Slavery and the Demographic and Economic History of Minas Gerais, Brazil, 1720–1888

This 2000 book examines the history of slavery in Minas Gerais, the largest slave-holding region in Brazil.

Laird W. Bergad (Author)

9780521652667, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 28 October 1999

336 pages, 83 b/w illus. 5 maps
22.9 x 15.2 x 2.2 cm, 0.66 kg

"This is an ambitious volume focusing on the largest of Brazil's eighteenth and nineteenth-century regional slave system...the book has two important merits: it makes recent findings on a major slave economy available in a well-written English text; and it emphasizes the importance of market forces in determining historical tendencies...Bergad has undoubtedly made a substantial contribution to our understanding of price fluctuations and of age and gender distributions." American Historical Review Feb 2002

This 2000 book examines the demographic and economic history of slavery in Minas Gerais, the single largest slave-holding region in Brazil, from its settlement in the early eighteenth century until the abolition of Brazilian slavery in 1888. It utilizes the largest database ever assembled on a slave population in the Americas to reconstruct and analyse the unique history of slave labour in Minas Gerais. This slave population was remarkable in its ability to diversify economically as well as in increasing through natural reproduction, rather than through importation via the trans-atlantic slave trade. Minas Gerais therefore invites comparison with the patterns of slave reproduction found in the United States' South, heretofore considered unique. Extensively researched and finely documented, this book places the history of a unique Brazilian slave community into comparative perspective.

List of illustrations
List of tables
Preface
Acknowledgments
Maps
1. The mining-driven economy and its demise: from settlement to 1808
2. Economic transformations, 1808–88
3. Demographic rhythms from settlement to the census of 1872
4. Demographic aspects of slavery, 1720–1888
5. Economic aspects of slavery, 1720–1888
6. Conclusions
Appendixes
Glossary
Bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: Cultural studies [JFC], History of the Americas [HBJK]