Tupinambá's narrative
Register of the speech of a Tupinambá chief in the 17th Century
The Tupinambá and Equinoctial France
By Beatriz Perrone-Moisés (antropologist, USP)
This speech was registered by the missionary Claude d'Abbeville, in his História da Missão dos Padres Capuchinhos na Ilha do Maranhão – History of the Mission of the Capuchin Priests in the Island of Maranhão (1614; here transcribed from the Brazilian translation by Sérgio Milliet, São Paulo: Martins, 1945, pages 115-116). Addressed to a group of Frenchmen who, in a diplomatic mission, tried to establish an alliance with Indigenous peoples of the region, it made great impact on those present. The response by the French ambassador-interpreter, Des Vaux, made possible the alliance and eventually the founding, in Maranhão, of Equinoctial France. The French colony, however, was conquered by the Portuguese two years later. Under the control of the peró (name given to the Portuguese), the Tupi from the region had the same fate of those from Pernambuco, as was described by Momboré-uaçu. In a few years, no accounts mention the existence of Tupi free villages on the coast of the colony of Brazil.
“I simply say what I saw with my eyes”
Chefe Momboré-uaçu - Aldeia de Essauap, Maranhão - 1612
I saw the arrival of the peró [Portuguese] in Pernambuco and Potiú; and they started like you, French, are doing now. At first, the peró only trafficked, they had no intention of living here. At that time they slept freely with the girls, which our comrades from Pernambuco reputed to be greatly honorable. Later on, they said we should get used to them and that they needed to build fortresses in order to defend themselves and build cities to live with us.
And so it looked like they wished to constitute one single nation with us. Then they started to say that they could not take the girls just like that, that God only allowed them to have the girls through marriage and that they could not marry if they were not baptized. And, for that, paí [priests] were needed. They ordered the paí to come; and they raised crosses and began to preach for our people and to baptize them. Later they said that neither them nor the paí could live without slaves to serve them and to work in their place. And so our people were forced to provide them. But they were not satisfied with the slaves captured in war and they also wanted our people’s children, and they ended up enslaving the whole nation; and with such tyranny and cruelty they treated them that those that remained free, like us, were forced to leave the region.
The same happened with the French. The first time you came here, you did so just for trafficking. Like the peró, you did not refuse to take our daughters and we thought we were happy when they bore children. At that time you did not talk of staying. You were content to visit us once a year, staying among us only for four or five moons. You would then go back to your country, taking our products to exchange them for what we lacked.
Now you already talk of establishing yourselves here, of building fortresses in order to defend yourselves against your enemies. In order to do that you brought a Morubixaba and several paí. In truth, we are happy, but the peró did the same.
After the arrival of the paí, you planted crosses like the peró. You now start to preach and baptize just like they did; you say you cannot take our daughters but as wives, and only after they have been baptized. The same used to say the peró. Like them, you did not want slaves, at first; now you ask for them, and in the end you want them just like they do. I do not believe, however, that you have the same objective as the peró; in fact, that does not frighten me, because, old as I am, I fear nothing anymore. I simply say what I’ve seen with my eyes.
