The present article seeks to understand how the way of ruling the Portuguese America gradually started to be put to writing. For that purpose, the author takes the titles of privilege granted to the general governors since 1548, the year of installation of the general government in Bahia, and compares them with the correspondence of the general governor Antônio Luís Gonçalves da Câmara Coutinho. The article intends to demonstrate how the letters and the titles were combined in order to ensure a good government to the State of Brazil.
Letters; Instructions; General Governors