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The Church and Justice: Indians, Blacks and mixed-race before the instances of episcopal power in eighteenth century in Maranhão
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.4067/S0717-71942022000100171Palabras clave:
Maranhão, Portuguese Amazon, eighteenth century , episcopal power, repression and control, Indians, mixed-race, black peopleResumen
In colonial society, baptized Indians, mixed-raced individuals, cafuzos, mamelucos, Black
people and pardos were subject to the jurisdiction of bishops. All dioceses had episcopal
tribunals, but their records represent a documentary resource that has received little
historiographical attention. The aim of this article is to investigate the role of episcopal
power in the repression and attempt to control the deviant behaviours of the non-white
populations whose members fell under differentiated ethnic and legal categories. Documents
indicate a significant integration of Indigenous and mixed-race individuals into the
Christian life of the communities based on the knowledge they demonstrated of the rules
and behaviours required of Christians. The episcopal power largely preferred to rehabilitate
and preserve these new Christians in colonial Maranhão of the Portuguese Amazon
during the eighteenth century.
Citas
Serge Gruzinski, O pensamento mestiço, São Paulo, Companhia das Letras, 2001. Stuart Schwartz, “Brazilian Ethnogenesis : Mestiços, mamelucos and pardos”, in Le Nouveau Monde: Mondes nouveaux. L’experience americaine, ed. Serge Gruzinski and Nathan Wachtel, Paris, EHESS, 1996, pp. 7-27.
Eduardo França Paiva, Dar nome ao novo. Uma história lexical da Ibero-América entre os séculos XVI e XVIII: as dinâmicas de mestiçagens e o mundo do trabalho, Belo Horizonte, Autêntica, 2015, p. 174 and 125, respectively.
Antonio Manuel Hespanha. Imbecilitas. As bem-aventuranças da inferioridade nas sociedades de Antigo Regime, São Paulo, Annablume, 2010, pp. 52-53.
The author analyzes everything from the word’s etymology to mameluco transgressions of Catholicism, which were reported to the Inquisition. Ronaldo Vainfas, A Heresia dos Índios: catolicismo e rebeldia no Brasil colonial, São Paulo. Companhia das Letras, 1995, pp. 141-159.
In the specific context of Maranhão, Ferreira argues that the administrative authorities and even the colonists used the term cafuzo to distinguish native people from wilderness and their descendants, mixed-race or not, who were born in or around villages. In addition, another connotation of cafuzo marked the transition of enslaved indigenous to freed slaves. André Luís Bezerra Ferreira. Os versos que o livro apagou: cativeiro, escravidão, liberdade de índios e mestiços na Capitania do Maranhão (1680 – 1777), Doctoral Qualification Report. Postgraduate Program in Social History of the Amazon in Universidade Federal do Pará, Belém, 2020, pp. 54-55.
See Eduardo Paiva, op. cit, pp. 40-41 and pp. 75-82. John Monteiro describes mulattos in 17th-century São Paulo in the 17th century as African and indigenous mixed-race. John Monteiro, Negros da terra: índios e bandeirantes nas Origens de São Paulo, São Paulo, Companhia das Letras, 1994, pp. 154-188.
Rafael Chambouleyron and Karl Arenz. “Indiens ou Noire, libres ou esclaves: travail et métissage en Amazonie portugaise (XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles)," Caravelle, 2016, p. 16.
Rafael Bluteau, Diccionario de Língua Portuguesa, https://digital.bbm.usp.br/handle/bbm/5413.
"Servant" was used for indigenous workers maintained by settlers. They were not legally slaves. In the proceedings analyzed, these so-called servants were indigenous people who were “managed” by third parties.
“Quality”, in the coeval social vocabulary, referred to dozens of types or castes, “among which people and social groups were distributed and to which they were linked.” Regarding Portuguese America, Eduardo Paiva clarifies that “the notion of nature distinct from people and social groups also appeared under the ‘big’ quality category.” See Eduardo Paiva, op cit, pp. 126-129.
Politically speaking, the State of Maranhão was an administrative unit separate from the State of Brazil. São Luís, which was also the seat of the bishopric, was the capital of the state until the middle of the 18th century. In the 1770s the State split into two, forming the State of Grão-Pará and Rio Negro and the State of Maranhão and Piauí. Only two bishoprics, Maranhão and Pará, served this entire territory during the 18th century and part of the 19th. See Pollyanna Muniz, Réus de Batina. Justiça Eclesiástica e clero secular no Maranhão colonial, São Paulo, Alameda, 2017, pp. 27-28.
In Maranhão: Vinhais, indigenous village; Paço do Lumiar, indigenous village; São José indigenous site; Viçosa de Tutóia indigenous village; Araiós, indigenous site; Amanajós indigenous site in the Pastos Bons parish; São Fetis indigenous site; Trizidela, indigenous site; São Mamede, site of bearded indigenous; São Miguel, indigenous site; Lapel inhabited by indigenous with ; Monção, indigenous village, Viana, white and indigenous village; São José de Penalva settlement trough; São João de Cortes, indigenous site; Guimarães, white and indigenous village. In Piauí: São José de Sende Gougués Indian site; Cajoeiro Jaicós and São Gonçalo Indian site, Acoroazi indigenous site, see Mappa das cidades, vilas e lugares das capitanias do Maranhão e Piauí, National Library, Rio de Janeiro, Cartography sector, ARC 023, 04, 013.
