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tury Brazilian revolts could be found wearing medals with Dessaline, the revolutionary
governor of Saint Domingue, around their necks, and the revolution in Saint Domingue
seemed to trigger the “Tailors' Revolt” in Bahia. Radical revolutionary proselytizers
wandered through the Contestado, and there was general landowner anxiety about slave
may have been in the Amazon itself, and in the “almost” revolution of the Cabanagem
(1835-40), an uprising that resulted in the death of about a fifth of the Amazon popula-
tion, in which rebels did take hold of the state apparatus, echoing, albeit abortively, the
decolonial movements of the Haitian revolutionary Toussaint and those of Bolívar else-
where in South America.
The Cabanagem Uprising
The Cabanagem revolt reflected schisms within elites who were positioned uneasily
above a vast laboring class of detribalized Indians, free whites, free persons of color,
Brazilian- and African-born rural and urban slaves who had plenty to be resentful about,
especially at a time when the liberation movements had already resulted in abolition in
the Spanish empire and in the Caribbean, and slave-free lands of the Cabo Norte exist-
ing just beyond Brazil's boundaries. Local Amazonian elites wanted regional presidents
(or governors) chosen from members of their society rather than some meddling deputy
selected by the recently exiled Portuguese Corte in Rio. This was an issue of particular
importance for the prideful Amazonian ruling class, since it had been a separate colony
and not an adjunct of the south until the Portuguese monarch had fled.
Local Amazonian commercial interests and resentful politicos had had considerable
independence and fomented anti-Portuguese sentiment that exploded in 1835 with the
murder of some twenty Portuguese merchants and businessmen. As happened on many
occasionsduringtheearlynineteenthcentury,whatbeganasclaimsforlocalsovereignty
bylocalgrandeessoonmorphedintodeeperrebellionsandquestsforregionalautonomy.
Many of the elite Amazonian revolutionaries changed their surnames from the Por-
tuguese to Amazonian toponyms like Tocantins, Tapajos, Marajó to make their political
alliancesandregionalidentitiesobvious.Theimperialrepresentative,cowedbytheearly
dissidence, offered amnesty to the local elite insurgents and was able to be sworn in as
governor, but the rebels soon regrouped and took over the city of Belém.
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Within this rivalry between traditional powers and governors selected by the crown,
therewereinevitably,giventhezeitgeist,callsfortheabolitionofslavery.Astherebelli-
onmoveddowntheranks,intothestreets,anduptherivers,increasinglytherewerecalls
Marajó, the great island ranching economy, was captured by its slaves. As insurgency
expanded out from Belém and into Amazonian tributaries, not only were scores being
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