Georeferencing a Historical Map of Couto Reis de Campos in 1785. Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

The georeferencing of colonial historical maps of the Americas representing vast rural areas has been a methodological challenge for historiography that uses Geographic Information Systems. This paper presents the georeferencing of the Couto Reis Map of 1785 for the Campos Region, in Rio de Janeiro. Thus, it explains the problem of georeferencing this kind of maps and exposes, in detail, the method used to georeference. In addition, it offers some examples of the possible contributions for the historiography that works with this type of sources. In that sense, this text has the double objective, first, to explain the method, second, to invite the use of Geographic Information Systems in History.