Installation of the General Government in Brazil and foundation of Salvador
1. introduction
In this topic we will study the establishment of the General Government.
This historical event was an important milestone in Brazilian colonial history, as it led to the intensification of the settlement and colonisation of Brazil.
This allowed the colony to achieve greater development, especially in the cultivation of sugar cane and the establishment of sugar mills that began to produce this valuable product.
We will also study the historical process that led to the foundation of Salvador, the current capital of Bahia, on 1 May 1549.
The city of Salvador was to become the first capital of Brazil and an important commercial and cultural centre, as it was from Salvador that the foundations were laid for the colonisation of Brazil.
Fundação de Salvador - Primeira Capital do Brasil
2.2. General government of Brazil
With the collapse of the Hereditary Captaincies project, Portugal was forced to take on the task of permanently settling and colonising Brazil.
Central to this was the establishment of the General Government.
However, in order to reorganise the colonisation process, which had been disrupted by the unsuccessful experience of the hereditary captains, Portugal would have to invest a large sum of money.
As mentioned above, the experience of the hereditary captains was a private investment; the Crown didn’t spend a penny on it.
It was now time for the King of Portugal to take over the task of settling and colonising the colony.
According to Eduardo Bueno (2006, p. 32):
To reorganise the process of occupation and colonisation of Portuguese America, it would be necessary to invest around 400,000 cruzados, the equivalent of 1.4 tonnes of gold.
This time, however, the money would come not from private investors, tenants or speculators, but from the Royal Treasury. In fact, the treasury was becoming increasingly depleted as Portugal went through a serious economic crisis that had been worsening since 1537.
In 1547, the kingdom had just over 3 million cruzados in cash, but owed 3,880,000, mostly in loans at 25% interest per year.
The establishment of the General Government in Brazil would therefore mean spending more than 1/8 of the royal revenue at a time when the Crown owed more than it took in.
King João III and his advisers must have had good reasons for investing so much money in what had been the least profitable of all Portugal’s overseas possessions.
At the time, Portuguese America was unprofitable.
It was also sparsely populated, with no more than 2,000 settlers of European origin.
Nevertheless, the king was keen to colonise and populate Brazil, as this position was linked to “[…] an imperial policy in which the financial decline of India, the Muslim advance in Morocco and the Mediterranean and Portugal’s always unstable relations with neighbouring crowns played an important role” (BUENO, 2006, p. 33).
The establishment of the General Government would give Portugal greater control over the colony.
The Crown would increasingly impose its wishes on the American lands.
The centralisation imposed by the General Government would significantly reduce the power of the grantors, and thus Portugal laid the foundations for political centralisation in Brazil. It is certainly not an exaggeration to say that the General Government contributed greatly to the current configuration of the Brazilian territory, as we are the only country in Latin America that has not seen its territory fragmented into small states.
Again quoting Bueno (2006, pp. 33-34):
From 1540 onwards, the Portuguese state had begun to establish a series of mechanisms that enabled it to increase its control, coercion and domination over its subjects.
These new and efficient ways of exercising power included censuses, compulsory military conscription, a stricter definition of the kingdom’s borders and the creation of a more powerful and intrusive judicial system – as well, of course, as more extensive forms of taxation, coupled with more efficient methods of collection.
The new control mechanisms of this stronger, more centralised and more rational government would not only be present in the daily lives of those living in Portugal: they would be exported to the overseas territories as soon as possible.
The establishment of the General Government – and the concentration of the Crown – is the most visible aspect of this process in relation to Brazil.
In short, the establishment of the General Government on 1 April 1549 had the main objective of organising and putting things in order.
This was to be achieved by standardising taxes, behaviour and, above all, by subjecting not only the rebellious Indians to the rules of the Portuguese colonists, but also all those who in any way challenged the king’s authority.
What was about to begin in Brazil with the establishment of the General Government was therefore “a reaction of the state against the ambiguity, weakness and experimentation” that had characterised the Portuguese colonial adventure in the first half of the 16th century, as the American historian Harold B. Johnson observes.
