Famous discoverers of gold mines in Minas Gerais and Goiás - between the late seventeenth century and the eighteenth century -, the residents of Capitania of São Vicente, especially the village of São Paulo, had nebulous actions regarding his supposed mineral wealth on their own soil. The existence of mines in the captaincy in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries has always been a controversial subject, as in its time as to the historiography. Overestimated by some or underestimated by others, the true dimensions of this wealth was lost in the tangle of interests that surrounded her. Here, we intend to present some evidence of this mineral wealth, as well as part of the ambiguous interests regarding the mines of São Paulo at this time, especially when the presence in the village of governor general of Brazil, D. Francisco de Souza.
gold mines; São Paulo colonial; Francisco de Souza