An Amazonian Myth and Its History (Oxford Studies in Social and Cultural Anthropology)

182 Pages·2001·20.81 MB·English

by  Peter Gow

OXFORD STUDIES IN
SOCIAL AND CULTURAL ANTl-IROPOLOGY
EdZtorial Board
JOHN DAVIS Luc DE HEUSCH CAROLINE HUMPHRE Y
EMILY MART[N DAVID PARKIN PETER RIVIl~RE
AN AMAZONIAN MYTH AND ITS HISTORY
OXFORD STUDIES IN
SOCIAL AND CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY
Oxford Swdícs in Social and Cultural Anthropolog'y represents the work of 811lhors, new
and established, [hat wiIJ set the critería of excellencc in ethnographic description anel inno
vation in analysis. The seríes serves as an essential sOllrce of information aboLlt lhe world
anel the discipline.
OTHER TITLES IN TIlIS SERIES
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The Number One Reindeer Brigade
David G. Anderson
Sea Hunters oI' Indoncsía
Fishers anel Weavers of Lamalera
R, H. Barnes
Nationalism anel Hybridity in Mongolia
E. Bu!ag
The Heat of the Hearth
The Process of Kinship in a Malay Fishing Community
Carsten
A Place Apart
An Anthropo]ogical Stlldy of the kelandic Worlcl
Kirsten
Shamans anel Eldcrs
Onun
A Failurc of Trcatmenl
Gifbert LCl7Jis
Tbe Pastoral Continullm
The of Tradition in East Africa
Paul
Time
A Cosmo]ogy
Bornt Telban
" O!1 IVI angettl
'Bushman' Alllnnomy anel Namibian Independence
TllOI1ZilS Widlok
AN AMAZONIAN MYTH
AND ITS HISTORY
TER
In lhe chílly aír of a dry seaSO!1 dawn, a man drinks the beer
served by a girl at heI' kígimaJ1Jlo
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ACKNOWLEDGEME TS
My fieldwork on the Bajo Urubamba between 1980 and 1999 was funded by
the Social Science Research Council, the British Museum, the Nuffield Foun
dation, and the British Academy. The University of East Anglia provided free
time for fieldwork, while a visiting professorship to the Museu
Nacional/Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, leave from the University of
Manchester, and the generous forbearance of the London School of Econom
ics, gave me the time and the wherewithal to write it.
Artemio Fasabi Gordón died 011 the 6th of J une 1991, and I teU some of his
this book. Pablo Manchinari died on the 3rd March 1
and this book is a11 inadequate monument to a great friend. Mauricio Fasabi
and Clotilde Gordón, Artemio's parents and Pablo's parents-in-Iaw, must have
seen me coming, for they took me straight into their lives 011 that unforgettable
day in December 1980. Their dallghter Sara Fasabi, Pablo's widow, has always
provided me with a place to live well. I thank Lilí Torres, Mauricio Roberto
Fasabi, Antonio Urquía, Teresa Campos, Marcial Miranda, Julian Miranda,
Inez González, Juan Mosombite (padre), the late Luisa Campos, Celia
Mosombite, Juan Mosombite (hi;o), Ramón Mosombite, Linder Melendez,
Miriam Mosombite, , Lucinda Mosombite, the late Adolfina Campos, Antonio
Zapata, Arminda Quiroz, Segundo Quiroz, Jlllia Laureano, Segundo BIanco,
Manuel Lielia Fasabi, the late Clara Flores, the late Jorge Manchinari,
Cecilia Manchinari, Felix Rodriguez, Jorge Rivas, Candelaria Camaiteri,
Segundo MonsÍn, Etelvina Cushichinari, Virgílio Gabino, José Torres, Berna
Zumaeta, Julio Shahuano, Elena Moisés Miqueas, anel the late Pedro
Gordón. There are many more, particularly those swarms of children, most!y
llnreeognizable to me now that they have grown into men and women and have
cast aside lhei!" childhood nicknamcs, who were always on hanel to answer my
questions with a total disregard for adlllt conventions, and to ask their own
for the same 1'ea8011. I aIso thank those Campa people of the Gran
Alto Tambo anel Ene areas that I met in 1978, and especially
Jaanquiri, anel the late Augusto.
This book originated in Peru in 1988, appearing to me quite suddenly one
night in December of that year in Iquitos. Fernando Santos, Frederica BareIay,
and Luisa Elvira Belaunde were godparents to its inception, for which J thank
them heartily. I also owe much to Dilwyn and Claire Jenkins, Michael BowJes,
Cecilia McCallum, Patricia Thorndike, Alberto Chirif~ Lucy Trapnell, Carlos
Montenegro, Maureen Llewelyn-Jones, Alonso Sean anel Angela
Hagan, and Fiona Frank. The Dominican priests, P. Ricardo Alvarez and P.
Pedro Rey, and the schoolteachers of Santa Clara were consistcntly gcnerous
with their praetical, moral, anel inteUectual aid. In particular, Teresa Barinesa
x
has always been llnfailing in her help and generous with the fruits of her own
CONTENTS
profound insight into the lives of people in the Santa Clara area.
This book originated in Peru, but it owes a lot to Brazil. Its hardest passages
were written in Rio de Janeiro, and it got its first public hearing as a series of
AcknolPledgelnents IX
seminars at the Museu Nacional there. I thank Aparecida Vilaça, Mareio Gold or
man, Tania Stôlze Lima, Déborah Danowski, Bruna Franchetto, Carlos LZsI Plates XIV
Fausto, Sylvia Caiuby Novaes, Cecilia McCallum, Edilson Teixeira, Claudia List o{lVIaps xv
