View source for War of Canudos

{{Short description|1896–1897 internal conflict in Brazil}}
{{Expand French|topic=mil}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2025}}
{{Infobox military conflict
| conflict          = War of Canudos
| image             = Canudos-map.jpg
| image_size        = 300px
| caption           = Map of northern Bahia, showing the location of Canudos
| date              = 1896 – 2 October 1897
| place             = [[Bahia]], [[Brazil]]
| result            = Movement squashed; settlement destroyed and survivors massacred
| combatant1        = {{flagdeco|Brazil|1889}} [[First Brazilian Republic|Brazil]]
*[[Brazilian Army in the First Republic|Brazilian Army]]
*[[Public Forces (Brazil)|Police Corps]]
| combatant2        = Canudos inhabitants
*[[Jagunço]]s
*Civil [[militia]]
| commander1        = {{plainlist |
* Arthur Oscar
* [[Antônio Moreira César|Moreira César]]{{KIA}}
* [[:pt:Febrônio de Brito|Febrônio de Brito]]
* Virgílio Pereira
* Pires Ferreira
}}
| commander2        = {{plainlist |
*[[Antônio Conselheiro]]{{KIA}}
*[[João Abade]]{{KIA}}
}}
| strength1         = 12,000 soldiers (Army and Police)
| strength2         = 25,000
| casualties1       = Less than 5,000 dead
| casualties2       = Almost 25,000 dead; only some 150 survivors
}}

The '''War of Canudos''' ({{langx|pt|Guerra de Canudos}}, {{IPA|pt|ˈɡɛʁɐ dʒi kɐˈnudus}}, 1896–1897) was a conflict between the [[First Brazilian Republic]] and the residents of [[Canudos]] in the [[Northeast Region, Brazil|northeastern]] state of [[Bahia]].<ref name="Levine">{{cite journal |last1=Levine |first1=Robert M. |title=Canudos in the National Context |journal=The Americas |date=October 1991 |volume=48 |issue=2 |page=208 |doi=10.2307/1006824 |jstor=1006824 |s2cid=147510781 }}</ref> It was waged in the aftermath of the [[Lei Áurea|abolition of slavery in Brazil]] (1888) and the [[Proclamation of the Republic (Brazil)|overthrow of the monarchy]] (1889). The conflict arose from a [[Millenarianism|millenarian cult]] led by [[Antônio Conselheiro]], who began attracting attention around 1874 by preaching spiritual salvation to the poor population of the ''[[sertão]]'', a region which suffered from severe droughts. Conselheiro and his followers came into conflict with the local authorities after founding the village of Canudos. The situation soon escalated, with Bahia's government requesting assistance from the [[Federal government of Brazil|federal government]], who sent military expeditions against the settlement.

Antônio Conselheiro and his followers were branded as "monarchists" by the press, with the authorities seeing the settlement as a threat to the recently proclaimed Brazilian Republic, which was still in process of consolidating itself. Rumors spread that the inhabitants of Canudos were planning to "depose the new Republican government" and "restore the monarchy." The inhabitants of Canudos were "so numerous, employed such artful strategies and so committed" that it took four military campaigns to defeat them.<ref name = "Madden-8">{{cite journal |jstor = 3513950|title = The Canudos War in History|journal = Luso-Brazilian Review|volume = 30|issue = 2|page =8|last1 = Madden|first1 = Lori|year = 1993}}</ref> Despite the government's troops employing modern weapons against the poorly armed and organized ''Conselheiristas'', the first three expeditions resulted in failure, including the death of Colonel [[Antônio Moreira César|Moreira César]], which harmed the government's image and alarmed public opinion.  

The conflict came to a brutal end in October 1897, when the fourth and final expedition, led by General Arthur Oscar, with a large fraction of the [[Brazilian Army]], was deployed to bombard and overrun the settlement, raze it and slaughter nearly all its inhabitants.

