Mina

Mina, one of the most common terms used to define the ethnicity of Africans in Brazil. "Minas" came from a broad region in West Africa, usually between Cape Mount and Cape Lopez, which the Portuguese called the Costa da Mina. The name derived from the castle São Jorge da Mina (or Elmina), founded in 1482 by the Portuguese on the Gold Coast (modern Ghana). In the colonial period Bahian merchants traded directly with the Mina coast, exchanging tobacco for gold and slaves. Minas were highly valued for their mining skills in the gold-producing captaincies of Minas Gerais and Goiás. In the nineteenth century, however, Minas were often Arabic-speaking Muslims, that is, Hausas or Yorubas from what is now Nigeria. In the cities of Salvador and Rio de Janeiro, Mina slaves were especially successful at buying their freedom and return passage to West Africa.

See alsoAfrica, Portuguese; Slavery: Brazil; Slave Trade.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Philip D. Curtin, The Atlantic Slave Trade (1969).

Pierre Verger, Bahia and the West African Trade, 1549–1851 (1970).

Mary C. Karasch, Slave Life in Rio de Janeiro, 1808–1850 (1987).

Additional Bibliography

Klein, Herbert S. The Atlantic Slave Trade. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999.

Landers, Jane and Barry Robinson. Slaves, Subjects, and Subversives: Blacks in Colonial Latin America. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2006.

Silva, Maria Beatriz Nizza da. Brasil: Colonização e escravidão. Rio de Janeiro: Nova Fronteira, 2000.

                                              Mary Karasch

Mīṇā (Pañjābī, ‘a bull with horns inclined down along its face’, ‘deceitful’). Name given by Bhāī Gurdās to followers of Prithī Chand, Soḍhī Miharbān, and the latter's son, Harijī. The Mīṇās, whose significance faded in the late 18th cent. CE, disputed the succession of Gurū Arjan Dev.

mina (myna or mynah) Any of several species of tropical birds of se Asia, s Africa, Australasia, and the Pacific Islands; it is related to the starling. A natural mimic, especially the species Gracula religiosa, it imitates other birds. It feeds mainly on fruit. Length: to 33cm (13in). Family Sturnidae.

mina, myna(h) Indian starling. XVIII. — Hindi mainā.

mina (myna) See STURNIDAE.