In January 1835, the household's comfortable life was shattered by the political fallout of a slave revolt known as the Malê Rebellion, which was led by Islamicized Yoruba speakers. In its wake, anti-African, anti-Islamic hysteria swept the city. More than 300 Africans, both enslaved and freed, were imprisoned, including Iyá Nassô's two sons, Domingos and Thomé (Reis, 2003). ${ }^{4}$ Iyá Nassô lobbied courageously for her sons' sentences to be commuted to deportation to West Africa. In an 1836 petition to Brazil's Ministry of Justice, she argued that their convictions had resulted from 'false accusations by enemies'. Offering to pay their passage to Africa, she vowed that she would follow them herself, never to return to Brazil, 'not because she had been forced to [leave] by the authorities', but because she 'refused to tolerate being compromised' by those who wished her ill. ${ }^{5}$ Late in 1837, Francisca da Silva and her husband left  
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[^0]:    3 For more on José Pedro Autran, see Parés and Castillo, 2015.
4 For an earlier edition in English, see Reis, 1993.
5 Francisca's petition is transcribed in Reis, 2003, p. 466.  
for Africa, accompanied by over a dozen former slaves, many recently freed, including Marcelina Obatosi and her two young children.