Biography
Antônio Vilela Cid
About Antônio Vilela Cid
Antônio Vilela Cid lived in Rio Grande by 1613 and is recorded in a received account as a judge in 1620.
That Catholic account describes him as Castilian. An eighteenth-century genealogy, however, preserves a memory that he was born in Lisbon, while distinguishing his Castilian origin from that birthplace. His birth year remains unknown.
The genealogy identifies the elder Vilela Cid as the husband of Inês Duarte and the father of Antônio, called the Younger, and Pedro. It follows the family through later generations that reused the same names. Its later Antônio Vilela Cid, resident in Porto Calvo and married to Isabel Veloso, belongs to that subsequent generation and should not be mistaken for the martyr.
The author acknowledged using both legal documents and received memories. The genealogy places his death at Cunhaú. The recognition record instead lists him with the Uruaçu victims, killed on 3 October 1645.
Francis canonized him with the recognized martyrs on 15 October 2017.
His remembrance belongs to a group that included lay people and families. The reviewed accounts leave parts of his early life uncertain.
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