Indigenous peoples in Venezuela

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Distribution in percentages of the Amerindian population in Venezuela Venezuela 2011 Ameridian population proportion map.png
Distribution in percentages of the Amerindian population in Venezuela

Indigenous people in Venezuela, Amerindians or Native Venezuelans, form about 2% of the population of Venezuela, [1] although many Venezuelans are mixed with Indigenous ancestry. Indigenous people are concentrated in the Southern Amazon rainforest state of Amazonas, where they make up nearly 50% of the population [1] and in the Andes of the western state of Zulia. The most numerous indigenous people, at about 200,000, is the Venezuelan part of the Wayuu (or Guajiro) people who primarily live in Zulia between Lake Maracaibo and the Colombian border. [2] Another 100,000 or so indigenous people live in the sparsely populated southeastern states of Amazonas, Bolívar and Delta Amacuro. [2]

Contents

There are at least 30 indigenous groups in Venezuela, including the Wayuu (413,000), Warao people (36,000), Ya̧nomamö (35,000), Kali'na (34,000), Pemon (30,000), Anu͂ (21,000), Huottüja (15,000), Motilone Barí, Ye'kuana [2] and Yaruro.

History

The Natives of Cumana attack the mission after Gonzalo de Ocampo's slaving raid. Colored copperplate by Theodor de Bry, published in the "Relacion brevissima de la destruccion de las Indias". Masacre de Gonzalez de Ocampo en Cumana.jpg
The Natives of Cumaná attack the mission after Gonzalo de Ocampo's slaving raid. Colored copperplate by Theodor de Bry, published in the "Relación brevissima de la destruccion de las Indias".

Around 13 000 BCE human settlement in the actual Venezuela were the Archaic pre-ceramic populations that dominated the territory until about 200 BCE. Archeologists have discovered evidence of the earliest known inhabitants of the Venezuelan area in the form of leaf-shaped flake tools, together with chopping and scraping implements exposed on the high riverine terraces of the Pedregal River in western Venezuela. [3] Late Pleistocene hunting artifacts, including spear tips, come from a similar site in northwestern Venezuela known as El Jobo. According to radiocarbon dating, these date from 13,000 to 7000 BCE. [4] Taima-Taima, yellow Muaco and El Jobo in Falcón State are some of the sites that have yielded archeological material from these times. [5] These groups co-existed with megafauna like megatherium, glyptodonts and toxodonts. The Manicuaroids pre-ceramic communities was formed, primarily in Punta Gorda and Manicuare that followed one another on the islands of the Margarita and Cubagua, off the eastern coast of Venezuela, and that seem to constitute a unique cultural tradition.The bone point, shell gouge, and two-pronged stone are characteristic in this places. About 5000 BCE, the archaeological site at Banwari Trace in southwestern Trinidad island is the oldest pre-Columbian site in the West Indies. At this time, Trinidad was still part of South America. Archaeological research of the site has also shed light on the patterns of migration of this pre ceramic peoples from mainland actual Eastern Venezuela to the Lesser Antilles between 5000 and 2000 BCE. In this period, hunters and gatherers of megafauna started to turn to other food sources and established the first tribal structures. The first ceramic-using people in Venezuelan were the Saladoid indigenous, an Arawak people that flourished from 500 BCE to 545 CE. The Saladoid were concentrated along the lowlands of the Orinoco River. Around 250 BCE entered Trinidad and Tobago to later moved north into the remaining islands of the Caribbean sea until Cuba and the Bahamas. After 250 CE a third group, called the Barrancoid people migrating up the Orinoco River toward Trinidad and other island of the Antilles navigating in wooden canoes. Following the collapse of Barrancoid communities along the Orinoco around 650 CE, a new group, called the Arauquinoid expanded up the river to the coast. The cultural artifacts of this group were encountered in the northeast Venezuela and only partly adopted in Trinidad and adjacent islands, and as a result, this culture is called Guayabitoid in these areas. The Timoto-Cuica culture was the most complex society in Pre-Columbian Venezuela; with pre-planned permanent villages, surrounded by irrigated, terraced fields and with tanks for water storage. [6] Their houses were made primarily of stone and wood with thatched roofs. They were peaceful, for the most part, and depended on growing crops. Regional crops included potatoes and ullucos. [7] They left behind works of art, particularly anthropomorphic ceramics, but no major monuments. They spun vegetable fibers to weave into textiles and mats for housing. They are credited with having invented the arepa, a staple of Venezuelan cuisine. [8] Around 1300 CE the Caribs, a new group appears to have settled in the Coast Range and Orinoco Delta where introduced new cultural attributes which largely replaced the Guayabitoid culture. Termed the Mayoid cultural tradition, dividing their territory with the Arawak, against whom they fought during their expansion toward the east and navigating the Lesser Antilles until Puerto Rico. They were prolific travelers even though they weren't nomads, This represents the native indigenous which were present in 1498 when Christopher Columbus's arrival at Venezuela. Their distinct pottery and artifacts survive until 1800, but after this time they were largely assimilated into mainstream. It is not known how many people lived in Venezuela before the Spanish Conquest; it may have been around a million people [9] and in addition to today's peoples included groups such as the Arawaks, Caribs, and Timoto-cuicas the Auaké, Caquetio, Mariche, Pemon, and Piaroa. [10] The number was much reduced after the Conquest, mainly through the spread of new diseases from Europe. [9] There were two main north-south axes of pre-Columbian population, producing maize in the west and manioc in the east. [9] Large parts of the Llanos plains were cultivated through a combination of slash and burn and permanent settled agriculture. [9] The indigenous peoples of Venezuela had already encountered crude oils and asphalts that seeped up through the ground to the surface. Known to the locals as mene, the thick, black liquid was primarily used for medicinal purposes, as an illumination source and for the caulking of canoes. [11] In the islands of Cubagua and Margarita off the northeastern coast of Venezuela the indigenous people as expert divers harvesting the pearls that normally used as ceremonnial ornaments.

