O Hispanic aid in Northern sugar captaincies (1624-1640)
naval attempts to recover Dutch Brazil
Abstract
In the recent historiographical review about the impacts of the Filipes’ time for Brazil, this article revisits the theme of traditional works on the so-called “Dutch invasions” in order to question the classic argument of metropolitan neglect in the defense of colonial territory. By connecting the history of the Iberian Dynastic Union and Dutch Brazil from the analysis of historical sources of the period, especially the chronicles and correspondences, numerous Hispanic aid efforts made in the 1620s and 1630s were recovered. The sending of Luso-Hispanic squadrons and the naval battles that occurred point to the displacement of the scenarios of a war, which was began continental in Europe, but advanced on the Atlantic coast in the 17th century. Thus, the abandonment of an overseas territory was never part of the administrative logic of a modern monarchy like the Hispanic Habsburgs.
