The fact is that I knew nothing about this character until I went to Mariana and Con- gonhas do Campo… El Aleijadinho, nick- named ‘the cripple’ in Portuguese, was a man who overcame his physical hand- icaps by creating the most monumental work, a work of titans. The biography by Bretas that is still available today maintains that at the age of around 40, Aleijadinho started showing signs of a degenerative disease of the limbs (it is not known wheth- er this was due to leprosy, scurvy, goitre, rheumatism or syphilis, as there are no documents available to corroborate any hypothesis). Thus the movement and dex- terity of his hands gradually declined. In order to work, an assistant used to strap his tools to his arms and hands. This physical En Ouro Preto (en su traducción al español, oro negro), se da la mayor concentración del ba- deformity gave rise to his nickname of ‘the rroco colonial. También en Ouro Preto, Oscar Niemeyer construyó una de sus primeras obras en el año 40, el Gran Hotel. / Ouro Preto (or Black Gold) is home to the biggest concentration of little cripple’, O Aleijadinho. colonial baroque buildings. In Ouro Preto, too, Oscar Niemeyer built one of his first buildings of the 1940s, the Grand Hotel. t2918