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São Luís ((:sɐ̃w luˈis), ''Saint Louis'') is the capital and largest city of the Brazilian state of Maranhão. The city is located on Ilha de São Luís (''Saint Louis' Island'') in the Baía de São Marcos ''(Saint Mark's Bay''), an extension of the Atlantic Ocean which forms the estuary of Pindaré, Mearim, Itapecuru and other rivers. Its coordinates are 2.53° south, 44.30° west. The city proper has a population of some 986,826 people (2008 IBGE estimate). The metropolitan area totals 1,227,659, ranked as the 16th largest in Brazil. São Luís, created originally as ''Saint-Louis'', is the only Brazilian state capital founded by France (see France Équinoxiale) and it is one of the three Brazilian state capitals located on islands (the others are Vitória and Florianópolis). The city has two major sea ports: Madeira Port and Itaqui Port, through which a substantial part of Brazil's iron ore, originating from the (pre)-Amazon region, is exported. The city's main industries are metallurgical with Alumar, and VALE. São Luís is home of the Federal University of Maranhão. São Luís was the home town of famous Brazilian samba singer Alcione, Brazilian writers Aluísio Azevedo, Ferreira Gullar and Josué Montello, Belgian-naturalised soccer player Luís Oliveira, and the musician João do Vale and Zeca Baleiro, a Música popular brasileira (MPB) singer. == History == Originally the town was a large village of the Tupinambá tribe. The first Europeans to see it were the French, in 1612, who intended to make it the center of a colony named Equinoctial France. They built a fort named ''Saint-Louis de Maragnan'' after King Louis XIII and his Saintly ancestor Louis IX. The settlement was conquered for Portugal by Jerônimo de Albuquerque in 1615, when it was renamed ''São Luís''. There had been little time for the French to build a city, a fact which has led to some controversy as to the actual date of the founding of the city, whether by the French or the Portuguese. In 1641, the city was invaded by the Dutch, who left in 1645. In 1677, the city was made the seat of the new Roman Catholic Diocese of São Luís do Maranhão. Only when those invasions ceased permanently did the colonial government decide to create the state of Grão-Pará e Maranhão, independent from the rest of the country. By that time, the economy was based on agriculture, particularly the exportation of sugar cane, cacao and tobacco. Conflicts amongst the local elites would lead to the Beckman's Revolt. This started due the struggle between jesuits and landowners, the first against the Indian slavery and the others against the unfair treatment given by the Portuguese authorities; the situation lead to an uprising against the Portuguese, led by the brothers Manuel and Tomás Beckman and lasted till the intervention of Portuguese troops under the command of the general Gomes Freire de Andrade. After few skirmishes, the rebels were defeated and the Beckman brothers arrested and, after a brief trial, were hanged, drawn and quartered. The last words of Manuel Beckman at the gallows were "Pelo Povo do Maranhão morro contente" ("By the Maranhão people I die happy"). The phrase decorates the main hall of State Council Building. Soon after the outbreak of the American Civil War, the region started to provide cotton to Great Britain. The wealth generated by this activity was used to modernize the city; to bring religious men to come and teach in its schools; and supplement the water supply. The city came to be the third most populous city in the country. By the end of the 19th century, agriculture was in decay and since then the city's population has been searching for other ways to make a living. Nowadays, São Luís has the largest and best preserved heritage of colonial Portuguese architecture of all Latin America. The island is known as the "Island of Love" and as "the Brazilian Athens", due to its many poets and writers, such as Sotero dos Reis, Aluísio Azevedo, Graça Aranha, Gonçalves Dias (the most famous), Josué Montello, Ferreira Gullar, among others. The ancestral composition of São Luís, according to an autosomal DNA study, is 42% European, 39% Native American and 19% African.〔http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1415-47572005000100004〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「São Luís, Maranhão」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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