In preparation for the 2016 Summer Olympic Games, urban renewal in Rio de Janeiro's harbor area unearthed archaeological remains regarding the city's slave past, such as the old harbor, Cais do Valongo, used in the early 19th century to disembark thousands of captive Africans in Brazil. The article recounts efforts made by the state as well as civil society in upholding the . memory of slavery in Rio de Janeiro's colonial downtown vis-a-vis current perspectives on race, memory and cultural heritage in contested sites that reveal the enduring legacy of slavery in former slave societies. The article focus on cultural initiatives that show the inner conflicts between the need to memoralize slavery as historical reparation against the state's spectacularization of these monuments and archaeological findings for the sake of creating an image of the city for global events.