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Educar em Revista

Print version ISSN 0104-4060On-line version ISSN 1984-0411

Educ. Rev. vol.37  Curitiba  2021  Epub Aug 07, 2021

https://doi.org/10.1590/0104-4060.77146 

DOSSIER - Body and History: multiple processes of the education of the body

Entertainment, illness and body education in the Vila Rica District (18th Century)1

*Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais. Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, Brasil. E-mail: m.crosa@hotmail.com


ABSTRACT

This paper aims to understand the processes of education of the bodies in the district of Vila Rica during the 18th century, based on relationship between entertainment and illness. We have chosen to research civil and ecclesiastical sources, contemplating the terrain of norms, as well as of contraventions, in addition to medical guides. Bad behaviour of the population in regard to the cleanliness of physical spaces and entertainment practices caused the bodies to become ill and demanded, improvement and regulation. Entertainment associated with excessive practices, especially among the humbler population, made up of slaves and convicts, was noxious because it impaired recovery for work, which was already wearing. Two sides of the same coin, entertainment and illness wore down the bodies, led to insubordination and punishment, required care, and were fought against.

Keywords: Entertainment; Minas Gerais; Body; Education

RESUMO

Este artigo tem por objetivo compreender processos de educação dos corpos na Comarca de Vila Rica no século XVIII a partir de relações entre divertimento e doença. Optou-se por pesquisar fontes civis e eclesiásticas, contemplando o terreno das normas, bem como das contravenções, além de manuais de medicina. Maus comportamentos da população em relação à limpeza de espaços físicos e a práticas de diversão provocavam o adoecimento dos corpos e demandavam intervenções, melhorias e regulação. O divertimento associado a práticas excessivas, especialmente da população mais humilde, formada por escravos e forros, era nocivo porque prejudicava a recuperação para o trabalho, que já era desgastante. Faces de uma mesma moeda, o divertimento e a doença desgastavam os corpos, suscitavam desobediências e castigos, demandavam cuidados, eram combatidos.

Palavras-chave: Divertimento; Minas Gerais; Corpo; Educação

Introduction

The history of entertainment has been included in research, especially in the field of Leisure Studies. An important part of this production favours the study of body practices, institutionalized or not, such as dances, capoeira, games and, predominantly, sports (SOARES et al., 2020). In this context, body education is still poorly addressed, although several studies have as main argument for the analysis of the changes impacting the entertainment offers and practices in the urbanization process of Brazilian cities, especially in the late 19th and early 20th centuries XX, in which progress and modernization are recommended and carried out through improvements, both in spaces and in the behaviour of individuals. In the field of Education, this theme was approached from different subjects, such as teacher training, school subjects, corporal punishment, gymnastics, sports and childhood. Amusements are still poorly studied, when compared to schooled body practices; however, it is an interesting theme because it covers different practices, places of occurrence, subjects, customs, bodies, sociability. The study of amusements - notions, concepts, prescriptions, regulations, resistance, and sensitivities - makes it possible to understand society from everyday practices.

Melo (2020a) recognises the relevance of the theme for historical research and suggests that the experiences of entertainment are significant instances of education. Writing about the Tivoli amusement park, opened in Rio de Janeiro in 1843, he emphasizes the possibility of interpreting public behaviours from education for and through entertainment, as “everyone should learn how to behave in spaces of amusement, to the same extent that these spaces spread new ways of behaviour” (MELO, 2020a, p. 4).

The notion or understanding of body education has been worked on by different authors, such as Melo (2020b); Soares (2014, 2000); Taborda de Oliveira (2006), Moreno et al. (2012), who seek to “identify the permanence and rupture, with regard to the ways in which a given society designs forms of intervention aimed at bodies” (SOARES, 2014, p. 219). When writing about this notion, this author draws attention to the “processes that affect our bodies to modify and reveal the most intimate and hidden behaviours and conducts, as well as the most visible and public ones” (SOARES, 2014, p. 219). Dialoguing and considering this notion, this paper aims to understand the processes of body education based on the relationships between entertainment and illness of the bodies in the Vila Rica District in the 18th century.