Extracted from Muniz, op cit, p. 97.
Livro de Provisões, n 82, Ecclesiastical Collection, Public Archive of the State of Maranhão (hereinafter APEM).
Analyzing the diocese of Viseu, José Pedro Paiva clarifies that in addition to the regiments, little remains about the operation of the visitation order. It was the body that “dealt with the organization, routing, filing and inspection of matters related to pastoral visits.” See José Pedro Paiva. História da Diocese de Viseu, Coimbra, Impresa da Universidade de Coimbra, 2016, p. 211.
Many other duties fell under the responsibility of the Episcopal Assembly. José Pedro Paiva enumerates them: authorizing the construction of private churches and chapels, issuing letters of healing, carrying out the examinations for new priests and assigning them parishes and other benefits, overseeing the selection process for the church provisions, checking the qualifications of applicants to the clergyman, examining and licensing confessors and preachers, approving the constitution and congregation statutes, verifying compliance with the and paschal communion regulations, founding new parishes, authorizing the transport of the remains of the deceased, issuing licenses for healers and for grade school teachers, issuing pastoral letters or other episcopal communications. See José Pedro Paiva, op cit, p. 207.
Joaquim Ramos de Carvalho. “A jurisdição episcopal sobre os leigos em matéria de pecados públicos: as visitas pastorais e o comportamento moral das populações portuguesas de Antigo Regime”, Revista Portuguesa de História, 1990, t. 24, p. 138.
To learn more about the operations of episcopal courts see: Muniz, op cit, 2017; Jaime Gouveia, “Episcopal Justice in a Time of Change: the Court of Portalegre, 1780-1835.” Max Planck Institute for European Legal History research paper series. No.2020-11, http://ssrn.com/abstract=3619826.
Eduardo Paiva clarifies that references to white skin color are uncommon, despite the frequent mention of 'white men' and 'white people' in colonial documentation. See Eduardo Paiva, op cit, p. 157. In the Ecclesiastical Court proceedings it was not common for this information to appear in the headings of the cases, unlike the other social categories. Only when white defendants presented a defense was the color of their skin and quality of their ancestors ever mentioned, in many cases in order to emphasize their lack of or low degree of relation with the people born in or around the colony. This was the case of the sisters D. Ana and D. Maria Garcês accused of cohabitation with the priest João Antonio Baldez in 1764. In addition to their evident “quality” as “owners,” the accused sisters and priest invoked their Portuguese “mainland” ancestry to disallow the testimonies that accused them. See Muniz, op cit, pp. 116-118.
John Monteiro, Tupis, Tapuias e historiadores: Estudos de história indígena e do indigenismo, Campinas, UNICAMP, 2001, p. 4.
Maria Regina Celestino Almeida. Dossiê Os Índios na História, Rio de Janeiro, Tempo, 2007, (v. 1) 17.
See Rafael Chambouleyron. “The -Government of the Sertões and indigenous-”. The Americas, 2020, pp. 3-39, Rafael Chambouleyron, Karl Arenz and Vanice Melo. “Ruralidades indígenas na Amazônia colonial” Boletim do Museu Paraense Emílio Goeldi, 2020, pp. 1-22, Rafael Chambouleyron, Karl Arenz, “Indiens ou Noire, libres ou esclaves: travail et métissage en Amazonie portugaise (XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles)”, Caravelle, 2016, pp. 15-29. Karl Arenz, Federic Matos. 'Fazer sair das selvas': índios e missionários na Amazônia (século XVII) Boletim Tempo Presente, UFRJ, 2015, pp. 1-24, Karl Arenz, “Além das doutrinas e rotinas: índios e missionários nos aldeamentos jesuíticos da Amazônia portuguesa (séculos XVII-XVIII)” Revista História e Cultura, 2014, pp. 63-88, Almir Carvalho Júnior, Índios Cristãos, A Conversão dos Gentios na Amazônia Portuguesa (1653-1769) Doctorate in History, Universidade Estadual de Campinas, 2005. Márcia Eliane Mello, Fé e Império. As Juntas das Missões nas conquistas portuguesas, Manaus, 2009; André Luís Ferreira, “Nas malhas das liberdades: o Tribunal da Junta das Missões e o governo dos índios na Capitania do Maranhão (1720-1757)” Master's thesis, Universidade Federal do Pará, 2017; Patricia Sampaio, ‘"Vossa Excelência mandará o que for servido...": políticas indígenas e indigenistas na Amazônia Portuguesa do final do século XVIII’. Tempo, 2007, pp. 39-55; Rafael Rocha, “Os aruã: políticas indígenas e políticas indigenistas na Amazônia Portuguesa (século XVII)”. Revista Brasileira de História & Ciências Sociais, 2018, pp. 72-93, among others.
