A tiled Saint Joseph
Plus the spring sunshine
A promise of kisses
Two arms awaiting me
It's certainly a Portuguese house
There, it's certainly a Portuguese house
The largest voluntary foreign immigration to cross the Atlantic Ocean to Rio de Janeiro was the one that originated in Portugal. Although imprecise regarding entry records, it is estimated that at least one million Portuguese entered Brazil between the 1820s and the 1920s. This is a significant number, and this migratory flow was directed mainly to the city of Rio de Janeiro, which meant that by 1890 the Portuguese population could account for around twenty percent of the city's inhabitants.
Image description: This is an old black-and-white photograph. In the image, we see several people sitting on a bench, with a metal railing in the background. The spatial arrangement runs from left to right, from foreground to background. On the left, we see individuals wearing traditional clothing, some with hats. In the center, women and children are sitting together, some covered with shawls. On the right, men are also wearing traditional clothing, some with hats. The background features a building with columns and a light-colored facade.Imigrantes portugueses à espera do navio para o Brasil, século XX. Wikimedia Commons
Atlantic routes have always brought the Portuguese to Rio. From the first colonizers, through the 18th century with mining activity, and the transfer of the Portuguese Court in the early 19th century, it was especially from the turn of the 20th century onward that this movement intensified.
During this period, many Portuguese immigrants, mostly poor, sought to settle in the port area or downtown, where kinship networks or connections could help them find work. They occupied the tenement houses — spaces often shared with the Black population — and competed for jobs at the port and in factories — with advantages, considering the inequality of opportunities shaped by racism. With the urban reforms and the reduced possibility of living in these central areas of Rio, these immigrants headed, by train line, to the outlying neighborhoods, or even to the slopes of nearby hills, where the favelas grew.
Image description: This is a black-and-white photograph of two men holding large baskets over their heads. Both are wearing white shirts, fitted pants, and black belts. The baskets are full of bottles and containers of different sizes and shapes. The background is simple and neutral, with no additional elements.Garrafeiros portugueses. Além de trabalharem nas fábricas e no porto, os portugueses também eram trabalhadores ambulantes. Foto: Marc Ferrez
In the post-abolition period, Rio Atlântico would be the setting for encounters and close coexistence, but also for clashes and conflicts, between poor Portuguese immigrants and the equally poor Black population who inhabited the city. Prejudice was never absent from these relations, painfully so, but even so, these groups intermingled in different ways, and quite often these ties produced offspring and creations.
