whites. For example, the household of the free black Hilario dos Santos included his wife, three members of their family, one house slave, and seven field workers. Although only three married blacks owned slaves, the majority of slaves were actually owned by 14 single black women. The wealthiest single woman was Teresa de Jesus, who controlled two obligated persons, two house slaves, and nine field workers. The second wealthiest with four house slaves and four miners was Teresa de Freitas. Apparently, these free black women were supported by the labor of 340

their family members, dependents, and slaves. Only two men exercised skilled crafts: one was a shoemaker and the other a tailor. In this town, whites and free pardos dominated more of the good artisan and craft positions than did free black men. No slaves were identified as craftsmen. Since São Félix was a mining town, we would expect to find that most slaves engaged in mining in 1783. However, by that date about 70 per cent of the slaves worked in the households or in the fields, including ten on a cattle ranch (Table 1). The reason that so many slaves were in the fields may have been due to cotton production. A letter by the leading citizens of São Félix in 1799 clarifies that the mines were then in decadence and that people were trying to raise foodstuffs and cotton.4 Presumably, the 228 field workers were engaged in similar activities in 1783. The number of slaves attached to the households may point to cottage industries in the spinning and weaving of cotton. In contrast, less than a third of the slaves (186 males and 3 females) worked on the mines. What the household lists of 1783 suggest, therefore, is that the town of São Félix had already begun the transition to an agro-pastoral economy by 1783. The census, unfortunately, did not record the specific occupations of each of the parish’s slaves. The census taker listed them by their white, pardo, and black slaveowners and their place of work. i.e., roças (cleared fields), faisqueiras or lavras (gold mining sites), or casas (houses). They also classified them by gender. Most male slaves mined for gold using a bateia (wooden bowl) and a variety of iron tools to move and wash ores to extract the gold, or labored in food or cotton production in the fields. Most slave women served in the houses (99), although whites sent 25 slave women to the fields, but no pardo or black slaveowners did so. Apparently, they preferred to keep their few female slaves within their households. What is somewhat surprising is that more male slaves (134) than female slaves (99) worked in the houses. Possibly such a large number of enslaved males also points to cottage industries in the households, such as weaving or shoemaking. Slaves, however, probably lived and worked with still other dependents, which the census also recorded. Later household lists tended to record the dependents as

4 Goiânia, Arquivo Histórico do Estado de Goiás (henceforth AHG), director’s armário, Representação dos Habitantes de São Félix, attached to a letter of Governor Tristão da Cunha Menezes, Vila Boa, April 1, 1799.

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agregados, but this term only appears once on the census of 1783. Instead, various family members and obligated persons (pessoas de obrigação) were listed. The census reveals that white married couples had the most family members living with them (33), but we do not know if they were their children, siblings, or parents. In contrast, married pardos had only six, and married blacks 20. Single white men had 18 family members in contrast to none for single black men and one for a pardo. A white widow had one family member, while single pardas had 19, and black women four. Among the singles, white men and parda women were the most likely to have family with them, and single black men the least likely. In contrast, nonwhites tended to have more obligated persons, and whites the least. Of the married couples, no whites had them, but pardos had seven and blacks four. Among the singles, white men controlled 28 plus one agregado, pardos had 8, and black men the most of all 40. Black single women also had the obligated persons, but no single white women did, and pardas had only five. Overall, the census recorded 102 family members and 127 obligated persons for a total of 229.

What the 1783 household lists reveal, therefore, is a scribe’s view of the ordered world of São Félix organized by color with whites as the “first class,” free pardos as the “second class,” and free blacks as the “third class.” Family members, slaves, and obligated persons were listed with these heads of households and did not have a separate census entry. Married couples were listed before singles, but married slaves were not included as heads of households. Since a priest probably compiled this census information, as so many did, he had placed those married in the Church in a higher status than those who lived in consensual unions or “concubinage” in the language of the eighteenth century. In censuses, these couples were recorded as singles. Wealth gradations and incipient class demarcations were marked by numbers of slaves with whites owning the most slaves, in particular those engaged in mining. Pardo men were second in wealth, but free black women were third, which poses interesting questions. How and why did they own more slaves than free black men? Were their partners either free men of wealth or enslaved black men? Thus, the slave ownership was registered with them rather than their enslaved spouse. In any case, the status/wealth hierarchy established in 1783 was white at the top, free pardo in the middle, and free black at the 342

base of society. It was to be eroded over the next fifty years. As we will see, by 1832 only six white men remained to claim “first class” status, and one was a priest. No white women continued to reside in the town. Population Decline, 1779-1832 The exceptional 1783 census, which detailed the inhabitants of the parish of São Félix, was but one census through which we can trace the transformation of the town and region. The first substantive accounting of the population of the parish was that of 1779 (Table 2). The census of 1779 also divided the population of the parish of São Félix into three categories: white, pardo, and black. The black population of 2,681 easily outnumbered the 682 pardos and the 387 whites. Almost three-fourths of the parish was classified as black (71.5 per cent). Whites comprised only 10.3 per cent of the population, and almost 90 per cent of the population was nonwhite. This census did not distinguish between the enslaved and free or freed blacks.

