This dissertation aims to analyze female prostitution in Rio de Janeiro, from the turn of the nineteenth to the twentieth century, focusing on the role of black and brown women in this practice. The main goal is to mark a presence of these groups of women in the history of prostitution, observing how racism, based on racial theories, that were affirmed in Brazilian society throughout this period, decisively influenced the way in which they were faced by their contemporaries. Through the testimonies present in the main newspapers of the period, as well as of police and judicial records, the aim is to analyse the specific forms of repression and control that have been targeted by legal and police institutions since 1871, as well as the experiences shared by them between the final decades of the Empire and the early years of the Republic. This demonstrates the process of building networks of solidarity between these women, as well as their strategies for survival in the face of the daily persecutions that affected them.