Manguezal preservado no riacho dos Macacos, um dos braços do delta do rio
Paraíba do SulPreserved mangrove in Macacos Stream, one of the arms of Paraíba do Sul
River deltaOn the first of March we reached a re-
gion of small shoals, that is, rocks and
Restingas dotted with small rocks that
enter the sea, which the navigators avoid
passing by. From this place we can see
a flat land for 15 leagues extension(3)...In a famous dictionary published in 1813, restinga or
rastinga appears as sandbank or stone in the coast, next to the
sea(4). It appears that the word was widely used by Portuguese
during the period of the great navigations. The small rocks to
which Léry refers should be the same ones still found at the
Itapemirim mouth. One of these rocks is connected to the main-
land by a stone way built in the twentieth century. There may
be also cliffs or their fragments eroded by the sea. Then, until
Macaé there is a long extension of flat lands, very typical of the
septentrional and meridional units of northern Fluminense rest-
ingas, where the crystalline plateau borders the sea and forms
several islands, as Léry notes.
A document that seems to have been written from
1573/1574 to, perhaps, 1590, the Route of all the signs, knowl-
edge, depth, shallows, heights and defeats existing in the Coast
of Brazil from the Cape of Santo Agostinho to the Strait of Fernão
de Magalhães, attributed to the cartographer Luís Teixeira, omits
the names of the rivers Itapemirim, Itabapoana, Paraíba do Sul
and Macaé. This document only alludes, considering the knowl-
edge about restingas, to “one restinga that enters 3 or 4 leagues
into the sea and is all sand bank”, which coincides with the reefs
of Cape of São Tomé, as commented by Max Justo Guedes(5).
Again the expression restinga is now used as an extension of
sand deposits on the continental coast penetrating the sea.
In 1587, Gabriel Soares de Souza published a route of
Brazil coast, much more detailed than the previous ones. In his
treatise he included the Tapemerim, Managé and Paraíba rivers,
currently Itapemirim, Itabapoana and Paraíba do Sul. About the
latter he reports “it has opening and depth where large ships
enter ...” From the cape of São Tomé, to which he makes only a
simple mention, he passes straight to Macaé(6).
To conclude the sixteenth century, it is worth a reference
to the report of Anthony Knivet, who took part of a Thomas Cav-
endish expedition to the Pacific Ocean that failed in the South
Atlantic. Confused and very fanciful, it is difficult to identify in
his report the itinerary traveled by this unfortunate Englishman.
The report’s fantastic geography results in a true miscellaneous
of geographical features that can not be reliable(7).
Plants and animals. Pragmatic, bearing in mind the exploita-
tion of natural resources of the conquered lands and to set up
colonial companies in them the Europeans passed through the
territory that later would constitute the northern Fluminense on
ships, seeing it from the sea and registering the most visible
points of the coast, as well as collecting information about it
from third parties. Not even Pero de Góis, who tried to install
two European companies in those lands, reported about na-
tive plants and animals. Knivet mentions the resin of almecega
tree and alligators, without, however, contextualizing them in
their environments(7). Léry, relying on information from a Nor-
man interpreter, points out that the Goitacas Indians were able
to beat deer and does, reaching them by running, so fast was
their speed. Gabriel Soares de Sousa registered that these Indi-
ans used to capture sharks by offering themselves as baits and
shoving a piece of wood sharpened at both ends in the fish’s
throat. After towed to land, the natives used only the teeth of the
shark to produce arrowheads(3).