ABSTRACT

On the map specially prepared to illustrate this volume Harcourt's route along the coast of Guiana and his explorations of the rivers are plotted, so as to indicate as nearly as possible the ground which he and his party covered as now known to geographers. The names which he gives to rivers or mountains are placed in brackets after those now in use. As a rule his names are his rendering of Indian names and of course depend chiefly on the sound of the word. For the most part they accord with those which appear on other maps of the seventeenth century: for even where the maps do not copy one another the efforts of different authorities in transliteration of the sound are not often widely divergent. Some of these attempts soon settled down into an accepted use. It is easy to see how the river which came eventually to be written "Oyapok" was to the :first English "Wyapoco" or "Wiapoc[o]," the "i" clearly having the English or "y" sound.