"Nobreza da Terra" in the villages of Paranagua, Curitiba and

The "Nobreza da Terra" in the villages of Paranagua,
Curitiba and Sao Francisco do Sul
Ricardo Costa de Oliveira
Universidade Federal do Paraná
We investigate the social and political category of "nobility of the land" in the villages of
Paranagua, Curitiba and Sao Francisco do Sul, Ouvidoria de Paranagua, Southern District of the
Captaincy of São Paulo in the first half of the eighteenth century. The "nobility of the land" in
the region consisted mainly of the "descendants of the conquerors and early settlers” in the
region, forming the "Homens Bons" and their families. The social and economic structural
condition was the possession of land, with large agrarian properties, granted and formalized
with the dates of letters of allotments (sesmarias). Being the "nobility of the land" is to be a
landowner, to organize the production with sets of slave workers, administered Indigenous and
African slaves. Slavery is the social relation of production central to the structuring of the
"nobility of the earth" in the localities studied. The families of "Homens Bons" controlled the
land and political power in the municipalities. The officers of the chamber (Câmara), the clergy
of the churches, the public notaries, local trade, ordinances and other local power structures
formed the social, economic, political and cultural bases of the "land nobility” searched. The
method of research is based on genealogies, biographies and social prosopography of the
segments consisting of "the nobility of the land" by "Homens Bons", their families and internal
and external policies and networks. We investigated the social and geographical origins of the
genearchs and progenitors of the group. We reconstitute some pedigrees since the seventeenth
century to the twenty-first century, with sociological considerations of reproduction of power
and social and political capital.
Keywords: Land Nobility; Homens Bons; Genealogy.