Changing Perceptions of Social Deviance: Gypsies in Early Modern Portugal and Brazil

Author(s): Bill M. Donovan

Source: Journal of Social History , Autumn, 1992, Vol. 26, No. 1 (Autumn, 1992), pp. 33-
53
Published by: Oxford University Press

Stable URL: http://www.jstor.com/stable/3788811

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 CHANGING PERCEPTIONS OF SOCIAL DEVIANCE:
GYPSIES IN EARLY MODERN PORTUGAL AND BRAZIL

By Bill M. Donovan Loyola College in Maryland

Gypsies assume particular significance in the study of his

and local officials have persecuted them as much for thei
identity as for their alleged deviant behavior from their
pearance in Western Europe to present times. Authorities
modem era repressed gypsies, but perhaps the most sever
in Portugal where the crown attempted to systematically
gypsy (cigano) families to overseas colonies in Africa and
This essay argues that colonial Brazil's social and econom
Portuguese categorizations of gypsies as social deviants. l
to be fundamentally altered in the colony as African slav
Luso-Brazilian society's most marginalized and most dang
cal considerations in the later eighteenth century furthe
of deviancy as ethnic distinctions became secondary to ra
ining why gypsies were considered deviant sheds valuable
underlying their marginalized place in early modern Eur
examining the degree to which their social role changed w
the New World provides insight into the larger realm of
in colonial Brazil.
Ancien regime authorities classified a substantial segme
society as deviant individuals and groups whose behavior
gerous or antisocial. Thieves, murderers, prostitutes, vag
sense, the poor and inarticulate formed the ranks of soci
were invariably included in such official categories of soc
sirables. Yet unlike those who were marginalized by accid
many of the able bodied poor for example, civil and relig
liberately cast gypsies as threats to the larger social orde
derived not from their numbers which never approached
sand in all of Europe but what their autonomy popularly
modem society.
Illiterate, and culturally marginal to the mainstream of Eu
sies have remained part of the historically inarticulate and
history is found through discriminatory laws.3 Anti-gyps
goes back to Henry VIII. The 1530 "Egyptians Act" banned
'Egipcions' and ordered all those in England to leave the c
acts in the reigns of Mary Tudor and Elizabeth I went so f
punishment for gypsy immigrants found in the country
As late as 1743, the Justices Commitment Act stipulated
tending to be Gypsies, or wandering in the habit and form
tending to tell fortunes were to be dealt with as rogues an
anti-gypsy laws were found in Spain and France. Beginni

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34 journal of social history fall 1992

ordering their arrest and banishment, subsequent Spanish gypsy laws became
increasingly harsh. By 1705 gitanos were considered "public bandits" whom legal
officials could even apprehend in churches of refuge.5 In France, religious com-
pEaints about gypsies date from the early fifteenth century. French laws evolved
from simple banishment, such as the first official gypsy law of 1539, to more ex-
treme measures during Louis XIV's reign which included perpetual sentences in
the royal galleys.6 During the seventeenth century, Amsterdam developed Eu-
rope's most liberal social environment, as evidenced in part by itS large reigee
community of Iberian Jews. Yet even the Dutch stigmatized gypsies as pariahs.
Forbidden to reside in Amsterdam proper, they were oficially banished from
Holland altogether after 1695. Any gypsies caught thereafter were sentenced to
a public whipping on the first instance, branding the second time, and to public
execution on the third discovery. Dutch repression against gypsies increased in
the eighteenth century and even included individual gypsies who were gainfully
employed.7
The chronology of Portuguese anti-gypsy legislation demonstrates a visible
evolution in community wide attitudes toward them. Early sixteenth-century
anti-gypsy laws were aimed at preventing gypsy migration from Spain. Ciganos
residing in Portugal were simply expelled without corporal punishment or incar-
ceration.8 But in the late 1570's royal decrees began mandating severe punish-
ments for gypsies caught inside the Portuguese border. Men were sentenced to
the galleys. Families with women and children were banished to the colonies.
By the century's end, when the two Iberian crowns were united under Spain's
Philip II, ciganos found in "wandering groups or bandst' were punished by death
"without recourse or appeal".9
Although Philip's draconian measures ultimately failed to stop groups of gyp-
sies from crossing into and wandering through Portugal, the change from simple
expulsion to capital punishment necessitates some explanation. In the main,
Portuguese official attitudes toward ciganos reflected changes in popular atti-
tudes. Great anxiety existed throughout the early modem era about the size and
productivity of Portugal's population. The kingdom was popularly believed to be
underpopulated, an assumption which hatched various schemes for improving
the "arts of the reign" by enlisting peasants and the urban laborirlg class to work
harder with greater efficiency.l° Ciganos, identified as rootless even when they
lived in small communities, were in no way considered to lead socially or eco-
nomically productive lives. Their entire existence lacked an orderly relation to
Portugal's cultural center. Caste status and deviancy were conferred upon ciganos
since they could not otherwise be classified into the existing social stalcture.l 1
The Catholic Church was the institution most intimately concemed with
defining and maintaining Portugal's moral boundaries. It was from the Church
that some of the earliest censure of ciganos originated. Religious authorities
raised theological and functional opposition against gypsies. At the core of its
theological opposition was the belief that Christian society had been divinely
ordained into a well defined hierarchy. Not only did gypsies lack a clear place
within that hierarchy, they were aliens whom God had deliberately cast out-
side it. Padre Rafael Bluteau, author of Portugal's first dictionary, (1702-12)
defined gypsies as a nomadic non-Christian people, "coming from the Egyptian
nations, and obliged to wander through the world, without an abode or permaS

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CHANGING PERCEPTIONS OF SOCIAL DEVIANCE
35

nent dwelling, as the descendants of those people who refused to give the Christ
child shelter when he was with the holy Virgin.''12
In functional terms, gypsy customs of not employing Catholic practices in
marrying or baptizing their children openly challenged the Church's moral and
social authority. Such non compliance earned ciganos the lasting enmity of reli-
gious ofEcials as well as reinforcing their image as spiritual and community aliens.
It is with this background that religious complaints of gypsy sorcery should be
viewed. Although cigano "sorcery" consisted of little more than fortune telling,
Catholic authorities, particularly in the post-Tridentine context of discipline
from above, played upon popular superstitions to further brand them as threats
to the community's social and moral order.l3
The crown's interest in social stability coincided with complaints by religious
officials against ciganos. As the dominant ideology defending the state, Catholi-
cism formed a fundamental pillar of royal absolutism. Any defiance of Church
practices was by extension a challenge to the crown's governing authority. That
coalescence of religious and secular authority accounts for the harsh punish-
ments found in anti-gypsy laws. Gypsies' very existence was a sin against the
Church and a threat to their monopoly of moral authority. Their existence was
a crime against the state because one of the Church's primary functions was to
teach moral obedience to the crown. Capital punishment and exile were justified
to carry out God's law and the crown's duty to maintain society's moral safety.
Far more mundane motives sustained the popular antipathy toward gyp-
sies. Popular attitudes associated ciganos with poverty and criminality. While
poverty was accepted as a natural element of early modern society, a careful
distinction was yet made between resident poor and outsiders. Outsiders were
viewed as unworthy of assistance, and indeed, as a nuisance to local agencies and
individuals.14 Gypsies, by their language and dress, formed the most recognizable
element of that wandering poor. Lacking any effective police protection, farmers
and settlers in isolated rural settlements felt themselves particularly vulnerable
to wandering cigano bands. A 1686 decree gave voice to those fears, complain-
ing "armed bands of ciganos were wandering the countryside to better commit
their assaults.''15
An aura of presumed guilt nevertheless rings in many of these criminal com-
plaints. The simple fact of being a cigano, or part of a passing cigano band, cre-
ated sufficient grounds for local suspicion. One complaint typifying that popular
mentality found the petitioners admitting, "they did not know specifically which
ciganos stole livestock and other things, but the neighborhood people were scan-
dalized after hearing of the thefts which they knew gypsies had committed.''16
Social deviancy's racial component made it difficult for ciganos to escape
pariah status. Biological causes stigmatized gypsies as intrinsically criminal. Pu-
rity of blood laws, which also discriminated against new-Christians and other
minorities, created a formidable impediment against assimilation into the greater
population. Individual gypsies that had settled down and outwardly integrated
through their dress, behavior, and language, nevertheless confronted wider rang-
ing discriminatory legislation prohibiting anyone with "unclean blood" from
entrance to universities, military orders, and certain professions. Assimilation
through marriage was hindered since children and even grand-children from
such unions had to confront the same discrimination.