Rezende, Vanessa Lea, Robin Wright, and my fonner students and colleagues
in the Museu Nacional for their manifold support. I also thank aJl those Introduction
commentators at seminars and lectures il1 Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, Campinas,
Curitiba, and Salvador for their helpful comments. Part I: klyths
Joanl1a Overing once set me a literary challenge, which I here take IIp in her A Piro COl1text 35
honour. also thank Carollne" . . "
Joncs, Alfred Gell, Simenm Gell, Peter Riviere, Anne-Christine Taylor, The Setting of the Myth 36
Philippe Descola, Karen Jacobs, Maria Phylactou, Heather Gibson, Terence A Mal1 who was Tired of Living 39
Turner, Lynnette Caicco, Mauríce Bloch, Jadran Mímica, Andrew Jones, Artemio's Life 44
T'homas FilIitz, Andrc Gingrich, Ulrike Davis-Sulikowski, Nicholas Green, Telling Piro People about Country 50
John Onians, Elizabeth de Bievres, Stephanie Jones, Timothy Davies, Sheila
Arup, Nikolay Zhoukov, Jonathan Meuli, Rosie Gunraj, Cesare Poppi, Joannc 2. The Meaning of the Myth 56
PiIIsbury, William Rea,Melissa lVIedich, Andrew Holding, Heonik KW011, Eva
Castellanos, Patricia Peach, JeannetteEdwards, Paul Towell, Tim Ingold, The Sources in the Documentary Archive 56
Borut Telban, Jean Axel Koehler, Maia Green, Penny Harvey, Ben Juan Sebastián tells Esther Matteson 'The Sun' 58
Campbell, Elizabeth Ewart, Angela Torresan, David Rodgers, anel Isabella Artemio's and Sebastián's Versions Compared 60
Lepri. Tircdness, Death and Other-becoming 62
I thank NancyMunn for showing me how to research Piro art forms ethno The World of the White-lipped Peccaries 66
graphically, and Andreas Broeckmann for teaching me historical methoelology The Owner of lhe White-lipped Pecearies 69
and analysis. I Ihallk Claude Lévi-Strauss for his very kind el1couragcment, The 'lemporaJity of thc Versions 71
and Rebecca Posen, Edward Simpson, and Sam Treglown for responding wi/h Narrators and Listeners 73
such generous attention to my flrst public attempt to articulate my own ideas
about Lévi-Strauss's work 011 myth, This book could neveI' have been written 78
3. Mvths anel Mythopoeisis
at ali but for the good will and sustained efforts of my great anthropological
interlocutors, Christina Toren anel Eduardo Viveiros de Castro. Ancient People's Stories 79
This book records Piro people's curiosity about the lives of Scottish people. 82
Piro of Tel1ing
\;Vhen we first met we had, to my lmowledge, only a football match to connect Telling 'Ancient People's Storics' 84
USo lt turned out to be mllch more than that. I thank my làmily and friends in Mythopoeisis, anel 88
Scotland for having supported me throughout, and J eledicate it to my mother The Myths that People Tell 92
and to the memory of my fatheI'. Forgotten Myths 95
Old People, Village Leaders, and Co-rcsident White People 99
Xli Confents COlltents Xlii
Part lI: Transforma/ions 8. The Arrive 219
4. Design 103 'The New Life' 220
Divinity and Humanity 223
'The Birth of Tsla' 103 Going to the Sky to be with God 227
Births, Human and Miraculous 107 Rethinking Heaven 231
The Things with Design 110 Líving with the 236
\tVomen's Designs lU The 'New Life' lived out 240
Human anel Animal Design 114 Remaíning on tl1e Earth 242
To 100k like ]aguars 120 Staying the Same 249
The Transformations of Design 124
9. The Rethought 253
5. Hallucination 130
The Transformatio!1s of the 253
'The Kochma10to women' J30 Rumours about the Pishlaw anel the Saca.cara 256
To Transfimn 133 Life in Herzog's Film Camps O!1 the Camisea 260
Illness and its Cure 135 The Taker of Faces 266
Drunkenness 140
From Different Points of View 272
Drug Songs 144 The Stars in their Courses 276
Becoming Double ISO Silent Changes 279
Transforming Cosmologies 152
COl1elusion 286
6. The Girl's Initiation Ritual 158
TexlS 313
158
319
SeclllSiol1 anel RevelatioI1 160 lndex 331
To have a Good Time 165
The Transformation of Humanity 171
'Ali the Piro People along the River' 173
Changed beyond ali Recognition 177
011 the Surfaee of the MOOll 182
Part IH: The
The Envisioned 191
M orán Z1Il11atea's Story about Sangama ]93
A Sky Steamboat full of CIothes 195
'The Worlel on the Other Side' 203
Sangama's Analysis of Writing 208
Possible Origins for Sangama's AnaIysis 213
Contacts between the Earth and the Sky 215
LIS OI" PLATES
LIST OF "~1APS
In lhe chílly aír of a dry season dawl1, a man drínks lhe beer served by a gírl 1. Eastern Peru, showing places mentioned in lhe text 2
aI heI' leil!immvlo 2. Settlements in lhe Hajo Urubamha area mentioned in the text 45
1. Examples oI' design templates 114
2. A bccr fermenlÍng pot 117
3. A beer fcrmcnting pot 118
4. A largc beer serving bowl 119
5. skirts 120
6. 21
7. A girl painted for ínitiation ritual (photograph by Carlos Montenegro) 122
8. Girlleaving seclusíon cluring heI' ínitíation ritual in Sepahua, 1977
(photograph hy Carlos Montenegro) 160
9. Dancing during a girl's initiation ritual in Santa Clara, 1981 166