The Guaranitic Resistance: a look at the Prospecto do Attaque no Passo do Rio Churieby (1753-1756)

Abstract

What the official vision of history calls the “Guerra Guaranítica”, the Guaraní resistance calls a massacre. The text presented here has as its theoretical matrix the studies that are opposed to the official History and Geography of the territorial formation of Brazil. The mobilized perspective has as its reference the “history of the massacred”. Our approach is situated alongside the indigenous interpretative guideline, that is, the effort is to bring to the scene the Guarani resistance against the massacre led by Iberian troops between 1753 and 1756, in the Jesuit-Guarani territories known as Seven Missions Peoples. Thus, in a reading against the grain, we present a cartographic piece signed by the Portuguese military man José Custódio de Sá e Faria, military leader, engineer and eyewitness to the Caiboaté massacre. The interpretive transgression consists of capturing the scope of the Guaraní resistance on historical military maps in the mid-18th century.