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36 journal of social history fall 1992

Private attitudes not surprisingly reflected public opinion. EighteenthScentury

Lisbon businessman Francisco Pinheiro serves as a representative case. Pinheiro
left over a hundred dowries in his estate for distribution to "poor girls of good
virtue" living in three rural villages where ciganos were known to frequent.
Among the stipulations in his bequest was that none of the recipients be of
mixed gypsy blood, or marry anyone so tainted.l7
Behavioral criteria of deviancy created further problems for gypsies by catego-
rizing their traditions as anti-social. In the vocabulary of the era, "their lives and
customs made them a people so hateful and prejudicial" to Portuguese society.
Cigano customs like wearing hair in long braids (shared by men and women
alike) were in themselves not criminal, but they stereotyped ciganos as alien.
Church and civil authorities attacked such behavior as "scandalous." Anti-gypsy
statutes invariably attempted to ban their language, or teaching it to their chil-
dren, and prohibited "wearing cigano clothing" or engaging in "gypsy gambling
or horse racing.''18
Gambling, horse racing, and unlicensed begging were not of course, exclusive
to gypsies. Authorities recognized that migrarlts and other poor joined cigano
bands. Yet laws distinguished between itinerants and true gypsies, applied to
anyone who expressed "the same gypsy habits and lifestyles.''l9 Anti-cigano
legislation and the full constellation of behavioral and cultural characteristics
associated with ciganos brought special attention to them.
Portugal's War of Restoration ( 1640-1668) formed the only extended period
in the seventeenth century in which social barriers were relaxed. In his despera-
tion for military aid, Joao IV(1640-1656) granted citizenship to gypsies enlisting
in his army. More than two hundred and fifty gypsies fought for the new king
"with much appreciated zeal and valor." Their itinerant horse-centered lifestyle
made gypsies excellent cavalry, particularly well suited for campaigns in the dan-
gerous frontier area. Indeed the bravery of a cigano rlamed Jeronimo da Costa
produced an extraordinary about face from traditionally anti-gypsy officials. In
1646 crown attorney Tome Pinheiro de Veiga petitioned Joao IV on behalf of
da Costa's widow. The petition noted "before his brave death at the Battle of
Montijo [16441," Seronimo da Costa had served the Portuguese cause for three
years supplying "his own horse and arms, without any salary whatsoever". Veiga
protested the miserly reward of artisan status citizenship given tO da Costa's son.
"This poor cigano, who served so valorously before dying, while so many others
fled the battle," Veiga wrote, "deserved to be granted citizenship and knighthood
(cavaleiro fidalgo)."20
Persecution against all ethnic minorities renewed after the war's end and
the death of Joao IV. Ciganos, together with new-Christians, became preferred
targets. But, unlike new-Christians, the ciganos' anomaly stemmed from the
character of Inquisitional activity. The Inquisition was an organization whose
operating revenues came from property confiscations. Most ciganos belonged to
the wandering poor and hence did not make appealing targets. The handful of
gypsies prosecuted by the Inquisition were caught in cities for relatively minor
charges such as fortune telling.21
As a result, social control of gypsies remained largely in secular hands. Despite
repeated efforts neither local officials nor crown officials effectively prevented
ciganos from multiplying. How many gypsies lived in seventeenth-century Por-

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CHANGING PERCEPTIONS OF SOCIAL DEVIANCE 37

tugal is dihScult to estimate, since they, and the itinerant poor in general, largely
avoided demographic registration. Data from early modern Spain suggest gypsies
formed less than one percent of the general population. For mid seventeenth
century Portugal, this would amount to approximately ten to twenty thousand
individuals. Yet ciganos' social impact far outweighed the importance of actual
numbers. Even before the Restoration a growing number of sedentary gypsies
reportedly encamped on the outskirts of towns. By mid-century local authorities
complained of ever larger gypsy bands. Their appearance sparked attempts to ban
them from urban areas. A 1641 decree, for example, prohibited ciganos from liv-
ing within five leagues of Lisbon. Anyone discovered, "giving or renting houses
to gypsies [was] liable to three years banishment in Africa as punishment."22
In Portugal complaints against gypsies multiplied during the last decades of
the seventeenth century. To the traditional list of petty offenses were added
serious crimes such as murder and assault. Such complaints indicated not so
much an increase in gypsy criminality per se, but reflected more generalized
conditions in post-Restoration society. Portugal's lengthy post-war depression
created greater competition for diminishing charitable resources. Even during
the best of economic times ciganos led difficult lives. Like other members of
the early modern poor, especially the itinerant poor, daily existence was highly
precarious, almost totally directed toward simple survival. Economic downswings
tended to harden public attitudes toward the poor. As traditional charity became
overwhelmed by the demands placed upon it, those attitudes turned hostile and
frequently to violence against those identified as vagabonds.23
Moreover, the war and its aftermath raised the level of violence in Portuguese
society. Many young men became accustomed to using force during the almost
thirty-year struggle for independence. The post-war return to normalcy elevated
public authorities' sensitivity to disorderliness and violence. Lisbon officials, for
example, became increasingly outspoken about the lack of public security. Not
surprisingly, "the vices and bad habits" of a small, but rapidly growing, community
of ciganos living in the outlying parish of Sao Sebastiao de Pedreira were viewed
as a chief source for the disturbances.24
In rural areas the potential for violence was still greater. Preventive policing
was virtually non-existent for the early modern period. There is no evidence
that local militias or military troops had the competence or the support from
rural citizens to deal effectively with marauding criminal bands. In fairness,
however, the same held true for other European countries. Social networks in
rural areas throughout Europe made punishment of criminal or deviant acts a
highly selective process. Demands for punishment were greater for strangers,
particularly poor offenders, than for established local residents who committed
crimes.

Given these circumstances, ciganos presented an obvious and non-

controversial target for social control and criminal punishment. In a period
of acute economic distress and social tension they served as a point of congru-
ence for what one historian has termed the "two concepts of order". One of
those concepts derived from the state's fundamental goal for seeking, "a pattern
of authority and ultimate scheme of values" that eliminated the possibility of
rebellion or widespread social conflict. Toward that end the state worked with
religious authorities to ensure that social morality coincided with individual self

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38 journal of social history fall 1992

restraint. The other concept derived from local concerns which more narrowly
focused on avoiding community discord while maintaining traditional prerog-
atives of local authority. Frequently, the two concepts conflicted over social
control and criminality.26
It was no coincidence that the two groups most singled out for repression
during the late Restoration were "New Christians" (individuals who possessed
one or more Jewish ancestors) and gypsies. The two groups represented opposite
ends of the same social spectrum. New Christians were popularly stigmatized
as rich merchants. In their public lives they allegedly harmed Old Christian
society through suspect business practices, such as the efEciency they showed
as tax collectors, while in their private lives they harmed Old Christian soci-
ety by allegedly maintaining their ancestors' Jewish faith. Hence they became
a popular and, often, financially lucrative target for the Inquisition.27 While
little distinguished New Christians from the rest of Portuguese society, language
and dress made gypsies conspicuous. Moreover, unlike New Christians, who had
some powerful champions, ciganos' general poverty, religious unorthodoxy, and
peripatetic life style left them with few advocates. Civil and religious officials
viewed gypsies as socially disruptive on the local and national level. Their re-
pression allowed the post-Restoration state to accommodate its vision of social
control with local concerns about law and order.
Royal officials acted on local complaints by revoking citizenship and residency
privileges. Yet even with local help crown officials were hard put to effectively
repress the gypsies. A resourceful gypsy network had developed that enabled
them to maintain their communities on the margins of Portuguese society and
in the face of increasing hostility. The frequency with which anti-gypsy statutes
and complaints appeared demonstrate their ineffectiveness. A 1708 edict openly
admitted, "experience has demonstrated the royal ordinances, various orders, and
other subsequent laws that in different times have been passed against ciganos
have not been enforced, and hence they remain in this country."28 Without
an extraordinary impulse, anti-gypsy laws would have remained indifferently
enforced.
In 1706 that impulse arrived with ascension of Joao V to the Portuguese
throne. The reasons behind Joao's animosity remain unknown, although one
contemporary claimed a bad affair of long term duration with a beautiful cigana
provoked his enmity.29 Beginning in 1718 he ordered increased efforts to rid
the kingdom of its gypsies. "Exterminating from this kingdom all gypsies for
their thefts, serious offenses, and excesses they frequently commit; I have thus
ordered the governors of the armies on the frontier that through their officers
they have ordered them [gypsies] apprehended so as to be scattered through the
separate conquests of Indis, Angola, Sao Thome, Ilha do Principe, Benguela and
Cabo Verde, Ceara, and Maranhao."30 The crown chose Ceara and Maranhao
so that they might languish far away from Brazil's mineral and agricultural areas
as well as away from as the colony's major ports of Rio de Janeiro and Salvador da
Bahia.
As a public display of his determination Joao V ordered the immediate depor-
tation of a small cigano community consisting of fifty men, forty-one women,
and forty-three children, then detained in the Limoeiro municipal jails. Their
banishment was a carefully planned proceeding befitting an act of state. Early

