HAHR 81.

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Comments, Criticism, and Debate

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A New Interpretation of Contraband Trade

Ernst Pijning

Under the pressure of a Napoleonic invasion in 1807, the Portuguese court

took the unprecedented step of moving from Lisbon to Rio de Janeiro. With
this transfer, a European country was ruled from its overseas colony for the
first time. Upon arrival in 1808, one of the first measures of the Prince Regent
was to open all Brazilian ports to direct trade from Europe, without first hav-
ing to pass through the now occupied port of Lisbon. As a result, the political
and economic heart of the Portuguese empire moved to Rio de Janeiro and
Lisbon lost its monopolistic position as an intermediary in the Brazil trade.
In the November 2000 issue of the HAHR, Portuguese historian Jorge M.
Pedreira and Brazilian historian José Jobson de Andrade Arruda debated anew
their differences concerning the meaning of this transfer.1 Both relied heavily
on the balances of trade between Brazil and Portugal to gather data, but they
arrived at opposite conclusions: Pedreira argues that there was a continuity in
Luso-Brazilian trading relations, but Arruda stresses a breach. Part of their
debate disputes the existence of illegal trade in Brazilian waters, and both
authors have found inspiration in my dissertation for their lines of argument.2
Both Arruda and Pedreira rely heavily on quantitative material, that is,

Section photo: Tapuya warrior. Photograph courtesy of Stuart B. Schwartz.

I would like to thank Bethany Andreasen, Joseph Jastrzembski, Wim Klooster, Daniel
Ringrose, A. J. R. Russell-Wood, and ShaunAnne Taugney for their comments and
suggestions.
1. Jorge M. Pedreira, “From Growth to Collapse: Portugal, Brazil, and the
Breakdown of the Old Colonial System (1760 –1830),” HAHR 80 (2000); idem, Estructura
industrial e mercado colonial: Portugal e Brasil (1780 –1830) (Lisbon: Difel, 1994). José Jobson
de Andrade Arruda, “Decadence or Crisis in the Luso-Brazilian Empire: A New Model for
Colonization in the Eighteenth Century,” HAHR 80; and idem, O Brasil no comércio colonial
(São Paulo: Ática, 1980).
2. Arruda, “O sentido da colônia: Revisitando a crise do antigo sistema colonial no
Brasil (1780 –1830),” in História de Portugal, ed. José Tengarrinha (Bauru, SP: EDUSC,
2000), 183 n. 34; and Pedreira, “From Growth to Collapse,” 855 – 58.

Hispanic American Historical Review 81:3 – 4

Copyright 2001 by Duke University Press
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734 HAHR / August and November / Pijning

statistical data. My dissertation, however, demonstrates the significance of a

qualitative approach to illegal trade, especially through the analysis of local
reports.3 My research not only showed “how much” illegal trade took place
but also “how” contrabandists traded. Thus, in my opinion, the debate should
focus more on the nature of authority over commercial transactions, not on
the quantity of contraband goods. The authority of colonial administrators to
regulate illegal trade is a vital indicator of the motherland’s grip on its colony.
To comprehend the concept of authority over illegal commerce, it is
essential to understand the meaning of the term “contraband trade” and the
circumstances under which it took place. “Contraband” literally means against
the law (contra = against; bando = law).4 Contraband trade thus encompassed all
illegal commercial activities, including trading with foreigners, trade in forbid-
den goods, or underpayment of taxes on goods. Yet some forms of contraband
trade were more illegal than others. Because illegal trade was inevitable in
some commodities, it was less likely to be condemned by the colonial adminis-
trators. It is therefore not enough to measure illegal trade; we need to under-
stand who had control over these transactions. Thus we need to examine the
local circumstances in Rio de Janeiro and its environs more closely.
Rio de Janeiro had become the major Brazilian port of transit by the end
of the eighteenth century. Carioca merchants conducted trade with Africa,
Asia, Europe, Rio de la Plata, and gold mining districts in the Brazilian inte-
rior. Trading connections between Portugal and Brazil were frequent and
uninterrupted. Unlike Spanish fleets to the Americas, Portuguese fleets were
annual and they arrived and departed from Rio de Janeiro within a predictable
framework.5 Trade adequately met the demand for foreign goods, so insuffi-

