This is a timeline of Brazilian history, comprising important legal and territorial changes and political events in Brazil and its predecessor states. To read about the background to these events, see History of Brazil.
Centuries: 10th 15th 16th17th 18th19th20th21st
10th century Year Date Event 1000 Marajoara culture flourishes as an Amazonian center.
15th century Year Date Event 1492–1502 Voyages of Christopher Columbus: navigator Christopher Columbus, sailing in the employ of Castile and Aragon, departed from Palos de la Frontera in search of a westward route to the East Indies. 1494 7 June Treaty of Tordesillas: Spain and Portugal divide the New World between themselves.Davenport, ed., 107–111. Even though the treaty was negotiated without consulting the Pope, a few sources call the resulting line the "Papal Line of Demarcation".Leslie Ronald Marchant, The Papal Line of Demarcation and Its Impact in the Eastern Hemisphere on the Political Division of Australia, 1479–1829 (Greenwood, Western Australia: Woodside Valley Foundation, 2008) . 1500 Spanish navigator Vicente Yáñez Pinzón lands in the coast of Brazil but is prevented from claiming it by the Treaty of Tordesillas.Geo Brasil Granito do Cabo de Santo Agostinho, Pernambuco, BrasilDireito 2 Projeto pode mudar data do descobrimento do Brasil Quem descobriu o Brasil?COUTO, Jorge: A Construção do Brasil, Edições Cosmos, 2ª Ed., Lisboa, 1997.primeiro 22 April Portuguese navigator Pedro Álvares Cabral officially discovers Brazil and claims the land for the Kingdom of Portugal. He has 13 vessels with him.Fonseca (1908: p.225) 18 July Amerigo Vespucci Letter from Seville describes experiences on Alonso de Ojeda's May 1499 voyage. The letter is notable for its description of the Brazilian coast and its inhabitants.
16th century Year Date Event 1502 1 January Portuguese explorers, led either by Gaspar de Lemos or Gonçalo Coelho, sail into Guanabara Bay, Brazil, which they name Rio de Janeiro. Beginning of the exploitation of brazilwood. The Trindade and Martin Vaz Islands are discovered in 1502 by Portuguese navigators led by Estêvão da Gama, and, along with Brazil, became part of the Portuguese Empire. 1503 10 August The Fernando de Noronha island is discovered by a Portuguese expedition, organized and financed by a private commercial consortium headed by the Lisbon merchant Fernão de Loronha. The expedition is under the overall command of captain Gonçalo Coelho and carries the Italian adventurer Amerigo Vespucci aboard, who writes an account of it.The Coelho expedition is also known as the "Fourth Voyage" of Vespucci, and is related in the letter of Amerigo Vespucci to Piero Soderini, 1504–05. See the English translation of the account in Letter to Soderini 1516 The first sugar cane mills appear in Pernambuco. 1527 Cristóvão Jacques imprisons three French galleons in Recôncavo, Bahia. But having acted with barbarity towards the prisoners, this gesture eventually caused him major problems with Dom João III. 1530–1533 Martim Afonso de Sousa's expedition patrols the Brazilian coast, banishes the French, and creates the first colonial town: São Vicente.Taques, Pedro. História da Capitania de São Vicente. Brasília: Edições do Senado Federal, 2004. Available at http://www.dominiopublico.gov.br/download/texto/sf000043.pdf|access-date=24/10/2011 1531 Bertrand d'Ornesan tries to establish a French trading post at Pernambuco.R. J. Knecht, Renaissance Warrior and Patron: The Reign of Francis I p.375 1532 22 January São Vicente is established as the first permanent Portuguese settlement in Brazil.Rachel Lawrence: 2010, Page 183 1534 The Captaincies of Brazil are established by King Dom João III. Colonial Brazil is divided into fifteen captaincies 1534–1536 Iguape War in the region of São Vicente. 1537 12 March The Portuguese establish Recife in Pernambuco, in the Northeast of Brazil. 1539–1542 The first African slaves arrive in Pernambuco. 