Indigenous people displaced from their home communities to the so-called aldeamentos worked part time for their own maintenance and part time at the service residents, missionaries or public works for a salary stipulated by law and administered by local religious and native authorities. See Camila Loureiro Dias, “Os índios, a Amazônia e os conceitos de escravidão e liberdade”. Estudos avançados, Dez. 2019, v. 33, n. 97, p. 240. In the aldeias (indigenous villages), the regular clergy was responsible for the spiritual and earthly administration of the majority of the indigenous population, in accordance with several provisions established by the Portuguese Crown. On the subject, see Almir Carvalho Júnior, Índios Cristãos, Campinas, 2005.
See Jaime Ricardo Gouveia. Ubi Societas Ibi Ius. Os indígenas nos auditórios eclesiásticos do espaço luso-americano in Os Indígenas e as Justiças no Mundo Ibero-Americano (sécs. XVI-XIX) ed Ângela Domingues, Maria Leônia Chaves de Resende and Pedro Cardim, Lisboa, 2019, pp. 191-216.
See Maria Leônia Chaves de Resende. “Devassa da vida privada dos índios coloniais nas vilas de El Rei” Estudos Ibero-Americanos, Dezembro 2004, v. XXX, n. 2, pp. 49-66.
See Ana de Zaballa. Los indios ante los foros de justicia religiosa en la hispanoamérica virreinal (México, 2010); Jaqueline Vassallo, “Represión y castigo en la Córdoba borbónica” Anuario del Centro de Investigaciones Jurídicas y Sociales, n. 6, 2001-2002, pp. 549-558; Gerardo Lara Cisneiros. La justiça eclesiástica ordinária y los índios en la Nueva España Borbónica: balance historiográfico y prospección in Los indios ante los foros..., ed Jorge Traslosheros, Ana de Zaballa Beascochea, México, 2010.
See Jaime Gouveia, Ubi Societas Ibi Ius, 191-216.
See José Pedro Paiva, Baluartes da fé e da disciplina: o enlace entre a Inquisição e os bispos em Portugal (1536-1750), Coimbra, Impressa da Universidade de Coimbra, 2011, pp. 46-54.
See Almir Carvalho Júnior, op cit, p. 78.
Ibid.
See Sebastião Monteiro da Vide, Constituições Primeiras do Arcebispado da Bahia ed Bruno Feitler and Evergton Sales Souza, São Paulo, EDUSP, 2010, pp. 249-252.
There are two boxes of manuscripts referring to the 18th century. Autos de Impedimento, Câmara Eclesiástica (Ecclesiastical Assembly) (hereinafter EA), boxes 140 e 141. APEM. Some of these processes have been analyzed by Luana Maria Leitão. Os índios e o matrimônio: o ideal tridentino e o cotidiano indígena no Maranhão colonial Graduation in History (São Luís, 2015).
See Ronaldo Vainfas. Casamento, amor e desejo no Ocidente Cristão, São Paulo, Ática, 1996.
Autos de Impedimento, EC, APEM, doc. 4537, fl sn.
Ibid, fl sn.
Ibid, fl sn.
Autos de Impedimento, EC, APEM, doc. 4597, fls 8-8 v.
Autos de Impedimento, EC, APEM, doc. 4597, fls 8-8 v.
See Vide, op.cit, p. 256.
See Pollyanna Gouveia Mendonça, “Uma questão de qualidade: Justiça Eclesiástica e clivagens sociais no Maranhão colonial” in Hierarquias, raça e mobilidade social: Portugal, Brasil e o Império colonial português, séc XVI-XVIII ed Célia Tavares and Rogério Ribas, Rio de Janeiro, 2010, pp. 15-31.
Autos de Impedimento, EC, APEM, doc. 4605, fl. 9-9v.
Ibid, fl. 7 v-8.
See Ronaldo Vainfas. Trópico dos Pecados. Moral, sexualidade e Inquisição no Brasil, Rio de Janeiro, Nova Froteira, 1999, pp. 101.
Habilitações de genere, EC, APEM, caixa 42, doc. 1544 e doc. 1564, respectively.
Habilitações de Genere, EC, APEM, doc. 1566.
Habilitações de Genere, EC, APEM, doc. 1579.
Habilitações de Genere, EC, APEM, doc. 1553, fl. s/n.
Habilitações de Genere, EC, APEM, doc. 1553, fl. s/n.
D. Manuel d Cruz governed the bishopric of Maranhão between 1738 and1745. Unlike the other bishops of Maranhão who appointed officials of the ecclesiastical government for more than one function, the government of D. Manuel da Cruz appointed a Judge of the Qualifications of Genere who exclusively performed this function, Father Filipe Camelo de Brito. See Muniz, op. cit, p 48. Kate Soares examined the qualifications of that period when analyzing the government of that bishop. See Kate Soares, “Aspectos do governo episcopal de Dom Frei Manuel da Cruz no Bispado do Maranhão,” Master in History, Niteroi, 2015.
Livro de Ordenações, Acervo Eclesiástico, APEM, n. 175 fl. s/n.
