Breve História da Amazônia review by Denis Minev

		Breve historia da Amazonia by Marcio Souza Edition: Unknown Binding Availability: Out of Print--Limited Availability
GOOD SUMMARIZED HISTORY OF THE AMAZON, June 4, 2006 This book is in portuguese and is somehwat difficult to come by. Marcio Souza is a celebrated author (perhaps the most celebrated) in the Brazilian Amazon. In this book he succintly puts together thousands of years of human history in the Amazon into about 200 pages.  In so doing, of course much of history is left out or only briefly mentioned. However, the author does touch upon all the major events of Amazon history, with chapters focusing on the following:  1. Conquest by Spaniards initially  2. Colonization of the Amazon, mainly by Portuguese  3. Adventures of naturalists and other travelers  4. Independence of Brazil  5. Cabanagem - the main revolutionary movement in the Amazon in the early 19th century. The author does give a special emphasis to the cabanagem movement, being himself a specialist on it.  6. The rubber boom  7. A more modern view of history  I highly recommend it to someone who wishes to get acquainted with Amazon history, esp regarding Brazil. This is a good starting point, from which the reader can choose to go deeper into particular events in history.