| For much of the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries, the Guaraní Indians of what is now
northeastern Argentina, southeastern Paraguay and northwestern Rio Grande
do Sul were only nominally within the domain of the Spanish and Portuguese
empires, and instead were ruled – or protected – by the Society of
Jesus, the Jesuits. The first redução – a self-governing
Indian settlement based around a Jesuit mission – was established in
1610 and, within a hundred years, thirty such places were in
existence. |
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| With a total population of
150,000, these mini-cities became centres of some importance, with erva
maté and cattle the mainstay of economic activity, though spinning,
weaving and metallurgical cottage industries were also pursued. As the
seventeenth century progressed, Spain and Portugal grew increasingly
concerned over the Jesuits’ power, and Rome feared that the religious
order was becoming too independent of papal authority. Finally, in 1756,
Spanish and Portuguese forces attacked the missions, the Jesuits were
expelled and many Indians killed. The missions themselves were dissolved,
either razed to the ground or abandoned to nature, surviving only as
ruins.
Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay each have one fine
ruin of a Jesuit mission and, without too much difficulty, it’s possible
to combine a visit to all three. There are direct bus services every day
between Santo Ângelo, which serves the São Miguel site in Brazil,
and Posadas in Argentina, crossing the border at São Borja. Posadas is a
short distance from Argentina’s San Ignacio Miní ruins and
Paraguay’s Trinidad. Alternatively, these latter two missions are
an easy side-trip from the Iguaçu falls; the superb country hotel Estancia
Las Mercedes, roughly midway between the two areas near Eldorado,
makes a convenient base. |