3 - The Journey of Mendonça: The Princes of Pungo-Andongo in Brazil

Summary

Chapter 3 examines how the exile of the Ndongo royals to Salvador and Rio de Janeiro was aligned with power struggles in Luanda. The House of Ndongo was led by a generation that rejected the Portuguese alliance that its predecessors had endorsed. The new generation broke away from this alliance when Portugal was gaining independence from Spain. The chapter focuses on the royals’ lives in Brazil, on what they saw there of the treatment of enslaved Africans and Indigenous people, how their stay was shaped by African slave communities, Black Brotherhoods, and how these experiences shaped Mendonça’s discourse in the Vatican. It examines the case of runaway slaves and connects it with those of Quilombo dos Palmares. It looks at how this community forged a political and economic alliance with Cristovão de Burgos, a judge in the High Court of Salvador. Palmares provoked the governing authorities in Bahia to reconsider their strategy, which led them to send the royals to Rio. The authorities in Brazil feared that the exiled royals’ status could help fortify the enslaved fugitives’ community, which would endanger Portuguese economic interests.