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CHANGING PERCEPTIONS OF SOCIAL DEVIANCE 39

modern justice was meted out in a deliberately ceremonial fashion. Oficials pub-
licized the event beforehand through word of mouth and public announcements.
In this case the embarcation of the Brazil fleet, which always drew large crowds,
provided the open stage. The sight of gypsies leaving the chains signalled to the
assembled spectators the crown's effort at social control. This and subsequent
publicized banishments unmistakably signalled that assimilation was no longer
an option for gypsies to escape their criminal status.31
Joao V failed in his efforts to eradicate gypsies from Portugal. Despite cigano
roundups, news of their activities surfaced throughout his reign. Royal persecu-
tion mainly resulted in driving gypsies away from Lisbon and other towns. Poor
roads and rugged terrain gave gypsies the opportunity to evade capture from
military detachments sent against them. In 1745 the crown again conceded the
failure of existing anti-gypsy laws and renewed its call to expel all ciganos from
the kingdom. How little that effort succeeded is evident in petitions sent by
several town councils in 1751 which complained, "ciganos infest the Alentejo,
continuing to commit thefts and scandalous insults and thus it is necessary for
his Majesty to send professional soldiers as quickly as possible to render all the
help that is necessary [for their removal]."32 But the King's actions did lead to
the establishment of cigano communities in Brazil. Reports of gypsy activity
increasingly filtered back from all parts of the colony in the decades after the
arrival of the Limoerio prisoners and subsequent cigano exiles.
While gypsy communities date from the eighteenth century, individual ciganos
and a few families had been in Brazil long before 1718. Inquisition records from
the late sixteenth century cite ciganas for blasphemy and a 1655 magistrate re-
port from Rio de Saneiro referred to local complaints about thefts by individual
gypsies of both sexes.33 Despite their inherited bias, a useful profile of early gypsy
activity in Brazil emerges from these reports. Colonists identified as gypsies in-
variably had been born in Portugal or Spain. Although most had been deported
directly from Europe, a number were originally banished to Angola and from
there had made their way to Brazil. Colonial officials complained that gypsies
and other degredados (exiled criminals) travelled with little difficulty between the
two colonies. Once in Brazil ciganos freely integrated among lower class whites.
Women found occupations such as domestic servants, men as urban laborers,
while a few enterprising gypsies assumed such non-traditional occupations as
jailers and store owners.34
In functional terms, cigano integration into seventeenth-century Brazilian
society was a consequence of demographics. No evidence exists of identifiable
gypsy groups anywhere in the colony before Joao V became king. In light of
their high level of social visibility, colonial officials would have noted any siz-
able gathering of ciganos. Given the colony's small white population, it seems
highly improbable that Brazil held more than a few hundred scattered ciganos.
The Dutch occupation of the Northeast (1624-54) together with the War of
Restoration (1640-68) limited the frequency of deportations to Brazil. During
those years, however, the crown continued tO deport criminals, which would
have included any captured ciganos, to other parts of the empire. Under such
circumstances maintaining group boundaries by language, marriage, and shared
tradition, proved difficult in Brazil. Although criminal records identified in-
dividual gypsies, their assimilation was evident in employment, their spoken

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40 journal of social history fall 1992

Portuguese (as opposed to Romany), and the fact that none was arrested solely
for his ethnicity or for demonstrating traditional cigano behavior.
Not all seventeenth-century gypsies arrived in Brazil as criminals. Joao Coelho
and Viuolante Femandes "came from the realm by their own free will without
having been deported." Like many colonists they left Portugal for better op-
portunities in the colony. Their daughter Tareja felt sufficiently assimilated to
voluntarily denounce other gypsies for blasphemy.35 Because Brazil's white com-
munity was itself a distinct minority, ethnic boundaries tended to blur. Slavery's
economic and political realities formed the common denominator for social
cowexistence among colonial whites. New-Christians? for example were occuS
pationally indistinguishable from old<Christians. Only in extreme instances,
such as rare Inquisition visits, did questions of ethnicity become a public prob-
lem. In the absence of culturally and ethnically identifying clothes, language,
and behavioral patterns, individual gypsies were free to integrate into the lower
classes.36

Joao V's determination to expel Portugal's gypsy population changed those

circumstances. His policy of deporting entire communitiest such as the families
transported to Bahia in 1718, made it easier for ciganos to maintain their cultural
identity. At the same time, Joao's policy frustrated attempts by colonial officials to
assimilate them into the white community. Although officials were supposed to
retransport gypsies to Maranhao, Ceara, and Angola, many managed to remain
near the ports where they first arrived in Brazil and thus became the problem
of local municipal councils. In keeping with royal policy the first large group of
gypsy exiles to Bahia were prohibited from speaking their language (a sua giria)
or teaching it to their children. Bahia's municipal council further sought to force
gypsies to remain within the city by having the women hnd work as maids or in
retail stores, and mandated cigano children be apprenticed to a trade. But those
attempts proved unsuccessful in the face of the community's rapid growth and
the lure of the gold rush.37
Within five years after Joao V's deportation orders, colonial officials actively
pursued gypsies as social deviants. Charges of thievery, engaging in contraband,
and lesser crimes were common. In 1723 the city of Olinda's municipal council
grumbled about the "elevated" number of gypsies living throughout the capS
taincy of Pernambuco, "who commit all types of crimes, principally thefts and
murders on such a large scale that they could no longer be tolerated." The coun-
cil suggested ciganos be sent to Ceara where they could render some public
service fighting Indians. But Ceara officials had their c)wn complaints of large
gypsy bands living in cattle ranches and wandering along the frontier. Ciganos
in Ceara had been involved in a number of murders and threatened local settlersf
Colonists further complained of gypsies "scandalous lifestyles that embarrassed
God and all decent people."38
Although legally prohibited from entering the mining areas, ciganos joined
the gold rush as soon as they arrived in Brazil. Dom Lourenco de Almeida,
governor of Minas Gerais ( 1721-1732 ), issued a 1723 decree ordering the arrest
of "every gypsy man and woman together with anyone in their company.?' They
were to be then deported to Angola since gypsies were "highly prejudicial to the
community as they do not live except by stealing." Yet gypsy companies increased
in the gold Xelds and some, like the band led by Joao da Costa and his three

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CHANGING PERCEPTIONS OF SOCIAL DEVIANCE 41

