AZORES IN RIO DE JANEIRO – BRAZIL

Brazil was the first destination for Azorean emigration.
Two hundred years after the settlement of the islands, we went to Maranhão in the 17th century, to Santa Catarina and Rio Grande do Sul in the 18th century, to Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo between the end of the 19th century and the middle of the 20th century.
Meanwhile, the new paths of Azorean emigration also took us to Uruguay and the United States of America in the 18th century, Bermuda and Hawaii in the 19th century, and Canada in the 20th century.
In Brazil, from the first quarter of the 16th century until the middle of the 18th century, around 4,200 Azoreans emigrated to the lands of Grão-Pará and Maranhão.
However, Azorean emigration was most intense in Santa Catarina and Rio Grande do Sul—around 6,500 Azoreans from 1748 onwards—to fight off the constant Spanish invasions of the border region.
With Brazil’s independence in 1822, Azorean emigration continued to intensify, especially in the provinces of São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, and Minas Gerais, to compensate for the lack of labor resulting from the abolition of slavery.
The Azoreans also appeared in other Brazilian regions, such as Espírito Santo, Bahia, Pernambuco, Amazonas, and Paraíba.
In Rio de Janeiro, the first heritage mark of the Azorean presence seems to date back to 1850, when immigrants from the island of Terceira brought an image of Ecce Homo to Brazil.
A small chapel was built on the seafront in the city’s fishing area, the Brotherhood of Senhor Santo Cristo dos Milagres was formed, and construction began on a new church, which was elevated to the status of parish church in 1901.
In 2014, the church reactivated the popular festival in honor of Senhor Santo Cristo dos Milagres in Santo Cristo Square, on Rua do Santo Cristo, in the Santo Cristo neighborhood.
The celebration of the Divine Holy Spirit in the Outeiro and Praça Sete brotherhoods, founded and maintained by Azoreans and their descendants, is also centuries old.
Olinda, Encantado and Calumbi are other Brotherhoods of the Divine in the “wonderful city”, which also coexist with a sixth festival, held by the Engenhoca Brotherhood, in the neighboring city of Niteroi.
All of them have the ritual of the “seven Sundays” for the recitation of the rosary, the coronation mass in the neighborhood church, the procession of the Crown and Flag, and, in some cases, even the widespread sharing of the traditional Soups of the Holy Spirit.
The cult of the Divine accompanies the Azoreans along the different paths of our collective life.
In Rio de Janeiro, Azorean emigrants come mainly from the islands of the central group of the Azores archipelago – Terceira, Graciosa, São Jorge, Pico, and Faial.
In fact, they are mainly from Terceira, many of whom were born in the parish of Ribeirinha.
Until the end of the 1930s, they worked mainly in milk production and commerce in dairies located throughout the city.
They then went on to work in small butcher’s shops, in some cases as owners. These declined significantly in the 1990s due to Brazil’s economic crisis.
In this city, he is not popularly associated with the Azores, perhaps not even with Portugal, but our greatest poet also has a large square named after him in the chic Leblon neighborhood.
The “Praça Antero de Quental” was recognized as a public area and so named in 1942, on the centenary of his birth “in Ponta Delgada, Azores”, as a discreetly located biographical plaque mentions.
More recently, his name gained even greater public visibility when the Antero de Quental metro station was constructed on the same site.
At least one more Azorean is enshrined in the important toponymy of Rio de Janeiro—the “Rua Professor Ferreira da Rosa” was inaugurated in 1956 in the Bairro da Tijuca to honor the honorary lieutenant colonel who was born in Angra do Heroísmo in 1864, taught Portuguese at the Military College of Rio de Janeiro, and died here in 1952.
It was precisely in this neighborhood of Tijuca and in 1952 that the history of the Casa dos Açores in Rio de Janeiro began, the first in Brazil and the second in the world, under the direct influence of Vitorino Nemésio, after the pioneering Casa dos Açores founded in Lisbon in 1927.
The “Padre Tomás de Borba” Folklore Group is always particularly involved in all Casa dos Açores events. It was founded in 1954 as a guitar group and debuted in 1957 as a folkloric ranch. This oldest Azorean group in Brazil is celebrating seven decades of history this year. Congratulations on your persistence!

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José Andrade is the Regional Director for Communities in the Government of the Autonomous Region of the Azores
Based on a text from his book Transatlântico – As Migrações nos Açores (2023)

(translated by Diniz Borges)