Transition Toward Slavery: Changing Legal Practice Regarding Indians in Seventeenth-Century São Paulo *
A seventeenth-century inhabitant of Sao Paulo once remarked that Indians were “the most profitable property in this land.” Legally, however, Indians were not property at all, for the crown explicitly prohibited their enslavement. During most of the seventeenth century, the settlers of Sao Paulo complied with the letter of the law and did not officially give their Indian servants any monetary value, and though they often sold them, the sales were known to be illegal and were not usually recorded in public documents, such as the documents used for this study, inventarios , settlements of estates. By the end of the century, however, local judges were openly allowing the monetary appraisal of Indians and their subsequent sale was duly recorded in inventarios and other court processes.