Guna of Panama
The Guna people of Panama and Colombia have a high incidence rate of albinism, [7] which led Westerners to nickname them "white Indians" in the early 1900s. [8] [9]
White Amazonian Indians or White Indians is a term first applied to sightings or encounters with mysterious white skinned natives of the Amazon Rainforest from the 16th century by Spanish missionaries. These encounters and tales sparked Percy Fawcett's journey into the uncharted jungle of the Amazonian Mato Grosso region. Various theories since the early 20th century have been proposed regarding the documented sightings or encounters.
The Spanish Dominican missionary Gaspar de Carvajal first claimed meeting a white tribe of Amazonians, he wrote in his Account of the Recent Discovery of the Famous Grand River (1542) of a tribe of Amazonian women who were "very white and tall" who had "long hair, braided and wound about their heads". [1] British Journalist Harold T. Wilkins in his Mysteries of Ancient South America (1945) compiled further accounts of similar sightings of "White Indians" in the Amazon Rainforest from the 16th to 19th century by explorers and Jesuits.
Percy Fawcett in the 1920s searched for the Lost City of Z in the Amazon which he believed was inhabited by a race of "White Indians".
Alexander Hamilton Rice Jr.'s 1924-1925 expedition into the unmapped Amazonian regions adjacent to the Parima River was publicized in The New York Times in July 1925. [2] [3] The article contains the following physical description of the "White Indians":
Then two Indians who were bleached white by the sun, but of pure Indian blood, came out from the forest to greet the party. Dr. Rice described them as being undersized and undernourished. Their faces were streaked with pigments so that it was difficult to discern the features, but they were undeniably white. They wore no clothing, and carried bows and arrows which were tipped with poison, so the Indians in the expedition said. When the two received presents of beads and handkerchiefs they yelled to their companions and others soon emerged and joined the group, making in all twenty men and two women.
One group of Indians who may be the source of some of these tales are the Brazilian Parakanã. Although some are light skinned, "Parakanã have skin colors that are not much different from those of other Amerindian groups.". [4] Another journal article states "there is no evidence of miscegenation with Caucasians". [5]
The Aché ( /ɑːˈtʃeɪ/ ah-CHAY) Indians are a traditional hunter-gatherer tribe living in Paraguay. They are called "Guayakí" by Guaraní speaking neighbors and in early anthropological accounts. Early descriptions of the Aché emphasized their white skin, light eye and hair color, heavy beards, Asiatic features, and practice of cannibalism as identifying characteristics. Some writers have suggested that they are the descendants of Norsemen or shipwrecked European sailors, although neighboring groups have said that they look Japanese, not European. [6] A 1996 study reported that "recent genetic studies have in fact concluded that the Ache are physically and genetically dissimilar to most other South American Indians studied but they show no evidence of any European or African admixture." [6]
The Guna people of Panama and Colombia have a high incidence rate of albinism, [7] which led Westerners to nickname them "white Indians" in the early 1900s. [8] [9]
The Amazon rainforest, also called Amazon jungle or Amazonia, is a moist broadleaf tropical rainforest in the Amazon biome that covers most of the Amazon basin of South America. This basin encompasses 7,000,000 km2 (2,700,000 sq mi), of which 5,500,000 km2 (2,100,000 sq mi) are covered by the rainforest. This region includes territory belonging to nine nations and 3,344 formally acknowledged indigenous territories.
Francisco de Orellana Bejarano Pizarro y Torres de Altamirano was a Spanish explorer and conquistador. In one of the most improbably successful voyages in known history, Orellana managed to sail the length of the Amazon, arriving at the river's mouth on 24 August 1542. He and his party sailed along the Atlantic coast until reaching Cubagua Island, near the coast of Venezuela.
Aguirre, the Wrath of God is a 1972 epic historical drama film produced, written and directed by Werner Herzog. Klaus Kinski stars in the title role of Spanish soldier Lope de Aguirre, who leads a group of conquistadores down the Amazon River in South America in search of the legendary city of gold, El Dorado. The accompanying soundtrack was composed and performed by kosmische band Popol Vuh. The film is an international co-production between West Germany and Mexico.
Amazonas ( ) is a state of Brazil, located in the North Region in the north-western corner of the country. It is the largest Brazilian state by area and the ninth-largest country subdivision in the world. It is the largest country subdivision in South America, being greater than the areas of Chile, Paraguay, and Uruguay combined. Mostly located in the Southern Hemisphere, Amazonas is the third-largest country subdivision in the Southern Hemisphere after the Australian states of Western Australia and Queensland. Located entirely in the Western Hemisphere, it is the fourth-largest country subdivision in the Western Hemisphere after Greenland, Nunavut, and Alaska. If independent, Amazonas could become the sixteenth-largest country in the world, slightly larger than Mongolia. Neighbouring states are Roraima, Pará, Mato Grosso, Rondônia, and Acre. It also borders the nations of Peru, Colombia and Venezuela. This includes the Departments of Amazonas, Vaupés and Guainía in Colombia, as well as the Amazonas state in Venezuela, and the Loreto Region in Peru.
Percy Harrison Fawcett was a British geographer, artillery officer, cartographer, archaeologist, and explorer of South America. Fawcett disappeared in 1925 during an expedition to find an ancient lost city which he and others believed existed in the Amazon rainforest.
Gaspar de Carvajal was a Spanish Dominican missionary to the New World, known for chronicling some of the explorations of the Amazon.
