Mãozinha

Mãozinha was a capoeirista in early 20th century Salvador who was killed during the brutal persecution led by Police Chief Pedro de Azevedo Gordilho, known as "Pedrito". This persecution, which began in 1920 when Pedrito assumed command of the Bahian police cavalry, represented one of the darkest periods in capoeira history.

Mestre Onça Preta, who witnessed this era as a boy, recalled Mãozinha among the fallen in a 1972 O Dia newspaper interview: "Besourinho, Doze Homens, Mãozinha, Antônio Galindéu, Geraldo Chapeleiro, Finado Manteiga, Nagé, Paulo César de Moura, Gasolinha, Juvelino and many others". According to Onça Preta, Pedrito's cavalry squad "conducted a real massacre among the old capoeira masters, not in open combat. Generally he assassinated them after capture, with the body appearing days later thrown in the woods, the back opened by knife cuts".

The apelido "Mãozinha" (meaning "little hand" in Portuguese) was typical of the era when capoeiristas used nicknames to protect their identities, as the practice of capoeira was criminalized under the 1890 Penal Code. No further biographical details about Mãozinha survive beyond this single reference in Onça Preta's testimony, making him one of the many anonymous victims of state violence against Afro-Brazilian culture and resistance.