The 1783 census, however, suggests that most of the black population of 1,840 was enslaved since only 259 were free blacks, and there were 1,581 slaves. The number of free pardos was then 140 and whites were still a minority of 432 of a total population of 2,412. This total may be too low, but that for 1785 is even more inaccurate. A priest recorded 1,500 “almas” (souls) for the Vila de São Félix and identified them as “whites and Indians.” In this case, what this number may represent are the baptized persons known to the priest who lived in the mining town. Significantly, he called attention to the presence of Indians in São Félix, and these may have been the captive Indians counted as obligated persons in 1783. The next census of 1789 was one of the most accurate ever done for the captaincy of Goiás. Furthermore, it was closely followed by two other censuses of 1791 and 1792. Not only had the total population reached 3,925, but also the number of blacks was still high at 2,697. In a time of alleged economic decadence, as measured by the decline of the quinto, the slave population was slightly larger than it had been ten years earlier. The number of free pardos had risen to 750, but whites numbered just about the same: 385. The census takers added a new category of 93 babies of unknown color and legal status. Two years later the scribe recorded 3,808 in the parish with 2,683 blacks, 725 pardos, and 343

400 whites. No babies appear, but in 1792 the scribe recorded 99 babies, and a total population of 3,865. Blacks were 2,696, pardos 707, and whites 363. These were the last years of census taking in the eighteenth century, except for a partial census of 1798, but no data for São Félix have been found for that year. The 1790s were also the last years for economic prosperity. In 1779 the quinto yield had been about 263 marcos for the north; by 1792 output had dropped to 115 marcos of gold (Table 3). Obviously, one of the reasons the Portuguese required census taking was to determine how many blacks were available to mine gold. Their suspicions about significant gold contraband and evasion of the quinto must have been fueled by the number of blacks living in São Félix in 1792, i.e., 2,696, who outnumbered the 2,681 blacks counted in 1779, when the quinto had been more than twice as large as in 1792. Earlier in the eighteenth century the Portuguese had tried to secure gold from tax evaders by taxing slaves. Later they used the “carrot” of the reward of an order of Christ in exchange for the delivery of gold to the Smelting House, but clearly in the north in the early 1790s none of these tactics had stopped the flow of gold from their hands. The decadence in the ability to collect the quinto, however, was firmly underway when in desperation the Portuguese ordered another census in 1804. They could discover only 1,754 people in all of the parish of São Félix. Furthermore, there were only 1,003 blacks, of whom 641 were enslaved. The number of free and freed blacks had risen to 362. Although pardos had declined slightly to 673, whites had suffered the most attrition, falling to only 78. Only 39 white males then dominated the parish. Toward the end of the Portuguese colonial period, gold production stood at slightly more than 54 marcos in 1804. Obviously, population decline matched gold decline in 1804, as the town’s population fell even further. Between 1810 and 1818, the decline of the slave population of São Félix can also be documented via the tax records.5 In the captaincy of Goiás, each purchase of a slave had to be recorded by a scribe as well as the payment of the sales tax called the meia-

5 City of Goiás, Arquivo do Museu das Bandeiras (henceforth AMB), no. 174, São Félix, 1810, ff. 1-2; 1812, ff. 3-4; 1813, f. 4; 1814, f. 1; 1817, ff. 1-2; 1818, ff. 102. A more complete study on the ethnicity and identity of Africans in the captaincy of Goiás is in my “Guiné, Mina, Angola, and Benguela: African and Crioulo Nations in Central Brazil, 1780-1835,” in Enslaving Connections: Changing Cultures of Africa and Brazil during the Era of , eds. José C. Curto and Paul E. Lovejoy (New York: Humanity Books, 2004): 163-184.

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siza. Even slaves who bought their own freedom had to pay the tax. The payment of the meia-siza enabled a purchaser to establish legal claim to the person sold, or in the case of a freedman, to his freedom by purchase. Between 1810 and 1818, only nineteen slaves were sold in São Félix, which suggests that there was no longer an active business in buying and selling slaves. Furthermore, there were no purchased manumissions. All of those sold had been born in Brazil and were identified by their color: one mestizo (Indian-European), 7 cabras (racially mixed), and 10 crioulos (blacks born in Brazil), as well as one of unknown color. The sexes were nearly equal with ten males and nine females sold. The growing percentage of females suggests that the old colonial pattern of most slaves being African males was no longer a reality. Furthermore, the price differential by sex was no longer significant. Francisca Crioula sold for 120 oitavas of gold in 1810, almost as much as Luis crioulo in 1818 (128 oitavas). The most costly slaves were Rosa cabra and her son, who were purchased for 130 oitavas in 1817. Two crioula women cost 80 oitavas each (1812 and 1818), vs. Felipe who was sold for 68 oitavas in 1817. Thus, female slaves were more valued by 1818, and they probably account for the renewed growth of the slave population via natural reproduction in the 1830s. However, the first census after independence, that of 1825, recorded only 866 people in the parish, of whom 680 were free and freed people of color (Ingênuos e libertos). Only 142 were still enslaved (15.4 per cent), while whites numbered 44. White flight had led to the erosion of slavery and the evolution of a free population of color. By the 1832 census, however, slaves numbered 231. Except for ten African men, all other slaves were crioulos, or blacks born in Brazil. These slaves, however, were more likely to be owned by the 181 free or freed blacks or 474 pardos because only six whites still lived in São Félix. In effect, São Félix had evolved from a white-dominated mining town in which most blacks were enslaved to a backlands rural parish with almost everyone being nonwhite and free. In fact, three-fourths of the people enjoyed the free or freed status. Whites formed less than one per cent of the population (0.7). In contrast, during the years of prosperity, perhaps three-fourths of the people of São Félix had been enslaved. Clearly, the decline of the mines had impoverished miners and the Portuguese 345

