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Canudos
KNOWLEDGE OF Canudos
Canudos was a town founded in the Bahia state of northeastern Brazil in 1893 by Antônio Vicente Mendes Maciel, an itinerant preacher who had been wandering through the backroads and lesser-inhabited areas of the country from the 1870s onwards, followed by a band of loyal supporters. As his following swelled, he took on the name Antonio Conselheiro (The Counselor) and increasingly began to trouble the local authorities, who saw him as a rival to their legitimacy.
In 1893, following a protest over taxation and a violent mellee with the police forces in Masseté, Conselheiro and his band settled on an abandoned farm called Canudos, so called because a plant, canudo-de-pita (scientific name Ipomoea carnea, its popular name referring to its hollow tubes, used for manufacturing smoking pipes) was common in the region. The place was named Bello Monte (Beautiful Mount) by Antonio Conselheiro, but the old name, Arraial de Canudos, prevailed. Over the years people from across Bahia, including landless farmers, former slaves and indigenous people, flocked to join him, and within a few years the fledgling settlement numbered 30,000 people.
The local and national government were none too pleased about this situation and, pressured by the British (who were concerned about their economic investments in Brazil) decided to intervene. The first three invasions were amply defeated by the villagers. However, in 1897, a fourth - and considerably huge - invasion force managed to overwhelm the village. Their success was in part helped by the death, from dysentery, of Antonio Conselheiro, during the early stages of the siege. The Brazilian army showed no mercy, brutally massacring the survivors and destroying the entire village. A Medicine academician, Alvim Horcades, would thus describe the massacre:
"Eu vi e assisti a sacrificar-se todos aqueles miseráveis (...) e com sinceridade o digo: em Canudos foram degolados quase todos os prisioneiros (...) Arrancar-se a vida a uma criancinha (...) é o maior dos barbarismos e dos crimes que o homem pode praticar".
Translation: "I saw and watched the sacrifice of all those miserable (...) and I say it sincerely: in Canudos almost all the prisoners were beheaded (...) To take the life of a little child (...) is the greatest of cruelties and crimes man can put into practice."
Today the area is submerged by water, the result of a 1970s dam project, which, by overswelling the Vaza-Barris river, flooded the old city, creating the Cocorobó Dam. At low water the ruins of the church that was once the village's centrepiece can occasionally be seen. Once a year, in October, a mass is held to commemorate the those lost in what is known today as the War of Canudos. The municipality of Nova Canudos was built nearby, at latitude 09º53'48" South and longitude 39º01'35" West, currently having around 13,000 inhabitants.
The story of Canudos was magistrally told by a war correspondent who later became one of the most important writers in Brazil, Euclides da Cunha, and also, in romance form, in a book by Mario Vargas Llosa.
In 1893, following a protest over taxation and a violent mellee with the police forces in Masseté, Conselheiro and his band settled on an abandoned farm called Canudos, so called because a plant, canudo-de-pita (scientific name Ipomoea carnea, its popular name referring to its hollow tubes, used for manufacturing smoking pipes) was common in the region. The place was named Bello Monte (Beautiful Mount) by Antonio Conselheiro, but the old name, Arraial de Canudos, prevailed. Over the years people from across Bahia, including landless farmers, former slaves and indigenous people, flocked to join him, and within a few years the fledgling settlement numbered 30,000 people.
The local and national government were none too pleased about this situation and, pressured by the British (who were concerned about their economic investments in Brazil) decided to intervene. The first three invasions were amply defeated by the villagers. However, in 1897, a fourth - and considerably huge - invasion force managed to overwhelm the village. Their success was in part helped by the death, from dysentery, of Antonio Conselheiro, during the early stages of the siege. The Brazilian army showed no mercy, brutally massacring the survivors and destroying the entire village. A Medicine academician, Alvim Horcades, would thus describe the massacre:
"Eu vi e assisti a sacrificar-se todos aqueles miseráveis (...) e com sinceridade o digo: em Canudos foram degolados quase todos os prisioneiros (...) Arrancar-se a vida a uma criancinha (...) é o maior dos barbarismos e dos crimes que o homem pode praticar".
Translation: "I saw and watched the sacrifice of all those miserable (...) and I say it sincerely: in Canudos almost all the prisoners were beheaded (...) To take the life of a little child (...) is the greatest of cruelties and crimes man can put into practice."
Today the area is submerged by water, the result of a 1970s dam project, which, by overswelling the Vaza-Barris river, flooded the old city, creating the Cocorobó Dam. At low water the ruins of the church that was once the village's centrepiece can occasionally be seen. Once a year, in October, a mass is held to commemorate the those lost in what is known today as the War of Canudos. The municipality of Nova Canudos was built nearby, at latitude 09º53'48" South and longitude 39º01'35" West, currently having around 13,000 inhabitants.
The story of Canudos was magistrally told by a war correspondent who later became one of the most important writers in Brazil, Euclides da Cunha, and also, in romance form, in a book by Mario Vargas Llosa.
Anthony