where did the portuguese establish brazilian sugar plantations
Colonial Brazil In contrast to the neighboring Spanish possessions, which had several viceroyalties with jurisdiction initially over New Spain (Mexico) and Peru, and in the eighteenth century expanded to viceroyalties of Rio de la Plata and New Granada, the Portuguese colony of Brazil was settled mainly in the coastal area by the Portuguese and a large black slave population working sugar plantations and mines. The boom and bust economic cycles were linked to export products. Brazil's sugar age, with the development of plantation slavery, merchants serving as middle men between production sites, Brazilian ports, and Europe was undermined by the growth of the sugar industry in the Caribbean on islands that European powers seized from Spain. Gold and diamonds were discovered and mined in southern Brazil through the end of the colonial era. Brazilian cities were largely port cities and the colonial administrative capital was moved several times in response to the rise and fall of export products' importance. Unlike Spanish America that fragmented in many republics, Brazil remained as a single administrative unit with a monarch, giving rise to the largest country in Latin America. Like Spanish America with European Spanish, Brazil had linguistic integrity of Portuguese. Both Spanish America and Brazil were Roman Catholic.