Real name: Afoxé Filhos De Gandhy

Effective period / Period of releases: 1996

Do not confuse with the group of the same name from Rio De Janeiro Afoxé Filhos De Gandhi (2).

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At the beginning, the carnival group was called “Comendo Coentro” (Eating Coriander), founded by port dockers in Salvador city. Concerned about the lack of work in the ports and the policy of wage tightening generated by the post-war crisis, Durval Marques da Silva, known as “Vavá Madeira”, had the idea of ​​putting a group on the street. It was on February 18, 1949, that Vavá and his colleagues from stevedoring services as Hermes Agostinho dos Santos, “o Soldado”, Manoel José dos Santos, “Guarda-Sol”, Almir Passos Fialho, “o Mica”, and many others founded the group Filhos de Gandhy , parading for the first time, as a “cordão” (recreational association).

From 1951 on, the group began to admit other kinds of workers. Today, it has become the largest and said the most beautiful Afoxé of Salvador Carnival, in Bahia. Afoxé Filhos de Gandhy, in the first years, used to sing marchinhas until they started dedicating themselves especially to Ijexá, (even composing their own songs). Afoxé is characterized as one of the many cultural developments of the traditional African religion terreiro-communities in Brazil. (terreiro = place where Candomblé rituals take place)