A palafito in the Orinoco Delta Palafito.jpg
A palafito in the Orinoco Delta

Spain's colonization of mainland Venezuela started in 1514, establishing its first permanent South American settlement in the present-day city of Cumaná. The name "Venezuela" is said to derive from palafito villages discovered in 1499 on Lake Maracaibo reminding Amerigo Vespucci of Venice (hence "Venezuela" or "little Venice"). [12] Amerindian caciques (leaders) such as Guaicaipuro (circa 1530–1568) and Tamanaco (died 1573) attempted to resist Spanish incursions, but the newcomers ultimately subdued them. Historians agree that the founder of Caracas, Diego de Losada, ultimately put Tamanaco to death. [13] Some of the resisting tribes or the leaders are commemorated in place names, including Caracas, Chacao and Los Teques. The early colonial settlements focussed on the northern coast, [9] but in the mid-eighteenth century the Spanish pushed further inland along the Orinoco River. Here the Ye'kuana (then known as the Makiritare) organised serious resistance in 1775 and 1776. [14] Under Spanish colonization, several religious orders established mission stations. The Jesuits withdrew in the 1760s, while the Capuchins found their missions of strategic significance in the War of Independence and in 1817 were brutally taken over by the forces of Simon Bolivar. [14] For the remainder of the nineteenth century governments did little for indigenous peoples and they were pushed away from the country's agricultural centre to the periphery. [14]

Mucuchi women, who were part of the greater Timoto-Cuica people Indias Mucuchies.jpg
Mucuchí women, who were part of the greater Timoto–Cuica people

In 1913, during a rubber boom, Colonel Tomas Funes seized control of Amazonas's San Fernando de Atabapo, killing over 100 settlers. In the following nine years in which Funes controlled the town, Funes destroyed dozens of Ye'kuana villages and killed several thousand Ye'kuana. [15] [16]