This “movement towards rigidity and codification” and the deliberate “exclusion of alternatives” would spell the end of what can be called, with some liberality, the “Romantic period” of Portuguese expansionism.
From the point of view of those on the other side of the process – in the case of Brazil, the settlers trying to reinvent their lives in the tropics, struggling to free themselves from the social ties and “brakes” so present in the kingdom – the new rules would be perceived as a profound intrusion into their daily lives.
It’s not hard to imagine that the Portuguese living in America would do everything in their power to conspire against the new order.
It can therefore be said that the arrival of the General Government signalled the first conflict between the individual and the State in Brazilian lands (BUENO, 2006, p. 36).
The expedition that brought Brazil’s first Governor General – Tomé de Sousa – was accompanied by the first Jesuits, Manuel da Nóbrega and five other priests.
These Jesuits were responsible for establishing the first schools in the colony. They also had the difficult task of catechising the natives.
The first three governors of Brazil were
- Tomé de Sousa: He was the founder of the city of Salvador. He reigned from 1549 to 1553 and his expedition, made up of six ships, brought about a thousand people, as well as cattle, horses and sheep. At that time, the first Brazilian bishopric was created, cattle ranching and sugar cane cultivation began, and sugar mills were founded.
- Duarte da Costa: the second governor-general of Brazil. He ruled from 1553 to 1558 and his expedition brought the Jesuit José de Anchieta. During his reign, the French invaded Rio de Janeiro and founded a settlement called “Antarctic France”.
In January 1554, José de Anchieta and Manuel da Nóbrega founded the College of São Paulo. Next to this college, the village was born, which became the city of São Paulo.
- Mem de Sá: was the third governor-general of Brazil. He ruled from 1558 to 1572 and expelled the French from Rio de Janeiro, fought the Indians and was responsible for the destruction of some 300 villages, and encouraged the importation of black Africans to serve as slave labour.
In this way, the General Government was established in Brazil, whose main characteristics were political centralisation and the standardisation of the behaviour of the Brazilian population.
In the next section, we will study the foundation of the city of Salvador and its importance in the context of colonial Brazil.
3. The foundation of Salvador
Construction of São Salvador da Bahia de Todos os Santos began on 1 April 1549.
It was the first capital of Brazil and its construction was carefully planned and coordinated directly by Tomé de Sousa, the first governor-general of Brazil.
On the sunny morning of 29 March 1549 – a Friday, just like the day of departure – the governor’s fleet sighted land after exactly eight weeks of travel.
It was the sandy shoals of Tatuapara (now Praia do Forte), which stretched to the tip of Itapuã.
After leaving behind the sharp reefs of the Vermelho River – a fearsome barrier reef where Caramuru had been shipwrecked thirty years earlier – Tomé de Sousa’s ships skirted the tip of Padrão and, one by one, entered the bay of Todos os Santos (BUENO, 2006, p. 86).
The region of present-day Salvador was chosen as the site of the Brazilian capital because it had a good geographical position, a safe bay and a good harbour.
In addition, Diogo Álvares, the Caramuru, had lived there for more than thirty years and played an important role in the founding of the city, helping Tomé de Sousa with the arduous task of building the city.
Tomé de Sousa’s expedition brought with it a number of professionals who were entrusted with the task of building the city.
That’s how Eduardo Bueno (2006, p. 82) describes the situation:
But, as we know, the objectives of the expedition were not only military.
That’s why a group of craftsmen, whose skills were essential to the construction of the new city, mingled with the soldiers and sailors who roamed the ship’s decks.
These craftsmen were under the command of the “Master of Stonemasonry”, Luis Dias, a renowned architect in charge of the project and responsible for overseeing the construction of Brazil’s first capital.
Luis Dias’ team included 15 carpenters, nine blacksmiths, eight sawyers, eight roofers, five whitewashers, four locksmiths, four charcoal burners and three excavators, as well as 16 stonemasons – a total of 72 craftsmen who, once work began, would be assisted by at least 62 convicts.
