Brazil

by Heloisa Maria Murgel Starling

  Members of the nobility in Brazil were defined by what they did not do. Manual labour, running a shop, working as an artisan and other such activities were all carried out by natives or slaves. This may explain why the prejudice against manual labour, considered an ‘inferior’ activity and generally treated with contempt, has persisted in Brazil. The ‘nobles’, on the other hand, lived off their income from rents and government posts. The best thing of all, however, was to be a sugar baron and surround oneself with a large number of relatives, servants and hangers-on. Capital, power, authority, ownership of slaves, engagement in politics, being the head of a large household with numerous relatives – these were the collective trappings of this new ‘nobility’ that dominated colonial society. This model, based on the extended family, was to last throughout the sugarcane cycle. Although the biological family formed the nucleus of the engenho, the master’s entourage also included adopted children and others to whom the household offered a home,52 as well as relatives, servants and slaves.

  Furthermore, taking these landowning families as a whole, very few of them were Portuguese nobility, and even fewer Old Christians. Ever since the establishment of the Inquisition in Portugal, during the reign of Dom Manuel I, the distinction had been made between the descendants of Roman Catholics – ‘Old Christians’ – and those of recently converted Jews – the ‘New Christians’. Despite their airs and graces, many of the sugar barons were in fact New Christians, descended from wealthy immigrant tradesmen who had invested their time and capital in the production and sale of sugarcane. After a few generations of marrying into Old Christian families, these landowners set about the task of creating a mythical genealogy, establishing distant links to noble families.

  However, whether they were descended from nobility or not, they ‘reinvented’ themselves as though they were. There are many reports describing how the landowners ceremoniously paraded around the streets in their fine clothes, white hats and polished boots. Early risers, by daybreak they would have already examined the property, given work orders, and checked that the previous day’s tasks had been satisfactorily completed. They also liked to be associated with a certain type of sociability, maintaining their salons and tables generously replete, and entertaining and organizing outings. The local villagers and the workers who crushed the sugarcane would greet them with filial reverence, often being bestowed with nicknames as part of the display of paternalistic dominance.

  An important part of this spectacle of power involved dressing the master’s family in the finest clothes originating from abroad, offering lavish hospitality and showing off the luxurious interiors of the casas-grandes, whose architecture during the seventeenth century became more and more imposing. These two-storey houses varied in style and size. All of them, however, had large windows, verandas that ran all around the house, and elegant pillars. They were usually built on the highest point of the engenho so that they could be seen from afar. They contained a large number of bedrooms – for the family and those it had taken in: parents-in-law, nephews, grandchildren, political allies, tradesmen, family friends and the household’s parson – as well as a reception room, a dining room, an oratory, an office, a larder and a kitchen. Adjoined to the casa-grande, and virtually an extension of it, was the chapel: modest, entirely white, but big enough for baptisms, marriages and funerals. These were normally low brick buildings with only one altar. The landowners were often greatly attached to their small chapels and frequently stated in their wills their wish to be buried there.

  Whether built inside the casa-grande or set apart, these chapels were an essential element of this universe. On Sundays and public holidays the few wooden benches and chairs they contained were not enough to seat all of the people who came for Mass: the master’s extended family, local farmers, neighbours and others whose lives gravitated around the engenho. The slaves were also summoned to attend religious services, and those who had not been previously christened in Africa were ritually baptized. The Roman Catholic religion was central to this world of sugarcane and forced labour; it was therefore an established tradition for the master to choose one of his sons for a life of celibacy in the priesthood. The oldest son would be the heir to the engenho. The second was usually destined for service to the Crown, in administration, law, or in war. And if the master, whose virility was measured by the number of offspring – preferably male – he sired, was ‘blessed by fortune’, the third son would become a priest. And so the landowners ensured their ties both to the government and to the Church, both of which supported the sugar industry.

