Victor Wolfgang von Hagen , South America: The Green World of the Naturalists (o/p). Fascinating overviews of the great naturalist-explorers who uncovered a continent, from Peter Martyr of 1494 to Sanderson in the 1930s, including extracts from their work and some vivid illustrations. For Ecuador, there are accounts from von Humboldt, Herman Melville, La Condamine and Edward Whymper. On a similar theme, his South America Called Them (Robert Hale/AMS Press; o/p) is an enjoyable, if sometimes overwritten, volume dealing with four ground-breaking scientific explorers (La Condamine, Darwin, von Humboldt and Richard Spruce), all of whom spent time in Ecuador or the Galápagos Islands.

 

Alexander von Humboldt , Personal Narrative of Travels to the Equinoctial Regions of the New Continent during the Years 1799-1804 (o/p). Von Humboldt, perhaps the greatest of all the scientist-explorers, wrote thirty volumes on his travels across South America. The sixth volume of his Personal Narrative touches on Ecuador, and includes the ground-breaking botanical map of Chimborazo (which von Humboldt failed to top after several attempts), showing the changes in the volcano's flora at different elevations. A heavily edited version of Personal Narrative is available from Penguin.

José Toribio Medina (ed), The Discovery of the Amazon (o/p). The most detailed account of Francisco de Orellana's voyage down the Amazon, with half the book given over to the original source documents, all translated into English.

Anthony Smith , Explorers of the Amazon (University of Chicago Press). An entertaining introduction to the exploration of the Amazon, streaked with a wry sense of humour. It includes chapters on Francisco de Orellana, Charles Marie de la Condamine and Alexander von Humboldt.