Augusto Ivan de Freitas Pinheiro and Eliane Canedo
Research and contributions: Cristiane Titoneli
Brazilwood
Historian Joelza E. Domingues 2 stresses that Caesalpinia brasiliensis, also known as echinata, or ibirapitanga (in Tupi), had been known in Portugal since 1220. Originally from Sumatra, but also identified by Christopher Columbus in the forests of the Caribbean and along the Brazilian coastline by Pedro Álvares Cabral, logging this wood was one of the main economic activities of colonial Brazil, from 1530 through to the mid-XIX century. Ranging from scarlet to brown and purple, its sap was scraped from the trees and used to dye fine fabrics. Called brasil by French and Portuguese explorers, brézil by the French and brazili or brazire by the Italians, the word relates to embers and brasiers, the color of burning wood.
The first recorded shipload of around 21 tons of wood set sail from Northeast Brazil in February 1500, heading to Europe. Also according to Domingues: “brazilwood was cut at such a savage rate that some two million trees were felled during the first century of exploitation – an amazing average of 20,000 trees a year, or almost fifty a day. A ship could carry around 5,000 tons on each trip. It is thus not surprising that by 1558, the best trees could be found only twenty kilometers away from the shoreline or more.” 3
At that time a Crown monopoly, this business led to the appearance of feitorias: trading posts where timber was stored, protected and sold. Brazilwood loggers or timber dealers became known as brasileiros – a name that extended over time to everyone born in this Portuguese colony. These logging activities also involved the use of slave labor, initially indigenous and then shipped over from Africa. By 1570, the settlement had no more than 700 inhabitants, including enslaved residents.
No one knows for sure when the first slaves were brought to Brazil. However, it is probable that some of them arrived with the recipients of early land grants known as capitanias. (...) Regular slave traffic providing labor replacing the indigenous peoples seems to have begun in the mid-XVI century (…). It was the Portuguese Crown that launched this trade, on its own account and for its own benefit. According to Anchieta, there were more than a hundred slaves in the city by 1585, brought over from the Guinea Coast. This was a two-way trade: outgoing vessels carried wares such as aguardente cane spirit and cassava flour, which were exchanged for “items”.4