Zumbi and the Quilombos dos Palmares

Hi everyone and welcome back to the Kapoe de History podcast singing for survival. This is your host Desconfiado. In this first real episode of this podcast, we're going to be going over one of the earliest Kapoe de Legends within Brazil and that's Zumbi and the kilomba stospomates. I had a lot of fun doing the research for this episode. Zumbi is a figure that being in Kaupura you hear a lot about both in songs and a lot of the iconography around the art. So it was really fascinating to dig into what literature is available to learn about the conditions surrounding Brazil around this time. And the development of the kilomba stospomates that kind of paved the way for Zumbi to be a really prominent figure within the country. Zumbi is not at least in most iterations considered a Kapoe de Sta himself per se, but as we'll get into a lot of the philosophies and fighting styles that he was using, developing and teaching. Relate pretty closely to how we think about Kapoe de today. And as we get into that, it'll be really clear why Zumbi is considered one of the most important figures in Kapoe de History and one of the most important symbols to Kapoe de today. So without further ado, Zumbi and the kilomba stospomates. I'll be there for you, Zumbi. I'll find Zumbi. [singing in foreign language] To really understand Zumbi, we first have to talk about the kilomba stospomates. Early Brazilian history is built entirely on the transatlantic slave trade. Starting in the early 1500s, African people were imported in huge numbers to support several different industries in Brazil. The specific industry that we're talking about varies a lot depending on the specific time frame we're looking at in Brazil. It varied from wood to coffee to sugar and gold even, but the details of all these industries, the work conditions around them, and why they were so important in Brazil are something we'll talk about in some later episodes. Much like in the US, the Africans brought to Brazil faced completely in human conditions, both in the way they were transported and the work conditions that they faced once they got to Brazil. And there's really a lot in that topic to cover, and it's something we will go into further later on, but a good illustrative example is life expectancy. So for some of the more extreme labor jobs, like in this case gold mining, the life expectancy for a slave brought over to Brazil was oftentimes less than 10 years. And that's pretty staggering to think about, and it's documented. You can see that the Portuguese who were bringing over these people had life expectancy as something they considered when they were planning out these industries in a really detached and in human way. It's very clear when you look at these things and when you read these records that they really saw these people as livestock. And it's very similar to the way that people thought about and treated the African slaves in both the United States and in the Caribbean. And the impression that the African people found themselves in here in Brazil, many fought to escape from their captivity. And this is not unique to Brazil. It's something we see in both the United States as well as the Caribbean islands where you see revolts, revolutions, and escapes. When the slaves would escape from the plantations, they would flee into the forests to establish small villages or refuges there. And again, like I keep drawing parallels, this is very similar to really all other parts of the African diaspora in the quote-unquote "new world" where you have essentially what you could call "escapes-laid villages" in the US and several Caribbean islands they were referred to as "Maroon Towns" and in Brazil they were called "Kilombus". These Kilombus took advantage of the natural terrain of Brazil and in particular the forests that they were developed in to defend themselves. The forests were often described by the Portuguese as "impeditable" and "rugged" and by escaping deep into these forests using that terrain and working with the native Amerindians of the area. These Kilombus were able to survive. The biggest and most famous Kilombu was the Kilombu dos Palmares. This was located in the northeastern state of Alagóis and bordering on to present-day Pernambuco. And to help you visualize exactly where this was, I'll include a link to a map that outlines exactly where the Palmares were in relation to the present-day Brazilian states. It's important to note here that the Palmares was not just a single Kilombu but it was a network of Kilombus spread throughout the forest. Founded in the early 1600s, the Kilombus dos Palmares was a fully functioning and self-sustaining Kilombu unlike many other of the time. They grew crops, produced rope and straw goods and ceramics and used the products that they were producing to trade nearby communities for things like firearms and salt that they weren't able to make completely on their own. What's interesting here is first that from the products that were seeing produced in the Palmares, it's evident that there's not just escaped African slaves living there but also the local Amerindians such as the Tupi who were contributing to this developing what was really a society. And in addition, like I'm kind of hinting at, this is looking less like a simple refuge or a runaway gathering here in the forest. It's more looking like a really developed community and that's more clear when we look at the leadership structure. So the Palmares was