3. Unless otherwise indicated, all the arguments below are based on my dissertation
“Controlling Contraband: Mentality, Economy and Society in Eighteenth-Century Rio de
Janeiro” (Ph.D. diss., Johns Hopkins Univ., 1997).
4. “Bando” literally means an expression of the royal wish that a law be implemented.
Bandos were used on the local level to make a law known. See Rafael Bluteau, Vocabulario
portuguez, e latino ... autorizado com exemplos dos melhores escritores portuguezes, e latinos ... pelo
Padre d. Rafael Bluteau, 8 vols. (Coimbra: Collegio das Artes da Companhia de Jesus,
1712 – 21).
5. One notable exception in the availability of numbers is the case of the cacao trade
from New Granada and Venezuela. Three fundamental works on this issue, with both
qualitative and quantitative analyses, are Lance Grahn, The Political Economy of Smuggling.
Regional Informal Economies in Early Bourbon New Granada (Boulder: Westview Press, 1997);
Wim Klooster, Illicit Riches: Dutch Trade in the Caribbean, 1648 –1795 (Leiden: KITLV
Press, 1998); and Eugenio Piñero, The Town of San Felipe and the Colonial Cacao Economies,
Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, n.s., 84, pt. 3 (Philadelphia: The
American Philosophical Society, 1994).
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Toward a New Interpretation 735

ciency of European products was not a reason for contraband trade. Illegal
trade took place because it was lucrative. Given these local circumstances, it
was unlikely that the amount of illegal trade ever surpassed legal commercial
transactions in colonial Rio de Janeiro.
For most of the eighteenth century both legal and illegal trade was regu-
lated or condoned by the king’s servants. Contraband trade in foreign goods
took place in various spheres of control, depending on the degree of authority
administrators had over commercial transactions. However, once illegal trade
took place outside of the realm of an official’s jurisdiction, it was proscribed
and the contrabandists could be arrested. One such example was the gold
trade. In the most severe cases, foreign vessels anchored in a small port outside
the confines of Rio de Janeiro’s jurisdiction and exchanged untaxed gold dust
for European products. In such cases, neither did Carioca administrators have
any say in the captain and crew’s transactions nor did anyone pay the requisite
taxes on the gold. If caught, officials immediately arrested such smugglers and
put the criminals through the legal system. In the most regulated way, a pas-
senger could smuggle minted gold on board one of the fleet vessels, make full
disclosure to the captain, and pay a one percent fee for protection. In other
words, Brazilian authorities gave their consent to the smuggling of gold.
The nature of illegal trade in Rio de Janeiro changed during the eigh-
teenth century. Until the 1730s, Brazilian authorities confiscated foreign ves-
sels for conducting illegal trade outside the jurisdiction of Rio de Janeiro, and
arrested contrabandists for crimes related to the counterfeiting of gold bars. In
the 1760s, gangs engaged in contraband trade smuggled gold and diamonds on
board official fleet vessels. These practices took place with the consent of the
captain and other officials and thus fell within the confines of legal trading
networks. However, after the 1790s, it took a turn for the worse. Brazilian offi-
cials frequently mentioned that illegal trade had increased dramatically; more-
over, these officials indicated that foreign, Portuguese, and Brazilian mer-
chants conducted this outlawed commerce both within and outside the legal
frameworks.6 As legal trade grew, so too did the opportunity to engage in con-
traband trade. Because so many foreign vessels visited the port of Rio de
Janeiro and surrounding ports, officials wrote alarming letters saying that
curbing contraband trade had becoming a major problem.7 Two snapshots