This study is important because, as Fonseca states, in this temporality, educational conceptions “did not necessarily turn to a school perspective of education, but dealt with broader issues, actions and practices that formed socially useful individuals, that is, Christian subjects, loyal to the State and to the Church” (FONSECA, 2014, p. 32), among them the occupation against idleness. And, as he affirms, the history of education must give more importance to the “non-school dimension of education, necessary for the understanding of educational processes and practices strongly present in the centuries before independence” (FONSECA, 2014, p. 16), whose traces are found in different types and forms of documents, generally dispersed and manuscript.

Following this path, this paper explored the terrain of norms, starting with the analysis of edicts, postures and pastorals issued by both the Church and the State, the main institutions of power that ordered, prohibited and recommended behaviours and regulated customs and morals, aiming to control the public welfare; as well as the terrain of offences through the study of transgressions, crimes and deviations revealed by ecclesiastical and civil justice, which allowed for an understanding of how people approached or departed from standards and, furthermore, how they reinvented them. In the sources surveyed, the slave population emerged, forcefully, as offenders, defendants, victims. In addition, medical manuals written by surgeons, one of the main agents of the healing arts present in this environment, were mobilized.

The District of Vila Rica, formed by urban and rural nuclei, such as camps, hamlets, parishes and villages, occupied the centre of the Captaincy of Minas in economic, population and commercial terms. The administrative seat was Vila Rica. Another important urban centre was the Village of Nossa Senhora do Carmo, elevated to the town of Mariana in 1745 to host the Bishopric. The two locations concentrated characteristics and practices related to the urban, such as population concentration; buildings; matrix or cathedral; bridges, pavements and fountains; uprisings and riots; festive cheers; trade in goods produced in the country and abroad; transit of people and goods; diversity of offices and officers; variety of entertainment practices.

In this temporality, entertainment was seen as a diversion from the useful to the useless, moving away from necessary work, from any serious occupation to give way to another, less necessary activity. To have fun was “to take away, or decrease, the application to some study, business. To deviate from some occupation, company”, from virtuous actions (BLUTEAU, 1712-1728, p. 259).

In the Vila Rica District, the entertainment of the population, predominantly male and slave, was mainly associated with a negative meaning. To it was added idleness, laziness, deviation, excess and time for doing useless things. Amusement was considered something that did not build, was not solid, a thorn among flowers. Something useless that amused, gave pleasure, but was dangerous. The regularization of experiences was sought: an exit or distancing from deviations, addictions, disruptions, excesses, pain and suffering, aiming at the government of simultaneous actions to the process of civilization.

In different discourses, such as ecclesiastical, legal and medical, and in different practices of behaviour regulation, amusements were associated with addiction, sin and, also, with the illness of the bodies2. When talking about fun, it was intended to demonstrate the harmfulness, damage and perniciousness of a practice said to be disruptive. In this way, the lawful and moral were established. Among the good values and procedures, work and virtue were highlighted while the addiction and idleness that caused diseases and allowed for pleasure and fun was denied.

Under this context, some locations and entertainment practices stood out and were more feared, such as the taverns, where, besides the sale of food and drinks, there was prostitution, gambling, dispute, escaped slaves, goods cheated by theft or robbery; the brothels in which, presenting a favourable situation for people to offend God, there were drums, cults, concubinage, drinks and dances; the street where meetings, games, walks, transit of people and practices, parties took place; the gambling houses where drinking and prostitution took place, as well as allowed and prohibited games, especially card games; the drumming or illegal gatherings in which, in addition to dances considered dishonest, there was music, singing, drumming, voices, disturbances, drinking and mixing of genders; parties, especially popular ones, such as soirees, baptisms, batuques and dances, in which bodies of both genders gathered. The Legal and illicit amusements occurred during the night, a period of less vigilance and regulation, as a time of greater predominance and, consequently, of more excess, sociability. On these occasions, due to the gathering of practices and people, possibilities to sin, to practice addictions, to fall ill arose.