ruled by their king, the most famous being Ganga Zumba, who resided in their capital city of Makako. So it's important to note that when we refer to Ganga Zumba, Ganga is his title. So it derives from the Bantu term Ganga, which refers to a king or chief or ruler. So Makako by the standards of the Kylambus was very large. It was said to have consisted of 1,500 homes, 220 service buildings, four blacksmith shops and a government house. And when you kind of paint this picture of the capital city, you can see that it's much more developed than a lot of the other Kylambus of the time. And the very established leadership structure seems to resemble that of central African nations of the time. We mentioned earlier that the Kylambus relied a lot on the natural terrain to defend themselves. But in the case of the Palmares, this was not the only thing that they used. Makako was reported to be surrounded by a double palisade with a spike-line trough inside. And there are several other reports from the Portuguese of different traps and tactics that were employed by those in the Palmares to defend their land. And it's way more important than the Palmares. When you put all of these together, it's clear that the Palmatis doesn't look like a refuge, it doesn't look like a hideout. It looks like it's own separate city state within Brazil. Even in the way that it relates to other communities, it had established trade, it had a very well-defined leadership structure, it had a well-established capital city, and a network of other key lombas around supporting it. So this is extremely different than the way that other key lombas of the time worked. It was why the key lombas of those Palmatis was so powerful and why it was so important as a symbol of resistance. So in this setting, rises the prominence of Zumbi. So Zumbi's exact origin is not very clear. There are conflicting stories, some say that he was born in the kilombo stoss Palmatis, and others say that he was an African king sold into slavery who then escaped to the Palmatis. But whatever is origin, Zumbi became the sergeant of arms at the Palmatis under the king Ganga Zumba. This means that he was responsible for training the warriors in the Palmatis to fight against the Portuguese and in some cases the Dutch. And he did this with Angolan fighting techniques such as Sangar, which we will definitely have to do a separate episode on, and most importantly, practices of ritualistic combat. So I want to call really special attention to these because while these aren't Kapwata per se and most stories agree that there's not necessarily what we think of as Kapwata here, it seems to clearly be the roots of Kapwata. When we have Angolan fighting techniques, we have ritualistic combat. These are super important elements of Kapwata. So it's conceivable that we're looking at kind of the baby steps of Kapwata happening in the kilombo stoss Palmatis. Zumbi was also responsible for recruiting fighters to help defend the Palmatis. And this was done by raiding plantations to free slaves that were kept there. It was a really interesting tidbit here and gives a lot of insight into who Zumbi was, is that slaves that were freed were then required to help free other slaves in order to stay in the Palmatis. This really gives a look into who Zumbi was as someone with very strong principles and was unyielding in the way that he applied them. And we'll see more of that as we get into some of his later actions. So now that we've set the stage for what the kilombo stoss Palmatis were and who Zumbi was and his importance to the kilombo, I want to take a short break and go back to the song that we started the episode with. So I'm going to play just a couple verses here and then we're going to talk about it. [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] our hearts continue to rise and we end up too but again for the sake of humanity I weeping to gain again and we end up too weeping to gain Now I really just love this track and first just because of the energy behind it the passion of the lead singer the rest of the chorus there it just you really feel a lot when you listen to a track like this and more than that once we take it a step further the lyrics are really deep and powerful and they talk a lot about the conditions of slavery the search for liberty which is just central to to cup what a philosophy and the attitudes around resistance within cup what a and there's so much material in this song there's so many different verses that have really a lot to say we could spend a whole episode on packing all of this but just to say focused on our topic at hand I just want to briefly talk about the chorus here so the chorus starts and now boss of Ficaraki I can't stay here La Pra Sensala and now Caruir I don't want to go to the Sensala which is the slave quarters Ojiya Vomi Libertar today I'm going to free myself to liberate myself Vola Bra Capoeira I'm going there for Capoeira Vola En Contra Zumbi I'm going to find Zumbi to meet Zumbi so this is clearly you know from the perspective of a slave who is reaching the point where he needs his liberation he needs to free himself he can't go back he can't go and stay in the in the Sensala in the conditions of his enslavement so he's going to escape to find Zumbi and to find Capoeira Zumbi being this symbol of resistance this symbol of escape I think it's interesting that the person who wrote this song I'm going to find Capoeira and to find Zumbi and I think there's a potential double