The author also offers a commentary on Marquis of Pombal's measures for the region and the growing role of African labour after the creation of the Companhia de Comércio. See Patrícia Melo Sampaio. Espelhos Partidos: etnia, legislação e desigualdade na Colônia, Manaus, EDUAM, 2011.
In the same year, 1755, another license with force of law abolished the earthly administration of regular ecclesiastics over the indigenous. The said law abolished the administrative power of the missionaries over indigenous aldeamentos (villages). See Agostinho Malheiros, A Escravidão no Brasil. ensaio histórico-jurídico-social, Petrópolis, Vozes, 1944, p. 282.
On “Black” as a synonym for slave, see Eduardo Paiva, Dar nome ao novo, 199-221 e Silvia Lara, Fragmentos setecentistas: escravidão, cultura e poder na América Portuguesa, São Paulo, Companhia das Letras, 2007, pp. 132-135.
See Antonia da Silva Mota and Maísa Faleiros da Cunha. “No âmago da africanização: pessoas negras e de cor nos mapas populacionais do Maranhão colonial (1798-1821).” Revista brasileira de estudos das populações, 2017, vol.34, n.3, pp. 465-484.
Autos e Feitos de Denúncia e Queixa, Auditório Eclesiástico (or Ecclesiastical Court, hereinafter EC) , APEM, doc. 906.
The distance in leagues from the bishopric seat mentioned from this note is based on Mappa das cidades, villas, lugares e freguezias das Capitanias do Maranhão. National Library (Rio de Janeiro), Cartography sector, ARC 023, 04, 013.
Autos e Feitos de Denúncia e Queixa, EA, APEM, doc. 923
Autos e Feitos de Denúncia e Queixa, EA, APEM, doc. 935 and doc. 935, respectively.
Autos e Feitos de Denúncia e Queixa, EA, APEM, doc. 913.
Autos e Feitos de Denúncia e Queixa, EA, APEM,, doc. 927.
André Ferreira describes the saga of Maurício and his family, all indigenous, to end Joana da Assunção's captivity. Maurício took the legal case for his family's freedom to D. José. See André Ferreira “Nas malhas das liberdades” 178-179.
Autos e Feitos de Denúncia e Queixa, EA, APEM, doc. 907, fl s/n.
Autos e Feitos de Denúncia e Queixa, EA, APEM, doc. 907, fl. s/n.
Autos e Feitos de Denúncia e Queixa, EA, APEM, doc. 907, fl. s/n.
See Charlotte de Castelanu-L’Estoile, “O ideal de uma sociedade escravista cristã: Direito canônico e matrimônio de escravos no Brasil colônia” in A Igreja no Brasil: normas e práticas durante a vigência das Constituições primeiras do arcebispado da Bahia, eds. Bruno Feitler and Evergton Salles de Souza, São Paulo, 2011, pp. 355-398.
See Titles 303, 304 and 989 of the Constitutions. On canonical doctrine and theology regarding slave marriage, see Castelanu-L’Estoile, op cit, 370-374.
Another example involving an indigenous slave appeared in the divorce records. In 1741, “Juliana, freed indigenous woman” asked for separation from her husband João, a slave of Francisco Xavier Baldez. She claimed that her husband, being a slave, was obliged by the master to go to Pará, leaving her helpless. She confessed to having to prostitute herself to survive. When João returned to São Luís, he was angry to learn what she had done and threatened to kill her with knives several times. Juliana filed for divorce alleging danger to her life the outcome of the lawsuit is unknown, but the latest piece of information is that Juliana was sent to prison following the complaint of adultery filed by her husband. Autos Cíveis de Libelo, Acervo Eclesiástico, APEM, doc. 4393.
Autos e Feitos de Denúncia e Queixa, EA, APEM, doc. 918, fl. 2.
See Eduardo Paiva, “Escravo e mestiço: do que estamos efetivamente falando?” In: De que estamos falando?Antigos conceitos e modernos anacronismos – escravidão e mestiçagens, Eduardo França Paiva, Manuel F. Fernández Chaves and Rafael M. Pérez García (orgs.), Rio de Janeiro, 2016, pp. 57-82.
Freemen and slaves were two ways of denoting indigenous workers according to how they were incorporated into society and the nature of their relationship with the person in whose possession they were. Free and slave labor coexisted and complemented each other, and did not engender opposition. See Dias, Camila Loureiro, Estudos avançados, Dez. 2019, v. 33, n. 97, p. 246.
Livro de Registro de Denúncias, Acervo Eclesiástico (Ecclesiastical collection), APEM, n 212, fl 192-195.
Ibid, fl 217 e 217 v.
Ibid, fls 221-229.
Autos e Feitos de Libelo Crime, EA, APEM, doc. 4234.
Autos e Feitos de Libelo Crime, EA, APEM, doc 4228.
Autos e Feitos de Libelo Crime, EA, APEM, doc. 4261, fl. 6 e 9.
Feitos Crimes de Apresentação, EA, APEM, doc. 4679, fl 18, 18 v e 56v, respectively. There are other examples of the issue of quality as social divides in the Ecclesiastical Court of Maranhão. See Muniz, op. cit., p. 111-124.
