The villancico was one of the main poetic-musical forms of Baroque sacred music in the Iberian Peninsula and its colonies. It emerged from the evolution of the villancicos (also called vilancetes) of the Renaissance. Its popularity was such that it filled churches with worshippers during festivities, and practically all the great Iberian composers of the 17th century wrote villancicos.

In colonial Brazil, the only villancico on record is Matais de Incêndios, found in the Mogi das Cruzes group. The "Mogi das Cruzes Group" is an important collection of musical manuscripts, likely copied in the 1730s, containing Luso-Brazilian sacred music, discovered by IPHAN historian Jaelson Bitran Trindade on the front and back covers of the Charter Book of the Village of Mogi das Cruzes.

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