“(In)afortunada sorte?” The trajectory of Duarte Gomes da

“(In)afortunada sorte?”
The trajectory of Duarte Gomes da Silveira *
Mozart Vergetti de Menezes
Universidade Federal da Paraíba
Duarte Gomes da Silveira was one of the main signatories of the conquest and consolidation
of the Captaincy of Paraíba Real, still in the late sixteenth century. Protagonist of sucrocracia and lord
of sugar cane plantation in the same captaincy, Duarte experienced in life the two sides of the coin: the
glory of the hero and its reverse. If on the one hand he is considered the meritorious founder of the
House of Mercy of Nossa Senhora das Neves city, the person who instituted Morgado do Salvador do
Mundo and a man who spared no effort to develop the town, including competition with prizes to
residents of the city, who built ground or double floor houses; on the other hand, he also has his name
recorded in history as a forger and tax evader, and collaborator of the Dutch invaders. In this work,
Duarte da Silveira is seen as a man of his time. He represents the possibilities and limits of action of
the settlers who, armed with a historical consciousness, thought they could create a new nobility in the
tropics. (Un) fortunate chance? Duarte did not survive to see the dilapidation of his achievements by
his descendants.
Keywords: Sucrocracia; Nobility of Earth; Portuguese America; XVI and XVII Centuries.
*
This communication is part of the panel Strategies of insertion of the minor nobility of the land: Portuguese
America – 16th to 19th centuries.