Favela is a term that refers to a densely populated informal urban settlement characterized by precarious housing and misery.

The origin of the term in Brazil arises mainly in the historical episode known as Guerra de Canudos, in the 19th century. The citadel of Canudos was built next to some hills, among them the Morro da Favela, named after a plant popularly called favela, which covered the region.

Some of the soldiers who went to war, upon returning to Rio de Janeiro in 1897, stopped receiving their pay, settling in temporary buildings erected on Morro da Providência.

The place then became popularly called Morro da Favela, in reference to the original "favela".

The name favela became known and in the 1920s, the improvised housing, without infrastructure, that occupied the hills came to be called favelas.