Brazil’s original capital has a difficult past, but in its UNESCO-listed centre you can see first-hand how the descendants of enslaved Africans and Portuguese migrants carved a home in their image...
In 1832, when Charles Darwin saw Salvador, now capital of Brazil’s north-eastern state of Bahia, from the deck of the Beagle, the usually matter-of-fact naturalist found himself transported into a ‘chaos of delight’, his senses overwhelmed.
‘It would be difficult [to] imagine, before seeing the view, anything so magnificent,’ Darwin wrote in his diary. Indeed, glimpsing the colonial city shimmering under a dome of blue sky, the brilliance of its colours, the diversity and detail of the exuberant flowers, insects and birdlife in the forests all around, had captivated him.
Darwin’s Salvador was tiny; the 21st-century version is now one of the largest cities in South America. Yet its UNESCO-listed historic centre remains much as it was in 1832, and even today it still overloads the senses with its buttery light yellows, terracotta palace roofs and eggshell-blue bell towers.
Life is everywhere here. Parakeets chirrup and caw in mango trees around Praça da Sé square, and in the shade of the branches, capoeira martial-art dancers whip and whirl to the twang of the berimbau. Afro-Brazilian women in cotton skirts fanned-out with petticoats sit in front of cauldrons of sizzling acarajé patties, sending wafts of dendê-palm and coconut spice through the narrow streets. And that exuberant nature that Darwin loved still tries to reclaim the city at every turn, in the vines that sprawl over the walls of patio gardens scarlet with heliconia flowers that shake beneath the thrumming wings of hummingbirds.
The carved rococo interior of the Convent of São Francisco has some of the most intricate woodwork in the city (Alamy)
Above and below, Old Salvador is stained a brilliant blue, whether through the vastness of the sky or the lapping of the sea. Here you can spy frigatebirds silhouetted in delta wing, yachts bobbing in the distance and dolphins cresting the waves. It is also where modern Brazil was born, as a Portuguese encampment hacked into a cliff. Back then, it was little more than a semi-circle bitten out of the great green carpet of the Atlantic Forest; a cluster of log huts huddled around a stockade and a church.
By 1549, the alluvial lands around the Bay of All Saints had been planted with sugar cane by the enslaved Tupi, the region’s Indigenous people. As they died from conflict or European diseases, the Portuguese responded by importing more enslaved Africans to Brazil than any other nation in the history of the Atlantic slave trade.
Sugar-rich Salvador was its first capital for over two centuries. The stockade became a vast, fortress-like governor’s mansion with an even larger cathedral beside it. Spilling down the stone-flagged streets at their feet, Portuguese merchants built mansions, a university and administrative centres. Monastic orders settled convents and abbeys, and Salvador rose as a glittering rococo city.
Life in the wealthiest colony in Atlantic South America was one of excess. Merchants competed to sponsor ever more lavish church decorations for the city’s elite to admire on Sunday. Perhaps they wanted to atone for the cost of their sugar wealth in African blood, sweat and tears – and their lavish designs needed artisans.
A female Afro-Brazilian drumming group bangs out a rhythm as they walk the streets of Salvador’s historic centre (Alamy)
Out-of-work Lisbon carvers and painters arrived in dribs and drabs. They, along with the enslaved Africans and Indigenous peoples, became the city’s artisan underclass: the first urban Brazilians. With few European references, no stone or marble to work, and only wood to hand, the art they produced was unique.
The names of only a few of these early artists are known today, such as Bento dos Reis or Francisco das Chagas (both children of enslaved workers); most were never recorded. Their work glitters in Salvador’s historic centre and is most magnificent in the Carmelite and Franciscan convents, which are smothered in carved gilt wood. Statues perch in swirling shapes like fruits on a vine, and star-shaped paintings show scenes from the lives of European saints played out in neotropical landscapes.
Hidden high up in the astonishing nave of the Convent of São Francisco are African faces – perhaps even those of the artisans themselves. The church of Nossa Senhora do Rosário was built by artisans in their spare time, for their own ceremonies. It is the heart of the Pelourinho (historic centre), and is where Catholicism and African spirit religion meet. Inside, and surely modelled on one of those first Brazilians, stands a wonderfully serene Saint Benedict – himself born to Ethiopian slaves in Messina – cradling the Christ-child in his arms.
Acarajé are black-bean patties that originated in West Africa and are stuffed with spicy fillings (Alamy)
Location: Salvador is the capital of the Brazilian state of Bahia. It sits on the southern Atlantic coast of Brazil’s Nordeste (North-east) region, which, at 1.56 million sq km, is about the size of the UK and South Africa combined.
Getting there & around: Direct flights connect Salvador with São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and most other Brazilian state capitals at least once daily. There are no direct flights from the UK; international routes usually connect via Lisbon or Madrid.
The historic centre is easy to explore on foot. You will need taxis to reach other parts of the city; these are safest when taken from a taxi rank.
Accommodation: The hotels and guesthouses with the most character sit in the Pelourinho. The Casa do Amarelindo is a lovely old Portuguese colonial house with views of the Bay of All Saints. The Fasano sits in a luxurious Neoclassical-meets-Art Deco tower.
Further Information: Alex Robinson’s Bahia (Bradt, 2010) is still one of the only major standalone guides to Salvador and Bahia state.
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