Autos e Feitos de Libelo Crime, EA, APEM, doc. 4259, fl 32 v e 20, respectivamente.
Papal bull Sublimes Deus. https://web.archive.org/web/20171227123459/https://www.nthurston.k12.wa.us/cms/lib/WA01001371/Centricity/Domain/747/SublimisDeusPopePaulIII.pdf.
See Frei Bartolomeu de Las Casas. Único modo de atrair todos os povos à verdadeira religião.Translation Noelia Gigli, Hélio Lucas, São Paulo, Paulus, 2005.
See Carvalho Júnior, Índios cristãos 6.
Eduardo França Paiva, Dar nome ao novo. Uma história lexical da Ibero-América entre os séculos XVI e XVIII: as dinâmicas de mestiçagens e o mundo do trabalho, Belo Horizonte, Autêntica, 2015, p. 174 and 125, respectively.
Antonio Manuel Hespanha. Imbecilitas. As bem-aventuranças da inferioridade nas sociedades de Antigo Regime, São Paulo, Annablume, 2010, pp. 52-53.
The author analyzes everything from the word’s etymology to mameluco transgressions of Catholicism, which were reported to the Inquisition. Ronaldo Vainfas, A Heresia dos Índios: catolicismo e rebeldia no Brasil colonial, São Paulo. Companhia das Letras, 1995, pp. 141-159.
In the specific context of Maranhão, Ferreira argues that the administrative authorities and even the colonists used the term cafuzo to distinguish native people from wilderness and their descendants, mixed-race or not, who were born in or around villages. In addition, another connotation of cafuzo marked the transition of enslaved indigenous to freed slaves. André Luís Bezerra Ferreira. Os versos que o livro apagou: cativeiro, escravidão, liberdade de índios e mestiços na Capitania do Maranhão (1680 – 1777), Doctoral Qualification Report. Postgraduate Program in Social History of the Amazon in Universidade Federal do Pará, Belém, 2020, pp. 54-55.
See Eduardo Paiva, op. cit, pp. 40-41 and pp. 75-82. John Monteiro describes mulattos in 17th-century São Paulo in the 17th century as African and indigenous mixed-race. John Monteiro, Negros da terra: índios e bandeirantes nas Origens de São Paulo, São Paulo, Companhia das Letras, 1994, pp. 154-188.
Rafael Chambouleyron and Karl Arenz. “Indiens ou Noire, libres ou esclaves: travail et métissage en Amazonie portugaise (XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles)," Caravelle, 2016, p. 16.
Rafael Bluteau, Diccionario de Língua Portuguesa, https://digital.bbm.usp.br/handle/bbm/5413.
"Servant" was used for indigenous workers maintained by settlers. They were not legally slaves. In the proceedings analyzed, these so-called servants were indigenous people who were “managed” by third parties.
“Quality”, in the coeval social vocabulary, referred to dozens of types or castes, “among which people and social groups were distributed and to which they were linked.” Regarding Portuguese America, Eduardo Paiva clarifies that “the notion of nature distinct from people and social groups also appeared under the ‘big’ quality category.” See Eduardo Paiva, op cit, pp. 126-129.
Politically speaking, the State of Maranhão was an administrative unit separate from the State of Brazil. São Luís, which was also the seat of the bishopric, was the capital of the state until the middle of the 18th century. In the 1770s the State split into two, forming the State of Grão-Pará and Rio Negro and the State of Maranhão and Piauí. Only two bishoprics, Maranhão and Pará, served this entire territory during the 18th century and part of the 19th. See Pollyanna Muniz, Réus de Batina. Justiça Eclesiástica e clero secular no Maranhão colonial, São Paulo, Alameda, 2017, pp. 27-28.
In Maranhão: Vinhais, indigenous village; Paço do Lumiar, indigenous village; São José indigenous site; Viçosa de Tutóia indigenous village; Araiós, indigenous site; Amanajós indigenous site in the Pastos Bons parish; São Fetis indigenous site; Trizidela, indigenous site; São Mamede, site of bearded indigenous; São Miguel, indigenous site; Lapel inhabited by indigenous with ; Monção, indigenous village, Viana, white and indigenous village; São José de Penalva settlement trough; São João de Cortes, indigenous site; Guimarães, white and indigenous village. In Piauí: São José de Sende Gougués Indian site; Cajoeiro Jaicós and São Gonçalo Indian site, Acoroazi indigenous site, see Mappa das cidades, vilas e lugares das capitanias do Maranhão e Piauí, National Library, Rio de Janeiro, Cartography sector, ARC 023, 04, 013.
Extracted from Muniz, op cit, p. 97.
Livro de Provisões, n 82, Ecclesiastical Collection, Public Archive of the State of Maranhão (hereinafter APEM).
Analyzing the diocese of Viseu, José Pedro Paiva clarifies that in addition to the regiments, little remains about the operation of the visitation order. It was the body that “dealt with the organization, routing, filing and inspection of matters related to pastoral visits.” See José Pedro Paiva. História da Diocese de Viseu, Coimbra, Impresa da Universidade de Coimbra, 2016, p. 211.
