Mato Grosso | state, Brazil | Britannica
Mato Grosso was settled first by pioneering gold seekers from São Paulo after they had been forced to retreat by the emboabas (Portuguese colonists) of Minas Gerais in the socalled war of the emboabas in 1708, over mining rights in gold fields. With the founding in 1719 of Cuiabá, where rich placer mines had been found, Mato Grosso became a district of the captaincy of São Paulo, and in