SLAVE REBELLION IN BRAZIL: THE AFRICAN MUSLIM UPRISING IN BAHIA, 1835

This dissertation is a study of the 1835 African Muslim rebellion in Bahia, Brazil. It is primarily based on the extensive court and police records produced by the Bahian authorities at the time. These records allowed us to study with a certain degree of depth many facets of the African community in Bahia, besides the rebellion itself.;The rebellion was led by Muslims but it did not exclude non-Muslims. Islam was the main organizational force and "language" of the movement, but not its exclusive ideological factor. Ethnicity and cultural cohesion also played an important role. The rebellion was carried on by African-born slaves and freedmen, most of them belonging to Yoruba, Hausa and other West African ethnic groups. Despite the weight of ethnicity, class determination was not absent from the movement.;This study shows that the structure of Bahian slave society and the shape of the economic conjuncture during the first half of the nineteenth century were conducive to social unrest. The majority of Bahian population at the time had very little access to material resources and the difficulties of Bahia's export economy worsened the lot of its inhabitants. These socio-economic trends merged with the political uncertainties of decolonization from Portuguese rule. The years that followed independence witnessed tremendous social unrest, within both slave and free sectors of the population. The 1835 rebellion happened in, and was part of, this historical context.