A Visit to the City of Black Gold-BY AWAKE! WRITER IN BRAZIL

Black Gold Turns Red

Between 1700 and 1820, prospectors mined 1,200 tons of gold-80 percent of the gold produced worldwide during that time.  But where did all that gold go?  Mined gold was cast into bars at the Casa dos Contos, or House of Coinage. After that, one fifth of the gold, the levied tax, ended up in the treasure chest of Portugal's royal family.  

The colonists opposed the tax. One of them was Felipe dos Santos, who roused miners, military men, and church members against the Portuguese Crown.  But the Portuguese fought back. In 1720, dos Santos was hanged and his body was dragged through the streets by horses.  The miners went back to the pits, and the taxes continued to rise.

However, this was only a temporary stop to rebellion.Later in the same century came Joaquin da Silva Xavier, nicknamed Tiradentes, meaning "tooth puller"-a reference to one of his jobs. He was among a group of poets, jurists, and military men of Ouro Preto who met regularly in the house of Toledo, a priest. At first, the conversations were mostly philosophical banter, but then they switched to the politics of those days.  Later their conversations turned rebellious when the group discussed, in whispered tones, the suffocating demands of the Portuguese Crown.  Portugal's queen, Dona Maria I,  had warned that rebels would be beheaded. Nevertheless, in 1788, Tiradentes, then a military ensign, took the lead in the Inconfidencia Mineria, or the Rebellion of the State of Minas Gerais. 

A spy disclosed the names of the conspirators. One by one, they were arrested and exiled to Africa to die. Tiradentes languished in a humid prison cell in Rio de Janeiro until he was hanged and beheaded on April 21, 1792. Tiradente's head was displayed on a post in Ouro Preto city square, and his quartered limbs were staked along several roads . For the time being, this discouraged any potential rebels. But three decades later, in 1822, Brazil gained its independence from Portugal. 

Next time: A Visit to the City of Black Gold-AS TOLD BY AWAKE! WRITER IN BRAZIL/Treasures of Art, History, and Religion

From the Awake! magazine