The understanding of diseases in Portuguese America was established by the knowledge elaborated by different cultural practices that referred to official medicine, empirical and popular knowledge, magic and religion. Strands that merged, not only in the understanding of what disease was, but also in the various features of the body - preservation, purification and cure (VIGARELLO, 2001), either by the methods and medicines used, or by those who exercised the action. Like other manifestations of culture, the knowledge, insights and practices of medicine were formed by the diversity. The art of healing carried out in the District of Vila Rica could portray the dynamics of this cultural universe in which medicine, exercised by doctors, surgeons, apothecaries, barbers, healers, sorcerers and midwives, showed agreement, divergence and reconciliation in the different ways of treating patients. As Dias (2002) points out, who writes about the body in Minas, especially during the mining period, having as reference the work Erário Mineral, written by Luís Gomes Ferreira and published in 1735, there was the formation of “a hybrid culture of customs related to the human body [...] because it contains prescriptions, apothecaries and spells of the popular traditions of northern Portugal, of the Carijós Indians, of the Mina and Bantu slaves” (DIAS, 2002, p. 325).

For the medicine exercised mainly by surgeons, who had as one of their principles the observation of bodies and the experience gained through practice, the disease was based mainly on the change of mood, the acrimony, which constituted the temperaments. These were mainly influenced by climate, food, winds, water quality, humidity and way of living. And in Vila Rica District it was no different. Factors such as poor food quality, misery, overwork, air and water quality, filth, allowed the emergence and spread of diseases that were combated mainly with administrative actions of the Chambers, which manifested the need for interventions to monitor the various agents, as well as to improve the bad behaviour of the population. Among these actions, the cleaning of public places and the regulation of entertainment practices.

Cleaning of public places

The accumulated dirt, rubbish in the streets and the misuse of some places motivated illnesses. The cleaning of public places, therefore, was essential to avoid them and there were several ongoing actions. The edict of June 4, 1791 published in the streets of Mariana determined “that no person of any quality and condition should spill or throw dirty water, or other filth or manure in any pipes, streets and alleys of this town” (AHCMM, 1791), and established a penalty for transgressors, be they free people or slaves. There were several problems with manure and manure plants pointed out since the beginning of the century as a mean of proliferating contagious diseases. There were interventions that talked about its use mainly in times of epidemics, when care should be redoubled.

Likewise, the quality of the water, which should not be infected or dirty, proved to be an important item in order to prevent diseases. In Vila Rica, for example, the residents of the square requested the canalization of the fountain water to prevent illness (APM, 1751). In Mariana and its term, for several years, edicts were published about the bad use of the sources. The decree of 28 January 1775 published in the town streets prohibited the use of public fountains to wash clothes or other things (AHCMM, 1775)3. What were the authorized uses of the fonts? Water was used for cooking, drinking, bathing bodies, washing clothes and objects. However, this use required cleanliness, because people came to get water from the fountains, which must to be clean. Water would also be used for entertainment, since the fountains sat in places where other practices, rather than work, took place? It was expected, therefore, not only the cleanliness of the place, but also of the practices that took place.

Another important factor was the corrupt air that could cause an epidemic. There were, therefore, edicts of the Chamber, such as that of Mariana, which determined its purification: “make fires at your doors for eight days in every successive night, burning together with fern, by another name [fetus], fragrant herbs, and balsamic” (AHCMM, 1780). For Vigarello (1996), comfort and strengthening of the body are some therapeutic references of perfume. When talking about the transformation of defences against the plague, the author explains that, associated with the burning of fire, aromatic substances were added, justifying the greater effectiveness in the purification or correction of the air.

The habit of residents, breeders, middlemen and sellers of bringing loose pigs through the streets of towns and villages also brought damage to health related to dirt and appearance, as these animals are unclean. In Vila Rica, pig farmers were ordered to keep these animals in their own places, preventing them from walking through the streets of the country (APM, 1733). They should, therefore, be collected. In Mariana’s term, the discomfort and damage caused by pigs to the appearance of dwellings, buildings and churches demanded representations of the residents of some localities to the Chamber, in which they asked for measures.

Likewise, there were edicts and positions that spoke about the quality of food, specifically about trading in some shops of corrupt things. Meat and beiju made with cornflour were the commonly cited foods. Touched, infected or corrupt and smelly meat appeared to be a persistent problem. In Vila Rica, for several years, such as 1724, 1738, 1745 and 1761, they tried to monitor and punish the presence of spoiled meat in butcher shops and markets of the Vila, as well as the markers who sold them. In Mariana, the positions of the markers, established by the Chamber on September 18, 1771, in addition to establishing prices of meat, said that they “will not cut cattle that have been touched or infected in any way, under the penalty of losing the same cattle and pay four octaves of gold for each ox, and similarly what is presumed to be bitten by a snake” (AHMI, 1771, p. 90).

