Primórdios da rede urbana cearense

Abstract

The text analyses the origin of the urban system formation in Ceará during the XVIII century, emphasizing the role of the Portuguese State and of its local agents involved with cattle raising, which gave an economic meaning to the territory occupation. Sent off from the sugar litoral of the Brazilian Northeast, due to the increasing necessity of soil in order to plant sugar cane, the cattle reached the captaincy of Ceará at the end of the XVII Century through the cattle roads. In strategic points of these roads, the Portuguese founded the villages of Ceará. In the regional scale, in the beginning of the XIX Century, the captaincy was completely interconnected. These roads also led to Bahia, located in the extreme west of Brazil, in the Northeastern coastline. However, although the territory was completely interconnected, the supply of the captaincy by an internal production of food was very rudimental because of the small productivity and of the huge distance between the villages.