Zuruahã
The Zuruahã , also Zuruaha , Suruahà , Suruaha , Suruwaha , Índios do Coxodoá , are an indigenous people from the Amazon region in Brazil , who achieved particular fame for their widespread tendency to commit suicide . The Zuruahã Indians live in the south of the Brazilian state of Amazonas in the “ Área Indígena ” established for them and speak a language belonging to the Arawá family .
features
In 1995 143 members of the tribe were counted. A special feature of this people is that - apart from deaths due to illness, accidents or war injuries - all people sooner or later seek suicide by ingesting poison. To do this, they use a poison obtained from a special type of liana , which they primarily use to coat their arrowheads. In the mythology of the Zuruahã, the life span of the human being on earth is only a transit station laden with hardship in a very imperfect world, which after death is replaced by a paradise-like supernatural world. Another cause can be seen in the murder of the chiefs and shamans during the advance of the Brazilians about 100 years ago. These murders destroyed the social fabric of the clans and ensured that from this point on the drug Cunaha was no longer used by the shamans for ritual reasons, but was consumed by all members of the tribe, from toddlers to old men.
The traditional way of life of the Zuruahã as well as other tribes is threatened by missionaries , gold prospectors and above all by the timber industry.
exploration
During expeditions, in contrast to other tribes, researchers did not find any elderly people of old age in this people , but significantly more orphans who, according to the villagers, had usually lost their parents to suicide .
The ethnographic filmmaker Gernot Schley made a documentary about Zuruahã in 2005, which was also broadcast on German television.
literature
Gernot Schley : Zuruaha: Stories from the Rainforest . Horlemann, 2006, ISBN 978-3-89502-219-7 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ Zuruahã Língua e identificação ( Memento of the original from October 1, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . On: pib.socioambiental.org ; last accessed on February 19, 2014.
- ↑ In the forests of the Zuruaha Indians - The priest and the unknown people. . TV documentary, Radio Bremen TV , last broadcast on March 15, 2010.