  Another symbol of opulence was the abundant quantities of food served at the master’s table. The household was never without sugar, large quantities of which were delivered to the kitchen, above all for making deserts – made from corn, coconut, passion fruit, banana, genipap and mangaba53 – as well as cakes and sweets. Many of these desserts were given sentimental names, indicating intimacy, such as ‘love rings’, ‘love ties’, ‘love cake’, ‘husband fattener’ or ‘flirty’; while others had religious overtones such as ‘Eve’s pudding’, ‘Manna from heaven’ or ‘nun’s dream’.54 By the way, these pious names are an indication that housewives in the colony continued the Portuguese tradition of the confectioner nuns (and may be related to the fact that some of the larger engenhos had convents built on their land).55 Perhaps it is no coincidence that the expression ‘winning friends through the stomach’ is still used in Brazil today.56

  But there was no casa-grande without the senzala – the slave quarters. It was these two, apparent opposites – which were in fact intimately connected – that became the subject matter of Gilberto Freyre’s iconic account of the formation of Brazilian society, Casa-grande & Senzala, published in 1933, in which he discusses the contradictions surrounding the relationship between masters and slaves. The ‘&’ in the title, linking the two, shows that the Pernambucan anthropologist understood the importance of the co-relation between these two extremes. ‘Balancing the economic and cultural antagonism’ were the words he used to indicate how paternalism and violence, but also negotiations between the two sides, coexisted in daily life.57

  Senzala is a Kimbundu58 word that means ‘residence for workers on an agricultural property’ or ‘a dwelling separate from the main house’. The sugarcane senzalas housed dozens or even hundreds of slaves, frequently with their hands and arms chained, lying on the dirt floor in appalling hygienic conditions. As owning large numbers of slaves was a sign of prestige and prosperity, the masters preferred quantity to quality. The circumstances varied: on some plantations the slaves were lodged collectively, on others there were separate lodgings for men and women, and in a few cases separate lodgings for couples and children. In the northeast, most of the senzalas consisted of adjoining huts laid out in rows at a certain distance from the casa-grande. The overseers padlocked them at night in order to prevent escape, to impose discipline, and to control what time the slaves woke up and went to sleep. Rest was scarce, as was sanitation. The senzalas had neither light nor windows, so not only was there permanent darkness, but overcrowding made them stifling. The huts usually consisted of mud walls and roofs thatched with sapê, and were very fragile, leading many travellers of the time to comment on their rudimentary appearance.59 There was no casa-grande without a senzala, two sides of the same coin.

  In contrast, the masters surrounded themselves with symbols of their ‘aristocracy’: fine clothes, rich furniture, thoroughbred horses, literacy in a land of illiterates, and above all the power of command. Another aspect of Brazilian life that differed from that of Lisbon was the coexistence of various cultures that were classified by the colonizers in terms of gradation of colour. Since both Africans and Indians were seen as pagans (even though they had been baptized or transformed into vassals), neither group had any rights. The divisions between ‘natives’ and ‘village Indians’, or, among Africans, boçais and ladinos,60 thus represented cultural categories that marked the divisions within internal
hierarchies of inclusion and exclusion.

  Colour became a basic social indicator. The categories were fluid and varied according to time and place: but they always defined social status. Mixed-race groups that originated, from the early days of the colony, from intercourse between Portuguese and Indians or between whites and blacks, were classified separately. And there were further subdivisions in the day-to-day life of the colony: children born from intercourse between masters and slaves were called mestizos; those from intercourse between Indians and blacks were called cabras; moreno (originating from the word ‘Moor’) referred to a person with ‘dark-coloured’ skin, and lastly came pardo (something akin to ‘a pale-skinned mestizo’). The colour pardo is still included in the Brazilian census, in practice meaning something along the lines of ‘none of the above’, a sort of et cetera or a wildcard in the classification. In other words, those who are not white, yellow (the colour used in Brazil to refer to peoples from the East), red (the Indians) or black are usually called pardo.

