Fort

Maricary

Brazil

Between Cape Orange and Cape North, the Dutch settled along the Maricary lakes. It is uncertain when the fort was built exactly, but probably around 1620. The Dutch had friendly relations with the indigenous people, like the Arikare, with whom they traded in salted sea cows. It is certain that the fort was destroyed in 1646, by the Portuguese captain major Sebastião Lucena de Azevedo. Lucena was based in Maranhão and in the reconquest of Maranhão in the 1640s, he heard that a Dutchman named Van der Goes was planning on attacking the Portuguese fort on the island of Gurupá, along the shores of the Amazon. Lucena had happened upon Van der Goes during an expedition to the Ilha da Marajó to investigate a shipwreck, and captured him. Upon learning about a planned Dutch attack from his new captive, Lucena then decided to instead to march north to destroy the Dutch fort on the Amapá coast.

Van der Goes was said to have lived in the region for over twenty years. Even though 400 local indigenous people fought for the Dutch, English and French occupants of fort Maricary, the Portuguese proved to be stronger.

In the fort, Lucena found weapons and slaves. Lucena mentioned that the Dutch were able to speak with the local people and that some were even married to local Amerindian women. He concluded that the indigenous inhabitants of the northern region were all too willing to help the other Europeans to establish their presence in the region and showed them where best to build their forts, which all agonised the Portuguese. The fort was the size of a stronghouse and 30 people could live inside it.

Sources and literature

Hulsman, Lodewijk, Colonial fortifications in the States of Pará and Amapá: Historical research in the Netherlands