FROM VILLAGES TO PLANTATIONS: EMPHYTEUSIS ON INDIGENOUS LANDS IN CAMPOS DOS GOYTACAZES (1770-1800)

Abstract

Over the past twenty years, a new generation of researchers has been dedicated to discussing the scales of property rights that shaped colonial occupation in the Americas. Since the studies produced in the 1990s, research has sought to unravel the dynamics of territorial appropriation, based on a key concept of Luso-Brazilian Civil Law. In this sense, the present article analyzes the institute of emphyteusis in its relation to the perception problems of land concentration in Campos dos Goytacazes, Rio de Janeiro, in the late 18th century. For this purpose, we analyze the troubled historical process of the loss of rights suffered by Indigenous groups over those lands as well as the operationalization of the emphyteusis as a way of constituting a property right of the direct domain holder.

Keywords
Property Right; Emphyteusis; Indigenous Lands; Indigenous Villages; Agrarian History