In the Vila Rica District, the actions of the Town Councils in relation to diseases were similar to those announced by Roberto Machado et al (1978), who claimed that there was no social medicine in the colony. There was no public hygiene that was related to the social one. What took place were responses to solve problems in the relationship with dirt and diseases based on complaints and inspections, in which the action of inspectors stood out. These were fragmented, punitive and restorative actions, without concern for prevention, planning or evaluation. They were restricted, simply, to palliative or mitigating actions. In fact, they were common characteristics of actions that concerned different dimensions of life in Portuguese America, such as public health, urban (re) structuring, government of social practices and regularization of behaviours, such as entertainment.

Entertainment practices regulation

Fun, drinking, prostitution, games, fights were actions that not only the Chamber, but also the Church constantly monitored and tried to monitor. The aim was not only to clean the spaces, but also the bodies that circulated through them and some practices considered vicious. Some filth, therefore, was not only physical, but predominantly moral, which referred to uses and customs. Among the various speeches focused on illness and entertainment, the doctor stood out, who had a relevant role, placing lifestyle habits among the causes of disease, with emphasis on the black people. Thus, amusement emerged, among other practices, as a reason.

In the study “Observations on Diseases of Black People4, Dazille (1801) addresses symptoms, causes, ways of curing and preventing diseases for black people, using practical medicine and close observation of changes in temperaments influenced by the way of life. Among the main causes of illnesses he identified were poor or insufficient food, lack of clothing, excessive or overwork, sudden change from heat to cold and the type of work and life, as well as forms of rest, sex life and the consumption of cachaça.

In addition to overwork, as Dazille (1801) mentions, for colonies in general, rest time also emerged as a stimulus to disease, as the rare breaks were used for debauchery rather than necessary rest. The night time, mainly, was not for rest, restoration. amusement was sought, alcohol consumption, sensual pleasures and the satisfaction of desires, pleasures of the body - to which black people were inclined. It is “from this time, that they steal the only rest they can take, being employed in the pleasures preceded and followed by painful careers, results in weariness, a consequence from which it is very difficult to save them” (DAZILLE, 1801, p. 31). Thus, in addition to overwork, poor nutrition, insufficient clothing, air injuries, inadequate treatment of diseases, there was an almost excessive delivery of sexual treats and drinking, thus not preserving health.

The rest were associated with entertainment, drinking, games, debauchery, parties, gatherings, drumming, pleasures of the body and sins of the flesh, which, according to the First Constitutions of the Archbishopric of Bahia of 1707 (VIDE, 1853), include sodomy, bestiality, molasses, adultery, incest, rape and abduction, concubinage and prostitution. Some were very present in the daily life of the District.

According to Ferreira (2002)5, black people, specifically those living in Minas Gerais, were very fond of the seduction of women and alcohol drinking. Diseases were associated with female bodies, with care being a recommendation for relating to women. In the parish of Cachoeira, Manuel dos Santos Sampaio was friendly with a black woman, his slave, whom he had already sold and bought twice. As it appears, the surgeons advised him to leave her, otherwise he would die (AEAM, 1727). Why? After all, it was public that they had been together for years. Was it a concern about illness? What are the evils of this female body?

For Dazille (1801), venereal diseases, the result of much depravity, were very common among black people and treatment was difficult, as they were usually complicated by other diseases. As he claims, in some cases, the disease persisted, because the treatments were generally not very methodical. There was excessive debauchery and black people often did not recognise the presence of the disease. In addition, it reveals that the virus acted more effectively on the tired, poorly fed and unnerved body, which is more prone to serious damage and less inclined to cure. In this way, the bodies of black people and their descendants were very susceptible due to treatments, in other words, mistreatment. As the most frequent among venereal diseases, it highlights gonorrhoea, including its virulent strain and which is called “falling into the scrotum”. In the enquiry into the death of the slave André Courano, the surgeon Manuel de Araújo Cortes, who lived on the street of São José de Vila Rica, was called on November 8, 1742 (AHMI, 1742b), around midnight, to attend Francisco Marques Coimbra. In his testimony, he indicates the presence in Francisco Marques Coimbra of gonorrhoea and consequences which, as explained by Dazille (1801, p. 135), were “difficulties to urinate produced by ulcers, and arrests of the urethra”, as well as using the bath as a way of treating the patient.