  Even today the meaning of this word varies according to social context and the person it is used to classify. The word is thought to have come from Portugal, originating from the name pardal (sparrow), known for its dark feathers of an undefined colour on the one hand and its common presence on the other.61 There were further ethnic and racial subdivisions of mestizos: mamelucos (resulting from intercourse between Indians and whites); caboclos (Indians who spoke the language taught by the Jesuits – the lingua franca); carijós (the term originally used to classify the inhabitants of southern Brazil, but which in Tupi designated the descendants of the union between a white man and a black bird with white wings); and curibocas (mestizos with copper-coloured skin, and straight hair).62

  During the ‘sugarcane era’ this was the complex human ‘mapping system’ by colour and by parentage. ‘Coloured people’, a word still current in Brazil (used as a sort of euphemism – ‘colour’ means ‘black’, whereas ‘white’ is a non-colour), were submitted to every possible type of discrimination. Firstly, the shade of their skin colour indicated that their forebears were slaves, with the consequent implications of forced manual labour that was treated with such contempt. Secondly, it indicated a morally doubtful social standing, since these people were born of ‘unofficial’ unions (cases of slave-owners officially registering their illegitimate children were very rare). And lastly, mestizos were typecast as greedy, devious and not be trusted.

  As some slaves were gradually released by their masters, a heterogeneous group of free blacks gradually emerged and surrounded the casa-grande. Again, this group was shaped by gradations of colour: the lighter a person’s skin colour, the easier it was for her or him to achieve their release (the so-called alforria) and employment, even a domestic job inside the slave-master’s residence. Freed slaves with sufficient resources immediately acquired slaves of their own, as did poor farmers. In the sugarcane culture, having slaves was a symbol of social distinction, a virtual guarantee that the owner was a prosperous, reliable citizen.

  A complex combination of racial, cultural and personal considerations existed. ‘Mulattoes’ and ‘Creoles’ – the latter referring to slaves born on their owners’ property, in other words, not African – were those who got closest to the casa-grande itself. They constituted a type of elite who undertook domestic and specialized tasks, although they were often referred to as lazy. Pardos were considered capable of mastering specific assignments, whereas ‘Africans’ were seen as ‘foreign pagans’ – or at best recent converts – who were, with rare exceptions, dangerous and unstable. Slavery became increasingly associated with Africans and their descendants. Over time, this concept was to become deeply rooted in Portuguese America.

  Although slave-owners and their slaves formed the heart of the sugarcane complex, there was a wider social world, made up of agregados (retainers) and farmers, which revolved around them. The former often comprised a large group whose living depended on the favour of the master. Although these retainers had little economic power, they did have some political and social significance because their numbers and loyalty bolstered their master’s influence. This group was made up of freed slaves, local politicians and tradesmen, and relatives who had no land, and thus were dependent. The dispensation of favours by the local master became a kind of currency that further increased his dominion, and fed the economic, political and cultural centralization of the plantation complex.63 Meanwhile, the farmers were divided into two groups: those who leased land from the owner; and small landowners who depended on the sugar mills of the engenho to grind their sugarcane. In neither case did they escape the sovereignty of the master.

  Thus a sugarcane aristocracy was created, commanded by the slave-owner around whom political and social life centred. In the ‘distant world of the Brazils’ the main landowner of the region reigned virtually uncontested. The Crown was reluctant to intervene in what it considered internal matters. However, the day-to-day business of sugarcane was by no means secure. There were many risks. The business was at the mercy of oscillations in international market prices, and the size of the harvest; it depended on good management, on adequate control of the slaves, and the wise administration of paternalistic favours to a vast extended family.