brothers, became notorious for counterfeiting and highway robbery. By 1730 all
gypsies were to be hunted down and if necessary "extinguished by the death
penalty (o ultimo castigo)."39 But attempts to drive gypsies out of the mining
areas failed. Brazil's frontier was too large, the terrain too rugged, and the troops
too few. Moreover, before their deportation, many ciganos had experience of a
harsh countryside, hostile population, and a fugitive existence on the Spanish
border. Such experiences enabled them to adapt to the colonial frontier more
easily than immigrant prospectors. According to civil and military authorities, a
network of gypsy informants continually frustrated attempts to capture them by
surprise. On the occasions when authorities succeeded in apprehending gypsies,
the results were often violent, resulting in dead and wounded on both sides.40
Oficials in other capitanias complicated cigano repression by evicting them from
their areas. Not surprisingly, many then headed to the mining districts. After
Brazil's Viceroy Cezar de Menezes ordered all ciganos expelled from Bahia in
1731, most made their way directly to Minas Gerais. "So many ciganos have
arrived here since last year," its governor then complained, "and the worst of
it is they trek through this backcountry introducing their wretched lifestyle
and other habits." Yet those same Minas authorities later angered officials in
neighboring Sao Paulo by expelling a company of gypsies to their territory.41
Repeated complaints about roaming bands underline a chief reason gypsies
became stigmatized as pariahs. Brazil in the gold rush era was so notoriously vio-
lent that "men killed each other like drinking a glass of water." Outlaw gangs and
poderosos do sertao (lit. powerful men of the backlands) roamed about with im-
punity making frontier and mining areas especially dangerous. Communities and
scattered settlers found themselves largely dependent upon their own resources
for police efforts. Brazil's interior roads and towns were full of itinerants: fortune
hunters, peddlers, vagabonds, fugitive slaves, and slaves sent out by their owners
for work. Because itinerants represented potential threats to the public order,
domicile stability was viewed as a key element for maintaining safety. Once
again wandering gypsies formed the most distinctive element of the real and
imagined threat such itinerants posed. In 1729, for example, Salvador's munic-
ipal council petitioned the Viceroy about "ciganos' detrimental behavior" and
the "extraordinary theft of slaves" that they were making from local citizens.42
Yet care must be taken to separate real from imagined problems. In the words
of one colonial governor, "complaints about gypsies are only made because they
are gypsies, without anyone being able to point out guilty individuals."43
Not all gypsies engaged in criminal or violent acts. Some earned their living
through legitimate means, usually involving petty trade. Horse and slave trad-
ing were two pursuits associated with ciganos. As in Portugal, many colonists
suspected gypsies "brought and sold horses as a pretext for their thievery, selling
in one place the property they sold in another." But sharp business practices,
even by non-gypsies, often became synonymous with thievery, especially in the
minds of the victims.44
Ciganos' most important role in the colonial economy lay in their participa-
tion in the slave trade. They mainly operated in the second-hand market where
capital requirements were far lower than wholesale trading. Acting as middlemen
(commissarios) between plantation owners in the interior and the owners' agents
on the coast, ciganos transported slaves and other goods throughout Brazil. By

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42 journal of social history fall 1992

the early nineteenth century foreign travelers reported that gypsies dominated
the southern inter provincial slave trade. "At the time of my voyage," reported
the French scientist St. Hilare, "it was principally the gypsies who, in Rio de
Janeiro, sold slaves second-hand, having among them some who thus hecame
quite wealthy." Travelling to Sao Paulo, he chanced upon a large band of cigano
slave traders, "all of whom appeared in good circumstancesZ they owned slaves,
and a large number of horses and pack animals.>'45
Trafficking in the interprovincial market provided gypsies with social as well
as economic benefits. Slavery was fundamental to Brazil's mining and planta-
tion economy. Despite all itS unsavory aspects, slave trading ultimately was a
utilitarian occupation suitable for lower classes. Ciganos identification with it
conferred upon them a measure of social utility absent in Portugal. From the
white majority viewpoint, slave trading formed a practical context for interac-
tion. Their domination of slavery as an institution meant the non-gypsy white
majority controlled the entire spectrum of ethnic interaction. If their utility no
longer made them pariahs, gypsies still continued to be a stigmatized minority
whose access to normal social statuses could remain restricted at the majority's
discretion. Even in their role as commissarios, for example, gypsies remained
popularly stigmatized as thieves.
On the other hand, slave trading enabled gypsies to advertise their ethnic
identity, and thus strengthened the cultural boundaries demarcating them from
the white majority.46 Brazil's dispersed internal slave market gave cigano bands
a legitimate reason to trek through the interior. The necessity, and not infre-
quently the danger, of maintaining groups of slaves for sale formed a major reason
sedentary gypsies in Bahia and Rio de Janeiro could openly maintain commuS
nities of several hundred individuals while co-residing with the majority white
population.
Slavery's role in changing gypsies' ascribed status from pariahs to an accepted
minority on the periphery of society becomes apparent when viewed in a wider
colonial context. Eighteenth-century Angola serves as the prima facie case.
While the number of gypsies deported there never reached that sent to Brazil, two
communities existed in the backlands by 1730. Surviving Angola registers, which
understate the number of deportees, list sixtySseven male and female gypsies
arriving in the colony between 1714 and 1757. In a 1731 report ciganos were
said to control the movement of blacks, ivory, and honey, from the interior. Its
author proposed they be allowed tO remain in their communities to manage the
trade.47 Their economic utility prompted Angola's crown magistrate to suggest
in 1754 that gypsies made better colonists than other migrants. In Gomes de
Avilar's view, most Portuguese whites emigrating to Angola were "in all respects
thieves." Hence he suggested that 'sMany ciganos along with their wives should
come here as they are the most resistant to this climate and have not proven to
be evil in their behavior."48
How many gypsies came to the colony from the time Joao V began actively
exiling them to the time Brazil achieved independence in 1822 is difficult to
gauge. While the Gazete de Lisboa mentions large groups of deportees, no official
lists of exile criminals have come to light. Thus the number of individuals
and families carried on the annual fleets, the bulk of those transported, remain
unknown.49 Well into the 1 780s, Portugal's colonial minister, Martinho de Melo

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CHANGING PERCEPTIONS OF SOCIAL DEVIANCE 43

e Castro, continued sending groups of four hundred ciganos to Brazil. Judging

by a 1793 letter, which complained that deporting gypsies to Brazil was neither
useful to the crown nor to Brazil, the practice continued until the century's
end.50
Also difficult to estimate is the number of gypsies who lived in late colonial
Brazil. Unfortunately, the geographic mobility and clandestine lifestyle char-
acteristic of so many ciganos absent them from eighteenth-century census and
parish records. No evidence has yet to come to light, for example, on the rate of
natural reproduction: were gypsy families in Brazil larger, smaller, or the same size
as other white or freedmen families? Numerical descriptions of eighteenth and
early nineteenth-century Brazil ciganos all drive from impressionistic estimates.
The two largest group of sedentary gypsies lived in Bahia and Rio de Janeiro. A
1761 letter from Bahia's municipal authorities to the Overseas Council reported,
"some thousands [of ciganos] live throughout the captaincy besides the slaves
they possess and some Indians that they join with.''5l Information on Rio de
Janeiro gypsies comes from the early nineteenth century. Four hundred gypsies
formed a community on the city's southern outskirts and another large group
lived inside the city around the Rua dos Ciganos, Campo da Sant'Anna, and
the city slave market. Reports of gypsy companies numbering up to a hundred
individuals come from Minas Gerais and Pernambuco, while smaller bands are
mentioned in other areas. Taking all of these reports together, and excluding
slaves and other itinerants living with them, a conservative estimate of at least
four and up to seven thousand gypsies lived in Brazil in the decades preceding
Independence.52
The degree to which Brazil's social environment furnished gypsies with so
opportunities, and at the same time, influenced the white majority's percept
of gypsies, is key to understanding their permutation in colonial Brazil. Cen
to that question is the extent gypsy culture changed in the New World. T
clandestine nature of gypsy networks and the paucity of documents origina
from ciganos make identifying changes in mentality and shared mores imp
sible. More identifiable is behavioral resistance and accommodation to colo
nial society. Despite the influx of thousands of forced and voluntary migra
eighteenth-century Brazilian gypsies survived cut off from their European r
in geographically and socially changed circumstances. Portuguese purity of b
statutes lost much of their effectiveness in the fluid ambience of colonial s
ety; hence opportunities to pass into the larger colonial society continued
exist for gypsies willing to dissociate themselves from the cigano communi
Apart from those with obvious African ancestry, successful individuals and t
descendants could escape the stigma of their ethnic or social background.
But that same fluidity created the social space for gypsies to remain a recogni
minority community in which successful individuals could retain their cult
identity if they so wished. Two early nineteenth-century accounts of Rio
Janeiro gypsies illustrate their situation. One by Lady Callcot describes gyp
openly maintaining their cultural boundaries:

There has long been a village inhabited by gypsies who have found their way hither,
and preserve much of their peculiarity of appearance and character in this their
trans-atlantic home ... but their conformity does not appear to have influenced

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44 jourrlal of social history fall 1992

their moral habits. 1 hey employ their slaves in fishing, and part of their families
is generally resident at their settlements; but the men rove about the country and
are the horse-jockies of this part of Brazil. Some engage in trade, and many are
very rich . . . they retain their peculiar dialect.53

