Terras de santo, terras de herdeiro e terras de preto: territorialidade negra e arqueologia nas comunidades quilombolas de Araçatiba, Jacarandá e Mucambo (ES)

Abstract

This research was the result of a project carried out since 2011, with the quilombola community of Araçatiba, Viana, in Espírito Santo. Throughout the research, the documents raised and the field work pointed to a sugnificant presence of material culture from the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries. In the 19th century, Araçatiba came to be considered one of the largest farms on the Brazilian coast. This property stood out as one of the largest slave units in Espírito Santo lands. In its territory, between the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, three quilombola communities developed. In this sense, this research intended to analyze, through historical, archaeological and ethnographic data, the process of formation of the quilombola communities os Araçatiba, Jacarandá and Mucambo. This analysis was guised by historical archeology, especially in the theme of archeology of the African diaspora. Seeking to understand the relationship between the so-called spaces of slave autonomy, with the formation of a local black territoriality. These communities originate from the so-called “common use lands”, such as terra de santo, terra de heir and terra de preto. The methodological contribution was based on prosopography, landscape archeology and ethnography. The first was necessary due to the scarcity of documents that present the constitution and daily life of enslaved communities in this territory, between the 18th and 19 th centuries. The second aimed to understand whether it is possible to identify in the construction of the social landscape of these communities, a relationship with spaces of slave autonomy, elaborated between captives, freedmen, free and masters, still within the rigid structure of slavery. Finally, the ethnography helps to understand what is the current relationship between these three quilombola communities with the landscape and the archaeological heritage constituted in this territory, between the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries.