“THE DEVIL WAS HERE”: WITCHCRAFT, POPULAR RELIGIOSITY AND INQUISITORIAL ACTION IN THE CAPITANIA OF RIO GRANDE (18th CENTURY)

Abstract

In recent years, the brazilian inquisitorial historiography studies has expanded and consolidated itself as a field of study. The analysis of the documentation resulting from the inquisitorial visitations of the XVI-XVIII centuries fostered different perspectives on themes and approaches. However, action inquisitorial in other spaces that did not actually receive inquisitors coming directly from Lisbon, still needs further investigation. The article aims to analyze the vestiges of the inquisitorial action in the captaincy of Rio Grande eighteenth century in order to discuss the social circulation of elements of popular religiosity in this space. Therefore, we analyzed a series of records - denunciations and confessions presented in Rio Grande to local representatives of the Holy Office of the Portuguese Inquisition - between the decades of 1740 and 1760, in order to identify the magical-religious practices associated with witchcraft registered in the documents inquisitorial. It was found that the circulation of practices from different cultural backgrounds was an expressive feature of popular religiosity in the colonial space of the captaincy of Rio Grande, in which indigenous people, blacks and whites resorted to elements of the supernatural universe to resolve the various everyday demands, such as the use of spells to resolve personal conflicts; the use of amulets for self-protection, as is the case with the use of mandingo bags and patuás; as well as, the practice of divinatory witchcraft widely used by the different groups that made up the colonial society of the second half of the 18th century.