Jean Baptiste Debret, a French artist, sketched and wrote about gypsy families
living in the city itselfa He described highly aMuent ciganos peacefially integrated
into the wider community, yet like those in the village described by Lady Callcot,
openly expressing their cultural identity through the internal organization of
their households, marriage patterns, language, and dress.54
Debret's and Lady Callcot's observations, together with contemporary acS
counts of gypsies in rural areas, bespeak of both transformation and continuance.
By the late colonial era gypsies could not only be slave owners who appeared
"in good circumstances", they could continue trekking in the interior} '4totallX
dedicated to trading in mules and horses as was the custom of their race.'5
Despite an evident degree of cultural assimilation, these accounts describe the
same cultural patterns that traditionally had categorized Portuguese gypsies as
pariahs and had exiled them to Brazil.
A break in tradition had occurred, however, in the attitude of the majority
white community toward ciganos. After midcentury crown officials no longer
systematically persecuted them. Indicative of that change were Pemambuco
measures aimed at gypsies in the 1760s. Unlike the efforts of the 1730s, royal
officials sought not to eradicate or deport gypsies, but to integrate them into
colonial society through a program of compulsory work and education Behind
those integration efforts lay wider social and political concems.
The enlightened despotism that characterized Portugal's Pombaline regime
(1750-1777) brought a series of new laws and energetic administrators to the
colonies. Royal officials became more concerned with reforming the empire's
economic situation than with expending precious financial and manpower reS
sources chasing wandering ciganos. In keeping with their economic ideology was
widespread intolerance for the wandering poor or groups considered not usefully
employed. In the words of a colonial treasury official, "although they do not steal
with deceit or violence those who live in a Republic idly and without contribut-
ing to its subsistence or maintenance by their lahor and usefiil employment are
thieves in political consideration."56
Decline in Brazilian mineral production brought renewed fiscal and bureauS
cratic action to economically reinvigorate Minas Gerais and Sao Paulo and
integrate them with the rest of the colony. Suppressing criminal bands, desert-
ers, gypsies, and the wandering poor, was integral to their endeavors to make
the colonial population work productively. All those efforts took place against
the backdrop of the growing war on Brazil's southem Spanish American border
which required increasing amounts of money and manpower.57
A key part of the state's strategy for gaining effective control over Brazil's
hinterland was to reinvigorate the racial hierarchy that separated whites from
freedmen.58 The gold rush had weakened Brazil's traditional agricultural slave
system by providing economic and political opportunities for ambitious free
blacks and mulattoess Royal officials sought to dilute resistance to new taxation
efforts by driving a wedge into any potential alliance between colonial whites

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CHANGING PERCEPTIONS OF SOCIAL DEVIANCE 45

and freed blacks and mulattoes. Since whites remained a clear minority, racial
discrimination measures benefitted socially marginalized whites. It was no acci-
dent, for example, that during this same time the Pombaline regime officially
ended discrimination against New Christians. Like gypsies, New Christians too
were white, but religiously and socially marginalized owing to their ('infected
blood." Under such circumstances the crown's resources were far better spent
assimilating a small and potentially useful group of white colonists than chas-
ing gypsies in the backlands or New Christians in towns and plantations. As
the Governor of Pernambuco's orders indicated, their intent was for gypsies to
perform "useful and decent work." To that end, gypsies were ordered to return
to the cities, where they could remain unmolested with their slaves and other
property."59 Those efforts enjoyed some success. Although gypsy bands contin-
ued to roam the rural interior, the number living in towns began to multiply,
especially in Rio de Janeiro and Bahia.
Changes in social identity were further tied to changes in religious attitudes. As
in the rest of Western Europe, religious structures, particularly those defending
orthodoxy, weakened during the late eighteenth century. By the Pombaline
period's close, gypsies, alleged refusal to aid the Christ child no longer served
as a pretext for persecution of religious ostracism. In Brazil, Church and gypsies
co-existed through mutual accommodation in which gypsies nominally at least
followed religious orthodoxy. "They conform to the religion of the country in
all outward.respects and are obedient to Christian precepts, modified however
through their ridiculous superstitions. They believe in sorcery (sortilegios) and in
the magic power of certain chants repeated three times accompanied by certain
gestures."60
How far the dichotomy between gypsies and the wider community had less-
ened is found in the 1789 re-edited Diccionario of Padre Bluteau. In it all relig
references to ciganos had been extirpated. The new editor, a Brazilian named
Antonio de Moraes Silva, now described gypsies as, "a race of vagabond people,
said to be from Egypt, who tell fortunes by palm reading, they live from this
trickery, and from trading, and prostitution, or from dancing and singing; they
live together in a neighborhood (vivem em bairro juntos) have some peculiar cus-
toms and understand one another by a type of German." As an adjective cigano
meant "to fool with skill and without force.''6l While cigano retained a portion
of its pejorative cast, earlier religious condemnation and most criminal associ-
ation had been removed. Ciganos had been transformed from social pariahs to
socially seedy.62
Brazilian gypsies further benefitted from the low European opinion of colo-
nial society. Portuguese and other Europeans cited race and climate to allege
Brazilian moral and intellectual deficiencies.63 The jumble of race, caste, and
occupational criteria that defined Brazilian society weakened traditional notions
of a divinely ordained hierarchy. With so much of the minority white population
having mixed racial and ethnic backgrounds, gypsies' ethnic origins lessened as
a criterion of deviancy.
With the greater white majority a new image of ciganos emerged during the
late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Popular songs, stage plays, and
operas, reflected that change. Although gypsies had been occasionally present in
Portuguese theater since Gil Vicente (ca 1465-1537), they were now portrayed

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46 journal of social history fall 1992

less as objects of ridicule than as romantic hgures. Brazilians, looked down upon
themselves by those born in Europe, generated many of the artistic themes. Virtue
replaced scandal in operas such as A Cinganinha (Little Gypsy Girl), performed in
Ouro Preto's opera house in 1771, an A viganca da cigana (The Gypsy Woman's
Revenge) written by a Brazilian and first performed in Lisbon in 1794. In them,
poor gypsy characters assumed the roles of noble heros. Traditionally outlawed
and deviant behaviors were sympathetically depicted down to the buenas dichas
(gypsy fortune telling). Women especially assumed a different image as ciganas
became transformed from grimy fortune tellers to sensual and highly desirable
heroines.64
Reflected in this new romantic image were widespread anxieties affecting
Luso-Brazilian society, particularly among the economically marginal. Though
launched in Brazil, some reconsideration of the gypsy spread in Europe by the
late 1 700's. The spread of the market generated uncertainties about the ability
of Portugal's social structure to maintain social order while promoting economic
growth. Those anxieties intensified with Pombal's and his successor's moderniza-
tion programs. Efforts tO establish national industries and further commercialize
agriculture forced individuals into unfamiliar work disciplines and to confront
the vagaries of market demand. Correspondingly, the crown's policing power over
citizens improved during the Pombaline dictatorship and subsequent Joannine
period. Anti-poor laws became better enforced, while reaction to the alleged sex-
ual license of Joao V's and Jose I's reigns brought renewed efforts to guide public
morality. Changes that seemed to indicate the loss of individual autonomy tO
those on the periphery of the market and for those whose traditional life style
those changes had victimized. Hence the attraction of the open road as a potenS
tial avenue of escape from growing constraints on personal independence.65
Peripatetic gypsies embodied many of those romanticized feeling. Begin-
ning in the late eighteenth century, a new stereotyped vision of cigano cul-
ture emerged throughout Europe which emphasized their independent life style.
Non-traditional behavior lost some of its pejorative character as ciganos beS
came noted for their resourcefulness in dealing with the difficulties of everyday
existence. Living on the streets and wandering in the countryside became a stan-
dard motif in nineteenth-century romantic imagination. Using Iberian gypsies
for their models, French artists and writers in particular clothed themselves in
the new founded bohemian myth of the artist as cultural vagabond and social
outcast, independent of bourgeois material constraints.66 The popular image of
the sensual cigana tied itself to that perception of independence. It received
its most famous expression of course, in the fictitious Spanish gypsy "Carmen".
Carmen's beauty brought "suitors by the dozens," her independence to declare,
"my heart is as free as the air, who wants to love me? I'll love him."67
The transformation from pariahs to romanticized characters reached some
notable moments during the Portuguese court's stay in Brazil ( 1808-1821). The
court encountered a flourishing gypsy community when they arrived in Rio de
Janeiro. In addition to slave trading, gypsies held artisan occupations and even
low level official posts. Although most were firmly in the lower class, several
families had become rich. The cigano Jose Rabelo, for example, was considered
one of Rio's wealthiest citizens. To the newly arrived Europeans, Rio's gypsies

