Dauril Alden

The Growth and Decline of Indigo Production in Colonial Brazil: A Study in Comparative Economic History

Not long ago an authority on dyeing observed that “in the history of the dyeing industry indigo holds a unique place by reason of its irresistible rise to supremacy among dyestuffs and its equally rapid dethronement by the modern chemical colors. …” Among the sources of this once flourishing industry, one that has never been studied adequately is that of colonial Brazil. Commercial indigo production began there in the early 1760s, but after an impressive start the industry disappeared within less than two generations. Its beginnings occurred at a time when Portugal, like other imperial powers of that era, was seeking to diversify the agriculture of her colonies so as to make them more lucrative to the mother country. A study of the industrys brief tenure in Portugals most important colony reveals some of the problems that confronted its planters, merchants, and royal officials as they attempted, with limited experience and inadequate supporting capital, to develop new sources of income during a period of keen international economic rivalry. The factors involved in the rise and decline of the Brazilian indigo industry can best be appreciated when it is examined as part of the global history of indigo production and trade between the late fifteenth and early nineteenth centuries.

Yankee Sperm Whalers in Brazilian Waters, and the Decline of the Portuguese Whale Fishery (1773-1801)

On April 28, 1774, the Boston News-Letter published at the bottom of its first page the following “extract” of a letter it had recently received from Fayal, the Azores: By a Vessel that arrived here last Month from Rio de Janeiro in the Brazils, we have accounts of a small Whaling Brig belonging to some Part of North-America, putting in there for Refreshments, but that Part of the crew were prevailed on either by fair or foul Means to enter on board a Portuguese Scow, to go on a Cruise of three Months a Whaling…. That the Brig still remained there in October last, with only the Captain and three People on board…. That the Portuguese provided themselves with Harpoons and other Necessaries, agreeable to the English Model, and were gone in Search of Spermaceti Whales, a Trade they have hitherto been entirely ignorant of, and are very desirous of acquiring some Knowledge in. All the oil they used to make in the Brazils was from the Bone Whales, and those they caught in such Abundance in open boats along the Shore that they migh[t] undersell any other Europeans if they were expert in their Business, but they never venture out of Sight of Shore.

Fruitless Trees: Portuguese Conservation and Brazil's Colonial Timber (review)

Introduction 1. The colonial landscape: timber, forests, and soils 2. Forest policy with Portuguese roots 3. Brazils timber in the Atlantic basin 4. The tropical woodsman 5. Ax, ox, and sawmill: techniques and technology 6. Cabotage and transatlantic shipping 7. Shipbuilding and tropical timber Appendixes Notes Bibliography Index.