Our Lady of the Rosary in the Marian Sanctuary: Brotherhoods and Black Devotions in Salvador and the Recôncavo Baiano (Eighteenth Century)

Abstract

Organized by Frei Agostinho de Santa Maria and published in 1722, the Marian Sanctuary and History of the Miracles image of Our Lady consist the registrations of marian invocations worshiped in Portuguese territory, made by clergymen from differents parishes in the xviii century. The ninth volume deal witch the invocations found in Bahia. In this article we mean to use this text as a study sourse for the history religious belief, as well as in the study of the Catholic religiosity history among the black people in the reconcavo baiano. The reconcavo baiano was one of the most important region of the sugar cane production in the American Portuguesa in that period where concentrated an expressive population of black people that was used in the slave labor in that production. Our analysis which has as a main objective of study Our Lady of Rosario worship in the brotherhoods and the black people’s devotions in that region. Seeking to understand at first the motivation for such worship, experienced in the context of the slavery. Subsequently we will concentrate our analysis in the aspects linked to its growth and development, such as celebrations for their Patroness, and the use of images in moments of celebrations. From here it’s necessary to comprehend how the place of the black, as a slave or a free man, marked the relations established and the differents moments of celebrations.

Keywords

• catolicismo
• hermandades
• devoción
• negro