Crown, but such decadence had led instead to freedom from enslavement for so many blacks and pardos. Frontier Warfare These generalizations suggest that the nonwhites of São Félix had found a “utopia,” free of slavery and cruel threats of violence so typical on the coast. They had not. Those living outside the town faced Indian raids and warfare as the frontier wars revived in the early nineteenth century, which was due in part to the slave raiding and trading of Indian captives, some of whom were shipped north via the Tocantins River to Belém do Pará.6 The increase in indigenous enslavement led to revenge raids on white settlements and a concerted effort by the indigenous nations to drive settlers from the Tocantins River region. Among the indigenous nations, the two that threatened São Félix the most were the Xavante and the Canoeiro The Xavante had once lived to the east of the Tocantins River; but this Gê- speaking population crossed the great river on jangadas (rafts) and began attacking mining towns and threatening São Félix by the 1780s. Although about 3,000 had settled briefly in a mission village at Carretão in the south, most had deserted the mission and were once again raiding and killing local settlers. Their challenge was so significant by 1811 that the royal government in Rio de Janeiro authorized an offensive war against them, giving permission to enslave war captives. The Xavante retaliated by forming a coalition with the Xerente and attacked settlers and their slaves to the north of São Félix. They also joined up with the Karajá and destroyed a presidio in the north in 1813, and as we will see below, they also aligned with the Canoeiro and attacked the parish of São Félix.7 The greatest enemy of the people of São Félix, however, was not the Xavante, who eventually retreated to Mato Grosso, but the nation known as the Canoeiro or Canoeiros. The Avá-Canoeiro were speakers of one of the Tupi-Guaraní languages, who

6 Trade in Canoeiro war captives: AHU, Goiás, letter of Joze Luiz Pereira, Sargento da Companhia de Pedestres, Vila Boa, March 2, 1803. 7 Xavante: Mary Karasch, “Interethnic Conflict and Resistance on the Brazilian Frontier of Goiás, 1750- 1890,” in Contested Ground: Comparative Frontiers on the Northern and Southern Edges of the , eds. Donna J. Guy and Thomas E. Sheridan (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1998): 131- 132; and Mary Karasch, “Rethinking the Conquest of Goiás, 1775-1819,” paper given at the American Historical Association, Washington, D.C., January 9, 2004.

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may have migrated to the Tocantins River region before the seventeenth century. Or, they may have fled there from the south. In any case, by the 1720s, they had established a fierce reputation for lethal strikes along the Tocantins River. Almost 90 years later in 1811 their reputation was still so fierce that they too were included in the royal letter that authorized enslavement of those nations who engaged in offensive wars against local settlers along the Tocantins River.8 This letter did not stop their raids. In 1819 a Canoeiro attack on the town of Amaro Leite, was the cause of the formation of one of the most infamous bandeiras (expeditions) organized against them. The bandeira’s ambitious objective was to drive the Canoeiro from the Tocantins River region.9 For about three months, the bandeira was unable to locate the Canoeiro. However, on the return trip, they found a trail leading to a Canoeiro village on the Almas River, which had a large field of corn. Encircling the village, the bandeira proposed peace to the Canoeiro, who firmly rejected it. Among the Canoeiro was a bearded man, who had lived in São Paulo (as a slave?). According to Johann E. Pohl, he was “very obstinate, not wanting to hear [anyone] speak of negotiations.” In response, the commander of the bandeira cried out, “Then you will all die!” The chief shouted back, “And you too!” The troops immediately shot him and opened fire on the thatched roof houses, which they also set on fire. Using swords and muskets, they slaughtered “without compassion” all those who tried to flee. Only six children and one old woman were taken prisoner, but two escaped to carry news of the massacre to other Canoeiro villages and to the men who had been away on a raiding party. As late as 1830, the Canoeiro were still angry about “the atrocities” committed against them by the 1819 bandeira.10 The above vivid description helps explain why the Canoeiro took up arms and renewed their effort to drive everyone from the north of the captaincy and from the parish of São Félix. Before 1819, the warfare had been characterized by mutual raiding and small massacres. The events of 1819 changed everything, worsening the frontier violence. Shortly afterwards, in 1823-1825, Raymundo José da Cunha Mattos, an

8 Carta Regia, September 5, 1811: Mary Karasch, “Catequese e cativeiro: Politica indigenista em Goiás, 1780-1889,” trans. by Beatriz Perrone-Moisés, in História dos Índios no Brasil, ed. Manuela Carneiro da Cunha (São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 1992), p. 402. 9 Karasch, “Rethinking the Conquest,” pp. 29-30. 10 Ibid. 347

