Capoeira: The History of an Afro-Brazilian Martial Art

CAPOEIRAGEM IN RIO DE JANEIRO 85
Figure 3.8 A Nagoa (with lowered brim) and a Guayamú (with lifted brim) in typical outfits. Revista Kosmos, No. 3
(March 1906). Courtesy of Biblioteca Nacional, Rio de Janeiro.
return of ‘many African and African-Brazilian capoeiras’ ‘marked the end of the anomalistic [sic] high
representation of Portuguese in the maltas.’ 82 While I agree on the disruptive impact of the war on gang
structure (even though we have not as yet much evidence for it), I cannot see any proof for this author’s
claim that the Portuguese presence was reduced in the period after the war. Furthermore, most freed soldiers
were creoles, not Africans. Since the armed forces clearly preferred to recruit Brazilians, Africans
represented only 4 per cent of freed slave soldiers in Rio. 83
What is clear, however, is that by the 1870s the local gangs had coalesced into two more encompassing
rival groups or ‘nations’, called the Nagoas and the Guaiamus. 84 C.E.Soares, author of the most meticulous
study on the topic, compared patterns of residence with the affiliation of each gang to one of these wider
groups. His conclusion regarding the geography of the maltas is that the Guaiamus occupied the old city
centre, mainly the Sacramento and the Santa Rita parishes, the latter including the port area, characterized
by overcrowded tenements (cortiços). The Nagoas, on the contrary, were strongest in the areas of more
recent urban occupation, forming a circle around the old city centre, and they dominated areas such as
Glória, Lapa and the Santa Luzia beach. 85 The large Campo de Santana square constituted a territory
disputed by both groups.
Soares compared the geography of malta affiliation with the patterns of residence of African and creole
slaves. During the first decades of the nineteenth century, Africans, especially the newly arrived,
concentrated in the rural parishes around the centre. He suggested therefore that the Nagoas were ‘identified
with a slave and African tradition of capoeira’, whilst the Guaiamus ‘should be linked to a native and
mestizo root’. 86 He also claimed that the representation of a ‘typical’ Nagoa and Guaiamu (published in a
newspaper in 1906, see Figure 3.8) showed that the latter was lighter skinned than the former. However, as
Soares recognizes himself, by mid-century the concentration of Africans was greatest in the central parishes
of Santa Rita and Sacramento—the actual strongholds of the Guaiamus. Furthermore, these are only broad
trends, since Africans and creoles were largely present in all parishes. Since patterns of residence do not
strongly correlate with gang affiliation, it seems rather problematic to explain the identity of the Nagoas and