Acuña, Cristóbal de (krēstō'bäl dā akOO'nyä) [key], 1597–1676?, Spanish Jesuit missionary and explorer in South America, rector of the Jesuit college at Cuenca, Ecuador. In 1638 he was sent by the viceroy to accompany Teixeira on his return journey down the Amazon River. Acuña's New Discovery of the Great River of the Amazons (1639, modern tr. in C. R. Markham's Expedition into the Valley of the Amazons, 1859, repr. 1964) was the earliest first-hand description of the Amazon to be printed.