1549 29 March The city of Salvador, Brazil's first capital, is founded by Tomé de Sousa. 1551 Portugal founds a sugar colony at Bahia. 1554 25 January Missionaries Joseph of Anchieta and Manuel da Nóbrega establish São Paulo, then named São Paulo dos Campos de Piratininga, in southeast Brazil. 1557 German adventurer Hans Staden publishes a widely translated account of his detention by the Tupi people of Brazil, ("True Story and Description of a Country of Wild, Naked, Grim, Man-eating People in the New World, America"). 1560 17 March Fort Coligny on Villegagnon Island in Rio de Janeiro is attacked and destroyed during the Portuguese campaign against France Antarctique. 1565 1 March Estácio de Sá founds Rio de Janeiro as São Sebastião do Rio de Janeiro. 1580 25 March Iberian Union: King Philip II of Spain becomes King of Portugal under the name Philip I, following the death without heirs of King Henry of Portugal, in a personal union of the crowns, thus maintaining Portuguese independence (in Europe and throughout the Portuguese Empire, including Brazil). The Philippine Dynasty rule lasts until 1640.António Henrique R. de Oliveira Marques, History of Portugal. 1972, page 322. Boris Fausto, A Concise History of Brazil, page 40. 1588–1591 English privateer Thomas Cavendish loots Santos and São Vicente before losing most of the crew in a battle against the Portuguese at the village of Vitória. 1595 30 March – AprilAnglo–Spanish War: an English military expedition led by James Lancaster captures Recife.Bicheno pg 308-09
17th century Year Date Event 1608 Thornton expedition: a Tuscan expedition under Captain Robert Thornton, sent by Ferdinando I of Tuscany to explore northern Brazil and the Amazon River and prepare for the establishment of a settlement in northern coastal South America, which would serve as a base to export Brazilian wood to Renaissance Italy.Ridolfi, R. Pensieri medicei di colonizzare il Brasile p. 14 which would be colonised by France in 1630. The expedition was the only attempt by an Italian state to colonise the Americas.Ridolfi, R. Pensieri medicei di colonizzare il Brasile, in «Il Veltro», Roma, luglio-agosto 1962, pp. 1-18 1612 8 September São Luís is founded by the French, who intend to make it the center of the Equinoctial France. They build a fort named Saint-Louis de Maragnan after King Louis XIII and his Saintly ancestor Louis IX. 1616 6-year-old António Vieira arrives from Portugal, with his parents, in Salvador in Colonial Brazil where he will become a diplomat, noted author, leading figure of the Church, and protector of local indigenous peoples. Physician Aleixo de Abreu is granted a pension of 16,000 reis for services to the crown in Angola and Brazil by Philip III of Spain, who also appoints him physician of his chamber. A slave ship carries smallpox from the Kingdom of Kongo to Salvador. 12 January The city of Belém, Brazil, is founded on the Amazon River delta by the Portuguese captain Francisco Caldeira Castelo Branco, who had previously taken the city of São Luís in Maranhão from the French. 1624 The Dutch West India Company invades the Portuguese colony of Bahia in Brazil.Francis A. Dutra, "Dutch in Colonial Brazil" in Encyclopedia of Latin American History and Culture, New York: Charles Scribner's Sons 1996, vol. 2, p. 415. 1625 30 April The Portuguese recapture Salvador from the Dutch, with the help of a combined Spanish and Portuguese force, consisting of 52 ships and 12,500 men.Dutra, "Dutch in Colonial Brazil" p. 415. 1630 The Dutch West India Company invades the Portuguese colony of Pernambuco and founds Dutch Brazil. 1631 12 September Eighty Years' War: a Spanish fleet under the command of admiral Antonio de Oquendo defeats a Dutch fleet off the coast of Brazil in the Battle of Albrolhos. 1641 The first Rio Carnival happens to celebrate Dom João IV's coronation as king of Portugal. 