Palmares, or Quilombo dos Palmares, was a fugitive community of escaped slaves and others in colonial Brazil

Colonial Brazil

In the history of Brazil, Colonial Brazil, officially the Viceroyalty of Brazil comprises the period from 1500, with the arrival of the Portuguese, until 1815, when Brazil was elevated to kingdom alongside Portugal as the United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil and the Algarves.During the over 300 years...

 that developed from 1605 until its suppression in 1694. It was located in what is today the Brazil

Brazil

Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...

ian state of Alagoas

Alagoas

Alagoas is one of the 27 federative units of Brazil and is situated in the eastern part of the Northeast Region. It borders: Pernambuco ; Sergipe ; Bahia ; and the Atlantic Ocean . It occupies an area of 27,767 km², being slightly larger than Haiti...

.
The modern tradition has been to call the settlement the Quilombo of Palmares. Quilombos were settlements mainly of runaway

Fugitive

A fugitive is a person who is fleeing from custody, whether it be from private slavery, a government arrest, government or non-government questioning, vigilante violence, or outraged private individuals...

 and free-born enslaved African people

African people

African people refers to natives, inhabitants, or citizen of Africa and to people of African descent.-Etymology:Many etymological hypotheses that have been postulated for the ancient name "Africa":...

. The Quilombos came into existence when Africans began arriving in Brazil in the mid 1530s and grew significantly as slavery expanded.

No contemporary document calls Palmares a quilombo, instead the term mocambos

Mocambos

The mocambos were village-sized communities mainly of runaway slaves in colonial Brazil, during the Portuguese rule....

 is used.