Sudeste

The Brazilian southeast, holding two-fifths of the population and more than half the economy. Gold found in Minas Gerais in the 1690s produced the largest gold rush the world had yet seen, drew hundreds of thousands of Portuguese and enslaved Africans inland, and shifted the colony's centre of gravity south - which is why the capital moved from Salvador to Rio de Janeiro in 1763. The baroque towns of Ouro Preto and Congonhas were built with that money, and Aleijadinho, a mixed-race sculptor working with damaged hands, produced their finest carving. Coffee then took over: the Paraiba valley and then Sao Paulo's terra roxa soil made Brazil the dominant world producer, worked by enslaved labour until 1888 and by Italian, Japanese and Syrian immigrants afterwards. Sao Paulo's coffee capital funded the industry that made it the largest city in the southern hemisphere. Rio was the national capital until Brasilia opened in 1960. The region holds the remnants of the Atlantic forest, more endangered than the Amazon. Carnival, samba and bossa nova are its exports. Its two great cities regard each other with mutual condescension. The region covers Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Minas Gerais and Espirito Santo, with around eighty-five million people. Sao Paulo has over twenty million in its metropolitan area. Ouro Preto and Rio's landscape are World Heritage sites. Minas Gerais means general mines. The region generates most of Brazil's industrial output and holds its financial centre. Christ the Redeemer overlooks Rio. Petropolis was the imperial summer capital.

• Existed: 1554 CE – present
• Type: Entity