==Background==
[[File:Canudos village.jpg|thumb|left|250px|A view of the village of Canudos. Typical constructions such as the one in the foreground were very basic, made of mud and straw]]

The conflict had its origins in the former settlement of [[Canudos]] (named ''Belo Monte'' by its inhabitants, meaning "Beautiful Hill" in [[Portuguese language|Portuguese]]) in the [[semi-arid]] backcountry (or ''sertão'') of Bahia. In the late 19th Century, the region suffered with poverty, with an economy based on [[subsistence agriculture]] and cattle raising, severely lacking infrastructure. The disenfranchised population drew equally from rural and urban portions of the region and represented a "broad spectrum of ethnic and economic origins".<ref name="Levine VT" /> It was a fertile ground for the growth of dissatisfaction with the new Republic, proclaimed on 15 November 1889, after a military coup against the ruling emperor, [[Pedro II of Brazil|Pedro II]]. While the republic was strongly supported by much of the urban population,<ref name="Galvão"/> the old emperor was still beloved by the common people. For the ''sertanejos'', "the only change" that came with the establishment of the republic was "an increase in taxes."<ref name = "Madden-6"/> 

This period was characterized by considerable political, social and economic instability, as the military fought to put down revolts all over the country.<ref name = "Madden-6"/> It was, therefore "immensely unpopular" and dangerous to be known as anything other than republican during this time.<ref name = "Madden-6"/> At the onset of this early republican era, a man by the name of Antônio Vicente Mendes Maciel, known as [[Antônio Conselheiro]] (Antônio, the Counselor) began rising to prominence in Bahia's hinterlands. He was one of the many itinerant religious figures in the backcountry of Brazil.<ref name="Levine VT">{{cite book |last1=Levine |first1=Robert M. |title=Vale of Tears: Revisiting the Canudos Massacre in Northeastern Brazil, 1893-1897 |date=1992 |publisher=[[University of California Press]] |edition=First |pages= 171-177, 184-183, 196, 207}}</ref> Conselheiro traveled from village to village with his followers, assisting the local communities and garnering support from small farmers, "collecting money and organizing labor for the construction of churches, dams and cemeteries".<ref name="Madden-1993">{{cite journal |last1=Madden |first1=Lori |title=The Canudos War in History |journal=Luso-Brazilian Review |date=Winter 1993 |volume=30 |issue=2 |page=6 |jstor=3513950 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/3513950 |access-date=12 April 2022}}</ref> As an increasing number of supporters joined his cause, Conselheiro drew the attention and hostility of the local landowners, who disapproved of his ideals.<ref name = "Madden-6">{{cite journal |jstor = 3513950|title = The Canudos War in History|journal = Luso-Brazilian Review|volume = 30|issue = 2|page = 6|last1 = Madden|first1 = Lori|year = 1993}}</ref>

Conselheiro claimed to be a [[prophet]] and predicted the return of the legendary Portuguese king [[Sebastian of Portugal|Sebastian]] (see [[Sebastianism]]). He held that "it was the monarch’s God-given right to rule", which caused him to be progressively branded as a [[Monarchism in Brazil|monarchist]] figure by the unstable Republic at the time.<ref name="Levine VT" /> The ultra-conservative doctrine he preached, implicitly criticizing the "wayward behavior" of many priests, was "attractive" to many ''sertanejos'', and led the Church hierarchy to view him as a "threat to the Church's authority and popularity".<ref name = "Madden-10">{{cite journal |jstor = 3513950|title = The Canudos War in History|journal = Luso-Brazilian Review|volume = 30|issue = 2|page = 10|last1 = Madden|first1 = Lori|year = 1993}}</ref>

After wandering through the states of [[Ceará]], [[Pernambuco]], [[Sergipe]] and Bahia, he eventually decided to settle permanently in 1893 with his followers in the backlands of Bahia, in the farming community of Canudos, near [[Monte Santo, Bahia]] on the banks of the [[Vaza-Barris River]]. The village was very small but offered the ''Conselheiristas'' protection, as the location was hard to access. Within two years, as the religious community prospered, Conselheiro convinced several thousand followers to join him,<ref name = "Madden-1993-21">{{cite journal |jstor = 3513950|title = The Canudos War in History|journal = Luso-Brazilian Review|volume = 30|issue = 2|page = 21|last1 = Madden|first1 = Lori|year = 1993}}</ref> eventually making it the second-largest urban center in Bahia at the time.<ref name="Levine VT" /> The settlement was supported by cultivation of crops and export of leather, with residents allowed to retain private property and businesses. "The poor were maintained through donations to the community".<ref name = "Madden-1993-7">{{cite journal |jstor = 3513950|title = The Canudos War in History|journal = Luso-Brazilian Review|volume = 30|issue = 2|page = 7|last1 = Madden|first1 = Lori|year = 1993}}</ref>

