Curupira

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The Curupira is a figure from the Tupí - Guarani - mythology of the Amazon region of Brazil . He is mentioned as early as 1560 by the Canarian missionary and Jesuit José de Anchieta . He is considered to be the protector of forests and wild animals. The Curupira is described as a small figure, a dwarf or a boy. Hence the name of Guaraní curumim (boy) and pira (body). Further characteristics are described as flaming red or fiery hair and feet pointing in the wrong direction, which is why whoever thinks he is following his trail moves away from him and whoever tries to avoid him runs into his arms. Green or blue teeth, a hairy body, a missing anus and an oversized penis are also sometimes ascribed to him. According to Anchieta, he was very feared by the Indians because of the sometimes fatal blows he dealt. In order to appease him, the Indians are said to have deposited offerings on the jungle trails. He persecutes and punishes everyone (hunters, forest workers, etc.) who disregard nature. When a person disappears in the forest and does not appear again, the curupira is often suspected. Other defenders of the nature of the Amazon are the caipora and the white stag Appendixá .

reception

In the Brazilian film Macunaíma , which is based on the novel of the same name by Mário de Andrade (1928), the title character meets a Curupira while wandering around in the jungle. The Curipira appears here as a stout, white-skinned man with red hair and a full beard, who is dressed in a kind of paisley apron. He sits on a log, cuts strips of meat from his leg with a knife and eats them. Macunaíma asks the curupira for a piece, whereupon he also cuts a strip for him. When macunaíma has eaten it, the curupira tries to catch Macunaíma with a ruse in order to eat it and in this way regain its leg, but Macunaíma has difficulty escaping.

literature

  • Mário de Andrade : Macunaíma. O herói sem nenhum caráter. Critical edition by Telê Porto Ancona Lopez. Illustrations by Petro Nava. LCT, Rio de Janeiro 1978.
  • Luis Da Câmara Cascudo: Dicionário do folclore brasileiro. 2nd ed. Inst. Nacional do livro, Rio de Janeiro 1962, pp. 166-168, 261-262.
  • Luis Da Câmara Cascudo: Geografia dos mitos brasileiros. 2nd edition Olympio, Rio de Janeiro 1976.
  • Maria Thereza Cunha de Giacomo: Curupira: Lenda indigena. Melhoramentos, São Paulo 1975
  • George M. Eberhart: Mysterious Creatures: A Guide to Cryptozoology. ABC-CLIO, 2002, ISBN 1-57607-283-5 , p. 118.
  • Marcos Machado Nunes: Curupira. In: Dominique Lanni (ed.): Bestiaire fantastique des voyageurs. Flammarion, Paris 2014, ISBN 978-2-08-129055-6 .
  • Karl Shuker: On the Trail of the Curupira. In: Fortean Times No. 102 (September 1997), p. 17.