  THE SUGARCANE BUSINESS

  The idea of a sugarcane ‘culture’ is appropriate because sugar production permeated the social, economic and cultural life of the colony. The production process occupied the entire year, without intervals. Planting began with the first rains of February and continued until May. In some regions it extended into July or August. Preference was given to higher land due to the weeds – the great enemy of the sugar plantations – that proliferated in low-lying areas. The land was prepared by burning, a technique inherited from the Indians and based on the premise that there was no lack of land in these Brazils. First the trees were cut down and then the vegetation was set alight. Ploughs were not used; the slaves turned the earth with hoes. The cane that was introduced into Brazil originally came from India – the same plant that had been successful in Sicily – and was popularly known as cana-crioula. It was a slender plant with short stems whose productivity was considered to be poor in relation to other varieties. Once again the name is no coincidence; it denotes a moral judgement on the Creoles. After twelve or at most eighteen months, the harvest began, always programmed to coincide with the availability of the mills for grinding. The process had to be fast and efficient, because twenty-four hours after the cane was cut its sucrose content diminished significantly.

  Once the cane had been cut it was taken from the plantation to the mill by boat or on ox-drawn carts. Transport by boat was much faster. Consequently land that was close to rivers commanded the highest prices. Rivers also powered the large-scale watermills, which were known as ‘water mills’ or ‘royal mills’ because they were superior to the others, not because of any connection to the Crown. But very few landowners could afford the luxury of such a mill. Most were operated by oxen, horses, or even by human beings, and were popularly known as trapiches, molinetes64 or almanjarras. In the last named it was the slaves who inserted the sugarcane into the rollers, an extremely dangerous job that led to frequent accidents.

  There were further distinctions that separated the engenhos located on the coast – considered to be the oldest and most aristocratic – from those ‘in the woodlands’ or ‘the interior’. The latter were in general smaller and poorer. The technique used for sugar production was relatively primitive. Until the seventeenth century most of the mills worked with two horizontal wooden cylinders and the grinding process was slow. It was only after 1610 that more advanced installations began to be used, in the so-called ‘stilt mills’, which adopted a new system for grinding: three metal-lined cylinders that not only required fewer workers but also produced faster results.

  Another item that was essential for operating the mills was wood. It has been calculated that one ox-drawn cartload of wood per hour was needed to feed the furnaces.
The Jesuit Padre Antonil described them as ‘mouths that devour forests, dungeons of fire and smoke, the perpetual, living images of volcanoes’.65 One of the consequences was the devastation of the forests on Brazil’s northeastern coast, which had already suffered greatly from the removal of its brazilwood.

  No matter what type of sugar mill, after this initial process the sticks of sugarcane were prepared for feeding into the rollers to extract the juice. The fluid was stored in barrels before being transported to the furnace where it was boiled and purged in large copper boilers. Once it was free of impurities it was turned into molasses, which was poured into moulds or clay vessels with a capacity of around thirty-two litres. The long process did not end there. Next the sugar was taken to the ‘purge house’, where it went through a forty-day process of ‘whitening’. Lastly, it was dried, after which, with a thin-bladed knife, the whitest part was separated from the darker portion called muscovado.

  The price of sugar varied enormously. Four types were obtained from the first boiling. These were known as the macho or ‘male’ sugars: refined white, granulated white, low-quality white and muscovado – the prices they fetched depending on the degree of whiteness. The treacle that oozed from the vats during the purging process was also collected and reprocessed, but went for a lower price. There was also a thinner syrup that oozed from the moulds. This was used as the raw material for producing aguardente – cachaça or pinga – a spirit that was consumed throughout the colony and also widely used in Africa as barter for slaves. Although the three terms are used interchangeably to refer to the same drink, they are not, in fact, synonymous. Aguardente66 is the generic name for any spirit distilled from sweet vegetables; cachaça is the specific name for aguardente made from sugarcane, for which pinga is a popular nickname. The word (which means ‘drip’ in Portuguese) is said to have originated from the slaves who distilled the cachaça: while the liquid sugarcane boiled, the steam condensed on the roof and dripped down onto their heads.