Brazil : Past & Present

By Author: Adriaan P.
Total Articles: 273
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Brazil was born 8,000 years ago with the arrival of the first indigenous people that crossed the Bering land island into Alaska, coming from the North & Central Americas. During the 16th century until the 19th century, Brazil was a colony of Portugal until September 7th, 1822 when the country declared its independency from Portugal and became a constitutional monarchy - the Empire of Brazil.

During the pre-colonial period, the Andes and the mountain ranges of Northern South America created a very sharp cultural boundary between the already settled agrarians and the semi-nomadic tribes of the east. By the time the very first European discovery, the current territory of Brazil had about 2,000 tribes and nations. The above mentioned indigenous tribes subsisted on fishing, hunting, migrant agriculture and gathering.

Portugal didn't show very much interest in Brazil until 1530 because they had huge profits through commerce made with China, Indonesia and India. During the first century after the European discovery ( April 22, 1500 by Pedro Alvares Cabral - although contested by some people ), the country's major ...
... export was brazilwood which is a large tree with a trunk that contains prized red dye and was almost extinct due to overexploitation.

The biggest downside of this period was the extremely high mortality rate among slaves in sugar and gold enterprises. More than that, there weren't as much females as needed in order to repopulate the territory. Some of the slaves managed to escape from these plantations and established independent settlements, the so-called quilombos in distant areas. The most important one was the Palmares and was a consolidated kingdom that had more than 30,000 people in the 1670-1680s.

Unfortunately, these independent settlements were destroyed by the private troops and the government during long sieges and the usage of the heavy artillery. More than that, during the first two centuries of this period, many European powers tried to occupy this territory mainly because of the vast natural resources. Many French colonists tried to occupy the nowadays called Rio de Janeiro starting from 1555 until 1567 - this was called the France Antarctique episode and the nowadays called Sao Luis starting from 1612 until 1614 - this was called the France Equinoxiale.

During the Empire of Brazil period this country was one of the only two modern states in the Americas that had its own indigenous monarchy ( the other one was Mexico ), for a period of almost 90 years. In the year 1815, the king vested the country with the dignity of a united kingdom with Algarves and Portugal.

Brazil - the Old Republic started from 1889 and lasted until 1930. During the late 19th century, coffee replaced sugar as Brazil's main export merchandise. This was a very prolific period for Brazil as the exports grew tremendous. This period ended when the military coup placed Getulio Vargas, a civilian, in the presidency. From 1930 until 1964, the country was by Getulio Dorneles Vargas ( 1930 - 1954 ). After Vargas' reign, a democratic regime prevailed until 1964 - in this period the capital of Brazil was Brasilia. After 1964 and until 1985, Brazil was ruled by a military dictatorship and after that the redemocratization period began and persists in the present.

About Author: Adriaan P. is the manager of http://www.startbrazil.com/ where visitors can find the most affordable Brazil vacation rentals.