EL AMAZONAS DE TRES VIAJEROS CARTÓGRAFOS: ENTRE LA EXPERIENCIA Y LA IMAGINACIÓN GEOGRÁFICA
THE AMAZON OF THREE CARTOGRAPHIC TRAVELERS: BETWEEN EXPERIENCE AND GEOGRAPHIC IMAGINATION

Summary/Abstract: Since the first half of the 16th century, the Amazon River began to be represented cartographically, initially by sighting its mouth and, later, by the journeys that were undertaken. The first of these occurred by chance in 1542 when a Spanish expedition that left Quito reached the Atlantic. A century later, the Portuguese went up the great river from its mouth to the Andes. The records of both voyages served as the basis for some European descriptions and representations of this part of the New World. This article recounts the experience of three travelers who crossed the ocean, but, in addition, they were cartographers who left recurring maps in atlases, compendiums and historiographic works on the region that has probably most aroused curiosity and also the imagination in America. By reconstructing the context of cartographic production and observing the geographic information and representational content, three maps are analyzed, ranging from the sketch of a river estuary on the Atlantic coast to an aerial view of the river's course, passing through a serpentine figure. Finally, it is concluded that the three representations are the product of both the experience of the cartographer travelers, with different ways of perceiving and approaching reality, and of the geographic imagination that moves between the cosmographic, the mythical and the pragmatic.

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