Destinos incertos: negociantes, cativos e o tráfico interno em Juiz de Fora (1870-1880)

Abstract

The present research has as main objective to investigate the structural characteristics of the internal traffic of slaves. The region chosen for this study is the city of Juiz de Fora, located in the southern part of the Zona da Mata mineira during the 1870s, a period in which coffee cultivation was already consolidated and the Province of Minas Gerais concentrated the largest enslaved population of the empire. It was precisely this scenario that attracted our attention. The slave market functioned independently and also interlinked by complex social and economic networks of relationships between these individuals. In order to discover the attitudes of the lords in relation to the internal traffic, we analyzed the various features that this trade took on in the municipality. We were interested in understanding the mechanisms used by the masters to acquire, replace or even exchange slaves in the city, ensuring the full functioning of the local agro-export system and thus prolonging the servile regime in Empire of Brazil for a few more years.