In October 1999, Pemon destroyed a number of electricity pylons constructed to carry electricity from the Guri Dam to Brazil. The Pemon argued that cheap electricity would encourage further development by mining companies. The $110 million project was completed in 2001. [15]

Political organization

The National Council of Venezuelan Indians (Consejo Nacional Indio de Venezuela, CONIVE) was formed in 1989 and represents the majority of indigenous peoples, with 60 affiliates representing 30 peoples. [17] In September 1999, indigenous peoples "marched on the National Congress in Caracas to pressure the Constitutional Assembly for the inclusion of important pro-[indigenous] provisions in the new constitution, such as the right to ownership, free transit across international borders, free choice of nationality, and land demarcation within two years." [18]

Prior to the creation of the 1999 constitution of Venezuela, legal rights for indigenous peoples were increasingly lagging behind other Latin American countries, which were progressively enshrining a common set of indigenous collective rights in their national constitutions. [19] The 1961 constitution had actually been a step backward from the 1947 constitution, and the indigenous rights law foreseen in it languished for a decade, unpassed by 1999. [19]

Ultimately the 1999 constitutional process produced "the region's most progressive indigenous rights regime". [20] Innovations included Article 125's guarantee of political representation at all levels of government and Article 124's prohibition on "the registration of patents related to indigenous genetic resources or intellectual property associated with indigenous knowledge." [20] The new constitution followed the example of Colombia in reserving parliamentary seats for indigenous delegates (three in Venezuela's National Assembly) and it was the first Latin American constitution to reserve indigenous seats in state assemblies and municipal councils in districts with indigenous populations. [21]

Languages

The main language families are

See also

Related Research Articles

The history of Trinidad and Tobago begins with the settlements of the islands by Indigenous First Peoples. Trinidad was visited by Christopher Columbus on his third voyage in 1498,, and claimed in the name of Spain. Trinidad was administered by Spanish hands until 1797, but it was largely settled by French colonists. Tobago changed hands between the British, French, Dutch, and Courlanders, but eventually ended up in British hands following the second Treaty of Paris (1814). In 1889, the two islands were incorporated into a single political entity. Trinidad and Tobago obtained its independence from the British Empire in 1962 and became a republic in 1976.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arawak</span> Group of indigenous peoples of South America and of the Caribbean

The Arawak are a group of indigenous peoples of northern South America and of the Caribbean. Specifically, the term "Arawak" has been applied at various times from the Lokono of South America to the Taíno, who lived in the Greater Antilles and northern Lesser Antilles in the Caribbean. All these groups spoke related Arawakan languages.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Amazonas (Venezuelan state)</span> State of Venezuela

Amazonas State is one of the 23 states into which Venezuela is divided. It covers nearly a fifth of the area of Venezuela, but has less than 1% of Venezuela's population.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cariban languages</span> Group of languages

The Cariban languages are a family of languages indigenous to north-eastern South America. They are widespread across northernmost South America, from the mouth of the Amazon River to the Colombian Andes, and they are also spoken in small pockets of central Brazil. The languages of the Cariban family are relatively closely related. There are about three dozen, but most are spoken only by a few hundred people. Macushi is the only language among them with numerous speakers, estimated at 30,000. The Cariban family is well known among linguists partly because one language in the family—Hixkaryana—has a default word order of object–verb–subject. Prior to their discovery of this, linguists believed that this order did not exist in any spoken natural language.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Classification of the Indigenous peoples of the Americas</span>

The classification of the Indigenous peoples of the Americas is based upon cultural regions, geography, and linguistics. Anthropologists have named various cultural regions, with fluid boundaries, that are generally agreed upon with some variation. These cultural regions are broadly based upon the locations of the Indigenous peoples of the Americas from early European and African contact beginning in the late 15th century. When Indigenous peoples have been forcibly removed by nation-states, they retain their original geographic classification. Some groups span multiple cultural regions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ceramics of Indigenous peoples of the Americas</span> Pottery produced by Indigenous people of the Americas

Ceramics of Indigenous peoples of the Americas is an art form with at least a 7500-year history in the Americas. Pottery is fired ceramics with clay as a component. Ceramics are used for utilitarian cooking vessels, serving and storage vessels, pipes, funerary urns, censers, musical instruments, ceremonial items, masks, toys, sculptures, and a myriad of other art forms.

