Island in the Bay of Biafra (gulf of Guinea), measuring 860 km2 in area, presently an integral part of the Republic of São Tomé and Príncipe. When the Portuguese first landed there, the island was uninhabited and densely covered in vegetation, with fertile soil and an abundant water supply.
The date of discovery remains a mystery. The traditional version is that the island was discovered on the day of Saint Thomas (December 21) of 1471 by the navigators João de Santarém and Pêro Escobar, although no documents corroborate this version. Authors such as Luís de Alburquerque, basing their view on the information of Martin Behaim (Martinho of Bohemia) in the "Nuremburg globe" (which points to 1484) and of Duarte Pacheco Pereira (who situates the arrival during the reign of King John II), have situated the date of discovery after 1480, but before 1485, the year official colonization began.
In that year, the royal letter of September 24 established the donator of São Tomé and named the squire João de Paiva as donator-captain to promote the settlement of the island. The "charter letter" of December 16, 1485, in its turn, would bestow a vast array of privileges on the inhabitants, who at this date were still very few in number. Only in 1493, the year in which Álvaro de Caminha was named donator-captain and took up residence on the island, did the actual colonization start, with the installation of a significant number of settlers, including the so-called "young Jews," children and youth taken by force from families who were given shelter in Portugal, after the Jews were expelled from Castille. Sugar cane was cultivated from this time on and, in the second decade of the next century, sugar plantations began full operation; by cerca 1540, more than 60 plants were operating and the total annual production was about 150,000 arrobas (measure of dry weight equivalent to about 15 kilos). On the other hand, São Tomé was, from the beginning, a platform for the distribution of slaves destined for Lisbon, São Jorge da Mina and, after 1520, for Spanish America. After the mid 1600s, when the slave trade reduced and sugar production fell significantly (due to competition from Brazil, among other factors), São Tomé became an important port-of-call for trans-Atlantic commerce, particularly between Africa and Brazil. This meant that agricultural activity focused on crop variety for local food production.
The slaves that developed the economy of São Tomé, at the end of the 15th century and the early 16th century, came mainly from the Niger basin, especially from the reign of Benin. The lack of workers for the sugar industry and the increased traffic of slaves to the West Indies, however, would lead to the recruitment of slaves from Angola and the Congo, the main source of the great mass of slaves that reached São Tomé during the 16th century and the first decades of the 17th century. During the second half of the 17th century to the end of the 18th century, the source of indentured workers would be, once again, the Gulf of Guinea, but now from areas that were closer to the archipelago and less sought after by the weightier slave commerce of Europe, areas such as Gabon. As such, vessels from São Tomé would rarely call at the region of Niger, namely Calabar and the reign of Ardra. From the 15th century on, many were the slaves that fled from the port and the plantations to the interior of the island, which would lead to an endless "war of the forest," as well as the creation of stable fugitive enclaves in the more inaccessible peaks, a phenomenon that led to the creation of the Angolar community. Slave uprisings were also common in the sugar plantations; the main rebellions that were recorded occurred in 1585, 1595 (the famous revolt led by Amador, a Creole slave), 1617 and 1709.
The maximum number of Europeans living in São Tomé occurred in the mid 1600s, the peak of sugar production, but tended to decline after that. Due to tropical diseases (particularly malaria), the mortality rate was very high; this led to a reduction in the number of new settlers, who ended up being mainly exiles. At the same time, an elite class of half-breeds began to dominate the economic, political and religious life of São Tomé during the 17th and 18th centuries.
The first rulers of the island were donator-captains. In 1522, after the donator João de Mello was condemned for illegal activities, the captaincy of São Tomé was abolished and the territory became part of the property of the crown. The king himself began to name the higher authorities of the archipelago and the highest title was captain, which became governor after 1586, while some would receive the honorary title of general-captain.
The main urban center, which became a city in 1525, has the same name as the island of São Tomé. It has always been the capital of the archipelago and the residency of the governors, except during the period from 1753 to 1852, when the capital was transferred to Santo António, on the island of Princípe. At times, the city of São Tomé was attacked by corsairs and other foreign powers. It was violently attacked by the French in 1567 and 1709. In 1599, a large Dutch armada conquered, sacked and set fire to the city. Between October of 1641 and January of 1649, New Zealanders took over the capital and seized control of large part of the island, which they only abandoned after payment of a ransom and expulsion from Angola.
The diocese of São Tomé was created on November 3, 1534, by Pope Paul III, through the papal bull Aequum reputamus. Dependent upon the diocese of Funchal, it included, along with the islands of São Tomé and Príncipe, the islands of Ano Bom, Fernando Pó and Santa Helena, as well as the coast of the African continent from the Cape of Palmas to the Cape of Agulhas. The diocesan assembly was comprised of five dignitaries and twelve canonesses, but was rarely complete, although it was an excellent opportunity for promotion for the local clergy, who were first mestizos and, after 1671, also black.
The autonomous bishopric of São Tomé remained dependent on the Metropolitan Church of Funchal from 1534 to 1596, then on that of Lisbon (1597-1677) and, after, on that of Bahia (1677-1845). The first bishop of the diocese of São Tomé was Don Diogo Ortiz de Vilhegas, who never resided in the archipelago; neither did his successor, Frei Bernardo da Cruz, who was named in 1540. He would designate a vicar-general, the Dominican monk João Baptista (bishop of Utica), who probably disembarked in São Tomé in April of 1545.
Bibliography:
CALDEIRA, Arlindo Manuel, Mulheres, sexualidade e casamento em São Tomé e Príncipe (séculos XV-XVIII), 2.ª ed., Lisboa, Edições Cosmos/Grupo de Trabalho do Ministério da Educação para as Comemorações dos Descobrimentos Portugueses, 1999. IDEM, "Rebelião e outras formas de resistência à escravatura na ilha de São Tomé (sécs. XVI-XVIII)", Africana Studia, nº 7, 2004, pp. 101-136. HENRIQUES, Isabel Castro, São Tomé e Príncipe - A invenção de uma sociedade, Lisboa, Vega, 2000. NEVES, Carlos Agostinho das, S. Tomé e Príncipe na segunda metade do século XVIII, Funchal/Lisboa, Secretaria Regional do Turismo, Cultura e Emigração/Instituto de História de Além-Mar, 1989. PINTO, Manuel do Rosário, Relação do Descobrimento da Ilha de São Tomé, fixação do texto, introdução e notas de Arlindo Manuel Caldeira, Lisboa, Centro de História de Além-Mar, 2006. SERAFIM, Cristina Maria Seuanes, As ilhas de São Tomé no século XVII, Lisboa, Centro de História de Além-Mar, 2000.
