The one who rescues the mother and the child

Abstract

This paper aims to reconstruct the myth surrounding the Brazilian slave merchant Francisco Félix de Souza (1754-1849). Relying on the exam of textual sources, interviews with family members as well as the examination of Francisco Félix de Souza's memorial, the article analyzes the reconstruction of the memory of the slave merchant within his family. At the same time, it aims at understanding how the memory of the ancestor expresses the political issues related to the memory of slavery in the contemporary Benin.

memory; Atlantic slave trade; Francisco Félix de Souza