Itaúna

Itaúna is a Brazilian municipality in the state of Minas Gerais. It is located in the Iron Quadrangle (Quadrilátero Ferrífero), within the Metropolitan Belt, 80 km from Belo Horizonte in the Central-West region of Minas. It borders Itatiaiuçu (Central Region of Minas) to the south, Mateus Leme (Greater Belo Horizonte) to the east, Carmo do Cajuru to the west, Pará de Minas (Central Region of Minas) to the north, and Igaratinga (Central-West Region) to the northwest. Its estimated population in 2024 is 102,500 inhabitants.

== Early Days: 17th and 18th Centuries == The history of Itaúna begins during the colonial period, when the bandeiras (expeditions) from São Paulo ventured into the Brazilian hinterlands. According to information from História de Itaúna by Miguel Augusto Gonçalves de Souza, the first white man to explore the region where Itaúna is located was Lourenço Castanho Taques. Unlike another bandeirante, Fernão Dias Pais Leme, he faced the Cataguases indigenous people in 1675 and set up a camp on the banks of the São João River, in what is now Itaguara. Lourenço was the son of Pedro Taques, a Portuguese man, and Ana de Proença, from São Paulo. He died in São Paulo in 1677. In 1710, after the War of the Emboabas, the bandeirante Manoel de Borba Gato, in one of his land grants (sesmarias), reached the São João Valley.