Black Combat Arts Institute.
HISTORY · BRAZIL
Capoeira Was Born in the Batuque Circles of the Church Square
6 MIN READ
The young carioca capoeiras formed themselves inside the batuque circles that gathered in a corner of a church or a square during religious and civil feasts.
WHY THIS ARTICLE
Carioca capoeira's origins are obscure. The thesis locates an early formative setting — the batuque circles of the feast-day square — linking capoeira to a wider Afro-Brazilian circle-game.
The circle in the square
What at first seemed to distance a form from carioca capoeiragem — a sung part and a rhythmic part marked by the berimbau, pandeiro and reco-reco, beside the palms struck rhythmically by the spectators — in reality echoed the earliest forms of the game in the capital. The young capoeiras formed themselves inside the batuque circles that constituted themselves in a corner of a church or a square during religious or civil feasts, the participants shoulder to shoulder, clapping and intoning hymns in chorus, accompanied by drums.
A preserved inheritance
Mario Aleixo, the follower of Raphael Lothus, had preserved in his capoeiragem method the dances of African origin — mandinga, ginga, quebra, cateretê — so worn in certain states of Brazil. The circle-game of the square was the matrix from which the carioca form emerged.
Why it matters
Carioca capoeira did not spring from nowhere: it formed in the batuque circles of the feast-day square. Its origin is an Afro-Brazilian circle-game, older and wider than the roda.
SOURCES
La capoeira et les arts de combat noirs : histoire effacée, techniques invisibles (1905–1984), thèse de doctorat, Université des Antilles, 2020 (Part III: the batuque circles as the formative setting of carioca capoeira; Mario Aleixo, Raphael Lothus)
IN THE CORPUS
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HOW TO CITE THIS ARTICLE
MALO, Olivier. Capoeira Was Born in the Batuque Circles of the Church Square. In: Black Combat Arts Institute — Articles [online]. No. 117. 2026 [accessed date]. Available from: https://www.blackcombatarts.com/articles/capoeira-was-born-in-the-batuque-circles-of-the-church-square. Adapted from the author's doctoral thesis, Université des Antilles, 2020.