Published online by Cambridge University Press: 25 February 2013
A real algebraic curve of genus g is a pair (S,〈 τ 〉), where S is a closed Riemann surface of genus g and τ: S → S is a symmetry, that is, an anti-conformal involution. A Schottky uniformization of (S,〈 τ 〉) is a tuple (Ω,Γ,P:Ω → S), where Γ is a Schottky group with region of discontinuity Ω and P:Ω → S is a regular holomorphic cover map with Γ as its deck group, so that there exists an extended Möbius transformation $\widehat{\tau}$ keeping Ω invariant with P o $\widehat{\tau}$=τ o P. The extended Kleinian group K=〈 Γ, $\widehat{\tau}$〉 is called an extended Schottky groups of rank g. The interest on Schottky uniformizations rely on the fact that they provide the lowest uniformizations of closed Riemann surfaces. In this paper we obtain a structural picture of extended Schottky groups in terms of Klein–Maskit's combination theorems and some basic extended Schottky groups. We also provide some insight of the structural picture in terms of the group of automorphisms of S which are reflected by the Schottky uniformization. As a consequence of our structural description of extended Schottky groups, we get alternative proofs to results due to Kalliongis and McCullough (J. Kalliongis and D. McCullough, Orientation-reversing involutions on handlebodies, Trans. Math. Soc. 348(5) (1996), 1739–1755) on orientation-reversing involutions on handlebodies.