Francisco Moreno's travels

visions of nature and nation building in the extreme south of Argentina, 1873–1906

Abstract

This article analyses views of Eastern Patagonia that factored into the discourse of Francisco Moreno, an Argentine naturalist and geographer in the late 19th century. An analysis of the documents shows that his preoccupation with countering the belief at the time that the Patagonia was a “useless desert,” coupled with his sense of deception with the process of land distribution after the military conquest of the region, motivated Moreno to donate three leagues of his land to create the first Argentinean national park, the Nahuel Huapi. In the end, the view of the natural world as one of the basic elements in the building of the Argentinean Nation-State reveals itself as the framework for Moreno's actions.