Rio de Janeiro slave wharf may become world heritage site

The sight of a long valley between the hills of Conceição and Livramento was what welcomed the survivors of an inhumane trip from Africa to Brazil between 1774 and 1843 landing at a wharf called Cais do Valongo, in Rio de Janeiro. Of the 4 million Africans who came over to serve as slaves, 1 million did so through Valongo, which turns the spot into the main gateway for men and women enslaved in the Americas.

The Cais do Valongo was shut down and landfilled following laws banning the transatlantic slave trade in the 19th century. Recently, during renovation works on the site, it was once again unveiled with the aid of experts.

For being the only landing place in slave trading that remained preserved, the Cais do Valongo, already a national heritage site, is expected to turn into a UNESCO world heritage site. In September, a commission created by the agency inspected the old wharf, and a 400-page report on local conditions is expected to be released by the National Historic and Artistic Heritage Institute (IPHAN) in May. The final decision will be announced in June, 2017.

Recollections of the diaspora

In the view of Milton Guran, the anthropologist in charge of the Cais do Valongo application as world heritage site, the city has never come to forget what took place in that specific territory. “Society has always kept watchful eyes, as local residents preserved the power of the place through oral tradition.”

During the digging, thousands of signs of the passage of Africans from all several parts of the continent were unearthed. Objects include búzios (cowrie-shells used for divination), traded then as currency, and also necklaces, pipes, earrings, and bracelets. A total 1.5 million pieces have been stored in a thousand boxes, stowed in a warehouse and should only be shown to the public in 2018. City authorities signed a contract with a team of archaeologists as well as an agreement with federal prosecutors.

Former Executive Secretary for Policies on Racial Equality and local resident Giovanni Harvey, who has followed the process from the beginning, described the spot as a piece in the African diaspora “jigsaw puzzle.”

“There is a romanticized vision that the Cais do Valongo was where the father, the mother, and the children would land, but that is not the case. Rather, it was the arrival of someone severed from their family, deprived of everything. Three, four centuries ago, a human being was put on a ship having no clue whatsoever where he was headed,” he said. “The wharf serves as a physical landmark; it turns the coming of African slaves concrete,” added Harvey, who has paid a visit to the House of Slaves, on Gorée Island, off the coast of Senegal, where slaves were brought on board.

In the view of Harvey, former consultant to the United Nations, the recognition of Valongo allows us to reflect upon the past and think about the future, as well as the National Museum of African American History and Culture, which opened in September in the United States.

Milton Guran also expects the quay to be recognized with the official national historic site status for being an important landmark in the history of slavery violence. "This is the only port of landing that has been materially preserved in the world, there is no other," he said. He noted that the ports of embarkation of Gorée Island in Senegal, Elmina Castle in Ghana and Mozambique Island have already been recognized by Unesco.

An anthropologist, who studied the return of enslaved people to Benin, also advocates the creation of a "memorial museum celebrating the heritage of African roots" and the contribution of Africans and their descendants to Brazil. "In the application dossier, we explained that the entire neighborhood of the wharf has a unity and historical importance," citing, for example, the Dom Pedro II Docks building, designed by the black engineer André Rebouças, which is in front of the Cais do Valongo.

Little Africa

The region of the Cais do Valongo, the center of slave-trade activities, also shows vestiges of houses where Africa black people were sold as objects, as shown by the images of artists Jean Baptiste Debret, Johann Moritz Rugendas, and Maria Grahan. Close by, the Cemitério dos Pretos Novos [Cemetery of the New Blacks] is open for visitation. It is the place where they used to deposit the bodies of young people and children, mainly those who had not survived until the arrival to Brazil.

In the same region, called Little Africa by black artist Heitor dos Prazeres because it was occupied by Africans and their descendants, the first associations that promoted carnival processions, Candomblé and Angus Houses—where black people gathered for their celebrations—were created.

"It is no surprise that Rio de Janeiro is a pole of cultural production and renewal in Brazil and in the world," says Professor Martha Abreu, from the Fluminense Federal University, one of the authors of the application dossier for wharf recognition as a heritage site.

Translated by Amarílis Anchieta / Fabrício Ferreira