Proibição e extração de diamantes na capitania de Mato Grosso

Abstract

The present work analyzed the prohibition, liberation and illegal extraction and extraction of diamonds in the districts of Cuiabá and Mato Grosso, from the first diamond findings to the release of the first diamond and gold extraction sites. The work seeks to give visibility to diamonds and their presence in colonial society in a territory bordering Spanish domains. In this research we point out the extraction sites of diamonds and show that even with the prohibition, there were diverse social relations and personal interests that were contrary to the orders of the Portuguese Crown. In this sense, we try to reconstruct some of the spaces used by the miners and the consequences of the presence of diamonds in the daily life of the inhabitants of the region, through existing documentation, national and regional bibliography and of the historical imagination. As an unfolding of the actions approached the policies implemented to inspect and control an illegal extraction through the wasted diamantines and after the release the policies for collecting stones. The documentary sources worked were manuscripts of century XVIII and XIX, among them crafts, letters, certificates, memories, queries, requests, notices, orders, maps and flocks, these documents are under the custody of the Ultramarine Historical Archive, the Torre do Tombo National Archive and the Public Archive of Mato Grosso.