===Basis of history===
Determining what exactly happened in the war is problematic, as the two main historical source groups consist of military chronicles (written to justify the army's actions) and far-from-impartial journalistic reports.<ref name = "Madden-1993-8">{{cite journal |jstor = 3513950|title = The Canudos War in History|journal = Luso-Brazilian Review|volume = 30|issue = 2|page = 8|last1 = Madden|first1 = Lori|year = 1993}}</ref> According to Peter Robb, "[t]he foreign correspondents who covered what was soon being called the War of Canudos, as if it were a conflict between nations rather than the extermination of a tiny community within a single country, were nearly all embedded with the army of the Brazilian republic."<ref name="Robb" />

==Military campaigns==
===Initial military campaign===
[[File:40th infantry batallion canudos 1897.jpg|250px|thumb|left|The 40th Infantry Battalion, sent from the [[Pará]] state to quell the Canudos rebellion, 1897]]

The incident that served as the catalyst for Canudos’ eventual destruction was a dispute over delivery of lumber. Conselheiro had placed an order of wood from a business in the neighboring town of [[Juazeiro]] he often did business with to construct a new church.<ref name="Levine VT" /> However, a new local judge, Arlindo Leoni, opposed Conselheiro and prevented the delivery.<ref name="Levine VT" /> Some ''Canudenses'' then took it upon themselves to go to Juazeiro to claim the wood.<ref name="Levine VT" /> Hearing of this plan, the judge responded by requesting police forces from the state governor, Luis Viana, claiming an imminent "invasion" of his town  by Conselheiro and his followers.<ref name="Levine VT" /> Viana recounts that he had been informed by Leoni of "rumors which were current, and which were more or less well-founded, to the effect that the flourishing city in question [Juazeiro] was to be assaulted within a few days by Antônio Conselheiro’s followers."<ref name="Levine VT" />

[[Image:Conselheiro Revista Ilustrada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Caricature showing Antônio Conselheiro with an entourage of jesters armed with ancient [[blunderbuss]]es, trying to stop the Republic, ''[[Revista Illustrada]]'', {{circa}} 1896. The caption reads: "[He is] even daring to tell the Republic: 'hold on! You shall not pass...'"]]

While the troops were initially dispatched for the sole purpose of preventing the assault, Leoni managed to convince their commander Pires Ferreira to march on Canudos.<ref name="Levine VT" /> With scant information about terrain and the defensive resources of Canudos' population, a small, 100-man force commanded by Ferreira was sent towards the settlement on 4 November 1896.<ref name="Cunha">{{cite book |last1=Cunha |first1=Euclides da |title=Rebellion in the Backlands |publisher=[[University of Chicago Press]] |location=1957 |pages=xxxii-xxxiv |isbn= 978-0143106074|year=2010 }}</ref> However, the ''Canudenses'' marching from the religious settlement to Juazeiro surprised the troops at Uauá and a fierce battle ensued.<ref name="Levine VT" /> Estimates of the number of ''Conselheiristas'' that engaged in the battle varied anywhere from 1,000 to 3,000 men, and accounts reported that they were armed with "old muskets, pikes, scythes, long poles, and implements of the land."<ref name="Levine VT" /> Despite some considerable losses, estimated at around 150 men, the Canudenses drove the state police soldiers off.<ref name="Levine VT" /> The troops then retreated to Juazeiro and awaited reinforcements from the state of Bahia.<ref name="Cunha" />

The government and the local media quickly publicized the soldiers’ defeat in the backlands of Bahia. The media (i.e. newspapers) played an essential role in escalating the conflict, spreading rumors that rather than being a local and unsophisticated uprising, the ''Conselheiristas'' were allied with other monarchists scheming to launch a "restoration" of the monarchy.<ref name = "Madden-1993-5">{{cite journal |jstor = 3513950|title = The Canudos War in History|journal = Luso-Brazilian Review|volume = 30|issue = 2|last1 = Madden|first1 = Lori|year = 1993| pages=5–22 }}</ref> The unstable political climate along with the scarcity of military resources in Bahia led the state government to seek aid from the federal government to crush the increasingly threatening settlement.<ref name = "Madden-6"/> Since the First Brazilian Republic had only recently been founded, it saw the rebel settlers as a monarchist and [[separatism|separatist]] threat to its authority to be made an example of.<ref name="Madden" >{{cite journal |jstor = 3513950|title = The Canudos War in History|journal = Luso-Brazilian Review|volume = 30|issue = 2|pages = 5–22|last1 = Madden|first1 = Lori|year = 1993}}</ref>

