Cartography in dispute: the frontiers of Brazil in Abbé Raynal’s Histoire des Deux Indes

Junia Ferreira Furtado

doi:10.3989/chdj.2021.019

Abstract

This article analyzes the frontier line(s) of Brazil proposed by the Portuguese ambassadors (D. Vicente de Sousa Coutinho, D. Rodrigo de Sousa Coutinho, and Luís de Sousa Coutinho, the Viscount of Balsemão), drawn on maps and documents sent to Abbé Raynal when he was preparing the 1780 edition of his famous Histoire des Deux Indes. This was accompanied by an Atlas de Toutes les Parties Connues du Globe Terrestre, produced by the French geographer Rigobert Bonne. The objective is, in light of the Treaty of Santo Ildefonso, to compare the lines defended by the ambassadors and those which Raynal and Bonne drew on the map of South America in the Atlas, analyzing the geopolitical impacts.

Highlights

This article analyzes the frontier line(s) of Brazil proposed by the Portuguese ambassadors
The two diplomats provided textual and cartographic material about the shape of Brazilian territory, the geographer states in the Introduction to his Atlas, that he “drew the frontiers of Spanish and Portuguese possessions according to the 1778 treaty” (Bonne, 1780, p. 15) —referring to the New Treaty of El Pardo, signed in March of that year, which ratified the Santo Ildefonso Treaty in October 1777
The two Crowns only had a relative knowledge of the geography of the frontier territory, the available maps were omissive and contradictory, and in some cases it was decided that the border would be defined later

Summary

Introduction

This article analyzes the frontier line(s) of Brazil proposed by the Portuguese ambassadors Rodrigo de Sousa Coutinho, and Luís de Sousa Coutinho, the Viscount of Balsemão), drawn on maps and documents sent to Abbé Raynal when he was preparing the 1780 edition of his famous Histoire des Deux Indes. This was accompanied by an Atlas de Toutes les Parties Connues du Globe Terrestre, produced by the French geographer Rigobert Bonne. PALABRAS CLAVE: Histoire des deux Indies; Raynal; Diplomacia; Frontera; América del Sur; Tratado de San Ildefonso; Cartografía; Mapas Bonne transmitted his geographic doubts to the Abbé and asked for his help. The first of these, more favorable to the French, chosen as a border in the original edition (1748), corresponded to the North Cape, which coincided with the Bay of the Vicente Pinzón or Calcuene River; the second, the mouth of the Arawari River, pushed the border a little northwards, alongside the Island of Muracá; the third, the mouth of the River Oiapoque, near Cape Orange, pushed it more to the north, as defended by the Portuguese (Furtado, 2012, p. 289)

Objectives

Conclusion