experienced military officer, who had served for nineteen years in Africa, was confident that he could defeat the Canoeiro. In organizing his great expedition to the north, he stressed his intention of destroying, civilizing, or subjugating them to prevent further raiding. His justification was that they were “the most barbarous of the universe, whose cruelty exceeded that of the bugres and Botocudos.” Although they were not cannibals, he reported, they killed with war clubs and arrows and were similar [in culture] to the Payaguás of Paraguay and Mato Grosso. Soon after his arrival in July of 1823, he began collecting weapons for 100 men, including bows and arrows for archers, and sent a soldier to Carretão to recruit Xavante warriors for the bandeira. Some of the Xavante, who lived in the mission at Carretão, remained allied with the Portuguese and served as auxiliary troops in bandeiras sent to make contact with or conquer a hostile nation.11 By January of 1824, Cunha Mattos had settled near São Félix in Cavalcante and was writing of a frontier that had exploded into brutal warfare. He reported that the Canoeiro and Xavante had attacked more than 800 cattle ranches and plantations extending over an area of 400 leagues, including São Félix.12 But he focused his anger not on his allies the Xavante, but on the Canoeiro, accusing them of killing all those who came to make peace with them unless they were well armed. Around São Félix and Amaro Leite, he reported, they have “ruined” 300 cattle ranches and mining camps. Survivors of Xavante and Canoeiro attacks then fled to the south, leaving their mines and fields abandoned. The indigenous nations were so successful in their efforts to oust the outsiders that they nearly re-conquered the north of the captaincy in the early nineteenth century. The Xavante, however, left the north and migrated to the west of the Araguaia River, where they disappeared to be re-contacted in the 1940s. The Canoeiro remained in Goiás and continued to fight local settlers until the 1980s, but throughout the rest of the nineteenth century they slowed white settlement in the north of Goiás. Without physical security from Canoeiro attacks, São Félix languished; the census of 1832 clearly documents white flight.

11 Karasch, “Rethinking the Conquest,” pp. 29-30. 12 Ibid. 348

Quilombos One reason why the Canoeiro may have posed such a serious risk to the parish of São Félix is that fugitive black slaves (quilombolas) living in quilombos (small camps or settlements of fugitives) may have lived among them. When the anthropologist Dulce Madalena Rios Pedroso collected oral and written traditions about the Canoeiro and a quilombo near them, she concluded that there had been occasional mixture between the Avá-Canoeiro and blacks in the captaincy.13 Historically, blacks and Indians often ran away from their masters or captors and settled in the mountainous regions of the captaincy. One of the first references to quilombos near São Félix occurs in a letter of Captain-general Dom Marcos de Noronha (1749-1755), who complained of the great number of fugitive Indians and “aquilombados.” His fear was that they would attack the mule teams transporting the quinto and interrupt gold mining with assaults on muleteers and miners.14 When the Jesuits were expelled from their missions in the north of the captaincy in 1759, the Xacriabá (Sakriaba) and Akroá, both Gê-speaking populations, revolted in protest and fled the old missions. Apparently, they took refuge from the bandeira that tried to repress their revolt and enslave them in the mountains near São Félix. According to José dos Santos Pereira in 1761, at least 60 Indians were returned to the presídio, probably against their will. The 60 Indians were those that the Jesuits had loaned to a man “to go give” [what?] in a quilombo of fugitive blacks, before they had fled to the forests.15 This brief reference suggests that there were contacts between Indians and quilombolas that went back to the 1750s and 1760s. It also documents that the people of São Félix also had to confront the Xacriabá and Akroá as long as they remained at war with the local settlers due to the expulsion of their Jesuit missionaries. The decline of gold mining and military units to seek out and destroy quilombos left many quilombolas able to hide out in the mountains of the captaincy for the rest of

13 Quilombos: Dulce Madalena Rios Pedroso, “Avá-Canoeiro: A História do Povo Invisivel—Séculos XVIII e XIX,” Master’s thesis, Federal University of Goiás, 1992, pp. 132-136. 14 Mary Karasch, “Os quilombos do ouro na capitania de Goiás,” trans. by João José Reis, in Liberdade por um fio: História dos quilombos no Brasil, eds. João José Reis and Flávio dos Santos Gomes (São Paulo: Companhia das letras, 1996), p. 246. 15 Xacriabá and Akroá: Lisbon, Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo (henceforth ANTT), maço 598, letter to Dr. Pedro Barboza Cannaes from Joze dos Santos Pereira, São Félix, October 5, 1761. See also Karasch, “Quilombos do ouro,” p. 247. 349

their lives. It also facilitated indigenous resistance as well. In the nineteenth century, as the enslaved Africans died out and were not replaced and as indigenous nations such as the Xavante retreated west of the Araguaia River, the number of quilombos also declined. The governors of Goiás were also less preoccupied with destroying them, so there were fewer and fewer references to quilombos in official ocrrespondence. However, those who had found remote or difficult-to-access locations continued to hide out, as did the Canoeiro and the blacks who lived among them, who were never re-captured or re- enslaved. How much of a role attacks by quilombolas who hid in the mountains near São Félix played in depopulating the parish is still uncertain. However, it is probable that fugitive blacks and refugee Indians took advantage of warfare with the Canoeiro to wage their own war on their former masters and enslavers or simply to hide out while frontier militias focused on Canoeiro territory. The people of the quilombo of Kalunga not far from São Félix have persevered to the present. Military Forces Why so many could evade capture lies in part in the nature of military defenses. When the first miners entered São Félix, they invaded indigenous lands controlled by nations who had no interest in gold except for nuggets for personal adornment. Mostly, miners had to provide for their own protection, in part by arming their own slaves, and later by organizing militia forces. The Portuguese provided some paid regulars in the form of mounted dragoons and bare-footed infantrymen (the pedestres), but they were few in number and their responsibilities were enormous. Some dragoons must have been stationed in São Félix to protect the Intendant’s safe where the gold was held until escorted by other dragoons to a port city. Most of the pedestres, composed of the racially mixed (bastardos) and mission Indians, were quartered in the mission villages, at least in 1779, and sent throughout the captaincy at the governor’s command.16 Therefore, many of those who fought hostile nations were organized in other types of military units, which included free pardos and free blacks. In the late eighteenth century, the Portuguese required record keeping on the military strength of the captaincy. Although these documents were elegantly prepared, most were inaccurate, if we are to believe