The [[President of Brazil]] at the time, [[Prudente de Morais]], ordered another punitive military expedition to Canudos. A second 104-man force, again commanded by Ferreira, began its preparations in November 1896, and attacked the settlement on 21 November 1896.<ref name="Cunha" /> The settlement was fiercely defended by a band of 500 armed men, shouting praises to Antônio Conselheiro and the monarchy, and the attacking force faced problems similar to the first expedition. The Brazilian soldiers retreated after incurring severe losses and killing around 150 of the settlers, who were armed only with machetes, primitive lances and axes.<ref name="Cunha" />

===Second military campaign===
[[File:Canudos 24o Batalhão de Infantaria.jpg|250px|thumb|left|The 24th Infantry Battalion in Canudos, 1897]]

The defeat of the Pires Ferreira campaign produced sensationalist media reports about the ferocity and fanaticism of Canudos' inhabitants, which provoked an outcry and calls for reprisals against the settlement. Rather than causing its inhabitants to flee, the armed conflict caused the settlement to grow exponentially, and it now numbered over 30,000 residents.<ref name="Levine" /> 

On 12 January 1897, Republican troops, which comprised 547 men, 14 officers, and 3 surgeons, left Juazeiro for Canudos.<ref name="Cunha" /> The attack on the ''Conselheiristas'' began on 18 January, and led to the death of 115 ''Canudenses'' with minimal losses on the army's side,<ref name="Levine VT" /> which had some initial success with artillery against the villagers' trenches. However, the soldiers were eventually surrounded by more than 4,000 insurrectionists.<ref name="Cunha" /> Running short of ammunition, food and water, and with the rebels continuing to fight despite heavy losses, the Republican soldiers retreated to nearby [[Monte Santo, Bahia|Monte Santo]] to await reinforcements.<ref name="Cunha" /><ref name="Levine VT" />

''Canudenses'' celebrated their victory against the expedition in a particularly destructive way;<ref name="Levine VT" /> burning ranches and farm buildings, creating a ring of [[scorched earth]] within a radius of seven miles of Canudos.<ref name="Levine VT" /> With the ''Canudenses'' winning crushing victories and journalists responding with cries of alarm, the national military and civilian authorities labeled Canudos a dangerous threat to national order and to the prestige of the armed forces and the new government.<ref name="Levine VT" />

===Third military campaign===
[[File:Ruins church in canudos 1897.jpg|thumb|right|200px|Ruins of the Bom Jesus church after the destruction of Canudos, 1897]]

An experienced colonel, [[Antônio Moreira César]], set out with 1,300 troops; three [[infantry]], one [[cavalry]] and one [[artillery]] [[battalion]]s, all newly armed and trained, and reportedly carrying "seventy rounds of cannon-balls and sixteen million rounds of ammunition."<ref name="Levine VT" /> 

On 20 February, Moreira and his soldiers arrived at Monte Santo.<ref name="Levine VT" /> Antônio Moreira César had recently crushed another [[Federalist Revolution|insurrection in southern Brazil]] where he earned the nickname "cutthroat".<ref name="Galvão">{{cite journal |last1=Galvão |first1=Walnice Nogueira |title=Rebellion in the Backlands: Landscape with Figures |journal=ABEI Journal |date=2010 |volume=12 |doi=10.37389/abei.v12i0.3575 |doi-broken-date=1 November 2024 |s2cid=186307865 |access-date=11 April 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200216013547/http://revistas.fflch.usp.br/abei/article/download/3575/2929 |url=http://revistas.fflch.usp.br/abei/article/download/3575/2929 |archive-date=16 February 2020|doi-access=free }}</ref>

