Spanish Jesuit missions were the first settlements upstream on the Amazon. As many as 30 missions were founded in Amazon territory, seven in Brazil, between 1638 and 1727. The municipality of Silves on an island of Lake Saracá is one of the oldest in the Amazon, originating in a Mercedarian Indian mission founded in 1663. By the early 18th century, they were destroyed by the Portuguese, depopulated by smallpox, or their indigenous residents taken away as slaves by Portuguese Bandeirantes. A few were taken over by Portuguese Carmelites. The destruction of the missions was the end of Spanish claims in western Amazonia. Only one is a populated place today, San Pablo, now the municipality of São Paulo de Olivença.