Negra Point

Negra Point lies off the northeastern coast of Brazil near the Capibaribe River, where reefs, beaches and river mouths shape travel along the Pernambuco shore. Sugar estates and their mills spread through the coastal lowlands in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, linking Pernambuco's ports to Atlantic commerce through enslaved African labour. The Dutch occupation of Pernambuco in the 1630s and 1640s brought naval and military competition to these waters.