Although forewarned about the numbers and resolve of the rebels, the military thought it impossible that the rebels could resist such a strong regular army force. A day after arriving in Monte Santo, completely disregarding "the intense heat and parched land," the force advanced on Canudos.<ref name="Levine VT" /> Their equipment quickly turned out be inadequate for the ''sertão'' of Bahia. Wagon trains that carried supplies "sank up to their hubs in sand."<ref name="Levine VT" /> This was also disregarded and the troops continued their forced march to Canudos.<ref name="Levine VT" /> 

Attacking the settlement, the troops found that the artillery barrages had turned the settlement of huts into a "maze" that was impossible for the advancing soldiers to navigate.<ref name="Levine VT" /> On 6 March 1897, after only two days of fighting, the surviving officers had no choice but to vote to retreat.<ref name="Levine VT" /> Moreira César's protests were overlooked,<ref name="Levine VT" /> and he died before dawn due to a fatal wound.<ref name="Cunha" /> Moreira César's shocking failure may have been brought on by epileptic seizures.<ref name="Yacubian-2003">{{cite journal |last1=Elza Marcia Targas Yacubian |title=WHEN EPILEPSY MAY HAVE CHANGED HISTORY |journal=Arq Neuropsiquiatr 2003;61(2-B):503-509 |date=2003 |volume=61 |pages=503–509 |url=http://www.scielo.br/pdf/anp/v61n2B/16275.pdf | archive-date= 4 October 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121004223823/http://www.scielo.br/pdf/anp/v61n2B/16275.pdf |access-date=11 April 2022}}</ref> Starting to retreat, the soldiers panicked and a disastrous rout ensued; many were killed by pursuing ''Canudenses''.<ref name=Celarent-AJS-2012/> Many soldiers abandoned their weapons and ammunition, which were recovered by the rebels.<ref name="Galvão"/> The artillery maintained good order but was attacked and slaughtered by the rebels who took possession of its weapons and ammunition.<ref name=Celarent-AJS-2012/>

In [[Rio de Janeiro]] and [[São Paulo]], the country’s largest cities, where monarchism was very unpopular, demonstrations in the streets turned into riots and four monarchist newspaper offices were destroyed, and the owner of one lynched.<ref name="Galvão"/>

===Fourth expedition and final destruction of Canudos===
[[File:A matadeira.jpg|thumb|left|''A matadeira'' (The Killer), a British-manufactured cannon used in the War of Canudos by the Brazilian Army against the rebels. Photograph from a replica, taken from the movie ''A Matadeira'' by Jorge Furtado, 1994]]

Pressured, the federal government sent a new expedition under general Arthur Oscar de Andrade Guimarães, assisted by four other generals, and with the direct involvement of [[:pt:Carlos Machado de Bittencourt|Carlos Machado de Bittencourt]], the [[Ministry of War (Brazil)|Minister of War]], who  went with his entire staff<ref name="Galvão"/> to Monte Santo, the nearby city which had served as the gathering point for the army and where the large military force was being assembled.<ref name="Cunha" />  Machine guns and large artillery pieces, such as [[mortar (weapon)|mortar]]s and [[howitzers]], including a powerful [[Joseph Whitworth|Whitworth 32]], nicknamed ''Matadeira'' (Killer), went with the 3,000-man force, and had to be hauled with enormous effort through the unforgiving roadless landscape.

The troops set off on 16 June.<ref name="Cunha" /> This time, the attackers were aided by the rampant hunger and malnutrition (and most of all thirst)<ref name="Galvão"/> among the inhabitants of Canudos, and the heavy losses they had suffered in the previous attacks.<ref name="Levine VT" /> On the other hand, the atttackers were hindered by the fact that the rebels now possessed "some of the most advanced weapons of the time" (repeating rifles "like the Austrian [[Ferdinand Mannlicher|Mannlicher]] and the [[M1870 Belgian Comblain|Belgian Comblain]]s"), abandoned by fleeing republican troops.<ref name="Galvão"/> 

Accounts of the expedition differ. Robert Levine wrote that hundreds of men in the first battalion of 2,350 were trapped by the ''Canudenses'' and slaughtered.<ref name="Levine VT" /> Fearing another failed expedition, the troops retreated to the town of Monte Santo.<ref name="Levine VT" /> Walnice Nogueira Galvão and Levine agree there was a siege and starvation.

