On March 29, 1693, the captain-settler Matheus Martins Leme, when crowning the "appeals for peace, quiet and the common good of the people", promoted the first election for the City Council and the Vila facilities as required by the Portuguese Ordinations . The Vila de Nossa Senhora da Luz dos Pinhais was founded, later Curitiba.
Legend: View of Curitiba from 1855. Watercolor by John Henry Elliot. Newton Carneiro Collection. Reproduction Marcos Campos.
The change in the name of the village and the routine of the village came in 1721, with the visit of the ombudsman Raphael Pires Pardinho, today the name of a square in the city. He was probably the first authority to care about the city's environment, starting a tradition for which Curitiba is now internationally recognized.
At that time, the ombudsman ordered the inhabitants to take certain care of nature. The cutting of trees, for example, could only be done in limited areas. And the residents were obliged to clean the Ribeiro (today Belém river), in order to avoid bathing in front of the mother church. The ombudsman Pardinho also established that the houses could not be built without authorization from the City Council and should be covered with tiles. The streets that had already started would have to be continued so that the village could grow evenly.
Forgotten by the rulers of the Captaincy of São Paulo, Curitiba went through a period of extreme poverty. Prosperity would only come from 1812, with tropeirismo. Strategic point on the road from Viamão to São Paulo and Minas Gerais, the village saw trade grow with the passage of the tropeiros.
Legend: Reproduction on a lithography postcard of the American surveyor John Elliot representing an overview of Curitiba in 1855. Original printed by Litografia do Comércio, postcard edited by Cezar Schultz. Collection Casa da Memória. Reproduction Marcos Campos.
Renting farms for the wintering season transferred the inhabitants of the countryside to the village. Shops, warehouses and business offices linked to the transport of cattle appeared. Along with development, in 1853 the emancipation of Paraná was achieved. Curitiba became capital, owner of its destiny.
Curitiba is a word of Guarani origin: kur yt yba means "large number of pines, pine forests", in the language of the Indians, the first inhabitants of the territory. In the early days of human occupation, the lands where Curitiba is today had a large amount of Araucaria angustifolia, the Paraná pine. The adult tree is shaped like a cup. Its seed is pine nuts, a source of protein and food of great consumption, in natura or as an ingredient of the regional cuisine of Paraná. The pine nut served as food for a bird also found in large quantities at the beginning of the occupation of the territory: the blue jackdaw (Cyanocorax caeruleus). With a bluish body and a black head, the blue jackdaw, says a legend, harvested the pinion with its beak and buried it in the soil for later consumption. From these buried pine nuts, new pine trees were born.
From the town to the metropolis, the fundamental feature that defined the profile of Curitiba was the arrival of immigrants from the most varied origins. Europeans, Asians and Africans contributed to form the population, economic, social and cultural structure of the city. Likewise, paulistas, gauchos, northeasterners, in short, Brazilians from all locations are also here, building the image of Curitiba.
Until the 18th century, the inhabitants of the city were Indians, Mamelukes, Portuguese and Spanish. With the political emancipation of Paraná (1854) and the governmental incentive to colonize in the second half of the 19th century, Curitiba was transformed by the intense immigration of Europeans.
Germans, French, Swiss, Poles, Italians, Ukrainians, in urban centers or in colonial centers, gave the city a new growth rhythm and markedly influenced local habits and customs.
In 1872, according to historical records, the presence of Germans in the urban core was already notable. They started the industrialization process - metallurgy and printing -, increased trade, introduced changes in architecture and disseminated eating habits. They also spread the notion of associativism.
The Poles arrived in 1871 and c
reated the colonies of Tomás Coelho (Araucária), Muricy (São José dos Pinhais), Santa Cândida, Orleans, Lamenha, Pilarzinho and Abranches. They basically worked in farming and commerce. Today in Curitiba they form the largest Polish colony in Brazil.
The Italians came to Curitiba in 1872 and, in 1878, created the Santa Felicidade colony. Those from northern Italy were mostly workers, artisans, skilled professionals and traders. Those in the south were dedicated to farming and introduced new agricultural implements. Like the Poles, they sold their produce in the city by horse wagons.
Ukrainians came in 1895. They settled in Campo da Galícia and expanded their properties along the current Avenida Cândido Hartmann and throughout the Bigorrilho neighborhood.
The Japanese were present in Curitiba from 1915, with the arrival of Mizumo Ryu. In 1924, they moved here in greater numbers and settled in the city and its surroundings - the Uberaba, Campo Comprido, Santa Felicidade neighborhoods and the municipality of Araucária.
The Syrians and Lebanese, in the beginning of the 20th century, established themselves in the clothing, shoes, fabrics and haberdashery trade. Due to the characteristics of their stores, they occupied the central area of the city. The first immigrants sold the news to the more distant colonies traveling on donkey back and knocking from door to door.
Curitiba also keeps marks of the black presence, although this is little documented. Auguste de Saint-Hilaire, a French naturalist who walked around the city in 1820, surveyed the population of the province: in 1818 there were 1,587 slaves, against 1,941 twenty years later, in 1838. In the same years, the total population was 11,014 and 16,155 inhabitants. In other words: the population grew by 5,141 people and the slaves by 354. But, despite the few existing documents, slavery existed in Paraná, throughout the economic cycles and in the construction of gigantic works such as, for example, the Railroad Paranaguá-Curitiba, between 1880-85, connecting the coast to the First Plateau and with the engineering of brothers Antônio and André Rebouças, both mulattos.