Syphilis, known as Gallic or Yaws, also had a marked presence in Minas, as shown by Antônio José Vieira de Carvalho, translator of Dazille’s book, when explaining a disease by the name Pian, which, particularly in Minas, they call Bobas. This disease also appears in a libel that Domingos Francisco de Carvalho moved against Antônio Labedrene for agricultural debts in a shop. The defendant, by counterclaim, accused the plaintiff of a debt for the surgeon’s service for having cured a slave, with drugs and dangerous surgery, of a malignant disease that the author brought from the arid lands, among other actions of assistance to slaves (AHMI, 1741).

The constant attempt to normalize the trafficking and trade done by the black women on tray, as well as the surveillance to the permanence of black women, slaves or former slaves, in the taverns, although almost always run by these women (FIGUEIREDO, 2017), could be related to these diseases and attempts to regularize behaviour, including protests and rebellions (FIGUEIREDO, 2017). The deviations of the bodies, such as prostitution, needed to be directed, governed, especially in times of epidemics, to preserve those who had not yet been infected. It is worth mentioning that little or almost nothing is said about the pleasures and desires of the black bodies, outlined by music, food, drinks and other delights. The corporal punishments received by black people and their descendants, who constituted the great part of the population of the District of Vila Rica, stand out. When the fun was exalted, the intention is to show the problems this caused to the work or work body, mainly as a stimulus to the appearance of diseases. Another aspect ignored was rest as a recovery of the energies spent on work and entertainment.

The silence of the sources, with regard to the “leisure, parties and other similar activities” of the slaves, is indicated by Lara (1988, p. 230), in her study on violence in Campos dos Goitacases. However, it is worth considering that, even with the absence, or better, with restricted notes on entertainment in the sources consulted in her study, one can seen that several situations were conducive to these manifestations, such as practices mentioned in processes that investigated crimes, which occurred especially at night, in the streets, in taverns, in house of prostitution, in the churchyard, during the walk, at the moment when one was sitting at the door of the houses or leaving the mass. On these occasions, bodies became ill with injuries caused by blows, assaults, fights, bullies and other excesses, and these actions were often driven by jealousy, debt, drinks, pleasures, feuds, displeasures and games. However, certain factors associated with the universe of entertainment should be highlighted as motivators of diseases: drinks, mentioned by Dazille, and also physical aggressions.

About drinks

In Portuguese America, alcoholic beverages were widely consumed. Figueiredo (2004) cites drinks made with cassava, sugar cane, wheat, grapes and corn. Produced or imported, distilled or fermented, medicines or stimuli for addiction, besides explaining the intense cultural exchange, caused interference in the economy, due to the large-scale production of some. The generation of fiscal resources, being products of exchange, they could be the cause of joy, but also of sadness, due to diseases and other imbalances. However, in the art of curing, some, such as cachaça and wine, were used as medicines, therefore, there are several uses. In the Vila Rica District, the consumption of cachaça stood out6. The slaves, in particular, drank to support the hard work in mining, often in cold water for long periods, in addition to exposure to the weather. Its use reduced the number of deaths. As suggested by Luciano Figueiredo (2004), it constitutes a dietary supplement to the poor diet provided by the lords.

Ferreira recommends, in a health warning, a glass of brandy from the kingdom7 daily in the morning for people who have eaten something and a thimbleful of this drink for those who have not eaten anything, which can be replaced by tea or chocolate. It was also widely used in the composition of medicines, as plasters, and in the form of a lick. “How many people will seem mistaken in saying that the members burned by the fire of erysipelas are cured by applying cloths soaked in spirit or wine”, asks the author of the Erário Mineral (FERREIRA,2002, p. 226).

