Notas sobre fundadores e povoamento no Brasil

Os casos do sertão pernambucano e do norte mato-grossense

Abstract

Some historical accounts on the founding of new towns in the interior of Pernambuco and in the northern state of Mato Grosso are produced as resulted from personal initiatives, by individuals or small groups of founders. The article proposes a rapprochement between processes of founding of places far distant in time and space, in order to emphasize their commonalities and specificities. A tension between privatism of these businesses and the modes of state intervention in the local sphere is subsumed in these narratives and relates in part to their common civilizing purpose, claimed by these founders. Although sometimes elided, the collective character and focusing on the family of these projects is set out.