Chapada Diamantina, Bahia

January 28, 2014

Elviro struck it rich. In the 1850s, the miner was one of thousands of men engaged in the diamond rush that gave Chapada Diamantina its name and which had spread from Mucugê, where it started in 1844, to Igatu, then known as Xique Xique. Elviro had - so the story goes - made a vow, and it paid off: he found a diamond, and in 1854, he had a church built as a token of his gratitude.

Dedicated it to Saint Sebastian, the church is one of the top attractions in Igatu, a village which was practically abandoned after the decline of the mining rush in the first half of the 20th century and is now increasingly recognized as one of Brazil's most picturesque destinations.

 

If the church with an adjoining cemetery on a quiet dirt road away from the village center owes its existence to a hard, dense form of pure carbon formed at least 150 kilometers deep in the Earth's mantle, its stone walls look like so many formations in Chapada Diamantina's enthralling landscape. The area's sedimentary rock and conglomerates were also used by Igatu miners to build their mortarless, boulder-embedded shelters known as locas as well as self-standing houses (ruins of both have been preserved in the Igatu Municipal Park and led the village to be known as "Bahian Machu Picchu").

Situated at an altitude of 800 meters in the Sincorá Mountain Range, Igatu is, with Ubiraitá and Nova Vista, one of the three districts of Andaraí, founded in 1885 and one of the six towns in the Chapada Diamantina National Park - the others are Ibicoara, Itaeté, Lençóis, Mucugê and Palmeiras. 

 

With special thanks to Gabriela Claro de Astete and Mono Julian for the photos of the church interior and bell, and to João? Ramos for the other images. The author visited Igatu on a press trip with Bahiatursa. See the About.com ethics policy.

 

Next: Church interior

Church Interior

Every January 20, Igatu celebrates its patron saint with Mass at the Saint Sebastian Church, and festivities which reach a joyous climax with the parade of Boi Estrela de Igatu, a local bumba-meu-boi which has played a key role in the revitalization of the village's folk culture.

In 2012, however, Mass for St. Sebastian Day was held under the eucalyptus trees that surround the church and the adjoining cemetery.

Both were being restored with resources from the Brazilian government's PAC - Cidades Históricas fund, which also covered conservation work done at the Saint Anthony Church in the city of Mucugê at about the same time.

The newly restored heritage sites, part of Igatu's listing by Brazil's National Historic and Artistic Heritage Institute (IPHAN) and by the Institute of Artistic and Cultural Heritage of Bahia (IPAC) were officially presented on June 9, 2012.

Next: Altar

Altar

It's not always possible for travelers to visit the inside of Saint Sebastian Church, as it is usually open only for Mass and other special occasions. 

The commemoration of Saint Sebastian's Day is one of the highlights on a religious calendar which also includes Ternos das Almas. Artist Marcos Zacaríades, owner of nearby Galeria Arte & Memória, helped recover this ancient tradition, which had been left aside for a couple of decades.

It takes place at night about three times a week through Lent and involves people wrapped in white sheets, parading in the village streets and in the the Brejo-Verruga Mine, chanting sorrowful songs in honor of the dead. A similar ritual takes place in Andaraí.

Igatu joins in Festas Juninas, also known as São João. Bahia excels at promoting these folk Brazilian festivities statewide.

Next: Church Bell

 The church bell is one of many manufactured items which made their way through Chapada Diamantina to get to Igatu. In its mining heyday, Igatu had about 9,000 inhabitants, and the wealthy had access to European luxuries such as pianos and fine porcelain. 

Next: Cemetery

The cemetery spreads along the sides and the front of Saint Sebastian Church; in the front, many graves are marked by a plain cross in the ground.

All-white tombs, decorated not so much with statuary art but with forms such as pinnacles and arches, are reminiscent of the IPHAN-listed Santa Isabel Cemetery at the foot of the Sincorá Range in nearby Mucugê - and are likewise described locally as "Byzantine".

The reason for the use of the term is unclear, says Maria Elizia Borges, a Doctor in Arts at the College of Visual Arts of the Federal University of Goiás, in an article titled "Cemitério de Santa  Isabel de Mucugê: uma arquitetura peculiar que visa preservar a memória dos entes queridos (BA)". On the other hand, there's no mistaking the uniqueness of these places of rest, which, according to Borges, "don't follow the aesthetic and topographic pattern established in the country's other cemeteries" and which are part of the myriad places for contemplation and introspection in Chapada Diamantina.