Flex Mentallo

The leader of the expedition, Gonzalo Pizarro, ordered him to explore the Coca River and return when the river ended. By then, 3000 natives and 140 Spanish had already died or deserted on the march. Pizarro returned to Quito with only 80 men left alive.

Orellana's role in the search for El Dorado also forms part of the plot of the film Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

Orellana's voyages served as a partial influence for Werner Herzog's 1972 film Aguirre, the Wrath of God. An earlier -script penned by director Werner Herzog also deliberately included Orellana in the movie, but he was ultimately left out.

In 1541 Francisco de Orellana was one of the lieutenants on an expedition east of Quito into the South American interior charged by Francisco Pizarro to locate the "Land of Cinnamon", thought to be somewhere to the east.

El Dorado

That's beautiful

I'm starting to wonder if this one is as rare as advertised. I thought there were only two extant, but just one the boards here, we've got at least three. Yes, but I only know of those three, plus one more- that copy that sold for about $700. on eBay last August, remember? Here's the census I've been keeping on this book: RICK STARR'S copy, my copy (which is the Crippen copy), the one that sold on eBay last Aug., and another copy owned by a member of the Yahoo Romance group (he sent me a scan, years ago). Those are the only four I've been able to confirm. Anyone else have one? Never had one, only ever saw one listed in - roughly - 15 years.

you can't have this one. Aw, ya big meanie

Thanks Tony - lots more to come!

Many thanks for the kind words, Peter. Much appreciated.

Who looks outside, dreams. Who looks inside awakens. Carl Gustav Jung

They do not have a single representative in the 594-member Congress.

While multilateral bodies like the World Bank make approval of loans conditional on respect for indigenous rights, in Brazil native peoples continue to lack any influence over policies that directly affect them.

38 percent of indigenous people lived in extreme poverty, more than twice the national figure of 15.5 percent.

Between the 1991 and 2000 censuses, the number of people declaring indigenous identity doubled, an annual increase of 10.8 percent that must be attributed both to the birth rate and to people accepting an ethnic identity they had formerly denied.

The number of people identifying themselves as indigenous has grown rapidly since the 1980s, when an ethnic pride movement encouraged many people, including city dwellers, to reclaim their indigenous heritage.

There were 734,127 indigenous people in Brazil in 2000, according to the official census.

There are 230 indigenous groups in Brazil, speaking 180 languages and occupying 14 percent of the national territory, where they make an important contribution to nature conservation but have an extremely limited political role.

Paternalistic policies that fail to respect the self-determination of indigenous people only hamper solutions to their problems.

Brazil has strong indigenous rights laws, but they are not enforced.

Different government bodies have provided medical assistance to indigenous peoples, but they remain vulnerable.

Recent years have seen a dramatic deterioration in health, with outbreaks of hepatitis, malaria and other diseases in some regions.

And the armed forces are opposed to creating indigenous reserves on the country’s borders, claiming they are a threat to national sovereignty.

Landowners with legal title to their properties are putting up fierce resistance, and have taken legal action to suspend the handover of some indigenous lands already earmarked and approved by the national government.

Crammed together on insufficient land to support their way of life, outside cities that have grown prosperous on monoculture crops like soy and sugar cane, indigenous groups are demanding demarcation and enlargement of their territories, to cope with their growing population. But the prospects are not promising.