Kadiweu

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Kadiweu woman 1892

The Kadiweu are an indigenous people who live in Mato Grosso do Sul in Brazil . They are the last surviving group of the once large and powerful Mbayá tribe who once ruled large parts of Brazil and Paraguay . In 1998 the population still comprised about 1600 natives.

At the end of the 16th century they first came into contact with the Cimarrones - feral cattle and horses of the Spaniards. They learned the art of riding around the middle of the 17th century and then developed into feared South American cavalry warriors . The culture changed drastically. Since the hunt by horse in the relatively tree-rich Chaco was not productive enough, they mainly attacked Spanish settlers and stole their cattle. The social structure changed from an egalitarian society to a rank society . In the 20th century, the Kadiweu switched to sedentary farming. They became known for their aesthetic pottery and textile products. Since then, assimilation into the majority society and mixing with other indigenous ethnic groups has increased significantly.

They are still known for their equestrian skills as well as their elaborate body and face painting with geometric, abstract patterns.

Surname

Her name is a corruption of the name the Indians gave themselves: Cadiguegodi. Other names for the people are: Cadiguebo, Cadioeo, Caduveo, Caduvéo, Caduví, Cayua, Guaicuru, Kadiveo, Kadivéu, Kadiwéu, Kaduveo, Kaiwa or Mbayá-Guaikurú.

language

The Kadiweu language belongs to the Guaicurú subgroup of the Mataco-Guaicurú language family . The linguistic melody is characterized by the ethnologist Claude Lévi-Strauss as follows: “The sounds of the Guaicuru sound pleasant in the ears - quickly spoken long words, many bright vowels that alternate with dental and guttural sounds and with soft phonemes, are reminiscent of a brook that jumping over pebbles "(( Sad tropics , p. 163))

Settlement area

The territory of the Kadiweu lies between the Río Paraguay and Rio Nabileque in the west, the Serra da Bodoquena in the east, the Rio Neutaka in the north and the Rio Aquidavão in the south. Most of the Kadiweu now live in four villages, the largest of which, Bodoquena, is located in the northeast at the foot of the Serra da Bodoquena. There are also the villages of Tomázia, São João and Kinikanáo. The reserve has the name " Reserva Indígena Kadiwéu " and was officially recognized by the government in 1903 in the current area of ​​approx. 5400 km² (twice the size of the Saarland ). It is near Porto Murtinho .

As a rule, several families live in the houses. The construction of their houses is described by Lévi-Strauss as follows: “The frame of the house consisted of debarked tree stands rammed into the ground, which [...] supported the roof beams at the first fork. A layer of yellowed palm leaves formed the roof that hung low on either side; but unlike the Brazilian houses there were no walls. The buildings thus represented a kind of compromise between the homes of the whites [...] and the shelters of the natives, the roofs of which were flat and covered with mats ”(( Sad tropics , p. 163)).

history

The Kadiweu are the largest surviving branch of the Mbayá people, which numbered 4,000 natives in the 18th century. Their numbers were greatly reduced at the end of the 18th century due to smallpox and flu. The first news about the people comes from a European expedition from the 16th century. In the 18th century, many Mbayá groups came under the influence of Jesuit missionaries . In 1791 a peace treaty is signed with the Portuguese and the Indian country is recognized. During the Triple Alliance War from 1865 to 1870, the Kadiweu supported Brazil in the fight against Paraguay. The Brazilian government granted them a large area in the Pantanal and the Serra da Bodoquena . The Kadiweu have sold or leased large parts of the country to cattle farmers.

religion

The Kadiweu believe in life after death. The hereafter has the same form and social structure as the realm of the living. That is why the burial places are constructed in the same way as the villages of the living and the dead are buried with their possessions. The most important god is the creator god Go-noeno-hodi, who protects the people. The Kadiweu think of God as a poor old, fearful man who lives in heaven. He is more likely to be pityed than to be worshiped. Another important god is the crook Caracaca, who is responsible for the suffering and death of people in his insidiousness and selfishness. The shamans are supernatural beings who can take different forms and mediate between the realm of spirits and humans.

Social system

The Kadiweu are descended from the Mbaya, who had a caste system. At the top are the nobles, who are either by birth or by merit. Then come the warriors. The lower caste are made up of the slaves, who usually belong to other peoples. (Sad tropics, p. 169). Missionaries who lived with the Kadiweu in 1995 report a "master line, warrior line and slave line". “Society has shown itself to be averse to all feelings which they consider natural; so they felt a deep loathing for fathering children. Abortion and infanticide were the order of the day .. ”(( Sad Tropics , p. 169)) Children were instead kidnapped by other tribes. The same aversion to the natural is also evident in the fact that they always paint themselves on special occasions. Only animals didn't paint themselves. "In face painting as well as in abortion and infanticide, the Mbaya expressed their disgust for nature." ((Ibid., P. 179))

art

The men are sculptors and the women are painters who decorate pottery, animal skins or the body. According to Lévi-Strauss, the tribe “created a graphic style that cannot be compared with anything that pre-Columbian America left us ” ( Sad tropics , p. 175). Levi-Strauss has devoted an extensive analysis to the art of the Kadiweu. It is “characterized by a dualism: that between men and women, with some being sculptors and others being painters; the first maintain a representational and naturalistic style in spite of all stylizations, while the second devote themselves to abstract art ”(ibid., p. 181). The ethnologist then analyzes the dualistic principles in the construction of the abstract forms, which then stand in contrast to the dynamics of production, which "[overlaps] the duality on all levels" (ibid., P. 183). This creates very complex patterns of symmetry on a small scale and asymmetries in the overall composition. Lévi-Strauss also tries to interpret this complex style as a consequence of the social structure: He believes that “the graphic art of the Caduveo women, their mysterious seductive power and their at first sight unfounded complexity can be interpreted as the fantasy of a society and who [must] explain, who searches with unsatisfied passion for means to symbolically represent the institutions that they could have had if their interests and their superstitions had not prevented them from doing so. […] Hieroglyphs that describe an inaccessible golden age which, in the absence of a code, they praise in their jewelry and whose secrets they reveal at the same time as their nudity ”(ibid., P. 188 f.).

literature

  • Claude Lévi-Strauss: Sad Tropics , from the French by Eva Moldenhauer; Suhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt 1978, ISBN 3-518-57206-7
  • Kalervo Oberg : The Terena and the Caduveo of Southern Mato Grosso , Brazil 1949. Institute of Social Anthropology, Publication no. 9. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution.
  • Darcy Ribeiro : Kadiweu Kinship. In Native South Americans: Ethnology of the Least Known Continent, edited by Patricia J. Lyon, 167-183. Boston 1974: Little, Brown & Co.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Encyclopedia Britannica: Mbaya . Retrieved January 26, 2016.
  2. ↑ English website about the peoples of America accessed on July 6, 2014
  3. ↑ Languages ​​of the world website , accessed on July 7, 2014.
  4. ^ English website Religions of Latin America
  5. ↑ Report by missionaries about the Kadiweu ( Memento of the original from July 14, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved July 9, 2014 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.dipm.de