16 Military forces and pedestres: Luiz Palacin, Goiás 1722-1822: Estrutura e Conjuntura numa Capitania de Minas, 2nd. ed. (Goiânia: Editora Oriente, 1976), pp. 156-171; and AMB, #444, Praça de Militares Pedestres, 1779-1794. 350

bureaucratic critics, who did not want to pay for the expenses of infirm and aged officers and men. However, we can obtain some important insights from the limited data on those who defended the town of São Félix. The difficulty of obtaining accurate lists of troop strength in the captaincy of Goiás, much less the town of São Félix, is obvious from the correspondence of Governor João Manoel de Mello in 1760. He reported on a general state of disorganization of the captaincy’s troops. When he asked for lists of soldiers from the captains, they did not have them. Furthermore, in the towns, there are, he complained, only captains and second lieutenants; and he suggested that their only occasion to take up arms was to parade in religious processions at Easter and Corpus Christi, when a company traditionally walked in procession.17 If it was difficult for the governor to find men enrolled in the military, it was even more so between 1779 and 1825 when few soldiers and no high-ranking officers were willing to serve there. Considering the wealth in gold that was held at the Foundry House (until 1796), it is surprising that the troops were so few. Furthermore, the low troop strength clarifies how the Canoeiro could raid the parish of São Félix and escape. Although it is uncertain how many paid regulars served in São Félix, better documentation survives on the militia forces, especially in 1806. As in Bahia, as Hendrik Kraay has demonstrated, the captaincy’s troops were organized by color, although this is not obvious from the 1806 listing.18 Color data comes from other sources, in particular the petitions for officer patents. The whites appear to have served in the cavalry, such as, the second cavalry regiment, 7th company, of São Félix. In 1779, when an accounting was done of all the regiments of pardos forros (freed), São Félix was omitted from the list of pardo regiments.19 So, where did the pardos serve? São Félix did have an auxiliary cavalry regiment, where pardos were enrolled in other parts of the captaincy, but did pardos or whites belong to the auxiliary

17 Rio de Janeiro, Instituto Histórico e Geographico Brasileiro (henceforth IHGB), Arquivo 1.2.7., vol. 36, Ofício de João Manoel de Mello, Vila Boa, December 22, 1760, fol. 96. 18 Hendrik Kraay and militia troops of color in Bahia: Race, State, and Armed Forces in Independence-Era Brazil: Bahia, 1790s-1840s (Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 2001), pp. 82-105. 19 AHU, Goiás, Mappa do Regimento da cavalaria Auxiliar da Capitania de Goyas, 12 July 1779; and Mappa das Companhias das Ordenanças desta Capitania de Goiás de que he Chefe O Cap.m mor da Comarca Miguel Alves da Ora, July 12, 1779.

351

cavalry in São Félix? However, it had few men. It was supposed to have 40 cavalrymen, but only 28 men were ready to serve. Also on hand were a lieutenant coronel, sargeant, ajudant, quarter master, and surgeon. More men served in the reserve militia of the ordenanças in 1779. In the rest of Brazil, local whites performed their military service in the ordenanças.20 This regiment had 1 captain, 1 second lieutenant, 2 sergeants, 4 corporals, 1 drummer, and 63 soldiers. By the next census of 1783, São Félix still had a company of cavalry of the second regiment and another of ordenanças, and at least one captain can be identified from the census records, which gave his military title. In 1789, the seventh company of the auxiliary cavalry remained at just about the same size as in 1779. The total of men was 38, including 1 captain, 1 lieutenant, 1 second lieutenant, one trumpeter, 1 sergeant, 3 corporals, and 30 soldiers. The exact same troop strength was recorded again in 1792.21 By 1799, however, as the decadence and poverty worsened in São Félix, there were few to record the number of soldiers. However, some officers were still resident in the town in 1799, and they signed a petition. Among these officers were a captain of the ordenança, a guarda mor, two second lieutenants, and an adjutant.22 As the previous survey reveals, our knowledge of troop strength before 1806 is rather sketchy for São Félix. A more complete listing of those who served in the military comes from 1806 when São Félix had 340 in the militia regiments and 72 in the Ordenanças. The second cavalry regiment, the seventh company, was still based in São Félix and had 34 men in 1806, including 1 furriel (third sergeant), 3 corporals, and 30 soldiers. The infantry regiment, 12th company in São Félix, had 68 men with 1 furriel, 2 sargeants, 5 corporals, and 60 soldiers. The third regiment, 5th company, was the black regiment of the Henriques. Usually, this regiment included the free and freed black men of a region. Although Africans belonged to the Henriques in the eighteenth century, most were crioulos by the early nineteenth century.23 Finally, the Ordenanças, the reserve

20 Ordenanças: Kraay, Race, State, and Armed Forces, p. 84. 21 Troops, 1783-1792: Bertran, Notícia Geral, vol. 1 (1783), p. 94; AHU, “Mappa em que Tristão da Cunha Menezes . . . aprezenta das Tropas pagas, e Auxilliares . . . athe o prezente anno d’1789”; and “Mappa em que . . . Tristão da Cunha Menezes aprezenta o numero das Tropas pagas, e Auxiliares da guarnição . . . athe o prezente anno de 1792.” 22 AHG, Representação dos Habitantes de São Félix, April 1, 1799. 23 Henriques: Karasch, “Guiné, Mina,” pp. 176-180. 352

