Felipa Maria Aranha

Felipa Maria Aranha (c.1720 - c.1780) was a woman, who was enslaved in Guinea as a child, who escaped slavery and became the leader of the Mola quilombo in Pará, Brazil. Her leadership enabled the community to resist the incursions of slave-owners and Portugese troops. She is remembered by the remaining quilombolas and the Brazilian black community as an inspirational figure in their history.

Felipa Maria Aranha
Bornc.1720
Gold Coast, Guinea
Diedc.1780
OccupationLeader of the Mola quilombo

Biography
Zacharias Wagner - Mercado de escravos no Recife

It is thought that Aranha was born in the Costa da Mina (Gold Coast) region of what is now Guinea.[1] She was probably born between the years 1720 and 1730.[1] She would have been enslaved as a child, around 1740.[1] It is likely she was sold as a slave in the square of Santa Maria de Belém do Grão in Pará; the identity of the who purchased her is unknown.[1] Aranha was sent to Cametá, where she was forced to work as a slave on a sugarcane plantation. It is not known how she managed to escape, however, with hundreds of others, she managed to form one of the largest and best structured quilombos in Brazil at Mola, a site at the headwaters of the Itapocu River.

The Mola quilombo consisted of approximately 300 formerly enslaved people and had a high degree of political, social and military organization.[2] Aranha was the first leader of the community.[3] The group was also led by Maria Luiza Piriá.[4] It was organised as a republic, with democratic voting in place.[5] Over the course of the Mola quilombo's life, it expanded to include four other similar settlements in the region and was known as the Confederação do Itapocu.[6][4] In 1895 there were still traces of the settlement to be seen; they have now disappeared.[7]

Historiography

Historians, such as Benedita Pinto and Flávio Gomes, interpret the organisation of the group as an ideal model of resistance to slavery.[8][9] Aranha herself is seen as an inspirational leader and is increasingly viewed as a feminist role model.[10]

Legacy

In 2017 the poet Jarid Arraes (pt) published an eight-page work about her life.[11] In 2020 a virtual exhibition entitled Exposicao Heroinas com Moldura was hosted in Brazil to honour of the International Day of Latin American and Caribbean Black women; it featured the life of Aranha.[12]

References
  1. PINTO, Benedita Celeste de Moraes. «Slavery, Fugue and the Memory of quilombos in the Tocantins Region». Electronic Journals of PUC-SP. Retrieved on March 25, 2016
  2. "Tucuruí - Informações, Imagens e Vídeos". Amazônia (in Portuguese). Retrieved 2021-01-02.
  3. Galeano, Eduardo. Children of the days: a calendar of human history. London. ISBN 1-56858-971-9. OCLC 895700030.
  4. "Brasil de Fato". Brasil de Fato (in Portuguese). Retrieved 2021-01-02.
  5. "Quilombolas: quem são, origem, tradição, condições". Brasil Escola (in Portuguese). Retrieved 2021-01-02.
  6. Guimarães, José (2012). «Settlement in Southern Pará and Historical Origins of the Carajás Movement». Carajás Youth Debates (interview). Interview with Teixeira de Souza, M .. Teixeira de Souza, M. Belém.
  7. Moura, Clóvis (2004). Dicionário da escravidão negra no Brasil. São Paulo, SP, Brasil: Edusp. p. 47. ISBN 85-314-0812-1. OCLC 62236622.
  8. Pinto, Benedita Celeste de Moraes. «Rural Black Women: Resistance and Struggle for Survival in the Tocantins Region (PA)» (PDF) . XXVI National Symposium on History.
  9. Gomes, Flávio dos Santos. In the labyrinth of rivers, boreholes and streams: black peasants, memory and post-emancipation in the Amazon, c. XIX-XX. [Sl]: História Unisinos, 2006. p. 282.
  10. Domingues, Andrea Silva. (2014). Cultura, Trabalho e Cidadania. Rodrigues, Socorro Doriedson do., Moraes Pinto, Benedita Celeste de. São Paulo: Paco Editorial. ISBN 978-85-8148-678-9. OCLC 1114974895.
  11. Arraes, Jarid (2017). Maria Aranha (in Portuguese). Jarid Arraes.
  12. Exposicao Heroinas com Moldura
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