Many other duties fell under the responsibility of the Episcopal Assembly. José Pedro Paiva enumerates them: authorizing the construction of private churches and chapels, issuing letters of healing, carrying out the examinations for new priests and assigning them parishes and other benefits, overseeing the selection process for the church provisions, checking the qualifications of applicants to the clergyman, examining and licensing confessors and preachers, approving the constitution and congregation statutes, verifying compliance with the and paschal communion regulations, founding new parishes, authorizing the transport of the remains of the deceased, issuing licenses for healers and for grade school teachers, issuing pastoral letters or other episcopal communications. See José Pedro Paiva, op cit, p. 207.
Joaquim Ramos de Carvalho. “A jurisdição episcopal sobre os leigos em matéria de pecados públicos: as visitas pastorais e o comportamento moral das populações portuguesas de Antigo Regime”, Revista Portuguesa de História, 1990, t. 24, p. 138.
To learn more about the operations of episcopal courts see: Muniz, op cit, 2017; Jaime Gouveia, “Episcopal Justice in a Time of Change: the Court of Portalegre, 1780-1835.” Max Planck Institute for European Legal History research paper series. No.2020-11, http://ssrn.com/abstract=3619826.
Eduardo Paiva clarifies that references to white skin color are uncommon, despite the frequent mention of 'white men' and 'white people' in colonial documentation. See Eduardo Paiva, op cit, p. 157. In the Ecclesiastical Court proceedings it was not common for this information to appear in the headings of the cases, unlike the other social categories. Only when white defendants presented a defense was the color of their skin and quality of their ancestors ever mentioned, in many cases in order to emphasize their lack of or low degree of relation with the people born in or around the colony. This was the case of the sisters D. Ana and D. Maria Garcês accused of cohabitation with the priest João Antonio Baldez in 1764. In addition to their evident “quality” as “owners,” the accused sisters and priest invoked their Portuguese “mainland” ancestry to disallow the testimonies that accused them. See Muniz, op cit, pp. 116-118.
John Monteiro, Tupis, Tapuias e historiadores: Estudos de história indígena e do indigenismo, Campinas, UNICAMP, 2001, p. 4.
Maria Regina Celestino Almeida. Dossiê Os Índios na História, Rio de Janeiro, Tempo, 2007, (v. 1) 17.
See Rafael Chambouleyron. “The -Government of the Sertões and indigenous-”. The Americas, 2020, pp. 3-39, Rafael Chambouleyron, Karl Arenz and Vanice Melo. “Ruralidades indígenas na Amazônia colonial” Boletim do Museu Paraense Emílio Goeldi, 2020, pp. 1-22, Rafael Chambouleyron, Karl Arenz, “Indiens ou Noire, libres ou esclaves: travail et métissage en Amazonie portugaise (XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles)”, Caravelle, 2016, pp. 15-29. Karl Arenz, Federic Matos. 'Fazer sair das selvas': índios e missionários na Amazônia (século XVII) Boletim Tempo Presente, UFRJ, 2015, pp. 1-24, Karl Arenz, “Além das doutrinas e rotinas: índios e missionários nos aldeamentos jesuíticos da Amazônia portuguesa (séculos XVII-XVIII)” Revista História e Cultura, 2014, pp. 63-88, Almir Carvalho Júnior, Índios Cristãos, A Conversão dos Gentios na Amazônia Portuguesa (1653-1769) Doctorate in History, Universidade Estadual de Campinas, 2005. Márcia Eliane Mello, Fé e Império. As Juntas das Missões nas conquistas portuguesas, Manaus, 2009; André Luís Ferreira, “Nas malhas das liberdades: o Tribunal da Junta das Missões e o governo dos índios na Capitania do Maranhão (1720-1757)” Master's thesis, Universidade Federal do Pará, 2017; Patricia Sampaio, ‘"Vossa Excelência mandará o que for servido...": políticas indígenas e indigenistas na Amazônia Portuguesa do final do século XVIII’. Tempo, 2007, pp. 39-55; Rafael Rocha, “Os aruã: políticas indígenas e políticas indigenistas na Amazônia Portuguesa (século XVII)”. Revista Brasileira de História & Ciências Sociais, 2018, pp. 72-93, among others.
Indigenous people displaced from their home communities to the so-called aldeamentos worked part time for their own maintenance and part time at the service residents, missionaries or public works for a salary stipulated by law and administered by local religious and native authorities. See Camila Loureiro Dias, “Os índios, a Amazônia e os conceitos de escravidão e liberdade”. Estudos avançados, Dez. 2019, v. 33, n. 97, p. 240. In the aldeias (indigenous villages), the regular clergy was responsible for the spiritual and earthly administration of the majority of the indigenous population, in accordance with several provisions established by the Portuguese Crown. On the subject, see Almir Carvalho Júnior, Índios Cristãos, Campinas, 2005.
See Jaime Ricardo Gouveia. Ubi Societas Ibi Ius. Os indígenas nos auditórios eclesiásticos do espaço luso-americano in Os Indígenas e as Justiças no Mundo Ibero-Americano (sécs. XVI-XIX) ed Ângela Domingues, Maria Leônia Chaves de Resende and Pedro Cardim, Lisboa, 2019, pp. 191-216.
