Palmares (quilombo)

Palmares was a " Quilombo ", a settlement of escaped African slaves and free-born, founded in 1600 in the hills of the Serra da Barriga in the state of Alagoas in northeastern Brazil. The African name was presumably Angola Janga, small Angola. Palmares was an independent, self-sufficient republic. Around 1670, it consisted of ten settlements with about 20,000 inhabitants, escaped slaves and their descendants, but also native Indians. The population eventually rose to over 30,000 free African men, women and children. The first leader of Palmares was Ganga Zumba, a former slave who had escaped from a sugar cane plantation.

Palmares successfully lobbied against several military attacks by the Dutch and Portuguese colonial governments for military whose goal was the destruction of the settlement. The Maroons were determined fighter whose experience in the martial art Capoeira enabled them to fend for over twenty such attacks 1654-1678.

1655, a man was born in Palmares, which should be known as " Zumbi ". He was captured as a child by the Portuguese and enslaved, but managed to escape in 1670. Under his leadership, the residents began to fight back Palmares. They raided plantations and villages of the Portuguese and freed the slaves used there. Finally Zumbi Ganga Zumba superseded as leader of the settlement.

1694 translated the Portuguese at the decisive blow against Palmares, where they attacked from three sides at once. The settlement was destroyed, the surviving inhabitants were enslaved again, if they could not escape. Zumbi initially managed to escape, but he was betrayed and executed on November 20, 1695.

Excavations at Serra da Barriga showed a predominantly African material culture with Indian and European elements. Today Serra da Barriga is a national monument.