The strongholds of bandit domination in the wildernesses of São Bento do Tamanduá: The case of Januário Garcia Leal, the "Seven ears"

Abstract

Our work, fruit of our research that begun in 2003, aims to analyze the theme of banditism in the colony. To do so, we have developed the concepts of "command areas" and "bandit domineering" to construct the concept of "strongholds of bandit domination" - areas of domination monopolized by gangsters in regions where state dominance was weak or litigating. In these regions were powerful gangs of robbers. The gang of Januário Garcia Leal stood out among these groups. It was not by chance that its leader, by nickname "Seven Ears", had become a sort of bandit-potentate in the inhospitable hinterlands of São Bento do Tamanduá, now Itapecerica - Minas Gerais. In the end, as a fundamental point of our research, we find that the famous Law of Good Reason, by disrespecting customary rights, provoked a new form of collective reaction to the centralist attempts of the Crown - the banditism in gangs.