Chica da Silva: A Brazilian Slave of the Eighteenth Century

“This book is about a mining region, in the southeast of present-day Brazil, where there were gold and diamond mines. This was a very important region in Brazil during the mining boom of the 18th century. It’s the moment when the Portuguese started colonizing Brazil more broadly, because of the discovery of gold. Women who were born in Africa and their enslaved descendants were very important in this areas and although they were not miners, they performed work in the domestic environment and also sold food and provided resources to the cities. This story matters because it shows how enslaved women in these regions had social mobility through various means. They were sometimes able to buy their own freedom. In other cases, they were freed by their owners. In the case of Chica da Silva, she was purchased by a man who became her lover and, just after he bought her, he freed her.” Read more...

The best books on The History of Brazil and Slavery

Ana Lucia Araujo, Historian