Land, gold and captivity: the indigenous village’s of the Guarulhos occupation in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries

Abstract

This text – documental support and from the field of social history by archaeological research work of Guarulhos region (PIPAG) – analyzes the expansion and colonial occupation in the territory that would later constitute the municipality of Guarulhos. Focused on the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the research seeks to track the settlement of tenant farmers on dates and land grants and the modes of transmission of these properties among a few families. The text investigates ways of processing these lands, among them agricultural, pastoral setting and especially gold mining, the latter fundamental activity in the exploration of territory and little analyzed in the historiography. Finally, the paper discusses the interactions established between the colonists and the Indians, settled in the village of Nossa Senhora da Conceição of Guarulhos and vicinity, questioning the forms of indigenous agency.