King João III of Portugal bestowed the donatary captaincy on Francisco Pereira Coutinho on 5 March 1534 as a reward for his service at Goa. The initial grant was notionally for 50 leagues of coastline around the Bay of All Saints, from the mouth of the Rio São Francisco to the Rio Jaguariçá. In practice, the early captaincies' boundaries were not respected but the settlement was too small for it to matter.