Maria Prestes

Altamira Rodrigues Sobral Prestes (2 February 1930 – 4 February 2022), known by the pseudonym Maria Prestes, was an activist with the Brazilian Communist Party and the partner of the party's longtime leader Luís Carlos Prestes.

Biography Prestes was born Altamira Rodrigues Sobral in Recife, Brazil, in 1930. She grew up working in the fields; her parents João Rodrigues Sobral (known as "Camarada Lima") and Mariana Ribas Pontes Rodrigues Sobral were peasants and Brazilian Communist Party activists. Her father was imprisoned for a large portion of her childhood. Her first marriage, at a very young age, fell apart quickly, leaving her with two children, Pedro and Paulo. She lived among her children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren in Rio de Janeiro until her death on 4 February 2022, of COVID-19, at age 92. Brazilian women's rights activist Edna Calheiros called her death a "great loss of a compatriot, a comrade, a fighter."