The approach between drinking and slaves is made by several authors and in the Vila Rica District, the consumption of cachaça was particularly mentioned, whose continued and excessive use was condemned by Ferreira (2002), as it led to diseases, such as obstruction, very common in the region. In warning the lords that all slaves drank, this author states that many died due to this addiction or from the use of drink, which, in addition to damaging their health, could take away their life, their credit or farm. The study by Mendes, cited by Silva (1999), also indicates the association between excessive consumption of cachaça by black people and the Ressecação dos Bofes, a chronic disease. Likewise, the abusive use of cachaça is revealed by Romeiro and Botelho (2003), who associate the drink to the appearance of certain diseases, such as hardening (in) the corneal arch. Other diseases are mentioned by Silva (2015), such as liver cirrhosis.

In addition to bringing harm by making the slaves sick, who drew the wealth from the land, alcohol caused disorders and withdrawal from work. Thus, the Municipal Council of Vila Rica, in response to a petition made and signed by the miners, agreed to ban the sale of alcohol and other foods on Sundays and holidays in honour of God, due to what they mention (ANNAES DA BIBLIOTHECA NACIONAL DO RIO DE JANEIRO, 1936).

The alleged reasons are not known, probably it was their peace and quiet, because in the days of rest the brandy along with other stimuli was the cause of behaviours considered harmful, including resistance. As Figueiredo (2017) shows, in Portuguese America, similarly to what happened in Europe during the Modern Age, protests, resistance, political movements composed of popular groups were linked to the consumption of the drink, in a move to disqualify rebellious actions and delegitimize the claims.

But the drink gave rise to other behaviours on other days and was not only consumed by black people and their descendants. In the parish of Catas Altas, Manuel da Silva Neves is accused of living in drunkenness, a scandalous sin, being considered a perennial drunkard (AEAM, 1722). In ecclesiastical debauchery there were complaints from seculars and ecclesiastics, who lived around the grocery shops and taverns getting drunk on wine, brandy and cachaça. With much drinking, many lost their minds and were mistreated, spoke uncompromising words, committed excesses, did stupid things and gave scandals, like Father Alexandre Pereira Tavares, who according to Antônio Rodrigues said, many times got drunk on cachaça and caused trouble (AEAM, 1726).

The cachaça was drunk on occasions of entertainment, such as games, baptisms, weddings, gatherings and sales conversations. And from these coexistences arose conflicts, drunkenness and bullies, and there were even injuries caused by people who, in these places, on ordinary days or on holidays and holy days, exceeded their consumption. In Lavras Novas, parish of Itatiaia, José Ferreira Lisboa had issues with the bush captain Luís da Costa, who gave him some stab wounds, due to which he was in danger of death (AHMI, 1742a). In his testimony, captain Francisco Veloso dos Santos, who witnessed the surgeon healing his wounds at his home, said that on the night of the incident José Ferreira Lisboa was disturbed by his drinking.

Around one o’clock in the morning, on Senhor do Bonfim street, Francisco, a Creole, slave of Father Joaquim Pereira, who lived in Ouro Preto, was beaten and wounded (AHMI, 1800). Some witnesses denounced tailor Pedro, a former slave, who was arrested as responsible for the crime. According to Catarina da Costa, a mulatto woman, Pedro Crioulo, a former slave, entered her grocery shop, bought and drank cachaça, getting out of his mind. Later, he heard his son Serino say that, that same night, he went to watch a bell casting in Ouro Preto, where he was with Francisco Crioulo, who was drunk. Leaving there, Pedro, with a small knife, stabbed Francisco. According to Serino da Costa Pinheiro, also a witness to the debauchery, he had gone to the foundry together with Francisco, a Creole, and Pedro, the former slave:

both had drank cachaça on which they got drunk and in the company a witness they started playing with each other because they were very close friends and during the play, Pedro stabbed Francisco twice, injuring his body but not intentionally, but as consequence of their playing [...] (AHMI, 1800, fl. 6v).

The social relevance of watching a bell cast is unknown. However, it was an event that attracted the presence of several people who, based on this motivation, met friends, drank, had fun and sometimes ended up causing injuries. In what kind of game would a knife be used? After what happened, even that night or dawn, Catarina da Costa saw Francisco’s wounds, who asked her to heal him. Could it be that he was it still in the grocery shop? Why did she seek to heal such injuries? Could it be because there was cachaça in her grocery shop? Cachaça was often perceived as a problem, as it caused disease, took black people out of work, caused disorder and rebellion, but at the same time it was much appreciated for providing pleasures and sociability. Although Guimarães (2005) stands out as a carrier of political content, by favoring conditions for the preservation of slavery, it highlights situations in which it was used by slaves as a form of resistance, revealing, in the dynamics of life, the contradictory character of the various uses and attribution of meanings. The study of the consumption of alcoholic beverages, as well as the spaces of consumption, such as taverns, allows us to understand forms of sociability, community relations, ways of life and ways of being in society (ALGRANTI, 2011).