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CHANGING PERCEPTIONS OF SOCIAL DEVIANCE 41

added an exotic air to the tropical local. In an act unthinkable in Portugal,

gypsy dancers were invited to the wedding festivities marking the marriage of
Joao VI's oldest daughter. An eyewitness reported, "the young gypsy boys entered
into the middle of the festivities mounted on handsome horses that were richly
appointed. Each boy jumped on the floor with incredible agility, and joined
together to perform the loveliest dance I ever saw. Everyone only had eyes for
the young gypsy girls."68
But the three day celebration following Brazil's elevation to the status of
kingdom in 1815 offered the clearest symbol of the new image. On the second
day of the festivities Dom Joao VI took the entire court and foreign delegation to
the Campo dos Ciganos (gypsy quarter) for an afternoon and evening of dancing
and merrymaking. Rumor had it the Joao VI was fascinated by one particular
cigana, a mild irony, since it was grandfather's hatred for gypsies which brought
the families of those same now romantic ciganos to Brazil in chains. Before the
court's return to Portugal the Campo dos Ciganos had become Rio's bohemian
neighborhood, an area known for its gay nightlife and the Brazilian and foreign
artists who lived there. Even Dom Pedro, the future Emperor of Brazil, dropped
in on the merrymaking and cast glances at the lovely ciganas.69
Yet such indications of royal favor did not translate to full acceptance in
Brazilian society. Even during the court's stay gypsies never completely escaped
their criminal association. They continued to be "reputed thieves and cheats"
and "to call a man zingara (gipsy) is as much as to call him a knave." Prison rolls
and police reports from rural officials indicate that gypsies remained among the
chief suspects for highway crime.70 Moreover, the transformation from criminal
deviant to exotic bohemian was a social cul-de-sac. It created an inherently
fragile foundation for assimilation by sharply narrowing opportunities for social
and economic interaction. Economically, ciganos remained identified with the
traditionally marginalized occupations of peddling, horse trading, and the most
unsavory aspects of the internal slave trade. Abolition of Brazilian slavery in
1888 ended both the principal livelihood for many ciganos and their social
utility as slave traders. Itinerant gypsies then faced the choice of remaining
among an increasingly hostile rural population or joining the urban working
class. Culturally, gypsies' bohemian image characterized them as semi-European,
and hence effectively excluded them from general integration into the middle
and upper levels of Brazil's white majority unless they dissociated themselves
from the cigano community. Not only was the romantic image of bohemian
artist largely limited to Rio de Janeiro, it was, like all created images, subject tO
decline in public fashion. By the end of the nineteenth century, the bohemian
myth had become exhausted, and the gypsies everywhere became once again
popularly viewed as a community of rogues7l
Despite their marginal status, Brazilian ciganos remained in a better situa-
tion than European gypsies who continued to face ethnic oppression. The so-
cial tension created by slavery created the social space for Brazilian ciganos to
reach a permanent, albeit tenuous, accommodation with the rest of the white
community by the time of independence. In Portugal on the other hand, that
displacement was never complete. Slavery remained largely confined to urban
areas and Portugal's white population always remained overwhelmingly predom-

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48 journal of social history fall 1992

inant, thus obviating the need for social accommodation with gypsies or other
marginal groups.
In the century between Joao V's deportation campaign and Brazilian inde-
pendence, gypsies carved a permanent niche for themselves in Brazil. Their
achievement lay in preserving their linguistic and cultural heritage in the face
of long term persecution. They successfully maintained a distinct identity while
adapting into the cultural and racial melange that characterized Portuguese
America.

Department of History
Baliimore, MD 21 210-2699

ENDNOTES
Financial assistance for research of this paper came from the Johns Hopkins History
Department and the Brazilian Fulbright Commission. Earlier versions of this article were
read at the 8th annual Gypsies Studies Meeting in February 1986 at CUNY, and the 17th
Annual meeting of the Society for Spanish and Portuguese Historical Studies in April
1986 at the University of Minnesota. I would like to thank Edward Malfalkis, Miriam
Kaprow, and Stuart Schwartz, and especially A. J. R. Russell-Wood, Richard Slatta, and
Dauril Alden for their helpful comments on those papers and, the two anonymous referees
for their comments on the final draft.
Abbreviations: AN1T Arquivo Nacional Torre do Tombo; AHU Arquivo Historico
Ultramarino; BNRJ Biblioteca Nacional de Rio de Janeiro; RAPM Revista Arquivo
Publico Minas Gerais; HSR Historical Social Research.

1. Although scholarly interest in traditionally marginalized and disenfranchised ele-

ments of Luso-Brazilian society has flourished in the last two decades the history of gypsies
in Portugal and Brazil has remained virtually ignored. Neither Francis A. Dutra, A Guide
to the History of Brazil, 1500-1800, The Literature in English (Santa Barbara, 1980), nor
Fredric Mauro, "Recent Works on the Political Economy of Brazil in the Portuguese
Empire," Iztin American Research Review 29: 1 (1984): 87-105, mentions any work on
gypsies. Despite the title, Maria Luiza Tucci Carneiro, Preconceito racial no Brasil Colonia
(Sao Paulo, 1983), deals only with new-Christians. Those interested in gypsy history
have had to refer to Adolpho Coelho's Os Ciganos de Portugal ( 1892 ), A. J. Mello Moraes
Filho's Os Ciganos no Brasil (1886), and a handful of articles focusing narrowly on lin-
guistic and folkloric aspects of gypsy culture. The two best articles on ciganos are Jose
B. d'Oliveira China, "Os Ciganos do Brazil," Revista do Arquivo Municipal do Sao Paulo
31 (1937): 323-670 and Joao Dornas Filho, "Os Ciganos em Minas Gerais," Revista do
Insiituto Historico e Geografico de Minas Gerais 8 (1906): 138-187. Although both authors
discuss the colonial era, their focus is on the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Olimpio
Nunes O Povo Cigano (Oporto, 1981 ) is mainly ethnographical.

2. A fine outline of the problem is found in the Introduction to Deviants and the
Abarined in French Society, (Baltimore, 1978) ed. Robert Forster and Orest Ranum,
pp. vii-xii. See too, Jack P. Gibbs, 1 "Conceptions of Deviant Behavior: The Old and
the New," Approaches to IDeviance, ed. Mark Kefton et al. (NY, 1968), pp. 44-55; Kai
Erickson, Wayward Puritans: A Case Study in Deviance (NY, 1966), Chapter One, "The
Sociology of Deviance."

3. Analyzing the historical relationship between gypsies and social deviancy largely
depends upon non-gypsy sources. Although most of these sources are explicitly biased
they clearly reveal community attitudes and prejudices which associated guilt and made
the word gypsy synonymous with social deviance.

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CHANGING PERCEPTIONS OF SOCIAL DEVIANCE 49

4. David Mayall, Gypsy-Travellers in Nirleteerlth-Cerltury Society (Cambridge, 1988),

especially pp. 189-192, Appendix 1 "Major legislationrelating to Gypsies, 1530-1908."

5. John Hoyland, A Historical Survey of the Customs, Habits, &9 Preserlt State of The
Gypsies . . . (London, 1816), p. 17 and passim; J. M., Historia de Los Gitanos Facsimile
edition (Madrid, 1832). In the seventh century, Spanish laws prohibited gypsies from
moving freely, speaking their language, wearing gypsy apparel, or engaging in a variety of
artisan occupations.

6. Jean-Paul Clebert, The Gypsies (London, 1967), pp. 87-90- Paul Bamford, Fighting
Ships and Prisons: The Mediterranearl Galleys of France in the Age of Louis XIV (Minneapolis,
1973), pp. 180-181.

7. Peter Spierenburg, The Spectacle of Sufferirlg (London, 1984) pp. 173-75.

8. Coelho, Ciganos, annexo, #1 & #2, Alvara of March 3, 1526, and the 1538 petition
by the cortes of Torres Novas and Evora for early expulsions. Anti-gypsy legislation is
scattered in various printed collections. Aldolpho Coelho gathered most of them in the
annexo of his Os Ciganos, and all legal citations are from his work unless otherwise
specified.

9. Lei of August 17, 1557 and Alvara of March 14, 1573 for sentencing to Galleys.
The Lei August 28, 1592 issued by Philip "manda executa'-los com a pena de morte, sem
apelazcao nem agravo." Coelho, Ciganos, annexo, #3, #4, & #7.

