The Influence of Military Fortifications on Urban Expansion in the City of Rio de Janeiro under the Perspective of Historical Cartography
The present subject evaluates the participation of strategically positioning of forts which, since XVI century, were builtby the Portuguese and Frenchmen in order to protect Guanabara Bay, in the foundation and expansion of the initialurban core of Rio de Janeiro city. By historical reconstruction o...
| Authors: | , |
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| Format: | article |
| Status: | Published version |
| Publication Date: | 2015 |
| Country: | Brasil |
| Institution: | Universidade Federal de Uberlândia (UFU) |
| Repository: | Revista brasileira de cartografia - RBC (Online) |
| Language: | Portuguese |
| OAI Identifier: | oai:ojs.www.seer.ufu.br:article/49124 |
| Online Access: | https://seer.ufu.br/index.php/revistabrasileiracartografia/article/view/49124 |
| Access Level: | Open access |
| Keyword: | Influência Defesa Fortificação Influence Defence Fortification |
| Summary: | The present subject evaluates the participation of strategically positioning of forts which, since XVI century, were builtby the Portuguese and Frenchmen in order to protect Guanabara Bay, in the foundation and expansion of the initialurban core of Rio de Janeiro city. By historical reconstruction of the initial moments of urban expansion and analysisof geographical positioning occupied by the colonizers, this work seeks to identify in which ways and until when thepresence of these forts had influenced urban occupation and expansion. Other vectors acted secondarily in the expansionof the initial nucleus of the city and also they had been pointed. The methodology was based on a historical parallel ofthe installation of the forts and the gradual advance of the urban mesh in landward direction, through the elaboration ofthematic and synthesis maps, which used historical cartography and documents. The results show that the installationof these forts had as objective the protection of Guanabara Bay, considered as an exit port, for the Europe, of the localnatural products and the gold that came from plateaus of Minas Gerais. This protection first occurred in the entranceof the bay and, at a second moment, in century XVII, was turned to the urban core, in the neighborhoods of Praça XV.The forts at this moment had been installed in positions with great vision and privileged possibility of defense, in thequadrilateral formed by the mounts of Castelo, Conceição, São Bento and Santo Antonio, and conferred protectionto the city against the threats of the foreign invaders, usually the Frenchmen, who also recognized the great positionand the strategically format of the Guanabara bay. In general, this work concludes that the foundation of the city wasdirectly associated with the defense of the territory and this was the main strategy of the Portuguese colonizers toguarantee the supremacy and the exploration of their colony. The influence on the foundation and the development ofthe city occurred until the beginning of century XVIII when from now on, the expansion for west and southwest wereparticularly made possible trough the increasing occupation of areas until then marshy and of difficult access. |
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