About the physical aggressions

Physical aggressions caused by drink, or not, were very common. They occurredr in the withdrawal from houses, in situations of work, entertainment and in circumstances where there was corporal punishment. These resulted in wounds that seemed so common that Ferreira (2002), speaking of the way he practiced medicine and surgery and highlighting the treatments he used for healing, which was based on his experience, mentions wound healing. He says:

Who can be surprised not to see horrible wounds and unrelenting blood flows heal without applying any remedy to such wounds, but only putting sympathetic powders on the blood or on the instrument that wounded, with such a condition that the blood is still fresh?! (FERREIRA, 2002, p. 226).

The presence of violence in daily life in Minas is highlighted by Dias (2002), who alludes to Ferreira’s custom of always bringing, through the “inhospitable trails” that he travelled on horseback, “a good recipe forpowder wounds on his face or to heal wounds caused by excessive flogging”. By expressing the knowledge of this surgeon of herbs, plants and remedies, acquired in living with paulistas and carijós, the author shows that he

well knew the impact of the setbacks caused by sudden ills, stab wounds, sudden falls, which caused bone fractures, snake bites, road accidents, whether in clearing forests to plant crops, or in the custom of mining in rivers (DIAS, 2002, p. 53).

We still have to add: in amusements, as highlighted by Rosa e Silva and Santos (2020).

There were disputes, doubts and bullies that were successful in the churchyard, game houses, streets, drumming etc., in times and spaces of entertainment, which had the marked presence of blacks and their descendants and happened mainly at night, times of less visibility, which allowed the greatest transit of fugitive people, as well as escapes (GUIMARÃES, 2005).

Teresa Rodrigues de Jesus was wounded during the night, around eight o’clock, in Vila Rica square. As stated in the term made by the notary João Peres Souto and by the approved surgeon, Luis Pinto Ribeiro, who healed and assisted her, she had a wound on the “head above the fountain on the right where the bones [skeletons] and protoids the size of four are called fingers bruised with bruises, of leather and cut meat already cured with two points, and declared the said licensee to have offense in the skull” (AHMI, 1749). In addition to the shouts that reached people in their homes and in neighboring streets, there were voices and sounds of clubs that denounced the confusion. Some people passing by, some were talking in the street, others were at the window. Some saw the figure, others the bloody body. According to Manuel Francisco Ribeiro, who lived in the square, a goldsmith and the mulatto talking to him that night, at his door. While they were talking, in the sale, just him and Teresa, a black man arrived and wounded him. It was night and there were people in different activities that seemed to permeate the field of fun and / or work.

The injury caused by Manuel de Barros Silva to Antônio Pacheco was assisted by surgeon Francisco Coelho [Siqueira] (AHMI, 1747). It was only known that the two were playing or playing the shrine on the terrace of a house, while other people were also playing in the fields. However, the seriousness of the wound that hit his head led Antônio Pacheco to his death.

It was night. At Eugênia Mexia’s house, in the arraial of São Sebastião, Mariana term, there was a black drumming, in which peopleenjoyed themselves. There was Jorge Crioulo and his brother Inácio:

who was fair and employed with Miguel Francisco and he had sent for Ignacio to be called and, without listening to this call, he continued in his amusement that resulted in him coming with a stick, and entering the door of the house he called Inácio, and putting his hand on his breasts, he caught him, and went to hit him with the stick he was carrying, and in this fight the said Miguel Francisco fell and found his head on a stone that was behind the door that I succeed to do a bruise which she witnessed healed her without the defendant having to have said fall, and bruise for being too far away from said Miguel Francisco at that time neither had the defendant with a gun or a stick [...] (ACS, 1782)8.