A month later a second campaign began with over 8,000 soldiers<ref name="Levine VT" /> who encircled and laid siege to Canudos. This starved the population into submission.<ref name="Levine VT" />

[[File:O combate em Canudos entre as tropas legaes e os fanaticos de Antonio Conselheiro. Morte gloriosa do bravo capitão Salomão defendendo uma peça de artilharia.jpg|thumb|"Battle in Canudos between the government troops and the fanatics of Antônio Conselheiro", ''Don Quixote'', No. 82, 1897]]

A few days before the end, a surrender was negotiated. However, to the chagrin of the army, the only insurrectionists who actually surrendered were about three hundred women, who had been reduced to walking skeletons by extreme hunger, accompanied by their children and a few old men.<ref name="Galvão" />

The fighting started again. Reports of the fighting stated that hundreds of Canudos defenders and hundreds of federal soldiers died every day.<ref name="Levine VT" /> The last assault persisted until the beginning of October, when the military forces set off 90 dynamite bombs in the settlement, thus marking the defeat of the settlement of Canudos.<ref name="Cunha" /> Galvão wrote that the fighting ended on 5 October 1897, when there was no surrender, but no more fire from the rebels.<ref name="Galvão" />

Levine wrote that throughout this expedition, an undetermined number of ''Canudenses'' fled the settlement.<ref name="Levine VT" /> Others accepted an offer of surrender with the promise of their lives being spared.<ref name="Levine VT" /> This offer, however, was not honored. One of the forces' generals had the men "surrounded by soldiers, and hacked to death in front of hundreds of witness, including many of their wives and children."<ref name="Levine VT" /> Immediately after the final assault, soldiers "smashed, leveled, and burned all 5,200 in the settlement."<ref name="Levine VT" />

==Aftermath==
{{Multiple image
| image1            = Antonio Conselheiro.jpg
| direction         = vertical
| caption1          = The only photograph of Antônio Conselheiro, taken after his death in September 1897
| image2            = Canudos rebels.jpg
| caption2          = Survivors from Canudos, 1897
}}

It was eventually determined that Antônio Conselheiro himself had likely died of dysentery on 22 September.<ref name="Levine VT" /> Before Canudos was burned down and dynamited, Conselheiro's body was exhumed, the head was removed, and it was "displayed on a pike" to be "held high at the front of a military parade for all to see."<ref name="Levine VT" /> According to Peter Robb, it "was taken to the Medical Faculty of Bahia to be studied for abnormalities."<ref name="Robb">{{cite book |last1=Robb |first1=Peter |title=A Death in Brazil |date=2004 |publisher=Picador |isbn=978-0312424879 |page=208 |edition=Reprint }}</ref> When all resistance ceased and "peace" was restored, only 150 survivors remained. 

Estimates for the number of dead in the War of Canudos vary. [[Euclides da Cunha]] (1902) estimated approximately 30,000 (25,000 residents and 5,000 attackers) died;<ref name="Levine" /> Roelofse-Campbell also gives this estimate.<ref name="white-brazil"/> Robert M. Levine, gives a lower figure of around 15,000.<ref name="Levine VT" /> Joel Singer estimates only 5000 dead.<ref>Singer, Joel David, The Wages of War. 1816-1965 (1972)</ref><ref name="white-brazil">{{cite web |last1=White |first1=Matthew |title=36. Brazil, Canudos War (1896-97) |url=http://necrometrics.com/wars19c.htm. |website=Necrometrics |access-date=12 April 2022}}</ref>

Euclides da Cunha did not see the fighting but did bear witness afterward, Robb says, and his "obsession with progress and modernity, the scientific racism that told him the people of the northeastern interior were doomed to backwardness by their mixed race" led him to tell a story filled with preconceptions — which is, however, the only story we have.<ref name="Robb" /> Barbara Celarent described Euclides da Cunha point of view of the war as "a tragic encounter between atavistic barbarism and modern civilization," where "civilization itself reverted to barbarism".<ref name=Celarent-AJS-2012>{{cite journal |last1=Celarent |first1=Barbara |title=[Book review of ] Rebellion in the Backlands. By Euclides da Cunha |journal=American Journal of Sociology |date=September 2012 |volume=118 |issue=2 |pages=536–542 |doi=10.1086/668402 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131219012703/http://home.uchicago.edu/~aabbott/barbpapers/barbdacu.pdf |url=http://home.uchicago.edu/~aabbott/barbpapers/barbdacu.pdf |archive-date=19 December 2013 |access-date=11 April 2022}}</ref>