These artisans earned an average of 1,200 reais per month. Prisoners whose sentences included forced labour still received 330 reais a month (below the minimum wage of 360 reais).
The importance of the founding of the city of Salvador can be seen in the number of artisans who came with Tomé de Sousa’s expedition.
The city was a consequence of the process of establishing the General Government and its construction has great symbolism, as it represents Portugal’s new ideals in relation to Brazil, in the words of Sergio Buarque de Holanda (2007, p. 129), Salvador represents:
Of this structure, Tomé de Sousa’s city was to be the centre and, of all the hereditary captainships, as a monastic historian, son of the same city, would say in the following century, “like the heart in the middle of the body, from which all […] were helped and governed”.
It’s only fair, then, that the Governor General, with the auxiliaries he brought with him, should have had most of his needs met in the early days. In fact, this was an active effort on the part of the Crown, since it had been decided to open a new phase in the life of the colony.
Tomé de Sousa himself was present and helpful in all the work: according to an oral tradition still preserved by friar Vicente de Salvador, who was able to meet some of the people of the time, he was “the first to use the pestle for the rammed earth, and helped to carry the rafters and timbers for the houses on his shoulders, showing himself to be a friendly companion to everyone”.
The symbolism associated with Salvador testifies to the Portuguese intention to intensify the settlement and colonisation of Brazil.
Its foundation opened up new horizons for Portuguese colonisation. Brazil would be definitively included in Portugal’s plans for the future. The colony would be integrated into the metropolitan economy through the increasing intensification of sugar cane cultivation and the production of sugar in the sugar mills.
Eduardo Bueno (2006, pp. 97-98) notes that
Salvador would become an even more solid symbol than Mazagão.
As experts have noted, Brazil’s first capital was the “touchstone” that marked the true beginning of a revolutionary urbanisation policy for the overseas territories, the moment when “the imperial project began to turn into a colonial project”.
“Salvador was the first branch that marked the link between the regulated cities and the cities of the future Portuguese school of urbanisation in the Indies,” noted Walter Rosa in his essay Cidades Hindoportuguesas.
The construction of this “strong fortress” would prove that the Portuguese were determined to transform the mere coastal fringe of their empire into a fortified and urbanised colonial territory.
As we have seen, the foundation of Salvador was a milestone in the transformation of the Portuguese mentality towards Brazil.
After 1549, Brazil’s history entered a new phase.
The metropolis would strengthen the “colonial pact”. It will also tighten its control over the colony’s economic production. The founding of the city would take its toll!
In the next chapter we will study the implementation of the Portuguese civilisation project for Brazil, a project based on latifundia, slave labour and monoculture.
4. In this chapter you have learnt that
- The establishment of the Governo-Geral increased Portugal’s control over the colony. The centralisation imposed by the Governo-Geral would significantly reduce the power of the grantees, thus Portugal laid the foundations for political centralisation in Brazil.
- The foundation of the city of Salvador in 1549 was a consequence of the process of establishing the General Government. Its construction was highly symbolic, as it represented Portugal’s new ideals in relation to Brazil.
See the following periods in the history of colonial Brazil:
- Brazilian Independence – Breakdown of colonial ties in Brazil
- Portuguese Empire in Brazil – Portuguese Royal Family in Brazil
- Transfer of the Portuguese court to Brazil
- Foundation of the city of São Paulo and the Bandeirantes
- The transition from colonial to imperial Brazil
- Colonial sugar mills in Brazil
- Monoculture, slave labour and latifundia in colonial Brazil
- The establishment of the General Government in Brazil and the founding of Salvador
- Portuguese maritime expansion and the conquest of Brazil
- Occupation of the African coast, the Atlantic islands and the voyage of Vasco da Gama
- Pedro Álvares Cabral’s expedition and the conquest of Brazil
- Pre-colonial Brazil – The forgotten years
- Foundation of the Portuguese colony in Brazil
- Periods in the history of colonial Brazil
- Periods in the history of Brazil