11 March Guaraní forces living in the Jesuit missions defeat bandeirantes loyal to the Portuguese Empire at the Battle of Mbororé in present-day Panambí, Argentina. 1642 Isaac Aboab da Fonseca is appointed rabbi in Pernambuco, thus becoming the first rabbi of the Americas. 1644 6 May Johan Mauritius resigns as Governor of Dutch Brazil. 1648 19 April First Battle of Guararapes: the Portuguese army defeats the Dutch army in northeast Brazil. 1649 19 February Second Battle of Guararapes: decisive Portuguese victory against the Dutch in northeast Brazil. 1654 After several years of open warfare, the Dutch withdraw from Brazil; the Portuguese paid off a war debt in payments of salt. 1661 Treaty of The Hague: the Dutch Republic recognizes Portuguese imperial sovereignty over New Holland (Dutch Brazil).Facsimile of the treaty:Articulen van vrede en Confoederarie, Gheslooten Tusschen den Doorluchtighsten Comingh van Portugael ter eenre, ende de Hoogh Mogende Heeren Staten General ...; 1684 Beckman Revolt in Maranhão. 1693 Gold is found near modern-day cities of Sabará, Caeté and Ouro Preto, beginning of the Brazilian Gold Rush. 1694 6 February The runaway slave colony of Quilombo dos Palmares is destroyed.Guerra dos Palmares InfoEscola. 8 March The Casa da Moeda do Brasil is established by the Portuguese in Salvador. 1695 20 November Quilombo dos Palmares ruler Zumbi is captured and beheaded.Zumbi dos Palmares, O Guerreiro da Liberdade . Grandes Personagens da História do Brasil. Museu da Cruzada."Da invisibilidade à afirmação" . Número 27, janeiro/março de 2000. Revista do Legislativo.João José Reis & Flávio dos Santos Gomes, "Quilombo: Brazilian Maroons during slavery" , 31 January 2002, Cultural Survival Quarterly, Issue 25.4.
18th century Year Date Event 1707–1709 War of the Emboabas in modern-day Minas Gerais.FURTADO, Júnia Ferreira. José Rodrigues Abreu e a geografia imaginária emboaba da conquista do ouro. In: Modos de Governar - Ideias e práticas políticas no Império Português séculos XVI a XIX. BICALHO, Maria Fernanda & FERLINI, Vera Lúcia do Amaral (Orgs.). 1ª ed. São Paulo: Alameda, 2005, p.278 1710–1711 The Mascate War pits merchants of Recife against the planters of nearby Olinda. 1711 São Paulo officially becomes a city. 1720 28 June The Vila Rica Revolt, also known as the Filipe dos Santos Revolt, was held against the Portuguese Crown. 12 September The Captaincy of Minas Gerais is established, after being separated from the Captaincy of São Paulo and Minas de Ouro. 1722 Expedition led by the second Anhanguera discovers gold in present-day Goiás. 1727 Lt. Col. Francisco de Mello Palheta smuggles coffee seeds to Brazil in a bouquet, starting a coffee empire. 1750 13 January The Treaty of Madrid between Spain and Portugal authorizes a larger Brazil than had the Treaty of Tordesillas of 1494, which originally established the boundaries of the Portuguese and Spanish territories in South America. 1756 February The Guaraní War takes place between the Guaraní tribes of seven Jesuit missions and joint Spanish-Portuguese forces. 1759 Jesuits are expelled from Brazil by the Marquis of Pombal. Indians left without protection. 1763 The capital of Colonial Brazil is transferred from Salvador to Rio de Janeiro, which is located closer to the mining region and provides a harbor to ship the gold to Europe. 1772 The Kingdom of Portugal divides its colony of the State of Great-Pará and Maranhão into the State of Great-Pará (capital, Belém) and the State of Maranhão (capital, São Luis). 1775 The Kingdom of Portugal reunites its South American colonies of the State of Brazil, the State of Great-Pará, and the State of Maranhão into the Colony of Brazil. Rio de Janeiro is the capital. 1788–1789 Inconfidência Mineira, conspiracy against the colonial authorities in Brazil. 1792 21 April Tiradentes, prime figure in the Inconfidência Mineira plot, is executed in Rio de Janeiro.1798 Revolt of the Alfaiates in Bahia.
19th century