white militia, numbered 72 in São Félix. Apparently, almost all of the white men were enrolled in the Ordenanças in 1806; only priests would have been excluded. If the whites belonged to the Ordenanças, then the racially mixed, but in particular the pardos, must have staffed the other regiments other than the black regiment. In addition to these militia regiments, São Félix also had men enrolled in additional regiments known as regimentos aggregadas. The aggregada force attached to the second regiment had a total of 34 men including 1 furriel, 3 corporals, and 30 soldiers. The aggregada infantry regiment had 1 furriel, 2 sergeants, 5 corporals, and 60 soldiers for a total of 68. Even the Henriques had an aggregada force with 1 furriel, 2 sargeants, 5 corporals, and 60 soldiers. Notably, none of these regiments were led by high-ranking officers. What is significant in a period of economic decline is that São Félix still had 340 men in the militia regiments plus 72 in the reserve militia (ordenanças) in 1806. The total number of men who could provide protection to their parish was 412. By 1812, however, only three regiments were left. Even fewer men were enrolled in the military in the 1820s. When a report on troop strength in São Félix was done, it revealed that only four men were capable of service in 1823; the other two were sick. At about the same time, possibly in 1824, a sargeant Antônio José Pereira Cidade revealed that he could find only 11 militia troops in São Félix: one corporal, two cavalrymen, and eight in the infantry; plus one soldier who was too sick to fight. A year later in 1825 one sergeant and nine soldiers from São Félix marched north to Porto Real.24 So few men in the 1820s clearly documents the decadence of the military and militia forces after independence and clarifies why the Canoeiro were not conquered or fugitive slaves recaptured. Contraband Gold The reason for the decline of troop strength was then directly related to the lack of gold to attract and retain Portuguese officers and men. Some of the decline was probably due to drops in gold output using the technologies of the late eighteenth century. Gold

24 AHG, Doc. Div. # 69, Origenais dos Comandantes dos Registros e Presidios da Província, 1823-1825, f. 118. Lista dos Soldados Meliciannos da Cavalaria, Infantaria, e Henriques, que ficao guarnecendo este Arraial de Santo Antonio e minas de S. Felis: one corporal, two cavalrymen, and 8 infantrymen. The document was signed by Antônio Joze Pereira Cidade, Sargento Mor, August 20, 1824. See also fol. 334, “Rellação das Praças que marcharão do Destacamento de S. Felix para este,” Quartel de Porto Real, January 2, 1825. 353

mining continues in the region with both old and new technologies, as I have personally witnessed and photographed near Chapada and Cavalcante. The gold was still there to be discovered, but it was unable to be exploited either due to limited technologies or the danger of indigenous attacks. Portuguese bureaucrats in Vila Boa, Rio de Janeiro, and Lisbon were not convinced that the decline of thequinto was due to lower mine output. Their explanation was contraband, in particular by men of color. A second culprit, in their view, was the lack of African male slaves in the captaincy. They blamed the fall of the quinto on the shortage of African male slaves.25 On that point, the censuses and tax records are quite clear. There were few African men available to do the mining; but the reason there were so few enslaved Africans was also related to the lack of gold. Without gold to trade for slaves, few merchants were willing to hazard the long journey from the coast to São Félix. However, the Foundry House located in São Félix tried to collect the quinto from throughout the northern part of the captaincy. The list of quinto contributors reveals that most lived in or near the mining town of Natividade.26 Documents survive on the amount of the quinto collected between 1754 and 1805. Table 4, however, is not an accurate measure of gold production due to a pervasive culture of evasion and contraband. The Foundry House of São Félix was usually singled out by royal bureaucrats at the Tribunal de Contas (the Tribunal of Accounts) in Lisbon for its corruption that permitted the contraband trade in gold to prosper.27 What we can learn from Table 3, however, is that there was a steady decline in the amount of gold collected in São Félix for the northern part of the captaincy between 1754 and 1805. The single most prosperous year for the Portuguese had been 1755 when 931 marcos of gold had been collected. Three years later it was 837 marcos. The 1750s through 1762 clearly saw the highest levels of gold collection. After 1764, the quinto declined to 514 marcos in 1763. Another ten years brought a further drop to 357 in 1774. By 1780, the quinto was a mere 251 marcos, by

25 Contraband in gold: AHU, 1003, caixa 11, letter of Intendent of Gold, Manoel Gomez da Costa, São Félix, March 15, 1766. See also Palacin, Goiás, 1722-1822, p. 65. Shortage of African slaves: 26 Gold registered in São Félix: AHU, Goiás, 1003, caixa 11, “Diz Francisco Barretto, June 14, 1766. Casas de Fundição: Palacin, Goiás, 1722-1822, pp. 88-90. 27 Lisbon, Tribunal de Contas, 354

1790 only 163 marcos, and by 1800 only 97 marcos. The last recorded account reported about 52 marcos of gold in 1805. Why contraband could flourish was due to the immense size of the northern part of the captaincy. In 1766 when gold collection in São Félix was still sizeable, the Intendant, Manuel Gomez da Costa, had reported from São Félix on the difficulties for one patrol of 6 to 8 men based in Taboatinga of preventing the outflow of gold, especially on the part of small merchants, who received gold in payment for their merchandise. He noted that the quantities were so small (30 to 100 oitavas) and the distances so great that they preferred to take a risk rather than send the gold to the Foundry House to be assayed and counted. In the last part of his correspondence, the Intendant added yet another reason for tax evasion. He reported that the gold sent to the Foundry House came from miners who received it from their slaves and from businessmen who obtained it in payment from what they sold. Furthermore, everyone was involved in false gold. Therefore, people who feared the confiscation of their gold because it was mixed with false gold did not send their gold to the Foundry House.28 Those who wanted to evade the quinto then entered the contraband trade in gold, much of which exited the northern part of the captaincy via the sertão, or backlands, of the arid Northeast. One segment of the trade ran from São Félix and Natividade via Aldeas Altas, located near Caxias in eastern Maranhão. Merchants from São Félix also traveled up the Tocantins River, then east to the Mearim River, and almost to the port of São Luis, Maranhão. A second river route was via the Parnaíba River of Maranhão to the headwaters of the Itapicuru River and then to the ocean at São Luis. Other routes of contraband gold crossed the backlands of Piauí either to the coast or to Recife, Pernambuco.29

