PRETOS NOVOS INSTITUTE

When the slave market was transferred from the surroundings of Primeiro de Março St (formerly Direita St.) to Valongo St, the Pretos Novos Cemitery also had to be transferred from Largo de Santa Rita to the Caminho da Gamboa – where nowadays is the number 32 of Pedro Ernesto St, the address of Pretos Novos Institute (IPN). Pretos Novos (something along the lines of “new blacks”) was the name given to the captives that had just arrived in Brazil, many of which died upon arrival because they could not withstand the physical abuses inflected upon them during the journey from Africa. The archeological site was discovered in 1996, when the house was undergoing renovations. Archeologists identified millions of fragments of the remains of newly-arrived Africans, men, women, youngsters and children alike.

Considered the biggest slave cemetery of the Americas, 20 to 30 thousand people are estimated to have been buried there – although the official records show numbers a lot smaller: 6,122 people between 1824 and 1830. The bodies were thrown in ditches and burned, and the place also functioned as waste dump, which is an indicative of the outrageous treatment reserved to enslaved Africans. Besides human bones, some belongings of the “pretos novos” were also found, like food scraps and everyday objects discarded by the city’s inhabitants. The analysis of the site showed that the majority of the remains belonged to children and adolescents. Nowadays the house functions as a cultural center, and aims to recover the history of African culture, offering classes and workshops and a library about black culture.