Fernão de Loronha

The islands of Fernando de Noronha off the coast of Brazil, discovered by one of his expeditions and granted to Loronha and his heirs as a fief in 1504, are named after him.

[1] By 1500, Fernão de Loronha was a well-established merchant in Lisbon, where he served as the factor of Jakob Fugger, head of the wealthy German banking family of Augsburg.

The mapping expedition explored much of the Brazilian eastern coast from Cape São Roque in the northeast down to the environs of Cabo Frio and named many of the locations along the way.

[4] Brazilwood was highly valued by the European cloth industry as a superb dye, producing a deep red color, but it had to be imported from India at great expense.

[4] Sensing the commercial opportunity of the new discovery, Fernando de Loronha assembled a consortium of Lisbon merchants, with himself at its head, and petitioned the crown for permission to exploit the find.

In late September 1502, King Manuel of Portugal issued a charter (now lost) granting Fernão de Loronha the exclusive right to the commercial exploitation of the "Lands of Vera Cruz" (as Brazil was then known) for a period of three years.

[7] In April–May 1503, Loronha's consortium outfitted a new expedition of six ships under captain Gonçalo Coelho, accompanied once again by Amerigo Vespucci, to scout the Brazilian coast and set up harvesting warehouses.

[8] The Coelho-Vespucci expedition was instructed by Loronha to establish factories (feitorias, essentially warehouses) along the coast as collection points for brazilwood harvests.

By 1506, Loronha's consortium is said to have reaped a brazilwood harvest of 20,000 quintals by 1506, representing a 400-500% profit over the initial lump sum payment and ship expenses.

Brazilian Indians (mostly Tupi) did all of the woodcutting independently and delivered the harvest to the warehouses, where they traded with Loronha's agents for iron goods, tools, knives, axes, mirrors, and other miscellaneous products of that kind.

Despite losing its commercial charter, Loronha's family retained its hereditary capitaincy of Fernando de Noronha island (heirs are confirmed in documents down to 1580).