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elements, such as rivers, streams, hills, mountains, etc., that are impervious to easy changes. Such toponyms have great importance as chronicles of the geographic space, revealing their past features.

Although adequate and compatible names were created, meaningless and erroneously formed names also appeared, revealing nothing but the ignorance on the part of their creators of historical indigenous languages of Brazil.

There is, however, a positive aspect to this artificial naming: it ennobled indigenous languages in a century characterized by great technological modernization, as was the case during the 20th century, when Indians often represented the past, as well as social and economic backwardness. Though having been mythicized, the indigenous man was, in a certain way, valued in a country that had its eyes more focused on Europe and the United States. It was a way for Brazil to honor the losers of its history. Such a phenomenon also meant a nostalgic tribute to a traditional Brazil that was beginning to be transformed, modernizing itself. It represented the voices of a past that did not want to die. Theodoro Sampaio nicely expressed this sociocultural phenomenon of the 20th century in the preface to the third edition of O Tupi na Geografia Nacional:

"There is a nationalist feeling here that wants to be integrated and vivid, as if to say that, of the American race, defeated, not everything has been lost, and though in the blood of the descendants, the Indian portion decreases until it disappears, the memory of the primitive inhabitants will endure with the names of the places where civilization boasts of its triumphs. (SAMPAIO, 1987, p. 41, our translate)."

References

ANÔNIMO. Diccionario portuguez e brasiliano. 1ª edição facsimilar. Leipzig: B. G. Teubner, 1896 [1795].

BUENO, F.S. Vocabulário tupi-guarani português. 3ª edição. São Paulo, Brasilivros, 1984.

DAUZAT, A. Les noms de lieux. 1ª edição. Paris: Librairie Delagrave, 1937.

DIÁRIO OFICIAL DA UNIÃO. Seção 1, p. 15.750, 23 de outubro de 1943.

IBGE CIDADES: www.cidade.ibge.gov.br DOI logo.svg http://dx.doi.org/10.35572/rlr.v9i2.1700 266