De sirenas, gigantes y apariciones: maravilla y monstruosidad en Argentina y Conquista del Río de la Plata (1602), de Martín del Barco Centenera

Abstract

The Río de la Plata region has been, since it was discovered, a peculiar place. The conquerors did not find what later on characterized the rest of the American territory. Instead of abundance, they found scarcity; instead of immediate conquest, they found bellicosity; instead of gold and silver, they found poverty. They all perpetuated myths that never became true. The authors of these chronicles set out on a challenging writing enterprise: to be true to what they had seen and experienced and, at the same time, to represent the singularity of the space. This article is about Martín Del Barco Centenera's La Argentina (1602), a text that has been scarcely analyzed by literary criticism. The focus is the analysis of the wonderful and the monstrous, themes that seem to be related to the territorial complexity of the Río de la Plata area and to the peculiar and slow process of its conquest.