The Antonian Movement and Dona Beatriz Kimpa Vita

Record summary

Dona Beatriz Kimpa Vita led the Antonian movement during the Kongo civil wars, claiming that Saint Anthony spoke through her and directing a religious-political programme centred on São Salvador. Missionary and administrative sources describe possession, visions, preaching, healing, prophecy, and her execution in 1706. The episode is valuable for comparing charismatic altered states with political mobilization and colonial interpretation. Evidence is predominantly hostile or mediated through Capuchin observers, while later scholarship debates her theology, agency, and the relationship between possession language and Kongo religious categories.