Related to the trade of the Tocantins River and the Northeast was that of eastern Amazonia, dominated by merchants resident in Belém do Pará. After 1782 they outfitted the riverboat expeditions that made annual trips down the Tocantins River to trade

28 Note 25 above. 29 Maranhão trade: Mary Karasch, “The Periphery of the Periphery? Vila Boa de Goiás, 1780-1835,” in Negotiated Empires: Centers and Peripheries in the Americas, 1500-1820, eds. Christine Daniels and Michael V. Kennedy (New York and London: Routledge, 2002), pp. 159-160. 355

European manufactures, foodstuffs, and salt for gold and shoe leather. The opening of the Tocantins River route in the early 1780s apparently played a key role in increasing the volume of contraband trade that flourished in the 1780s and 1790s. Previously, the Portuguese had interdicted trade on the Tocantins River between 1737 and 1782 in a vain attempt to stop the contraband gold trade, which, combined with Indian attacks on river expeditions, had slowed trade on the great river. After Indian removals in the 1790s and government encouragement of trade to counteract mining declines, trade rebounded, and by 1804 official figures reveal that trade with Pará was once again significant.30 Another river trade linked to Belém was that of the Araguaia River, which flows parallel and west of the Tocantins until it joins the Tocantins to empty into the delta of the Amazon River. Here the Karajá traded directly with the merchants of Belém; it is uncertain if they ever traded gold for tools and weapons. We do have one reference to a gold trade via the Araguaia in the 1790s in which bars of gold were carried by “poor Comboyeiros.”31 Although there are no statistics for the size of the contraband gold trade from São Félix, official complaints suggest that the largest and most significant of the contraband gold trades was across the sertão to Salvador da Bahia. The legal trade route is better known that ran from São Félix to Natividade and the old mission of Duro, where the fiscal authorities checked for contraband gold, then to Barreiras, across the São Francisco river, to Cachoeira, and finally to Salvador on the coast. If the patrols stopped them, the contraband gold might be discovered. Therefore, many of the smugglers followed secret routes across the enormous backlands of the Northeast to take the contraband gold to the coast. Those accused by the Portuguese of facilitating that contraband gold trade were both wealthy Portuguese merchants and numerous small traders, who were men of color. These men of color were also involved in yet another trade, that of gold for salt, which is a classic West African trade.32 One astute observer who tried to assess the reason for the decline of the quinto, however, argued that it was not due to lack of gold but rather due to administrative

30 Amazonia trade: Ibid., pp. 160-161. 31 Araguaia trade: Ibid, p. 161. 32 Bahia contraband trade by men of color: Ibid., p. 162

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inefficiency in Vila Boa and the societies of black miners who kept the gold for themselves. As he reported, a society of sixty freedmen organized themselves into two groups: forty who mined and twenty who raised foodstuffs to sustain them. Afterward, they divided the gold equally among themselves, thus depriving the king of his tax in gold. That blacks acquired gold is reflected in donations of gold to black churches and brotherhoods or the purchase of their freedom or that of their families.33 What is clear from these fragmentary references is that São Félix collapsed as a bureaucratic center for collecting, assaying, and counting gold. The temptation of acquiring great wealth in gold had kept miners and troops in São Félix, and they in turn had limited the Canoeiro to hit and run raiding, or led the Xavante to move to the south or to wage war against other towns, such as Carmo and Pontal. Without the gold, however, population loss and military decline made São Félix and its rural parish an attractive target as both the Canoeiro and the Xavante escalated frontier warfare in the early nineteenth century. Together, they almost succeeded in driving all whites from São Félix; the people of color held on, however, in what had become an impoverished village. In 1819, the Austrian traveler, Johann E. Pohl, visited São Félix and reported that it had been largely abandoned by its white population. Only the priest and two other whites still lived there. Most of the 200 houses had been abandoned and were in ruins. Only two streets were still occupied by residents, and only one church still held services. The Foundry House that had been built at a high cost of 19,000 cruzados was also in ruins. The reason for the Crown’s inability to collect the quinto, Pohl believed, was due to the contraband trade in gold dust to Pará. When Pohl visited São Félix, however, it was not an uninhabited ghost town because blacks and mulattoes still lived there and made a living based on agriculture and cattle raising. He described them as poor because of the dry lands and poor soil, and the “denuded mountains.” Although they could not farm corn, they cultivated manioc.34 A second observer also reached São Félix during his expedition to the north against the Canoeiro. Raymundo José da Cunha Mattos, who failed to conquer the

33 Leal on freedmen: AHU, Goiás, 1805, Relatorio de Antônio Luis de Souza Leal sobre o estado geral da capitania, Vila Boa, March 2, 1805. 34 Johann E. Pohl, Viagem no Interior do Brasil, trans. Milton Amado and Eugênio Amado (Belo Horizonte: Editora Itatiaia, 1976), pp. 212-213. 357

