Barra - birthplace of Brazil

Bairro Barra

Located in the encounter of the Atlantic Ocean with Todos os Santos Bay (All Saints’ Bay), Barra is the most advanced geographical point of the city on the sea. In the place where Fort Santo Antônio da Barra was built, navigator Américo Vespúcio placed the mark of Portuguese ownership, in 1501. In Porto of Barra, the first donee of the Captaincy of Bahia, Francisco Pereira Coutinho, disembarked, in 1535, and Captain Tomé de Souza founded Salvador in 1549. The monuments of this area, such as Forts Santa Maria and São Diogo, and churches Santo Antônio da Barra, Nossa Senhora da Graça and Nossa Senhora da Vitória, are part of the city’s initial history.

With the whole coast almost surrounded by reefs, the city has in Porto da Barra the only place where the landing of small boats in safety is possible.

PORTO DA BARRA

With the shape of a small bay, the port was chosen by donee Francisco Pereira Coutinho to found the Villa of the Captaincy of Bahia. Known as Pereira’s Villa, it received the ships that made trade with the native commanded by Diogo Álvares “Caramuru” in the first half f the 16th century. There, general governor Tomé de Souza (1549), and the soldiers of Companhia das Índias Ocidentais that invaded the city in 1624 also landed off

A commemorative mark, built in 1949, points out the place where Tomé de Souza landed off.

Fort Santa Maria

Built to protect Porto da Barra from the invaders, crossing fires with Fort São Diogo, the fort already existed when Companhia das Índias Ocidentais tried to occupy Salvador for the second time, in 1638.

With seven sides, four salient and three re-entering angles, in design is of Italian type from the end of the 18th century.

Fort São Diogo

Crossing fires with Fort Santa Maria and also with the function of impeding the disembarkation of invaders in the only natural port of the city, this fortification also existed in 1638 when the Dutchmen invaded Salvador for the second time. Embedded in the base of Santo Antonio‘s Hill, its main room exhibits a video on the System of Colonial Defense of the City of Salvador daily and, at noon, the fort discharges a cannon shot as it happened formerly.

Fort Santo Antônio da Barra (Barra’s Lighthouse

First fort built in the city, it had the function of hindering the enemies entrance in All Saints’ Bay. Initiated in 1582, it got the shape of an irregular polygon with ten sides, six salient and four re-entering angles; its current dimensions, however, just came about in the 17th century.

The first wooden lighthouse, which functioned with whale oil, was made in 1696 and it indicated the entrance of the bay, alerting to the dangers of the coral reef or sandbank of Santo Antônio – the current iron lighthouse, working with electricity, was built in 1836. In the fort, there are a restaurant, a bar and the Nautical Museum, with exhibitions of old maps, navigation equipment, models of vessels, artillery pieces and remains of shipwrecks that happened in Barra, mainly Galleon Sacramento’s.

Here, the Fort Santo Antônio da Barra is best known as Farol da Barra (Barra’s Lighthouse

Santo Antônio da Barra Church

Located on a hill, with a dominant view over Barra and a great extension of Todos os Santos Bay, this temple was built between 1595 and 1600. Its frontispiece presents a high classic front in a triangular way accompanied by two towers in pyramid, covered by tiles.

Church and Abbey of Nossa Senhora da Graça – The primitive wall chapel, covered with straw, in praise of Nossa Senhora da Graça, was built in 1535, by order of Catarina Álvares “Paraguaçú”, “Caramuru‘ s wife. The current church and its abbey were built in 1645 by the Benedictine, heirs of the lands of the family Álvares. Considered Catarina’s first temple – whose body was buried in its interior in 1583 -, the Church of Nossa Senhora da Graça is the oldest in Salvador