Família escrava e relações de compadrio: estudo das territorialidades escravas na freguesia de Sant'Ana de São José de Mipibu (1841-1862)

Abstract

The objective of this study is to analyze the presence of slave families in the parish of Sant'Ana of São José de Mipibu between the years 1841 and 1862, observing the construction of a slave territoriality in a space that was not theirs a priori, but rather the Church and Catholic Society. We interpret the formation of slave family institutions in this space as an act of resistance and survival by these enslaved women and men, who were inserted in a slave society. For this, we have as the main source of study the baptism records of this parish, which were read, transcribed, analyzed and systematized based on the methodology of Serial and Quantitative History. In fact, we believe in the choices of godfathers and godmothers by captive families at the time of the baptism of slave children would be a strategy for survival, (re)existence and the search for autonomy of these slavery people. The choice to study the parish of Sant'Ana was because part of this ecclesiastical territory is located in the rural area of the city of São José de Mipibu, which in the 19th century played an important role economically within the province of Rio Grande do Norte, counting on small and medium sugar, rapadura and cachaça sugar mills, activities that require significant slave labor to work in the sugar cane plantations.