Viewpoints – Placecloud (English)

If you’re new to Recife, the capital of Pernambuco, and you see how cosmopolitan this city is today, it might be difficult to imagine what it was like before the Dutch invasion in 1630.

Recife Brazil We are standing on the Boa Vista Bridge, “Boa Vista” simply meaning ‘lovely view’, built in 1876.

Recife Brazil We are at the Palácio do Campo das Princesas, located in the Santo Antônio neighbourhood of Recife, formerly known as Antônio Vaz Island. It serves as the seat of executive power for the state of Pernambuco and was founded in 1841.

Rio de Janeiro Brazil We're in the Glória neighbourhood in Rio de Janeiro, in front of the Brazilian Historical and Geographical Institute. Here you'll find around 160.000 documents on national history, including books, periodicals, artefacts, paintings, albums, maps and atlases, and more.

Recife Brazil The Port of Recife, where we are now, is older than the city. Back in the mid-16th century, the natural formation of reefs on the Brazilian coast provided a separation between the coast and the deep sea of the Atlantic Ocean, creating an expansive, calm region close to the shore.

Recife Brazil Here, in the Convent of Santo Antônio, in the centre of the city of Recife, lies the body of the Brazilian soldier Henrique Dias.

Luanda Angola The National Slavery Museum, here in Luanda, the capital of Angola, was built in 1977 on the site of the Casa Grande Chapel, a 17th century temple where the enslaved were baptised before boarding the ships that took them to the Americas.

Recife Brazil We’re standing on the corner of Rua do Imperador and Rua Primeiro de Março, the home of the first astronomical observatory in the Southern Hemisphere, and the Americas.

Alloa United Kingdom The Dunmore Pineapple is a folly in Stirlingshire, a county in Scotland.

Recife Brazil We find ourselves in front of the Church of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, in Casa Forte, one of the locations of the various battles that culminated in the expulsion of the Dutch from the north-east of Brazil in the 17th century.

Jaboat o dos Guararapes Brazil We are here at the entrance to the street that leads to Morro dos Guararapes, the scene of the Battles of Guararapes, which took place in 1648 and 1649, two armed conflicts between the troops of the Portuguese colony, which brought together indigenous peoples, Africans and Portuguese-Brazilians, and the Dutch forces, which had occupied Brazil since 1630 and had almos...

Recife Brazil We are standing in Praça do Carmo, in the city of Olinda. Here we find the Carmo Church, built on the ruins of a convent linked to the Carmelite Order, whose original construction dates back to 1580, which was during the first decades of Portuguese colonisation in Brazil.

Recife Brazil We’re at the beautiful Praça da República, in the city centre of Recife, in the state of Pernambuco, in northeastern Brazil.

Recife Brazil We are here at Fort Orange, one of the first fortifications built by the Dutch in Brazil, way back in 1631.

Recife Brazil The Forte das Cinco Pontas, where we are now, is one of the oldest buildings in Recife.

Recife Brazil We find ourselves in front of the Grêmio Musical Henrique Dias, the Henrique Dias Musical Guild, located in Rua Treze de Maio, in the Amparo neighbourhood, in the heart of the city of Olinda.

Recife Brazil To walk through the centre of Recife, whether you're a local or a tourist, is to embrace a continuous urban reconfiguration of particularly its older parts.

Recife Brazil It was right here, on Pau Amarelo Beach, on the northern coast of the state of Pernambuco, that, on February 16, 1630, the captains of the defence posts of the Portuguese colony in Brazil spotted a fleet of sixty-seven ships on the horizon.

Recife Brazil We're in Parque 13 de Maio, one of the best-known green areas in the centre of Recife. Surrounding this beautiful square are some of the most traditional public schools in the capital of Pernambuco and it's common to see students from several of them visiting the park on weekdays.

Amsterdam The Netherlands We’re standing in front of the Zuiderkerk, in the center of Amsterdam. The church played an important role in the life of Rembrandt, also because three of Rembrandt's children were buried in the church.

Recife Brazil A saying, popular in Brazil in the 17th century was this: ‘Women should only leave the house three times in their lives: to be baptised, to be married and to be buried’.

The 21 islands of the Fernando de Noronha archipelago can be found some 354 km off the Brazilian coast. The islands are now part of the state of Pernambuco, even though the state capitals Joao Pessoa and Natal are both closer to the islands.

Jo o Pessoa Brazil We are at the Fort of Santa Catarina, also known as the Cabedelo Fort, on the beach of the same name in the state of Paraíba, in Northeast Brazil.

Recife Brazil Rua da Moeda is also a historic bohemian stronghold in the city, perhaps due to its proximity to the port, and has served as a place for entertainment since the early days of European colonisation in the north-east of Brazil.

Salvador Brazil Although the Dutch presence in the Brazilian northeast in the 17th century is focussed on Pernambuco, where the cities of Recife and Olinda are located, the Dutch began their attempts to invade Brazil on the 9th of May 1624 at the city of Salvador, the capital of the state of Bahia.