See Maria Leônia Chaves de Resende. “Devassa da vida privada dos índios coloniais nas vilas de El Rei” Estudos Ibero-Americanos, Dezembro 2004, v. XXX, n. 2, pp. 49-66.
See Ana de Zaballa. Los indios ante los foros de justicia religiosa en la hispanoamérica virreinal (México, 2010); Jaqueline Vassallo, “Represión y castigo en la Córdoba borbónica” Anuario del Centro de Investigaciones Jurídicas y Sociales, n. 6, 2001-2002, pp. 549-558; Gerardo Lara Cisneiros. La justiça eclesiástica ordinária y los índios en la Nueva España Borbónica: balance historiográfico y prospección in Los indios ante los foros..., ed Jorge Traslosheros, Ana de Zaballa Beascochea, México, 2010.
See Jaime Gouveia, Ubi Societas Ibi Ius, 191-216.
See José Pedro Paiva, Baluartes da fé e da disciplina: o enlace entre a Inquisição e os bispos em Portugal (1536-1750), Coimbra, Impressa da Universidade de Coimbra, 2011, pp. 46-54.
See Almir Carvalho Júnior, op cit, p. 78.
Ibid.
See Sebastião Monteiro da Vide, Constituições Primeiras do Arcebispado da Bahia ed Bruno Feitler and Evergton Sales Souza, São Paulo, EDUSP, 2010, pp. 249-252.
There are two boxes of manuscripts referring to the 18th century. Autos de Impedimento, Câmara Eclesiástica (Ecclesiastical Assembly) (hereinafter EA), boxes 140 e 141. APEM. Some of these processes have been analyzed by Luana Maria Leitão. Os índios e o matrimônio: o ideal tridentino e o cotidiano indígena no Maranhão colonial Graduation in History (São Luís, 2015).
See Ronaldo Vainfas. Casamento, amor e desejo no Ocidente Cristão, São Paulo, Ática, 1996.
Autos de Impedimento, EC, APEM, doc. 4537, fl sn.
Ibid, fl sn.
Ibid, fl sn.
Autos de Impedimento, EC, APEM, doc. 4597, fls 8-8 v.
Autos de Impedimento, EC, APEM, doc. 4597, fls 8-8 v.
See Vide, op.cit, p. 256.
See Pollyanna Gouveia Mendonça, “Uma questão de qualidade: Justiça Eclesiástica e clivagens sociais no Maranhão colonial” in Hierarquias, raça e mobilidade social: Portugal, Brasil e o Império colonial português, séc XVI-XVIII ed Célia Tavares and Rogério Ribas, Rio de Janeiro, 2010, pp. 15-31.
Autos de Impedimento, EC, APEM, doc. 4605, fl. 9-9v.
Ibid, fl. 7 v-8.
See Ronaldo Vainfas. Trópico dos Pecados. Moral, sexualidade e Inquisição no Brasil, Rio de Janeiro, Nova Froteira, 1999, pp. 101.
Habilitações de genere, EC, APEM, caixa 42, doc. 1544 e doc. 1564, respectively.
Habilitações de Genere, EC, APEM, doc. 1566.
Habilitações de Genere, EC, APEM, doc. 1579.
Habilitações de Genere, EC, APEM, doc. 1553, fl. s/n.
Habilitações de Genere, EC, APEM, doc. 1553, fl. s/n.
D. Manuel d Cruz governed the bishopric of Maranhão between 1738 and1745. Unlike the other bishops of Maranhão who appointed officials of the ecclesiastical government for more than one function, the government of D. Manuel da Cruz appointed a Judge of the Qualifications of Genere who exclusively performed this function, Father Filipe Camelo de Brito. See Muniz, op. cit, p 48. Kate Soares examined the qualifications of that period when analyzing the government of that bishop. See Kate Soares, “Aspectos do governo episcopal de Dom Frei Manuel da Cruz no Bispado do Maranhão,” Master in History, Niteroi, 2015.
Livro de Ordenações, Acervo Eclesiástico, APEM, n. 175 fl. s/n.
The author also offers a commentary on Marquis of Pombal's measures for the region and the growing role of African labour after the creation of the Companhia de Comércio. See Patrícia Melo Sampaio. Espelhos Partidos: etnia, legislação e desigualdade na Colônia, Manaus, EDUAM, 2011.
In the same year, 1755, another license with force of law abolished the earthly administration of regular ecclesiastics over the indigenous. The said law abolished the administrative power of the missionaries over indigenous aldeamentos (villages). See Agostinho Malheiros, A Escravidão no Brasil. ensaio histórico-jurídico-social, Petrópolis, Vozes, 1944, p. 282.
On “Black” as a synonym for slave, see Eduardo Paiva, Dar nome ao novo, 199-221 e Silvia Lara, Fragmentos setecentistas: escravidão, cultura e poder na América Portuguesa, São Paulo, Companhia das Letras, 2007, pp. 132-135.
