Whither the Waters
Whither the Waters
Mapping the Great Basin from Bernardo de Miera to John C. Frémont
Bernardo de Miera y Pacheco (1713â€"1785) is remembered today not only as colonial New Mexico’s preeminent religious artist, but also as the cartographer who drew some of the most important early maps of the American West. His “Plano Geographicoâ€� of the Colorado Plateau and Great Basin, revised by his hand in 1778, influenced other mapmakers for almost a century. This book places the man and the map in historical context, reminding readers of the enduring significance of Miera y Pacheco. Later Spanish cartographers, as well as Baron Alexander von Humboldt, Captain Zebulon Montgomery Pike, and Henry Schenck Tanner, projected or expanded upon the Santa Fe cartographer’s imagery. By so doing, they perpetuated Miera y Pacheco’s most notable hydrographic misinterpretations. Not until almost seventy years after Miera did John Charles Frémont take the field and see for himself whither the waters ran and whither they didn’t.
“Kessell knows Miera so well, and writes so authoritatively, that reading this book is like having him along as a guide on the expedition.…Kessell’s book deserves great praise. It represents a superb fusion of image and word, storytelling and analysis, that students of the Southwest will treasure for generations to come.â€�â€'The Journal of Arizona History
“A lavishly illustrated cautionary tale about cartographic inference and its persistence even in the face of contrary experience.â€�â€'Southwestern Historical Quarterly
“Kessell’s style is inimitable, and his usage of illustrations and maps masterful.�
By means of his detailed yet lively examination of Miera y Pacheco’s evolving cartographic images, Kessell offers readers a meticulous case study of cartographic intertextuality and the role of maps in shaping, often powerfully, geographical imaginations and practices.
“Kessell’s book is much more than a geographical treatise. Kessell, an entertaining writer, employs a fine selection of words, and his extraordinary knowledge of the Spanish records allows him to punctuate what could be dry geographical material with details of the times and surroundings on the Spanish frontier and insight into the characters involved.â€�â€'Terrae Incognitae: The Journal of the Society for the History of Discoveries
John L. Kessell, a professor emeritus of history at the University of New Mexico, is the author or editor of many books, including Remote Beyond Compare: Letters of don Diego de Vargas to His Family from New Spain to New Mexico, 1675â€"1706 (UNM Press).