The testimony of Valéria Teresa de Jesus, a former slave, referred to the articles of libel of contrariness made by the defendant, Jorge Crioulo, slave of Sebastião Gomes de Abreu, arrested for being accused of having injured Miguel Francisco’s head. Like Valéria, the defendant’s other witnesses also confirmed his good conduct. As they said, Jorge was with his brother on a toy, when a disturbance started by Miguel Francisco attacking, pulling and beating Inácio. Jorge acted in defense of his brother and, in the dispute, Miguel ended up stumbling and hurting himself. The aggression that moved the debauchery and consequently the release was presented as an accident, but the context was that of beating drums and involved, in addition the practices related to entertainment, offenses against a slave. Moreover, next to the house where the toy was made, Bartolomeu Dias da Silva’s sale was opened, for it was from him that he heard the commotion in Eugênia Mexia’s house and hurried to check what it was.

Since Inácio was Miguel’s wage earner, who seemed to be a greedy slave, did Miguel have the right at any time to demand his services, his attention? Why didn’t Ignatius listen to the Lord’s call? What are the meanings of this fun for each other and their relationship to work? How did Inácio participate in the game? The fun associated with excessive practices appeared to be something harmful, as it hindered recovery for work, which was already exhausting. Illness or ill health added work and fun. The disease may perhaps be regarded as amusement, a stray, a thorn among flowers, due to the deviations of the bodies. In the Vila Rica District, the deviations marked dense features in the social dynamics, which may perhaps be seen as obstacles in the course of the civilization process.

Final considerations

In the Vila Rica District, education, entertainment and illness were intertwined, as well as black, rusticity, illegality and slavery. In the scope of entertainment, the deviations were highlighted when the government and the direction of the practices tried to dominate, when the economic was intended to govern cultural life and guide actions and compositions, such as rest, taste, fun and treatment of the bodies. This focus on entertainment brought, among its consequences, the attempt to institutionalize practices, an action that required multiple interventions and strategies, pedagogies, regularization of bodies, as well as transgressions and irregularities.

Thus, attempts to deprive delight, taste or enjoyment, even if lawful, was something that could not go unnoticed, for the government and surveillance of the bodies’ desires and appetites were sought behind the tastes, contacts, scents, sounds, even of other bodies. Therefore, an education of the senses was required. Pleasures and treats should be banished. Were new sensibilities created? The vicious body, given over to joys and vices, was considered sick and deserving of attention, for fun, addiction, sin and disease were contiguous. Fun and sickness, sides of the same coin, wore down bodies, impaired work, provoked disobedience and punishment, demanded care and were fought.

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1Translated by Marina Faria. E-mail:alpha@alphatradu.com.br.

2Speeches and practices present, for example, in the documentation produced by the City Council, in which judges, councilors and contracted doctors worked, and which made it possible to understand the regulation of daily life, the uses of urban spaces and their transformations, as well as customs, reforms and transgressions that caused the need for changes and new rules; in ecclesiastical debauchery carried out by visitors during diocesan and pastoral visits and which allowed the identification and analysis of warrants, prohibitions, recommendations, warnings, regulations and ordinances that sought to correct errors and customs considered inappropriate, verify compliance with the Constitutions and proceed with deficiencies; and in medical manuals written most often by surgeons in which not only scientific but also moral values were attributed to behaviours.

3Years in which edicts on the subject are published: 1749, 1757, 1775, 1782 and 1783.

4Study by Jean-Barthélemy Dazille, French surgeon of the troops on the island of São Domingos, about diseases of captives in colonial areas.

5This work was published in 1735, in Manuel de Rodrigues’ workshop in West Lisbon. The version utilized is a facsimile edition organized by Júnia Ferreira Furtado, published in 2002, which includes critical studies on the work written by Ferreira, a glossary and a medical glossary.

6Although some authors, such as Figueiredo (2017) and Silva (2015) who study drinks in this social context, differentiate between the terms and explain the meanings attributed, in this study, spirit, spirit from the land and cachaça appear without distinction. We chose to respect the sources, without delving into this issue.

7It is observed that this barber surgeon always recommends the use of spirit from the kingdom, said to be the best, which does not mean that the spirit of the land was not used for this and other purposes recommended by him.

8The name of the injured person Miguel Francisco also appears as Miguel Fernandes

Received: October 04, 2020; Accepted: January 07, 2021

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