6. Most of these reports can be found in the Arquivo Histórico Ultramarino [AHU]
(Lisbon), Arquivo Nacional (Rio de Janeiro), and the Biblioteca Nacional (Rio de Janeiro).
Unfortunately, Pedreira was unable to consult these archives.
7. Ernst Pijning, “Contrabando na legislação portuguesa durante o periodo colonial,”
Anais da SBPH 14 (1994): 85.
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736 HAHR / August and November / Pijning

illustrate this change between the 1760s and the 1800s. In 1768 the viceroy
virtually expelled Captain James Cook from the Rio harbor for failing to com-
ply with his orders to buy provisions from a designated intermediary. In 1801
Donald Campbell, a British admiral in Portuguese service, complained that his
own countrymen did not recognize any Portuguese jurisdiction over Brazilian
ports.8
Authority over ports was related to the opportunity for local administra-
tors to act as intermediaries in commercial transactions. In the case of Buenos
Aires in the seventeenth century, Zacharias Moutoukias has demonstrated the
importance of administrators in legal and illegal commercial activities.9 In fact,
the distinction between merchant and administrators was difficult to make.
This did not mean that officials refused to enforce the law. However, their
ability or will to do so depended on their control over commercial activities,
hence my distinction between “condoned” and “proscribed” illegal trade.
When contraband trade took place within the jurisdiction of an official, it was
condoned; whenever it was outside these boundaries, it was proscribed. Offi-
cials arrested illegal traders who transgressed this boundary. The number of
prosecutions of contrabandists was therefore an indication of the extent to
which illegal trade took place outside the realm of official control.
I agree wholeheartedly with Pedreira’s assumption that stricter enforce-
ment of royal legislation was related to the number of prosecutions.10 Indeed,
the boundaries between proscribed and condoned illegal trade shifted through-
out the century. Zealous and more honest viceroys, such as the marquis of
Lavradio (1769 –79), were able to raise the bar on what was considered pro-
scribed illegal trade.11 Regimes of “more involved” and less attentive viceroys,
such as the count of Resende (1790 –1801), achieved the opposite. In his arti-
cle, Pedreira pointed out the seeming contradiction in my dissertation that
during the 1760s more arrests occurred than in the 1790s.12 The reason was
that in the 1760s contraband trade was more controlled than it was during the
1790s. Prosecutions in the 1760s had a different meaning than arrests in the 1790s.
This is exactly why I have placed the number of prosecutions in the context of

8. Dauril Alden, Royal Government in Colonial Brazil (Berkeley: Univ. of California

Press, 1968), 409 –10; Campbell’s correspondence with the viceroy in 1801, AHU, Rio de
Janeiro, papeis avulsos, caixa 191, doc. 84.
9. Zacharias Moutoukias, “Power, Corruption, and Commerce: The Making of Local
Administrative Structure in Seventeenth-Century Buenos Aires,” HAHR 68 (1988).
10. Pedreira, “From Growth to Collapse,” 857
11. Alden, Royal Government, chap. 17.
12. Pedreira, “From Growth to Collapse,” 857 n. 35.
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Toward a New Interpretation 737

