Entre corredeiras, remansos e meandros: os desafios na conquista do Araguaia

Abstract

Source of food, transport route, power generation, irrigation, and so on. Responsible for the circulation of the "liquid of life", the rivers have always played an essential role in the development of civilizations and the Araguaia river is no exception to that rule. With its springs located in central Brazil, its flow runs in the south / north direction up to flowing together with the Tocantins river to form the biggest totally Brazilian hydrological basin. Its remoteness added to the exploratory model of the colonial period contributed to its isolation, getting government attention only in the late eighteenth century. From this time, several initiatives were taken with the goal of occupying its edges and establish interprovincial trade through the navigation. In order to understand how the natural obstacles limited the process of settlement and exploration of interprovincial navigation, this work seeks to dialogue with the sources produced by travelers who recorded their journeys on the Araguaia river throughout the nineteenth century. These reports are the main source of this research, listing relevant information on the socioeconomic status of the riverbank populations, navigation conditions, contact with native peoples and the challenges in winning the inhospitable “araguaiano” hinterland.