meaning here that gets a little bit to the origins of even the word Capoeira so there's a lot of debate on where the word Capoeira comes from but one of the ideas, one of the theories, is it comes from a toopy word which is actually Capoeira which refers to they call depleted forest or slash and burned forest which is a clearing technique that the toopy used in creating and defending their settlements in the forest and it was something that was seen used in the kilombus normally the kilomba was surrounded by an area of slash and burned forest which made it easier to defend so what you could say is that these kilombus were surrounded by Capoeira in the toopy sense so in this song saying I'm going to find Zumbi and find Capoeira you're find Capoeira by going to the kilombu because you have to pass through it and in addition we consider Zumbi at the roots of Capoeira so I think it's an interesting potential double meaning here that is you often find in Capoeira music and I just wanted to kind of throw that out there just to make you think about it a little bit but with that enough about this song for now I'll end the episode just playing out the rest of this track just because I love it so much so much and I feel like it's really worth listening to, but now back to our story on Zumbi. So at this point in our story we are in the mid to later 1600s where Ganga Zumba is the king of the Palmaris and Zumbi is the sergeant of arms. So at this point the Gailambos Pampades has existed for decades, like I said before, was founded in the early 1600s. So the Portuguese were not exactly content with allowing the Palmaris to exist on its own. Even though the Palmaris were largely self-sufficient, they still frequently raided plantations and supply lines in the regions to free more slaves. But I think more importantly was because of the success of the Palmaris, because of how long it had lasted, how large it was, and how well developed the community and society in it was, it was a very important symbolic threat to Portuguese rule. Like I was talking about before, we can kind of consider the Palmaris almost an independent city state, and that was encouraging more and more revolution within the enslaved community under the Portuguese. Like I said earlier, at this point the Palmaris had survived for several decades and it wasn't for lack of trying from the Portuguese. More Portuguese soldiers were used trying to destroy the Palmaris than were used in a war with the Dutch over some of that Brazilian territory, and with really almost no success. The Palmaris were able to resist the Portuguese so well because of a combination of their various fighting and defensive techniques. We already talked about the terrain of the forests being described as impenetrable by the Portuguese, but kind of co-existing with the forest terrain itself was also disease and insects that the Portuguese and Dutch people were especially susceptible to. In addition to that, the tactics of the Palmarinos were very effective against the Portuguese and were seen to parallel those of central African tribes at the time. They favored sabotage, clever traps, attacks against supply lines that stabilize and prevent the advance of the Portuguese armies. On top of that they had spies in nearby towns and plantations who would warn of Portuguese plans, making it very hard to surprise the Palmaris. And probably most importantly, the combat fronts were extremely fluid. A common tactic of the Palmaris was to abandon a kilombo that was being advanced upon and retreat farther into the forest. This in particular was a very well known central African tactic and one that I feel relates closely to the cup what a principle of Nagasa. Nagasa can be seen as denying your opponent. I've heard it described as denying one's body to the blow of an attacker. This kind of tactic seems really congruent with that principle where you are just not being where your attacker shows up. You're not being there when the blow falls, which is a really core cup what a principle, which is again why I want to reiterate, it feels that a lot of the philosophies of more modern day cup what are present here in the tactics of the kilomboos. So it's kind of easy to see where the roots of the modern art lie here. So because of the effectiveness of the Palmaris and pushing back the Portuguese, there was a kind of stalemate between the two for several decades. And this lasted all the way up into the 1690s when we see a change with the arrival of Domingos Georgy Velu. Velu was a Banderaanchi captain who commanded a large group of enslaved Amerindian warriors. Banderaanchi's were explorers and slavers who primarily sought to enslave the local population of Amerindians for their knowledge of the Brazilian terrain and the forests. They often use these people to hunt down escape slaves and go after a lot of the kilomboos because they knew the terrain and they were familiar with the tactics of the kilomboos themselves. So this gave a distinct advantage over the current Portuguese forces due to the knowledge that not only Velu had but his band of Amerindian warriors that he had captured. And with this knowledge and skill, Velu was able to make significant progress against the forces of the Palmaris. Fearing for the defeat of his kingdom, Gangazumba made a peace deal with the Portuguese to try to end the fighting. In this deal, he had promised to return all fugitive slaves to their owners in exchange for allowing the kilomboos of Palmaris to