When you say the word Amazon, an image immediately springs to mind: a vast, untamed river in the heart of the world's largest rainforest. The name seems so obvious, so ancient, that it appears to have always existed. And yet, the Amazon River has not always been called by this name.
Before being named by Europeans, this river bore other names, deeply rooted in the languages, territories, and worldviews of the peoples who had lived on its banks for millennia. Understanding the origin of the name "Amazon" means delving into a history of encounters, cultural misunderstandings, reinterpreted narratives… and symbolic power.
Before the Amazon: the river without a single name
Before the arrival of Europeans, the river we now call the Amazon was not a single entity designated by a single name.
He crossed immense territories, inhabited by a great diversity of indigenous peoples, each with their own language, their own relationship to the river, and therefore their own way of naming it.
Indigenous peoples did not see the river as a single entity, but as a multitude of immense, interconnected rivers. These names served more as a vivid description of the river: its size, its power, its life-giving role.
Among the names most frequently cited in historical sources:
• “Paraná-tinga” or “Paraná-guaçu” in Tupi-Guarani languages ( Paraná = “big river”, tinga = white, guaçu = big);
• “Curicho”, “Paranaguazu”, “Purús”,... depending on the areas and ethnic groups encountered.
For the Amazonian peoples, the river was not a border nor simply a thoroughfare. It was:
• a source of food,
• a means of communication,
• a space for spirituality,
• and a structuring element of social life.
The river was not "owned" or "named" in a logic of domination. It was inhabited, respected, and integrated into a global ecosystem.
A vision of the river radically different from that of Europeans
This difference in perception is essential to understanding what follows.
When Europeans arrived in South America in the 16th century, they brought with them a very different vision of the world:
• a need to map,
• to name,
• to classify,
• and to symbolically appropriate the territories.
Giving a name, in this logic, is to assert a form of control and to inscribe a place in a European narrative.
The immense river they discover overwhelms them. Its width, its length, its flow, the density of people and vegetation surrounding it: everything is beyond anything they know. They therefore need a name worthy of this immensity.
During the first known European exploration (1500), the Spaniard Vicente Yáñez Pinzón named the river "Rio Santa María de la Mar Dulce" (later known as Mar Dulce ).
After 1502, Some Europeans called it "Río Grande" because of its spectacular size.
From 1513 onwards, the river was known as "El Río Marañón," a term of Amerindian origin or derived from the Spanish word maraña ("entanglement"), especially its upper reaches (in present-day Peru). A major tributary of this name can still be found today.
Francisco de Orellana and the birth of a narrative
Francisco de Orellana (1490–1545) was a Spanish explorer and conquistador, lieutenant in Gonzalo Pizarro's expedition that departed from Quito (Ecuador) in search of the legendary Eldorado.
In 1541-1542, the Spanish explorer Francisco de Orellana undertook an expedition to the Atlantic Ocean which would leave a lasting mark on the history of the river.
The main historical source on Orellana's voyage is not a private letter, but a chronicle written by the Dominican Gaspar de Carvajal, who accompanied the expedition. (Chronicle of the new discovery of the famous great river discovered by Francisco de Orellana).
It describes in detail the descent of the river, the encounters with indigenous populations, the difficulties of navigation, the clashes with indigenous groups, etc. It was published long after the events (1894), thanks to the work of editors like José Toribio Medina, who gathered the original documents.
Carvajal reports that, during their descent of the river, the Spaniards were attacked by local tribes led by women armed with bows and arrows. Orellana, seeing these warriors, referred to the "Amazons" of Greek myths.
These stories immediately captured the attention of Europeans.
For what ?
Because they echo a very strong cultural reference: the Amazons of Greek mythology, these warrior women living without men, known for their bravery and independence.
For European chroniclers, the comparison is almost immediate. What they do not fully understand about indigenous societies, they interpret through their own imagination.
Thus, the river gradually becomes associated with these warrior women, real or perceived as such.
From comparison to baptism: the "river of the Amazons"
Initially, it was not yet an official name, but a descriptive expression:
“río de las Amazonas”, “the river of the Amazons”.
This name spread through stories, maps, and correspondence. It fascinated Europe, eager for exoticism, heroic tales, and mysterious territories.
Gradually, the expression becomes simpler.
The "river of the Amazons" becomes the Amazon.
This linguistic shift is far from insignificant. It marks the transition from a river with multiple local names to a single entity defined by a European imagination.
A name that erases, but that also tells a story
Naming the river "Amazon" has had lasting consequences.
On the one hand, this name has contributed to erasing some of the cultural and linguistic diversity of the Amazonian peoples. Indigenous names, which carry meaning and a connection to the living world, have been relegated to the background.
On the other hand, this name tells a story.
It testifies to the clash between two worlds, the difficulty Europeans had in understanding the societies they encountered, and their tendency to translate the unknown through their own references.
The Amazon River has thus become a global symbol, but this symbol is the result of an external perspective, projected onto a much more complex reality.
Behind the name are very real women.
However, it would be reductive to consider this name solely as a fanciful invention.
European accounts, although steeped in mythology, are based on observed realities: in some Amazonian societies, women occupied, and still occupy, central roles, sometimes warrior, often political, always structuring.
Among these figures, one group appears regularly in the sources: the Icamiabas.
These women, described as independent and skilled with the bow and arrow, will become the heart of a much larger narrative, blending history, legend, and cultural transmission.
It is this story, between European myth and indigenous reality, that we will explore in the following article:
The Amazons of the Amazon: myth or reality?
The river as the guiding thread of Amazonian history
The Amazon River is not just a backdrop.
It is the common thread in the history of an entire region, linking peoples, stories, symbolic objects and traditions.
It is along its banks that legends are born, but also objects carrying meaning, passed down from generation to generation. Among them, an ancient talisman occupies a special place: the muiraquitã, an object intimately linked to Amazonian women and fertility, which you can discover in
this dedicated article .
To restore depth to a name that was thought to be immutable
Today, the name "Amazon" is everywhere: in books, maps, political speeches, popular culture. But behind this apparent obviousness lies a history made up of encounters, projections, and reinterpretations.
Remembering that the Amazon River has not always been called by this name means:
• recognize the richness of the cultures that preceded it;
• understand how stories shape our perception of the world;
• and restore depth to a territory too often reduced to a mere symbol.
The Amazon River is not just a name. It is a memory in motion.
The Legend of the Icamiabas
Among the stories that the river carries, the legend of the Icamiabas is one of the oldest and best known. It tells of a people of warrior women, settled around Lake Yaci-Uaruá, and recounts how these women lived amongst themselves, cultivated their territory, and met with men only once a year, during a ceremony dedicated to the moon.
This myth fascinated European travelers because it evoked a distant echo of the Amazons of ancient Greece. But in its local context, it is nothing like them: it expresses an idea of power, autonomy, and female sovereignty that runs through certain regional traditions.
It was during these annual meetings that the talisman appeared which would become one of the strongest symbols of the Amazon: the muiraquitã .
Orellana was not initially seeking to explore the river: he was only supposed to find supplies for Pizarro's expedition. His descent of the Amazon (1541–1542) was an epic expedition, poorly documented at the time, but which profoundly influenced European cartography and knowledge of the interior of South America.
The river "Amazon" still bears this name today in reference to these 16th-century stories.
Discover also the story of the Jesuit missionary Fritz, the first cartographer of the Amazon River .
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