This paper presents the results of a survey that utilized the Capes Portal of Scientific Journals as an integrated tool, employed in its simple form, to search the keywords cartografia and cartography. Both words were investigated by area of knowledge in accordance with the scientific bases included in the Portal. The search of these words or terms had as a goal the survey and analysis of the quantity and relevance of the scientific papers dealing with this specific field of knowledge published in the bases and journals that were retrieved by the Portal´s search engine. The investigation consisted of a survey of the databases by area, the number of journals and publications, as well as the theme and the publication year of the articles. The data gathered were tabulated and analyzed, and, based on the results obtained, it can be concluded that the Portal, despite being an excellent research tool, presents discrepancies between the results provided by its search engine and those offered by the search engines which belong to the consulted databases. Another discrepancy was found with respect to the language applied to the terms searched (English or Portuguese).