Three maps, three scales: the Strait of Magellan in the eye of Spanish and Dutch interests (1616-1621)

MARTINEZ, CAROLINA

Annapolis

Simposio; McMullen Naval History Symposium; 2023

US Navy

The aim of this presentation is to analyze the production and circulation of cartographic images of the Strait of Magellan and of the island of Tierra del Fuego in the context of the Dutch crossing of the Le Maire Strait and Cape Horn in 1616 and the expedition organized shortly after by the Spanish crown led by brothers Bartolomé García de Nodal and Gonzalo Nodal (1618-1619). In a period when the Strait of Magellan became a contested area not for the territory around it itself but for what the region represented on a global scale, the manuscript and printed maps produced by Dutch and Iberian cartographers shed light of the geopolitical interests and ambitions of both maritime powers. In fact, the purpose of the 1618 expedition led by the Nodal brothers was to verify the existence of the interoceanic passage discovered by the Dutch south of the island of Tierra del Fuego in 1616. In 1621, a travel account describing the exploits of the Nodal brothers was published together with a map of the area made by Portuguese cartographer Pedro Teixeira Albernaz. The varying scales of the map made by Teixeira Albernaz, a manuscript chart made by the expedition’s pilot Diego Ramírez de Arellano and the map published by the Dutch right after their “discovery” of the Le Maire Strait evidence that in the early 17th century the discourses and representations of a peripheral but strategic zone such as the Magellanic-Fuegian area were being constantly redefined by the growing presence of European maritime powers.