these shifting boundaries. In the 1760s officials cracked down on illegal trade
that was organized by smuggler rings who operated within the framework of
the official trading system; in the 1790s officials prosecuted contrabandists
who operated outside the realm of official control.
According to Pedreira, in the 1810s Portuguese merchants regained some
of the Brazil trade. The Portuguese historian argues that this demonstrated
that British illegal trade before 1808 could not have been as pervasive. He
finds further evidence in British and North American reports to show the
Brazilian market was small, and the marketplace was difficult to penetrate.13
While I tend to agree with Pedreira’s contentions for the period after
1808, I am not convinced that these findings can be used as evidence for
British smuggling before the legalization of direct British commerce. Neither
am I convinced that Brazilian traders lacked goods to exchange for British
contraband goods. My data lead me to arrive at very different conclusions, as
the following three examples demonstrate.14 We are very fortunate to have
one published account of Thomas Lindsey, a contrabandist off the coast of the
state of Bahia. Lindsey smuggled brazilwood and intervened in the coastal
trade.15 Another British vessel, Duke of Clarence, was caught with a cargo of
tobacco, gold, and slaves near Santos, which suggests intervention in Brazilian
South Atlantic trade.16 Other reports, such as that of the French woman Joanna
d’Entremeuse, demonstrate that smuggling along the Brazilian coast to Rio de
la Plata and Cayenne was both common and lucrative.17 British and other for-
eign suppliers had established themselves well in a country trade along the
South Atlantic coastline and traded directly with Brazilian merchants.
In 1808 a new set of regulations changed the parameters for commercial
transactions, the boundaries between condoned or proscribed illegal trade,
and the jurisdiction, authority, and hence control of colonial administrators in
the port of Rio de Janeiro. In sheer numbers, it is unlikely that contraband
trade ever surpassed legal transactions before 1808. However, increased con-

13. Ibid., 858; Henri Hill, Comércio do Brasil em 1808/A View of the Commerce of Brazil
(Salvador: Banco da Bahia, 1964).
14. Pedreira, “From Growth to Collapse,” 858. For additional evidence, see Pijning
“Controlling Contraband,” 125 – 38, 161–73.
15. Thomas Lindley, Narrative of a Voyage to Brazil (London: J. Johnson, 1805).
16. Dispatch Viceroy Dom Fernando José de Portugal to Secretary of State, Viscount
of Anadia, November 39 1803, AHU, Rio de Janeiro, papeis avulsos, caixa 219, doc. 38.
17. Maria Fernanda Baptista Bicalho, “A cidade e o império: O Rio de Janeiro na
dinâmica colonial portuguesa, séculos XVII e XVIII” (Ph.D. diss., Univ. de São Paulo,
1997), 152 – 54.
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738 HAHR / August and November / Pijning

traband trade in the decade before the opening of the Brazilian ports under-
mined the authority of royal administrators as intermediaries in commercial
transactions between British and Brazilian merchants. This situation changed
after the opening of the ports, when British and other foreign merchants were
allowed to establish themselves legally in Brazil. Setting up strong, exclusively
foreign trading networks proved to be a difficult process that changed the
nature of transnational commerce. The marketplace was, and remained, con-
trolled. Once British merchants tried to penetrate the Brazilian market with
their own networks, they competed with long-established relations both across
the Atlantic Ocean and inside Brazil. Before the opening of the ports, the
British served as suppliers of foreign goods, using the fleet system and Por-
tuguese vessels and Brazilian merchants to supply goods to Brazil. This official
commerce was controlled by local administrators and regulated by legislation.
Nevertheless, in the 1790s, Luso-Brazilian administrators had already started
to lose their authority in the ports, and this threatened their position as inter-
mediary in the supply of foreign goods. After the opening of the ports in 1808,
British merchants were allowed to supply goods freely to Brazil in British ves-
sels. However, foreign merchants were confronted with fierce opposition from
Luso-Brazilian merchants, who allied with local administrators when foreign-
ers tried to use the new liberties to participate in the internal trade of Brazil.
Thus, the opening of the ports in 1808 changed the rules for a restricted Car-
ioca market place, and this inaugurated a new era of competition in Anglo-
Luso-Brazilian commercial relationships.
Reports on contraband trade open a window on the mentalities and the
social and economic practices that defined the Portuguese Atlantic World.
Beyond the statistics of balances of trade lie the values and norms of mer-
chants, peddlers, and officials who transgressed legal codes of behavior. In this
unofficial world Brazilian administrators negotiated their authority over legal
and illegal commerce, just as foreign and Brazilian merchants negotiated their
legal and illegal access to the Carioca market place. Before the 1790s all com-
mercial transactions took place through the proper channels. At the close of
the century, the rules of trade in the Portuguese Atlantic changed so too did
the social norms and corresponding illegal and legal approaches employed by
Atlantic merchants.