10. See Manuel Severim de Faria, "Dos Remedios para a Falta de Gente," and Duarte
Ribeiro de Macedo, "Sobre aIntrodu,cao das Artes," inAntologiados Ecorlomistas Portuguese
(Seculo XVII), ed. Antonio Sergio (Lisbon, 1974). See too Sergio's perceptive essay "As
Duas PoliticasNacionas," Obras Completas: Ensaios (Lisbon, 1972), v. II, pp. 65-91.

11. Laura de Mello e Souza, Desclasificados do Ouro: Pobreza Mineira no Seculo XVIII
(Rio de Janeiro, 1982).

12. Diccionario da Lingua Protugueza, 12 vols. (Lisbon, 1702-1712), vol. 2 p. 311.

13. For gypsy sorcery and fortune telling see inter alia, Coelho, Annexo, Alvara of April
11, 1579 and Jose Justino Andrade e Silva, CollecSao chronlogica da legislNao portuguez
(1603-1700), 10 vols. (Lisbon, 1854-59), Alvara of October 24, 1647, vol. 8 p. 332;
Jan Sundin, "Conflict Solution and Social Control: Civil and Ecclesiastical Justice in
Preindustrial Sweden," HSR, 37 (Jan., 1986): 50-68.

14. Stuart Woolf, The Poor in Western Europe in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century
(New York, 1986), pp. 4-40.

15. Collefao chronologica, vol. 10, p. 66, Decreto de 20 Julho, 1686.

16. My italics.1579 petition from the Elvas municipal council is reproduced in

Ciganos, annexo #8.

17. Purity of blood statutes kept gypsies from entering several professions an
orders. See "Consulta da Camara a el-rei em 13'agosto de 1690," Elementos para
do Municipio de Lisboa 17 vols. (Lisbon, 1885-1911), ed. Eduardo Freire de Olive
9. p. 211 for goldsmiths. Arquivo do Hospital do Sao Jose, Pinheiro collection, Maco,
"Papais particularis." The restrictions also pertained to new-christians and moors.

18. Alvara of October 24, 1647, "nao falem geregonsa, nem a ensinem a seus fillos, nem
andem em trage de syganos ... sem que fasao de suas trasas e embustes, a que chamao

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50 journal of social history fall 1992

buenas dychas, e jogos de corjolla nem partidas de cavalgaduras." ColleSao chronologica,

vol. 6, p. 332.

19. Registo de hua Provisao de Sua Magestade sobre os Siganos of July 15, 1686, repro-
duced in Coelho, Ciganos, annexo #22.

20. Petition of.}uly 28, 1646, Coelho, Ciganos, annexo no. 15.

21. Processo Inquistorial da Cigana Garica de Mira, December 7, 1682. No gypsies are
mentioned in the Inventario dos Processos da InquisiSao de Coimbra 2 vols. (Lisbon, 1972)
and I found no other in the ANTT indexes. In Brazil the few gypsies who went before
the Holy Office lived in Bahia. See below ft 28. No ciganos are found in Livro da Visitac,
faO do Santo Oficio da InquisiSao ao Estudo do Grao Para, 1763-1769 (Petropolis, 1973),
ed. Jose Roberto do Amaral Lapa.

22. Collewo chronologica, vol. 2, p.11, Decreto of July 30, 1648. Population figures
were suggested by Miriam Kaprow's paper on Saragossa gypsies read at the 1 7th Annual
SSPHS meeting in April 1986 at the University of Minnesota. None of the early modern
Portuguese census records mentions gypsies.

23. Fortunato de Azevedo, Histo7iade Portugal, (Coimbra 1922-1929), vol. 7, pp. 170-72
reproduces consultas from 1694 and 1707 mentioning serious crimes, Woolf, "Attitudes
towards the Poor" p. 17 et passim; Peter Spierenburg, "Deviance and Repression in the
Netherlands, Historical Evidence and Contemporary Problems," HSR 37 (Jan., 1986):
4-16.

24. Azevedo, Ibid.; Fernando Castello<Branco, Lisboa Seisceniista (Lisbon, 1969), pp.
201-220.

25. Philippe Robert and Rene Levy, "A Changing Penal Economy in French Society:
in Search of a Historical View," HRS 37 (Jan., 1986): 17-38; J. A. Sharpe, Crime in Early
Modertl Engimd (London, 1984).

26. Keith Wrightson, "Two Concepts of Order: justices, constables and jurymen in
seventeenth century England," A Ungoverrlable People: the English and their law in the
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, ed. J. Brewer and J. Styles (New Brunswick, NJ, 1980),
pp. 21a6.

27. Ant6nio Jose Saraiva, lnquisiSdo e Cristaos-Novos, (Lisbon, 1969) for the Inquisition
and the 'invention' of New Christians; David Grant Smith, "The Mercantile Class of Por-
tugal and Brazil in the Seventeenth Century: A Socio-Economic Study of the Merchants
of Lisbon and Bahia, 1620-1690," (Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Texas at Austin,
1975 ) is the best discussion of New Christians and their role in Portuguese Society.

28. ColleSao Chronologica Leis Extravagantes 4 vols. (Lisbon? 1786-1819), Alvara of

November 10, 1708, vol. 2, pp. 364-366.

29. Cavaleiro de Oliveira, Recreado Periodica 2 vols. [1751] (Lisbon, modern reprint
1922), "The sovereign himself became bewitched, the work of love charmes (amavios) or
seduction, for a great deal of time by the cigana Margarida do Monte. The intrigues that
she wove produced much disorder, exiles, and deaths." I, p. 193; C. R. Boxer, Portuguese
Seaborne Empire (London, 1966), p. 314.

30. Alvara of April 15, 1718; Coelho, Ciganos, annexo #29 reproduces this Alvara but
omits its mention of Brazil. Original copies in Rio de Janeiro include Ceara and Maranhao.
See ANRJ codice 952; BNR), xI-31<, 33, 1.

31. Gazeta & Lisboa, March 10, 1718, p. 80. Several authors have cited the Gaz.eta of

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CHANGING PERCEPTIONS OF SOCIAL DEVIANCE 51

December 18, 1756 referring to gypsy communities but I found no such reference in the
three copies I examined.

32. Coelho, Ciganos, annexo no 30, Decree of July 17,1745 and no 31, Alvara da Camara
de Villa Boim, June 15, 1751. John Villiers describes military action against gypsies in
1732. "Portuguese Society in the Reigns of Dom Pedro II and Dom Joao V 1680-1750,"
(Ph.D. diss., University of Cambridge, 1962), pp. 201-2.

33. Arquivo da cidade de Rio de Janeiro, codice 16-4-10 fl 32v; P7imeira visitafAo de
Santo 015;cio . . . Brasil, 1591-93 (Sao Paulo,1925), ed., Capistrano de Abreu p.285,309,
388.

34. Ibid. Cigano Maria Fernandes and her husband were jailers. For Angola, see Carlos
Couto, "Presenca Cigana na Colonizaao do Angola," Studia 36 (July, 1973), pp. 107-
115; C. R. Boxer, PortuFese Society in the Tropics (Madison, Wis., 1965), supplies a "list
of typical deportees" including ciganos, pp. 199-208. For complaints see Boxer Ibid., p.
119 and his Golden Age irl Brazil 1695-1750 (Berkeley, 1963), p. 140.

35. Primeira VisitaSao, p. 400-401.

36. See Inquisifao: Inventarios de Bens Confiscados a C7istis Novos (Lisbon, nd), ed.,
Anita Novinsky.

37. AHU, Bahia, caixas avulsos, #5674, August 1, 1761 for comments about those
measures' failure. The Camara's orders are reprinted in Resumo Chronologico e Noticioso
de Provincia da Bahia desde seu Descobrimento em 1500 (Bahia, 1983); Ordem por que o
Excelent&simo Senhor Vice-Rei concedeu licen,ca a Luiz de Souza e outros, todos ciganos,
todos moradores em Pernambuco para irem mora a Sergipe de El-Rei, 14, January 1721
Documentos Histo7icos, vol. 69 (1945), pp. 121-122.

38. Carta of December 16, 1723, reprinted in Anais Perrlambucanos 8 vols. (Recife,
1838-46), ed., F. A. Pereira da Costa, vol. 5 pp. 299-300; AHU Mac,os do Reino, Ceara
#7438 (?, 1735). In this caixa a several page list of criminals and their crimes identifies
gypsies.

39. ANTE, Manuscritos do Brasil, livros 2,4,5,6, contain numerous references to Minas
gypsies. For Joao da Costa, "O Gama", livro 5, June 16, 1732, fl 189-189v. For the death
penalty, Livro 5, April 8, 1732, fl 176-176v.

