Toponymic Study of the Map of New Lusitania: A Portuguese Cartographic Monument from the Eighteenth Century

Abstract

A set of four versions of the map “Carta da Projecçaõ Geographica Espherica Orthogonal da Nova Luzitania or America Portugueza and Estado do Brazil”, is a monument of Portuguese cartography in the eighteenth century. The wealth of details about Portuguese America, Spanish America, and other European domains is impressive. For instance, toponymic content, presented in colonial and indigenous languages illustrating a hitherto unique set of the location of indigenous groups and is considered one of the first ethnographic maps of the Americas and perhaps worldwide. The research focus is to carry out comparative studies of the toponymy used in each version, as well as documents that allowed its creation. From this, a database is being created for the identification of historical toponymy, and extraction of cultural elements, areas, and behavior at a spatial level. Extraction of toponyms from the 1798 copy revealed identification and classification of 4,750 toponyms, according to geographic groups, language, linguistic and geographic motivations.