Blonde Eskimos or Blond Eskimos is a term first applied in accounts of sightings of, and encounters with, light-haired Inuit peoples of Northern Canada from the early 20th century, particularly around the Coronation Gulf between mainland Canada and Victoria Island. Sightings of light-haired natives of the Arctic have been mentioned in written accounts as far back as the 17th century.
The Machiguenga are an indigenous people who live in the high jungle, or montaña, area on the eastern slopes of the Andes and in the Amazon Basin jungle regions of southeastern Peru. Their population in 2020 amounted to about 18,000. Formerly they were hunter-gatherer but today the majority are sedentary swidden cultivators. The main crops grown are manioc, maize, and bananas, but today commercial crops such as coffee and cacao are increasingly important. Their main source of protein used to be peccary and monkeys but today fish has become more important as game animals have become increasingly scarce as a consequence of the encroachment from highland immigrants to the area and the exploitation of the Camisea gas finds. The Machiguenga people have a preference for self-sufficiency when it comes to cultivating essential crops, made possible by their generous land allocation per capita, and the lack of conflict in their area.
The Shipibo-Conibo are an indigenous people along the Ucayali River in the Amazon rainforest in Peru. Formerly two groups, the Shipibo and the Conibo, they eventually became one distinct tribe through intermarriage and communal ritual and are currently known as the Shipibo-Conibo people.
The Waorani (Huaorani) language, commonly known as Sabela is a vulnerable language isolate spoken by the Huaorani people, an indigenous group living in the Amazon rainforest between the Napo and Curaray Rivers in Ecuador. A small number of speakers with so-called uncontacted groups may live in Peru.
The Matsés or Mayoruna are an indigenous people of the Peruvian and Brazilian Amazon. Their traditional homelands are located between the Javari and Galvez rivers. The Matsés have long guarded their lands from other indigenous tribes and struggle with encroachment from illegal logging practices and poaching.
Yanoama: The Story of Helena Valero, a Girl Kidnapped by Amazonian Indians is a biography of Helena Valero, a mixed-race mestizo woman who was captured in the 1930s as a girl by the Kohorochiwetari, a tribe of the Yanomami indigenous people, living in the Amazon rainforest on the border between Venezuela and Brazil. She lived with the Yanomami for about two decades. While living with the Yanoama, Valero married twice and gave birth to four children. She escaped in 1956 to what she refers to as "the white man" in the country of her birth. After rejection by her family and living in poverty at a mission, Valero chose to return to life with the Yanomami.
The Mashco-Piro or Mascho Piro, also known as the Cujareño people and Nomole, are an indigenous tribe of nomadic hunter-gatherers who inhabit the remote regions of the Amazon rainforest. They live in Manú National Park in the Madre de Dios Region in Peru. They have in the past actively avoided contact with non-native peoples.
Amazonian languages is the term used to refer to the indigenous languages of "Greater Amazonia." This area is significantly larger than the Amazon and extends from the Atlantic coast all the way to the Andes, while its southern border is usually said to be the Paraná. The region is inhabited by societies that share many cultural traits but whose languages are characterized by great diversity. There are about 330 extant languages in Greater Amazonia, almost half of which have fewer than 500 speakers. Meanwhile, only Wayuu has greater than 100,000 speakers. Of the 330 total languages, about fifty are isolates, while the remaining ones belong to about 25 different families. Most of the posited families have few members. It is this distribution of many small and historically unrelated speech communities that makes Amazonia one of the most linguistically diverse regions in the world. The precise reasons for this unusual diversity have not yet been conclusively determined, but Amazonian languages seem to have had fewer than 10,000 native speakers even before the invasion of European colonists wrought havoc on the societies by which they were spoken. Despite the large-scale diversity, the long-term contact among many of the languages of Greater Amazonia has created similarities between many neighboring languages that are not genetically related. Most indigenous Amazonian people today are bilingual or even monolingual in English, Spanish, Portuguese, French or Dutch and many Amazonian languages are endangered as a result.
The Lost City of Z is a 2016 American biographical adventure drama film written and directed by James Gray, based on the 2009 book of the same name by David Grann. It portrays British explorer Percy Fawcett, who was sent to Brazil and made several attempts to find a supposed ancient lost city in the Amazon. It stars Charlie Hunnam as Fawcett; Robert Pattinson as his fellow explorer Henry Costin, Sienna Miller as his wife, Nina Fawcett; and Tom Holland as his son, Jack.
The Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon is a non-fiction book by American author David Grann. Published in 2009, the book recounts the activities of the British explorer Percy Fawcett who, in 1925, disappeared with his son in the Amazon rainforest while looking for the ancient "Lost City of Z". In the book, Grann recounts his own journey into the Amazon, by which he discovered new evidence about how Fawcett may have died.
The Storyteller is a novel by Peruvian author and Literature Nobel Prize winner Mario Vargas Llosa. The story tells of Saúl Zuratas, a university student who leaves civilization and becomes a "storyteller" for the Machiguenga Native Americans. The novel thematizes the Westernization of indigenous peoples through missions and through anthropological studies, and questions the perceived notion that indigenous cultures are set in stone.
Jean-Pierre Dutilleux is a Belgian author, activist, film director, actor and editor of films.
The Araweté are an indigenous people of Brazil. They are swidden horticulturalists native to the state of Pará.
The Parakanã people are a group of about 1,300 people speaking a Tupi-Guarani language who are indigenous to a small region in Brazil between Pacajá and Tocantins. They practice slash-and-burn agriculture, with a small number of crops. Their staple crop is bitter manioc. Like other Amerindians in the region, they hunt large mammals.
A paper by Miss Frances Densmore discusses the music and songs of the Tule Indians of Panama - the so-called "white Indians".