40. ANTT, Manuscritos do Brasil, Livro 3, fl 219. On the lack of troops and difficult
terrain see Livro 3, fl 219, the Carta of Martinho de Mendonca, January 13,1737. RAPM,
(16:2) p. 446; See too Declussificados, p. 198-9.

41. ANTT, Manuscritos do Brasil, Livro 3, ibid., and Livro 5, f 176v, April 8, 1737;
Termo de veran,ca, of October 5, 1760, Actas da Camara Municipal de Sao Paulo (1937),
vol. 2, p. 136. I'd like to thank John Monteiro for this reference.

42. Arquivo Municipal da Bahia, Oficios ao governo 1712-1737, Camara to viceroy,

Salvador,5 November,1729, "Mau procedemento dos Siganos e os inseparaveis damanos
q. resultao a esta P. ca som a perda de escravos q. elles tem furtado aos moradores delle . . .
He certo . . . q. ha muito tempo se queiza este Povo do extgraordinario roubo de escrfavos
que estao padecendo ... " I'd like to thank Dauril Alden for providing me with this
citation.

43. Gomes Freire de Andrade to Martinho de Mendonca, March 12, 1737, RAPM
(16:2), p. 399.

44. Coelho, annexo no 8; Sharpe, Crime, p. 106; for sharp business practices and popular

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52 journal of social history fall 1992

mentality, Goncalo Femandes Trancoso, Contos e Historias de Proveito e Exemplo ( 1624

and many subsequent editions.) For condemnations, Antonio Baptista Vicozo, Exame du
conkssores . . . (Lisbon, 2nd ed, 1784), p. 226 et passim.

45. Auguste de St-Hilarie, translated by Regina Regis Junqueira Viagem a provincia de

Sao Paulo (Sao Paulo, 1976), pp. 102-3.

46. See Fredrik Barth's introduction in Ethnic Groups and BounMries: The Social Or-
ganizaiion of Cultural Difference (Boston, 1969), especially pp. 30-32, and Harold Eid
heim, "When Ethnic Identity is a Social Stigma," pp. 39-57; Mary Karasch discusses
the importance of ciganos as commissarios and their reputation as thieves in Slave Lik
in Rio de Janeiro (Princeton, 1987), pp. 5N54. She mentions a Joaquim Rose Rodrigues
who was suspected of having stolen and sold more than 1,000 slaves in Minas and Sao
Paulo.

47. AHU, Angola, Caixa 25 #70 February 20, 1731.

48. AHU, Angola, Caixa 39, #97, December 8, 1754.

49. The Lisbon earthquake destroyed most documentation about deportations prior to
1755. The ANTr Feitos Findos annex has uncatalogued manuscripts on de'portation.
The ones I saw in 1981 all focused on political criminals sent to India after 1760.

50. F. A. Oliveira Martins, Pina Manique-o polinco-amigo de Lisboa, (Lisbon, 1984), p.

17. Melo e Castro sent four hundred ciganos to Brazil in 1780 and 1786. I'd like to thank
Dauril Alden for bringing this reference to my attention.

51. AHU, Bahia, caixa avulsos #25351. This four page letter by Jose Carvalho de An-
drade discusses ciganos and problems with of icials and priests. Iraci del Nero da Costa and
Francisco Vidal Luna's authoritative demographic studies on Minas Gerias, for example,
do not mention ciganos.

52. Callcot, pp. 253-54; Henry Koster, Travels in Brazil (London 1824) for the North-
east. "Large Cigano bands" ranged from over a hundred, St-Hilaire, Ibid. to a women
and children dominated group of twenty, Arquivo Publico da Bahia, Cartas ao Governor,
#238, June 16, 1819. I'd like to thank Stuart Schwartz for this and reference 56.

53. Callcot, Ibid.

54. Jean Baptiste Debret, Viagem Pitoresca e Histo7ica ao Brasil 2 vols. (Belo Horizonte,
rpt 1978), vol. 1, pp. 262-66.

55. St. Hilaire, Ibid.

56. Arquivo de Instituto Historico Geografico Brasileiro, Arq 1.120 fl 28-32, consulta
of January 29, 1758.

57. AN1T Maso do Reino, documents de Chancelaria do Dom Jose I contain many
measures to aid the poor. Representative of the dozens of reports and remedies for Brazil's
economy is Jose Arouche de Toledo Rendon, "Reflexoes sobre o estado em que se acha
a agricultura na capitania de Sao Paulo [1788]" reprinted in Documentos Interrestantes
44 (1930), pp. 195-215. See also Dauril Alden, Royal GoqoernmerLt in Braril (Berke-
ley, 1968), for the experiences of one colonial viceroy and details of the Luso-Spanish
rlvalry.

58. George Reid Andrews, "Race and the State in Colonial Brazil," Laiin American
Research ReqJiew 19 (3: 1984): 212-213.

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CHANGING PERCEPTIONS OF SOCIAL DEVIANCE 53

59. BNJR, #1-31.31.30.98. Ordens do Governador de Pernambuco sobre Siganos, 12 de

Julho 1761.

60. Callcot, Ibid.; Manoel Cardozo, "The Modernization of Portugal and the Indepen-
dence of Brazil," From Colony to Nation (Baltimore, 1975), ed. A. J. R. Russell-Wood, pp.
185-210.

61. Diccionario da Lingua PortuFeza . . . reformado, e accrescentado por Antonio de Moraes

Silva, Natural do Rio de Janeiro 2 vols. (Lisbon, 1789), vol. 1, p. 273.

62. See Wim Willems and Leo Lucassen, "The Church of Knowledge: Representations
of Gypsies in Dutch Encyclopedias and Their Sources," 100 Years of Gypsy Studies: Papers
from the 10th Annual Meeting of the Gypsy Lore Society (Cheverly, Maryland, 1990), ed.
Matt T. Salo, pp. 31-50 for a similar transformation.

63. Representative of European attitudes are "Cartas escritas a S. Mag. to pelo seu
Conselho Ultramarino no ano de 1767", DI vol. 23 (1896) pp. 250-256; See Stuart
Schwartz's highly perceptive, "Formation of Colonial Identity in Colonial Brazil," Colonial
Identity in the Atklntic World, 1500-1800 (Princeton, 1987), ed. Nicholas Canny and
Anthony Pagden.

64. ANRJ, Cole,cao da Casa dos Contos de Ouro Preto, various caixas for A Cinganinha.
Three different catalogue listings exist for this collection which was thoroughly mixed
up when I used it in 1983. A published catalogue issued in 1966 reproduces several
documents. AVinganSa da Cigana Libretto by Domingos Caldas Barosa, music by Antonio
Leal Moreira, became very popular. See also, BNRJ, O Cigano a Pefa written in 1845, #I,
6,25,6.

65. The Decree of November 4, 1755 was the most wide ranging anti-poor measure.
Portuguese early modern social history remains largely unexplored. An eyewitness ac-
count of popular attitudes is Carl Israel Ruders, translated by Ant6nio Feijo. Viagem em
Portugal, 1798-1802 (Lisbon, 1981).

66. Marilyn R. Brown, Gypsies and Other Bohemians: The Myth of the Artist in Nineteenth-
Century France (Ann Arbor, 1985).

67. Carmen, Act one, Libretto by Henry Meilhac and Ludovic Halevy.

68. Wilhelm Ludwig Von Eshcwege, Brazilien, die Neue Welt 2 vols. ( Braunshweig,
p.55; Luiz Gonc,alves dos Santos, Memorias para servir d historia do reino do Brasi
(Rio,1820; reprint 1981), vol.1, p.265.

69. Vivaldo Coaracy, Memorias da CidMe do Rio de Janeiro 6 vols. (Rio,1965), vol.3,
pp.71-75; Basil Gerson, Historia das Ruas do Rio (Rio,1965), pp.277-78.

70. ANRJ, Memoria sobre a seguranca das estradas infestados de Salteadores e

ciganos . . . 1822", Codice 807, vol.7, fls 124-130; Callcot, Ibid; Karash, Slave Life, Ibid.;
Coaracy, Ibid.

71. Brown, Gypsies and Other Bohemians, Conclusion. For the situation of gypsies in
nineteenth-century and early twentieth-century Brazil see Jose B. d'Oliveira China, "Os
Ciganos do Brazil," and Joao Dornasfilho, "Os Ciganos en Minas Gerais".

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