Canoeiro, also reported on the decadence of São Félix in the 1820s. He found only 66 houses occupied. There were, however, three churches: the main church of Santo Antônio with five ruined altars, that of Rosário with only one altar, and that of the Abadia and Sant’Ana with one altar that was serving as the parish church due to the ruined condition of Santo Antônio. Since he was an experienced military officer, Cunha Mattos blamed the town’s decadence on the “hostilities” of the Canoeiro. However, he also blamed it on the transferal of the Foundry House to Cavalcante. Like Pohl, he concluded that the people were very poor and were afflicted with goiter, and cultivated some foodstuffs. However, he also noted that they had a factory that made “excellent” iron and steel that they sold, and there was still gold in the mountains around the town.35 Unlike the Austrian, Cunha Mattos was more positive about São Félix. However, he soon left São Félix and abandoned his efforts to defeat the Canoeiro, and São Félix never again realized its economic potential. In summary, Cunha Mattos and Pohl capture the poverty of a once opulent mining town, that had been a center of political and ecclesiastical bureaucracies in the eighteenth century. However, gold smugglers, declining troop strength, and Canoeiro warfare had driven its surviving people into poverty, even though its nearby mountains held potential in unexploited gold and iron. Clearly, it had been a Portuguese-dominated town that had failed to thrive in spite of its resources in the early nineteenth century. The one positive feature, however, was that most of its nonwhite population escaped slavery, although not Canoeiro raiding, as the parish shifted to an agro-pastoral economy. For a town that had been so central to Portuguese plans for wealth and economic development in the interior of Brazil, it is notable that it does not appear on modern maps of the region, and local geographers list it as one of the disappeared mining towns of Tocantins state.36

35 Raymundo José da Cunha Mattos, Chorographia Histórica da Província de Goyaz (1824, 1874; reprint edition, Goiânia: Editora Lider, 1979), pp. 121-122. 36 Horieste Gomes and Antônio Teixeira Neto list “Carlos Marinho Chapada de São Félix” as among the disappeared mining towns of Tocantins state. See their Geografia: Goiás/Tocantins (Goiânia: Centro Editorial e Gráfico/UFG, 1993), p. 71. 358

Table 137

Slaves in São Félix in 1783

Males Females Total Slaveowner House Mines Fields Xa Total House Fields Total White 122 151 162 10 445 43 25 71b 516 Pardo 4 23 21 1 49 25 -- 25 74 Black 8 12 20 3 43 31 -- 31 74 Total 134 186 203 14 537 99 25 127b 664

Table 238

Parish of São Félix, 1779-1832

Year Whites Pardos Blacks______% Sum

Free Captives Total Blackc Total 1779 387 682 -- -- 2,681 71.5 3,750 1783 432 140 259 1,581 1,840 76.3 2,412 (65.55) 1785 1,500d 1789 385 750 -- -- 2,697 68.7 3,925e 1791 400 725 -- -- 2,683 70.5 3,808 1792 363 707 -- -- 2,696 69.8 3,865f 1804 78 673g 362 641 1,003 57.2 1,754 (36.55) 1825 44 680h ? 142 ? (15.4) 866 1832 6i 474j 181 231k 412 46.2 892l (25.9)

37 Source: Rio de Janeiro, Biblioteca Nacional, Cod. 16.3.2, Notícia Geral da Capitania de Goiás, 1783. a Unknown place of work. Includes ten slaves who worked on a cattle ranch. b Includes three females engaged in mining. 38 Sources: Mary Karasch, “The Periphery of the Periphery? Vila Boa de Goiás, 1780-1835,” in Negoitated Empires: Centers and Peripheries in the Americas, 1500-1820, eds. Christine Daniels & Michael V. Kennedy (New York and London: Routledge, 2002), p. 146. c In parenthesis is the percentage enslaved. d White and Indian “almas” (souls) in the Vila de São Félix. e Includes 93 babies of unknown color and legal status. f Includes 99 babies of unknown color and legal status. g Mulatos e Mulatas. h Ingênuos/Libertos or Free and Freedpersons of color. i All but ten African men were crioulos, blacks born in Brazil. j Includes two Indians. k All males. There were no white females. l There were 344 males and 548 females. 359

Table 339

Amount of Gold Registered in São Félix, 1754-1805

Year Marcosa Year Marcos 1754 517 1781 224 1755 931 1782 173 1783 178 1756 688 1784 163 1757 732 1785 136 1758 837 1759 703 1786 143 1760 736 1787 144 1788 115 1761 532 1789 147 1762 737 1790 163 1763 587 1764 514 1791 104 1765 576 1792 115 1793 119 1766 487 1794 109 1767 527 1795 120 1768 506 1769 424 1796 132 1770 456 1797 140 1798 143 1771 429 1799 94 1772 445 1800 97 1773 320 1774 357 1801 71 1775 314 1802 94 1803 107 1776 336 1804 54 1777 255 1805 52 1778 365 1779 263 1780 251

39 Source: Table 3: The Income of the Royal Fifth of the Two Smelting Houses of the Captaincy of Goiás, 1752-1803, in Karasch, “The Periphery of the Periphery?” Negotiated Empires, p. 153. a In marcos of gold. The numbers have been rounded off. According to Paulo Beltran, one marco of gold was equal to 229g523 mg of gold. See Notícia Geral da Capitania de Goiás em 1783, ed. Paulo Beltran (Goiânia/Brasília: Editora da Universidade Católica de Goiás, 1997), 2: 213