in the final years of the nineteenth century,
chronic drought and unemployment in the northeast of brazil
sparked an uprising that required suppression by the brazilian
army.
federal soldiers
were given the incentive that if they returned victorious, the
government would build them houses in rio de janeiro, then the nation's capital. after the
war known as the
guerra de canudos came to a close
with a victory,
some 10,000 veterans descended upon rio in 1897.