JOSÉ DE ANCHIETA (1574)

Portuguese Jesuit acclaimed as a poet, dramatist, and scholar who is considered the founder of the national literature of Brazil and is credited with helping more than 1,000,000 Indians to become Christians.


Anchieta came from a prominent Portuguese family and was even thought to be related to the founder of the Jesuit order, St. Ignatius Loyola. He was educated in Portugal and entered the Society of Jesus in 1551. He first arrived in Brazil on July 13, 1553, in what is now the province of Bahia. In 1554 he went to Sâo Paulo, a new Jesuit settlement in the interior, to convert the Indians. For the rest of his life he was influential in converting and helping the Indians, especially in trying to protect them from the institution of slavery, which was developing  in the growing plantation economy of the Portuguese colony.


Anchieta´s most famous literary work was the mystic poem De beata virgine dei matre Maria or The Blessed Virgin Mary. He also wrote and staged several religious plays in the Brazilian wildermess, many of which have been lost. In addition, he wrote the first grammar of the Tupí (the major Indian tribal grouping of eastern Brazil) language and many letters describing the Indians way of life, customs, folklore, and diseases, as well as the flora and fauna of Brazil. His other accomplishments include playing a role in the founding of Brazil´s two largest cities, Sâo Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, the founding of three colleges (at Pernambuco, Bahia, and Rio de Janeiro), and becoming provincial of the Jesuit order in Brazil in 1577.


It was said thar Anchieta could write ease four languages -Portuguese, Spanish, Latin, and Tupí-Guaraní.