At the time of first contact between Europe and the Americas, the indigenous peoples of the Caribbean included the Taíno of the northern Lesser Antilles, most of the Greater Antilles and the Bahamas, the Kalinago of the Lesser Antilles, the Ciguayo and Macorix of parts of Hispaniola, and the Guanahatabey of western Cuba. The Kalinago have maintained an identity as an indigenous people, with a reserved territory in Dominica.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kalina people</span> Indigenous people native to the northern coastal areas of South America

The Kalina, also known as the Caribs or mainland Caribs and by several other names, are an Indigenous people native to the northern coastal areas of South America. Today, the Kalina live largely in villages on the rivers and coasts of Venezuela, Guyana, Suriname, French Guiana, and Brazil. They speak a Cariban language known as Carib. They may be related to the Island Caribs of the Caribbean, though their languages are unrelated.

The Saladoid culture is a pre-Columbian indigenous culture of territory in present-day Venezuela and the Caribbean that flourished from 500 BCE to 545 CE. The Saladoid were an Arawak people. Concentrated along the lowlands of the Orinoco River, the people migrated by sea to the Lesser Antilles, and then to Puerto Rico.

The Ortoiroid people were the second wave of human settlers of the Caribbean who began their migration into the Antilles around 2000 BCE. They were preceded by the Casimiroid peoples. They are believed to have originated in the Orinoco valley in South America, migrating to the Antilles from Trinidad and Tobago to Puerto Rico. The name "Ortoiroid" comes from Ortoire, a shell midden site in southeast Trinidad, they have also been called Banwaroid after another archaeological site in Trinidad

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Languages of Venezuela</span> Languages of the country and its people

The languages of Venezuela refers to the official languages and various dialects spoken in established communities within the country. In Venezuela, Castellan is the official language and is the mother tongue of the majority of Venezuelans. Although there is an established official language, there are countless languages of indigenous villages spoken throughout Venezuela, and various regions also have languages of their own.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ye'kuana</span> Indigenous tribe in present-day Venezuela and Brazil

The Ye'kuana, also called Ye'kwana, Ye'Kuana, Yekuana, Yequana, Yecuana, Dekuana, Maquiritare, Makiritare, So'to or Maiongong, are a Cariban-speaking tropical rain-forest tribe who live in the Caura River and Orinoco River regions of Venezuela in Bolivar State and Amazonas State. In Brazil, they inhabit the northeast of Roraima State. In Venezuela, the Ye'kuana live alongside their former enemies, the Sanumá.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pemon language</span> Cariban language spoken in Venezuela

The Pemon language, is an indigenous language of the Cariban family spoken by some 30,000 Pemon people, in Venezuela's Southeast, particularly in the Canaima National Park, in the Roraima State of Brazil and in Guyana.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Timoto–Cuica people</span>

Timoto–Cuica people were an indigenous people of the Americas composed primarily of two large tribes, the Timote and the Cuica, that inhabited in the Andes region of Western Venezuela. They were closely related to the Muisca people of the Colombian Andes, who spoke Muysccubun, a version of Chibcha. The Timoto-Cuicas were not only composed of the Timote and the Cuica groups, but also of smaller tribes including the Mucuchíes, the Miguríes, the Tabayes and the Mucuñuques.

