File talk:Brazil provinces 1889 new.png

Inaccuracies of the original version

1. The north borders of Mato Grosso with Amazonas and Pará were not straight in 1889. They have only been redesigned into a straight line in 1900.
2. The region known as "Cabeça do Cachorro" (Dog Head) was only annexed under Brazilian sovereignty by the Treaty of Bogotá in 1907. The first version of the map depicts it as part of Brazil, which was not.
3. The borders between Guyana and Venezuela were only defined as they are nowadays by the arbitration of 1899.
4. The borders between Bolivia and Paraguay reflect present ones, not those of 1889, before the Chaco War.
5. To be very precise, Bolivia only lost its coastline to Chile de jure in 1904, according to their Treaty of Peace and Friendship, but this had already been under Chilean de facto rule since 1879.
6. The argument that "the map intends only to show internal Brazilian borders" is nothing but a poor excuse. A historical map cannot be anachronic: it must reflect territory as it was, nor "partially contemporary" and "partially current".
7. To call an improving edition as "vandalism" is nothing but lack of ethics, besides childish.

--Pedro 02:02, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

Evidences of inaccuracies (historical maps)

It seems the author of the original maps, user Lecen, has abstained from commenting here (although he has indeed commented elsewhere since my last posting). Here are a few historical maps which contradict his version, all taken from the Wikimedia Commons repertoire:

1. Cary map of 1807, where we can see the Cabeça do Cachorro indentation into Brazilian territory
2. Pinkerton map of 1818, where the indentation is the most visible
3. Mitchell map of 1849, where we can see how different borders were both in the South and in Inner Amazon
4. Mitchell map of 1850, also with the visible Cabeça do Cachorro indentation
5. Colton map of 1855, the same as above
6. Johnson map of 1862, where we can clearly see the Acre indentation
7. Johnson map of 1863, again with the Cabeça do Cachorro indentation and the curved borders between Mato Grosso and Pará, as well as Mato Grosso and Amazonas
8. Johnson map of 1870, again with all the above, which are very different borders, both domestic and foreign, than those of Lecen's map

Not to mention the fact that, in all of the maps above, the international borders between other countries in the continent are radically different from the lines depicted in Lecen's map. The user made very beautiful maps, in a professional style which is admirable. However, they fail to meet one core prerequisite for a historical map: to represent the facts. Therefore, we are here arguing the obvious. The map needs correction, and it is nothing personal. --Pedro 02:13, 13 April 2012 (UTC)