According to Walnice Nogueira Galvão, one of the most important results of the war was the complete "solidification of the republican regime" and final exorcism of "the specter of monarchical restoration".<ref name="Galvão"/> But over time, "public opinion underwent a striking about-face" about the danger of a monarchist conspiracy. "The desperately poor peasants" had been fighting by themselves without help, and had "no connection whatsoever with real monarchists – white, upper-class urbanites, who were horrified at the very thought of associating with such a 'riffraff' of 'fanatics'"<ref name="Galvão"/> The war "turned out to have been an inglorious massacre of destitute wretches", in which the military had made a "common practice – approved by the commanders" – of tying up prisoners and beheading them in public.<ref name="Galvão"/>

==Canudos today==
[[File:Canudos Velho - 19.jpg|thumb|Statue of [[Antônio Conselheiro]]]]
Although the original town of Canudos has been covered by the reservoir of the [[Cocorobó Dam]], built by the [[Military dictatorship in Brazil|military regime]] in the 1960s, the [[Canudos State Park]], established in 1986, preserves many of the important sites and serves as a monument to the war. The stated purpose of the park is "to make it impossible to forget the martyrs led by Antônio Conselheiro".<ref>{{citation|language=pt|journal=Folha de S.Paulo |last=Neto|first=Ricardo Bonalume|date=14 June 1997|title=Inaugurado parque estadual de Canudos |url=http://www1.folha.uol.com.br/fsp/1997/6/14/cotidiano/46.html|access-date=4 November 2016}}</ref>

==Bibliography==
* Euclides da Cunha. Os Sertões, 1902. (Rebellion in the Backlands, University of Chicago Press)
* Calasans, José. No Tempo de Antônio Conselheiro. Salvador, Livraria Progresso Editora, 1959.
* Arinos, Afonso. Os Jagunços.
* Macedo Soares, Henrique Duque-Estrada de. A Guerra de Canudos.Rio de Janeiro: Typ. Altiva, 1902
* Benício, Manoel. O Rei dos Jagunços. Rio de Janeiro: Editora Fundação Getúlio Vargas. 2a. edição, 1997
* [[Mario Vargas Llosa]]. [[The War of the End of the World]]. Novel. 1981

==Media==
* ''Guerra de Canudos'' (The Battle of Canudos). Motion picture directed by [[Sérgio Rezende]], with [[José Wilker]], [[Cláudia Abreu]], [[Paulo Betti]], and [[Marieta Severo]]. Brazil, 1997. [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0130748/ IMDB record]
* ''Sobreviventes – Os Filhos da Guerra de Canudos'' (Survivors, the Children of the War of Canudos). Documentary film by [[Paulo Fontenelle]], Brazil, 2007.
* ''Canudos''. Documentary film by Ipojuca Pontes, with [[Walmor Chagas]], Brazil, 1978. [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0194735/ IMDB record].
* ''War of Canudos in Brazil''. Documentary radio broadcast, [[BBC World Service]]. Mon 9 June 2014 07:50 GMT. [http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0205w53 BBC iPlayer]

==See also==
* [[Revolutions of Brazil]]
* [[List of wars involving Brazil]]
* [[Juazeiro Sedition]]
* [[Caldeirão de Santa Cruz do Deserto]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==External links==
{{Commons category|Guerra de Canudos}}
* [https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p0205w53 Witness History: War of Canudos in Brazil] from the [[BBC]]
* [https://www.theguardian.com/world/2000/jan/16/alexbellos.theobserver Heroic rebel town rises from deep] from ''[[The Guardian]]''

{{Brazil topics}}
{{Monarchism in Brazil}}
{{Authority control}}

[[Category:Conflicts in 1896]]
[[Category:Conflicts in 1897]]
[[Category:First Brazilian Republic]]
[[Category:Peasant revolts]]
[[Category:Rebellions in Brazil]]
[[Category:1896 in Brazil]]
[[Category:1897 in Brazil]]
[[Category:Wars involving Brazil]]
[[Category:Massacres in Brazil]]
[[Category:Monarchism in Brazil]]
[[Category:Politicides]]
[[Category:Bahia]]
[[Category:Brazilian rebels]]
[[Category:Brazilian Army]]
[[Category:Civilians in war]]