"History of Rio" Rio de Janeiro Travelogue by intl_dan

Until the 16th century some 20,000 Tamoio indians, a Topi subgroup, inhabited the reigion around Guanabara bay.

Under the command of Gaspar Lemos, Cabral arrived with an expedition on the 10th of January 1501 to the bay of Guanabara, mistaking it for an estuary of a great river he calls the bay Rio de Janeiro (January´s river). Portugal claimed the rights to the land but was more preoccupied with finding a passage to India and so invested very little in this area. Meanwhile the French land in 1504, winning the freindship of that Tomoio indian, and eager to exploit local resources, particularly brazil wood. Eventually the French, headed by Breton admiral Nicolas Durand de Villegaignon establish a colony in 1555 on the island that is today called Villegaignon (today part of the naval academy), calling it Forte de Coligny, and making it the administrative centre for "French Antartica", and building forts at the Ilha Governador and Glória.

In 1560 Mem de Sá receives orders from the king of Portugal to expel the french and sends a fleet that after fierce battles destroys the colony and the remaining French flee to the Tomoio indians.

Captain Estácio de Sá sent further trops and colonists and founded a new town at the foot of Morro Cara de Cão, where the borough of Urca stands, calling it São Sebastião do Rio de Janeiro. Soon this small settelement proved difficult to defend against the French and Tamoio indian attacks, so two years later it was moved to Morro do Castelo, right in front of today´s Carioca metro station.

The Tamoio indians and the French are finally defeated and those of the indians that collaborated with the Portuguese, notably cheif Araribóia, is given land across the bay where the city of Niterói now stands. The rest, and most, of the indians are butchered by 1572. Rio grows slowly for next hundered years, even in 1813, as you can see on the map, it still occupies the area mostly around Morro do Castelo.