Caquetío is an extinct Arawakan language family. The language was spoken along the shores of Lake Maracaibo, in the coastal areas of the Venezuelan state of Falcón, and on the Dutch islands of Aruba, Bonaire and Curaçao.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pre-Columbian period in Venezuela</span>

The Pre-Columbian period in Venezuela refers to the period before the Spanish colonization of the Americas in the 16th century, known as the Pre-Columbian era. It covers the history of what are now known as the indigenous peoples of Venezuela.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Indigenous peoples in Guyana</span> Earliest inhabitants of Guyana

Indigenous peoples in Guyana, Native Guyanese or Amerindian Guyanese are Guyanese people who are of indigenous ancestry. They comprise approximately 9.16% of Guyana's population. Amerindians are credited with the invention of the canoe, as well as Cassava-based dishes and Guyanese pepperpot, the national dish of Guyana. Amerindian languages have also been incorporated in the lexicon of Guyanese Creole.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pre-Columbian cultures of Colombia</span>

The pre-Columbian cultures of Colombia refers to the ancient cultures and civilizations that inhabited Colombia before the Spanish Conquest in the 16th century.

References

  1. 1 2 Van Cott (2003), "Andean Indigenous Movements and Constitutional Transformation: Venezuela in Comparative Perspective", Latin American Perspectives 30(1), p52
  2. 1 2 3 Richard Gott (2005), Hugo Chávez and the Bolivarian Revolution, Verso. p202
  3. ↑ Kipfer, Barbara Ann (2000). Encyclopedic Dictionary of archaeology. New York: Kluwer Academic/Plenum. p. 91. ISBN   0-306-46158-7.
  4. ↑ Kipfer 2000, p. 172.
  5. ↑ Silverman, Helaine; Isbell, William (Eds.) (2008): Handbook of South American Archaeology 1st ed. 2008. Corr. 2nd printing, XXVI, 1192 p. 430 . ISBN   978-0-387-74906-8. Pg 433-434
  6. ↑ Mahoney 89
  7. ↑ "Venezuela." Archived 4 September 2011 at the Wayback Machine Friends of the Pre-Columbian Art Museum. (retrieved 9 July 2011)
  8. ↑ Gilbert G. Gonzalez; Raul A. Fernandez; Vivian Price; David Smith; Linda Trinh Võ (2 August 2004). Labor Versus Empire: Race, Gender, Migration. Routledge. pp. 142–. ISBN   978-1-135-93528-3.
  9. 1 2 3 4 5 Wunder, Sven (2003), Oil wealth and the fate of the forest: a comparative study of eight tropical countries , Routledge. p130.
  10. ↑ Others include the Aragua and Tacariguas, from the area around Lake Valencia.
  11. ↑ Anibal Martinez (1969). Chronology of Venezuelan Oil. Purnell and Sons LTD.
  12. ↑ Thomas, Hugh (2005). Rivers of Gold: The Rise of the Spanish Empire, from Columbus to Magellan . Random House. p.  189. ISBN   0-375-50204-1.
  13. ↑ "Alcaldía del Hatillo: Historia" (in Spanish). Universidad Nueva Esparta. Archived from the original on 28 April 2006. Retrieved 10 March 2007.
  14. 1 2 3 Gott (2005:203)
  15. 1 2 Gott (2005:204)
  16. ↑ See Los Hijos de La Luna: Monografia Anthropologica Sobre los Indios Sanema-Yanoama, Caracas, Venezuela: Editorial Arte, 1974
  17. ↑ Van Cott, Donna Lee (2006), "Turning Crisis into Opportunity: Achievements of Excluded Groups in the Andes", in Paul W. Drake, Eric Hershberg (eds), State and society in conflict: comparative perspectives on Andean crises, University of Pittsburgh Press. p.163
  18. ↑ Alcida Rita Ramos, "Cutting through state and class: Sources and Strategies of Self-Representation in Latin America", in Kay B. Warren and Jean Elizabeth Jackson (eds, 2002), Indigenous movements, self-representation, and the state in Latin America, University of Texas Press. pp259-60
  19. 1 2 Van Cott (2003), "Andean Indigenous Movements and Constitutional Transformation: Venezuela in Comparative Perspective", Latin American Perspectives 30(1), p51
  20. 1 2 Van Cott (2003:63)
  21. ↑ Van Cott (2003:65)
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