Iguazú

Iguazú lies in the forested river country where the Iguaçu approaches the Paraná. Its waterways already belonged to Indigenous travel and settlement before Europeans entered the region. In January 1542 Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca passed through on his journey from Santa Catarina toward Asunción. His expedition obtained canoes from local people, but the violent current and great waterfall forced the travellers to leave the water and carry their boats around the obstacle.

That journey was described in the Comentarios published in 1555. It records a passage through inhabited country, rather than the beginning of the river's human history. During the following century Jesuits established Santa María del Iguazú upstream from the falls. Between 1626 and 1633 the mission brought a new colonial institution into this landscape. Raids by slave-hunting bandeirantes then forced its inhabitants to migrate south, toward the place later known as Santa María la Mayor. The river region thus connected Indigenous routes, European travel and the displacement of mission communities.