exist. It's a little unclear as to why Gangazumba would have made this deal because it was well known at this point that the Portuguese were rather untrustworthy in these kinds of dealings that they would make with native populations and the African populations as well. But regardless, the deal was made. And this deal enraged Zumbi. He certainly didn't trust the Portuguese because of these reasons that I listed. And he refused to accept the concession of returning the Palmarinos to slavery. So Zumbi staged a revolt, Gangazumba with Poison T, and in doing so became the new king himself. And this is where we start to see Zumbi referred to as Gangazumba, Ganga being that honorific Bantu word for king, which is why a lot of songs and iconography of Zumbi referred to him as Gangazumba. And as his first act, Zumbi destroyed the peace deal and fighting with the Portuguese resumed. The Palmaris fought valiantly against the Portuguese. However, values forces were able to be constantly resupplied by nearby settlements, giving them near limitless resources with which to wear down the Palmaris. Still, it took two full years for all of Zumbi's forces to be pushed back to a single position. The final attack on Zumbi's last stronghold lasted six weeks until finally Zumbi and the last of the Palmaris were defeated. As with his birth, there are conflicting stories on the nature of Zumbi's death. Some say that facing defeat Zumbi threw himself from a cliff rather than be captured. Others claim that he was captured and beheaded and his head put on display. But whatever the case, Zumbi died a hero and a legend. And his legend has lived on long after his death, with Zumbi being considered the first honorary Kapwadista and continuing to appear in both Kapwada iconography and songs through the modern day. And it's easy to see why Zumbi is so important to Kapwada culture, even though by most accounts he was likely not a Kapwadista per se. Zumbi represents one of the largest and most successful resistances to the Portuguese throughout the early history of Brazil. He himself was a great warrior and was responsible for recruiting and training other warriors, making him a very literal symbol of the fight against oppression. But the quality of Zumbi that I want to really emphasize is his unyielding principles and sense of justice. And we can see this in his requirement of newly freed slaves to help free other slaves. And also in his revolt against Ganga Zumba and the concessions that were made to the Portuguese. For all of these reasons Zumbi will continue to be one of the most important legends in Kapwada and after Brazilian history, and we can learn a lot by remembering his life and his actions. And on top of all that, What I think is really interesting when looking back at this history and the history of the Palmatis are the seeds of Kapwata. We have a lot of principles of Kapwata that exist in the principles of their fighting techniques and their defensive tactics. And when we talk about soft power is a really important one. Ritualistic combat is a super important one. And it's clear that even though at that time there's most likely not what we consider modern day Kapwata, there are pieces of it. You can see it being brought together. I think that's one of the most interesting parts of walking through the history of Brazil, especially looking from the lens of Kapwata, because you can see all of these little elements start to appear in different things. And as we walk through the other stories of different people in different songs, we're going to see a lot more of that. So that is to me the most interesting part of our walk through Brazilian and Kapwata's history. So that concludes our episode today on Zumbi and the Quilombos dos Palmatis. But that doesn't mean that I've said all there is to say about either of these things. So because of that I want to open it up to all of you. I want you to send me questions that you have about either of these things or stories that you've heard that maybe I didn't bring up or even just songs about Zumbi or that include the Quilombos dos Palmatis that mean a lot to you. After I collect these, I want to have another episode where we talk about them and we learn even more about both of these in this kind of community effort. So please I'll put up my email in the description again. I welcome you to send me whatever you have to offer and I really appreciate the input. The next full episode that I will be releasing here is going to be on Lumpian. So for that next episode we're jumping all the way forward to the early 1900s to the time of Al Capone and John Dillinger and Bonnie and Clyde to talk about their Brazilian counterpart. Lumpian was an extremely popular among the common folk hero that antagonized the government and antagonized the police in a very similar way to the gangsters in the United States that I mentioned. I like to think of him as a Capone comic book hero or even more specifically a Capone combination of say Batman and Robin Hood and we'll get into why once we start to look through his history and his intentions and his motivations. I think Lumpian was really interesting to get into because he's more recent so there's a lot more existing literature on him and even photos. So I hope that you'll join me in that and with that until next time I hope you all tune in and I'll leave you with the rest of the song that we talked about earlier. Thank you everyone. [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [BLANK_AUDIO]