History says that the Portuguese pioneer that came from São Paulo, Antonio Correa Pinto de Macedo, founder of Lages, arrived there on November 22, 1766. He found scattered farmers who had come from the Southern state of Rio Grande do Sul. It is recorded that the state of Rio Grande do Sul claimed the territory, alleging that the state division was the Pelotas River and not the Canoas.

Dom Luis Antonio de Souza Morgado de Mateus, governor of the Captaincy of São Paulo, when requested from Correa Pinto to found Lages, was interested in blocking the Spanish claims for that area and also in expanding the Captaincy of São Paulo.

Lages (lajens) was founded under the invocation of Our Lady of the Seven Joys, initially, at a place called Taipa, where there was small country chapel, built by troopers. Soon, the founders left that place to start a village close to the River Canoas, whose waters, during one flood, carried everything away. It was only on May 22, 1771 that the development was elevated to the category of village under the name of Our Lady of Seven Joys of the Hinterlands of Lajens. It was the foundation of Lages where it is presently. Probably, it was around the school Rosa, or rather, what is nowadays the Vidal Ramos Elementary School. The river Carahá was a little too far for the women to go there and wash their clothes, due to the presence of natives. Correa Pinto looked for a water spring where he could build a pond. That was how our “Tanque” (pond, water tank) was born, the Jonas Ramos park.

Between 1787 and 1790, the Second Lieutenant Antonio José da Costa, opened a trail between Desterro (Florianópolis, now the capital of the state of Santa Catarina) and Lages, which would be one of the reasons why, in the year of 1820, Lages ceased to be under the control of the Captaincy of São Paulo and became subordinated to the jurisdiction of the government with head-offices in the island of Santa Catarina.

Lages became a city on September 9, 1860, being the forth city created in Santa Catarina, preceded by São Francisco, Florianópolis and Laguna.

It received the name Lajes because of the abundance of the stone “laje”, which means “stone slab” (sandstone) and, in 1960, the mayor Vidal Ramos Jr. signed a decree establishing the toponym of Lages with the letter “g”.

Translation: Maria Cecília Pastorelli.
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