In early 2011, during an outstanding archeological excavation in the port area of Rio de Janeiro city, stones were found that belonged to the wharf where hundreds of thousands of African slaves disembarked to be sold in the old Valongo market, held to be the largest of its kind in Brazil in the 18th and 19th centuries. Buried and erased from the urban texture of Rio for nearly two centuries, in 2012 Valongo has become a milestone in the Historical and Archeological Circuit of the Celebration of African Legacy, with both educational and tourist characteristics, within the context of a sweeping city-planning reform of the docks area: the Marvellous Port Project. This thesis discusses the possibilities of (re)reading today a part of the history of the city and the country, a history associated with the African slave trade and slavery which in many aspects was not told. Starting from a geographic location, an investigation is made into how the history of slavery has been impressed in the social imaginary of the city of Rio de Janeiro and the country over several historical periods. The contemporary discovery of the old wharf and slave market evokes the topos that the experience of slavery in Brazil was, in many aspects, wiped out. Seen in this light, the emerging of these ruins in the 21st century arouses questions as to how and by whom Brazilian history was and is configured.