O paraíso amazônico e seus mitos cartográficos

Abstract

This article focuses on Sheet 1 of the Amérique méridionale map, by the French geographer Jean Baptiste Bourguignon D’Anville, produced in collaboration with the Portuguese ambassador Dom Luís da Cunha, which represents the Amazon region. The objective is to discuss the appearance and erasure of mythological images in the different versions of the map, the original, from 1748, and that of 1760. The choice of the toponym Amazonas, based on the belief of the existence of these mythological warriors, and the Parima lake, in a geopolitical context of territorial disputes, served to justify the domination, or not, of the two Iberian Crowns – Portugal and Spain – over the region of the Amazon River basin.