See Antonia da Silva Mota and Maísa Faleiros da Cunha. “No âmago da africanização: pessoas negras e de cor nos mapas populacionais do Maranhão colonial (1798-1821).” Revista brasileira de estudos das populações, 2017, vol.34, n.3, pp. 465-484.
Autos e Feitos de Denúncia e Queixa, Auditório Eclesiástico (or Ecclesiastical Court, hereinafter EC) , APEM, doc. 906.
The distance in leagues from the bishopric seat mentioned from this note is based on Mappa das cidades, villas, lugares e freguezias das Capitanias do Maranhão. National Library (Rio de Janeiro), Cartography sector, ARC 023, 04, 013.
Autos e Feitos de Denúncia e Queixa, EA, APEM, doc. 923
Autos e Feitos de Denúncia e Queixa, EA, APEM, doc. 935 and doc. 935, respectively.
Autos e Feitos de Denúncia e Queixa, EA, APEM, doc. 913.
Autos e Feitos de Denúncia e Queixa, EA, APEM,, doc. 927.
André Ferreira describes the saga of Maurício and his family, all indigenous, to end Joana da Assunção's captivity. Maurício took the legal case for his family's freedom to D. José. See André Ferreira “Nas malhas das liberdades” 178-179.
Autos e Feitos de Denúncia e Queixa, EA, APEM, doc. 907, fl s/n.
Autos e Feitos de Denúncia e Queixa, EA, APEM, doc. 907, fl. s/n.
Autos e Feitos de Denúncia e Queixa, EA, APEM, doc. 907, fl. s/n.
See Charlotte de Castelanu-L’Estoile, “O ideal de uma sociedade escravista cristã: Direito canônico e matrimônio de escravos no Brasil colônia” in A Igreja no Brasil: normas e práticas durante a vigência das Constituições primeiras do arcebispado da Bahia, eds. Bruno Feitler and Evergton Salles de Souza, São Paulo, 2011, pp. 355-398.
See Titles 303, 304 and 989 of the Constitutions. On canonical doctrine and theology regarding slave marriage, see Castelanu-L’Estoile, op cit, 370-374.
Another example involving an indigenous slave appeared in the divorce records. In 1741, “Juliana, freed indigenous woman” asked for separation from her husband João, a slave of Francisco Xavier Baldez. She claimed that her husband, being a slave, was obliged by the master to go to Pará, leaving her helpless. She confessed to having to prostitute herself to survive. When João returned to São Luís, he was angry to learn what she had done and threatened to kill her with knives several times. Juliana filed for divorce alleging danger to her life the outcome of the lawsuit is unknown, but the latest piece of information is that Juliana was sent to prison following the complaint of adultery filed by her husband. Autos Cíveis de Libelo, Acervo Eclesiástico, APEM, doc. 4393.
Autos e Feitos de Denúncia e Queixa, EA, APEM, doc. 918, fl. 2.
See Eduardo Paiva, “Escravo e mestiço: do que estamos efetivamente falando?” In: De que estamos falando?Antigos conceitos e modernos anacronismos – escravidão e mestiçagens, Eduardo França Paiva, Manuel F. Fernández Chaves and Rafael M. Pérez García (orgs.), Rio de Janeiro, 2016, pp. 57-82.
Freemen and slaves were two ways of denoting indigenous workers according to how they were incorporated into society and the nature of their relationship with the person in whose possession they were. Free and slave labor coexisted and complemented each other, and did not engender opposition. See Dias, Camila Loureiro, Estudos avançados, Dez. 2019, v. 33, n. 97, p. 246.
Livro de Registro de Denúncias, Acervo Eclesiástico (Ecclesiastical collection), APEM, n 212, fl 192-195.
Ibid, fl 217 e 217 v.
Ibid, fls 221-229.
Autos e Feitos de Libelo Crime, EA, APEM, doc. 4234.
Autos e Feitos de Libelo Crime, EA, APEM, doc 4228.
Autos e Feitos de Libelo Crime, EA, APEM, doc. 4261, fl. 6 e 9.
Feitos Crimes de Apresentação, EA, APEM, doc. 4679, fl 18, 18 v e 56v, respectively. There are other examples of the issue of quality as social divides in the Ecclesiastical Court of Maranhão. See Muniz, op. cit., p. 111-124.
Autos e Feitos de Libelo Crime, EA, APEM, doc. 4259, fl 32 v e 20, respectivamente.
Papal bull Sublimes Deus. https://web.archive.org/web/20171227123459/https://www.nthurston.k12.wa.us/cms/lib/WA01001371/Centricity/Domain/747/SublimisDeusPopePaulIII.pdf.
See Frei Bartolomeu de Las Casas. Único modo de atrair todos os povos à verdadeira religião.Translation Noelia Gigli, Hélio Lucas, São Paulo, Paulus, 2005.
See Carvalho Júnior, Índios cristãos 6.
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Gouveia Mendonça Muniz, P. (2022). The Church and Justice: Indians, Blacks and mixed-race before the instances of episcopal power in eighteenth century in Maranhão. Historia, 1(55), 171–194. https://doi.org/10.4067/S0717-71942022000100171
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