Under the government of Tomaso de Souza and his collaborators, Brazil began to take on the aspect of a state almost independent of the metropolis. According to SPORTSQNA, the governor fortified the various colonies and organized compulsory military service; he founded new inhabited centers, such as Conceição do Itanhaem and São André; repressed, sometimes with excessive cruelty, the seditions of the Indians; he visited the various captains and organized an expedition in the interior of the current state of Minas Geraes. In 1551, a bull of Julius III granted the Portuguese kings perpetual patronage over Brazil; and the same year the bishopric of Bahia was created, with the appointment of bishop Pietro Fernandes Sardinha. Things did not go equally well during the four years of the subsequent governor Duarte da Costa (1553-1557), powerless to face the struggle against the Indians and the French, and engaged with the bishop in a serious conflict that had been provoked by his own son Alvaro da Costa: a conflict that divided the settlers into two parties and threatened to degenerate into civil war. Bishop Fernandes, recalled by the king and set out on a journey, was shipwrecked in the slums known as D. Rodrigo, and was captured and devoured, with his entourage, by the Cahetés Indians. This appeased for a moment the ire of the settlers, who then rekindled, due to the acts of excessive nepotism, against the governor and his son, although these had bravely rejected, and then subdued (1555), the Indians who had attacked Bahia. At that time, the whole Brazilian territory was terrified of a famous Indian chief, Cunhambebe, who committed all sorts of depredations and cruelties, not excluding acts of cannibalism. Pernambuco also suffered from it. The widow of the dealer Duarte Coelho, Donna Brites de Albuquerque, having her children in education in Portugal, entrusted the defense to her brother Girolamo de Albuquerque, who completely subdued the rebellious Indians. This Jerome had 24 children; and a daughter, Caterina, married the Florentine Filippo Cavalcanti. Hence the noble family, so illustrious in the history of Brazil, of the Cavalcanti d’Albuquerque. A branch of the Acciaiuoli also settled in Brazil, coming from Portugal, and gave rise to the illustrious Accioly family. having his children in education in Portugal, he entrusted the defense to his brother Girolamo de Albuquerque, who completely subdued the rebellious Indians. This Jerome had 24 children; and a daughter, Caterina, married the Florentine Filippo Cavalcanti. Hence the noble family, so illustrious in the history of Brazil, of the Cavalcanti d’Albuquerque. A branch of the Acciaiuoli also settled in Brazil, coming from Portugal, and gave rise to the illustrious Accioly family. having his children in education in Portugal, he entrusted the defense to his brother Girolamo de Albuquerque, who completely subdued the rebellious Indians. This Jerome had 24 children; and a daughter, Caterina, married the Florentine Filippo Cavalcanti. Hence the noble family, so illustrious in the history of Brazil, of the Cavalcanti d’Albuquerque. A branch of the Acciaiuoli also settled in Brazil, coming from Portugal, and gave rise to the illustrious Accioly family.
But a movement of far greater importance had begun to take place under the first two governors: the arrival of the Jesuits and the evangelization and reduction of the Indians to settlers by their hands. With de Souza, a first group had come, led by father Emanuele da Nobrega, who was called “the American Orpheus” because he mainly used music to attract and educate the natives. Other fathers of the company were seconded in different points of the coast, and one of them, Azpilcueta Navarro, began to study the indigenous languages, starting the long series of those Jesuit philologists, albeit empirical, to whom we owe much of the knowledge of American languages. Among them, it is worth mentioning the Italians Luigi Vincenzo Mamiani, from Pesaro,(Lisbon 1698), and of the Arte de grammatica da lingua brasilica da na ç am kiriri (therein 1699), and Simone Bandini, writer of Varias doctrinas em lengua guarani, which are still unpublished in the British Museum. Under the government of Duarte da Costa, in 1553, when St. Ignatius was living, Brazil was elevated by him to a Jesuit province, and entrusted to his father Emanuele da Nobrega, who contributed so much with his Cartas to the knowledge of the new continent. A new group of fathers came to swell the ranks of the tireless apostles: among them, the famous Giuseppe de Anchieta. The primitive college was followed by those of S. Vicente and Piratininga: the latter, dedicated to Saint Paul, then gave its name to the whole province and had great importance in the political and social life of the country. The Jesuits were also responsible for singular experiments in colonization and economic organization.
The third governor, Mem de Sá, brother of the famous Petrarchist poet Sá de Miranda, family member of the king, expert jurist, and then proved himself in the new position a man of great military and political virtues, held the government for fifteen years, from 1557 to 1572, year of his death, and performed a truly prodigious activity. The first problem he had to face was the expulsion of a strong French colony in the bay of Rio de Janeiro, established there by Nicola Durand de Villegagnon (or also Villegaignon). He was a talented French sailor (Brazilian historians call him Provençal, misinterpreting the name of his native city, which was Provins), distinguished in the enterprise of Charles V against Algiers (1541) and then made himself famous for his skillful audacity with which had transported Maria Stuart to France.
