author

André João Antonil

1650–1716

An Italian-born Jesuit who made colonial Brazil legible on the page, he is best known for a vivid early account of the country’s plantations, trade, and mining wealth. His writing remains a key window into Brazil at the start of the 1700s.

1 Audiobook

Cultura e opulencia do Brasil por suas drogas e minas : $b com varias noticias curiosas do modo de fazer o assucar; plantar e beneficiar o tabaco; tirar ouro das minas, e descubrir as da prata; e dos grandes emolumentos que esta conquista da America Meridional da' ao Reino de Portugal, com estes, e outros generos, e contratos reaes

Cultura e opulencia do Brasil por suas drogas e minas : $b com varias noticias curiosas do modo de fazer o assucar; plantar e beneficiar o tabaco; tirar ouro das minas, e descubrir as da prata; e dos grandes emolumentos que esta conquista da America Meridional da' ao Reino de Portugal, com estes, e outros generos, e contratos reaes

by André João Antonil

About the author

Born Giovanni Antonio Andreoni in Tuscany in either 1649 or 1650, he later became known in Brazil by the pen name André João Antonil. He studied law at the University of Perugia, entered the Society of Jesus as a young man, and traveled to Brazil in 1681 after attracting the attention of the influential Jesuit António Vieira.

He spent the rest of his life in Bahia, where he served in important Jesuit roles, including teacher, rector, and provincial. Beyond church work, he became known as a careful observer of colonial society and economics.

Antonil’s lasting reputation comes from Cultura e Opulência do Brasil por suas Drogas e Minas (1711), a major study of sugar production, tobacco, cattle raising, and gold mining in colonial Brazil. The book was quickly seized by the Portuguese Crown, but it later came to be valued as one of the most important early descriptions of Brazil’s economy and daily life.