JOHN HEMMING Tree of Rivers The Story of the Amazon John Hemming is an expert on the Amazon, having visited over forty indigenous tribes and been on many research expeditions, including explorations of totally unknown territories. His previous books include the prize-winning The Conquest of the Incas and a trilogy on the history of Brazilian Indians. He was for 21 years Director of the Royal Geographical Society in London. Other titles by John Hemming published by Thames & Hudson include: Monuments of the Incas Other titles of interest published by Thames & Hudson include: The Great Naturalists The Great Explorers The Seventy Great Mysteries of the Natural World: Unlocking the Secrets of Our Planet The Earth from the Air Latin Spirit 365 Days: The Wisdom, Landscape and Peoples of Latin America Sebastião Salgado: An Uncertain Grace See our websites: www.thamesandhudson.com www.thamesandhudsonusa.com Contents PLATES SECTION I 1 Arrival of Strangers 2 Anarchy on the Amazon 3 The Empty River PLATES SECTION II 4 Directorate to Cabanagem 5 A Naturalist’s Paradise PLATES SECTION III 6 The Rubber Boom 7 The Black Side of Rubber 8 Explorers and Indians PLATES SECTION IV 9 Archaeologists Find Early Man 10 Planes, Chainsaws and Bulldozers PLATES SECTION V 11 The Largest River in the Largest Forest MAPS First descents of the Amazon River The Colonial Era and Cabanagem Routes of nineteenth-century naturalists The rubber boom The twentieth century, and archaeological sites Protected areas and highways Notes Index First descents of the Amazon River PLATES SECTION I A black-water river in Venezuelan Amazonia, where the lack of sediment from ancient rocks and the tannin from decaying vegetation make waters as black as coffee. Forests are at their most exuberant on river banks, because of the sun and water. (Photo John Hemming) Palm trees are wonderfully useful to man, from the earliest foragers to present- day riverbankers. Graceful Buriti palms (Mauritia flexuosa) soar to 30 metres (100 feet), and supply nutritious red fruits, fronds for roofing, fibres for baskets and hammocks, and trunks for beams. (Photo Dudu Tresca) This caterpillar of a hawk moth (Pseudosphinx tetrio) is an example of ‘Batesian mimicry’, named after the nineteenth-century naturalist Henry Walter Bates. A predator thinks that such a gaudily coloured insect must be poisonous, so this edible caterpillar’s only defence is to mimic such ostentation. (Photo James Ratter)