The North-West Amazons: Notes of some months spent among cannibal tribes

by Thomas Whiffen

There is nothing to show any affinity among the tribes, and there is none of the intricate relationship of the Australian systems. The social unit of the tribes is the undivided household community of some sixty to two hundred individuals, with a common house, under the rule of a chief. Some tribes have but one central tribal house, others may have two or three; but each house would have its absolutely independent chief and would be exogamous. There is no head chief or central organisation to bind these households in the tribe, any more than there is to unite the tribes of any language-group. Intertribal fighting is continual, and only some great common danger, some threatened calamity of the gravest, might serve to combine the tribes in a supreme effort for self-defence. A man with an unusual magnetic influence might so dominate his neighbours as to weld tribe and tribe for extra-tribal struggle. At the most some half-dozen tribes under spur of most hazardous peril, urged to superhuman effort by imminent torture and death, ever unite even for war. On the rare occasions when this may be done the exceptional individual would be but the greatest among equals, not a recognised commander-in-chief.[58] I only know of one instance in point. Nonugamue, a Nonuya, was paramount chief of the entire Nonuya-speaking area, a large tract of country that lies between the Boro and the Okaina, and south of the Muenane and Resigero tribes. It was quite a recent usurpation on the part of this chief, and I never discovered any other case of one man influencing so large a district. It is true that a Boro chief named Katenere did get together a band of men numbering from thirty to forty to make war to the death against the white rubber-gatherers; but in this instance, though he was of notable personality, he could not combine the tribes. His band were all Boro, simply men of his own type, the boldest spirits of various tribes. A Resigero chief also made himself notorious by collecting a body of warriors to make war not on the white men but on those Indians who gave way to the pressure put upon them by these whites and agreed to work rubber. He warred, therefore, against his own tribe, against members of his own language-group, and he did so lest worse should befall his people. He knew of no other remedy than to make the punishment for yielding equal to that for refusing to yield. Nothing less in his opinion could save the tribes. Once I came upon a habitation with the dead bodies of thirty-eight men, women and children—for he spared none who had any dealing with the whites. They had been slain, and the house partly burnt, by this chief. In consequence of these drastic measures he was feared by whites and Indians alike, and both when walking through the bush within possible distance of his district would start at a sound every few minutes and imagine it was this redoubtable warrior on the warpath again.

But these cases were abnormal, due to the presence of new and evil factors that threatened the tribes with a fate to which death itself were preferable. It was the instance of the approach of an unparalleled danger, the signal for supreme exertion, and for unexampled negligence of customs that are stronger than all law.

In normal conditions the chief has no influence beyond his own household, and the extent of that influence would depend largely on the man’s personal character, and also the character of the rival authority, the tribal medicine-man. Whichever happens to possess the strongest personality would be the dominant spirit of their little community. Other things being equal, the odds are decidedly in favour of the medicine-man—death comes speedily to those who rebel against the magic-worker—and a weak chief would be entirely subservient to him.

The chief has a special portion of the house assigned to him and his family, a larger share than would be allotted to any other man; but this privilege is necessary, as all prisoners belong to the chief, and he takes all the unattached women. As he thus has more women to work for him the big tribal plantations become his. He leads the tribe in war, presides over the tobacco palaver, and has the last word in the tribal councils. The chief has no special name, for there are no titles of courtesy, except among the Andoke, who call a chief Posoa. The ordinary warrior will talk to the chief with no outward sign of respect; still, the chief’s word carries a great amount of weight.

On the death of a chief his successor must be elected by the tribe, and though the son as a rule is appointed, he does not become chief as a matter of course, but only after tribal selection. If due cause should be shown against him, and the tribe be of accord on the point when the matter has been discussed in tobacco palaver, another man would be chosen, and the honour conferred on him in accordance with tribal decision independent of relationship.

There is but one law among the tribes, and that law is paramount and infrangible—Pia, it is our custom. Custom, more binding than any legal code, shepherds the Indian from the cradle to the grave. And Pia is not only the law, it is the reason for all things. So it has always been. Neither the chief, the medicine-man, nor the tribal council makes the law, though it is the business of all three to enforce it, and it can only be set aside, on the rare instances when such liberty would be tolerated, with the consent of the tribesmen given in formal conclave.

The tribal council consists of all the males of the household who have attained to man’s estate, under the presidency of the chief; and the Indian parliament, the Indian court of law, is the tobacco palaver.

This tobacco drinking—the chupe del tabac, as Robuchon calls it—of which so much has been written, must not be confounded with the kawana drinking at a dance. When word has gone round that it is desired to hold a council the warriors and elders of the tribe foregather, and squat on their haunches round the tobacco-pot, which is placed by one of the assembly on the ground in their midst. One of the group will start the subject to be brought under discussion, usually the Indian whose advice or suggestion has influenced the chief to call the council, or the one who has a cause to lay before the tribe. It may be a matter of war, some question of hunting, or the wrong-doing of a fellow-tribesman that has to be discussed and judged. The speaker is doubtless under the influence of coca, and will talk on and on. He may take hours to deliver his oration, given with endless repetitions, while those who agree with him will grunt “Heu!” to show approval from time to time throughout the performance. When his final word is uttered the spokesman will reach forward and take the pot, dip in a short stick, and wipe some of the black liquid on his tongue. He will then pass the pot round to his companions, and every man who has agreed with him will take tobacco, whilst any one who passes the pot by—to signify he disagrees—will be bound to give his reason for being of an opposite opinion. This is continued until all in disagreement with the original speaker have put forth their views. The question at issue is then settled by whichever side may have the majority, the chief having the casting vote. There is no appeal against such settlement. It is absolutely final.

The passing of tobacco is also used as a binding promise on every verbal agreement between individuals. In this case they will dip a small stick like a match into the liquid and pass it over the tongue, or put their forefingers into each other’s tobacco pots, made from the hollowed husks of nuts, and which are usually carried suspended round the neck by a string. The tobacco pot comes into requisition again at a friendly meeting, and serves to emphasise the binding nature of the friendship.

Though these Indians now all hold to patrilineal and patrilocal law, there are traces that point to possibly original matrilocal customs among them, such as still obtain among some of the tribes of British Guiana.[59] We find survivals of marriage by capture; but in no tribe are the girls sold, nor have they any dowry. The husband, once he has obtained his wife, is entirely responsible for her maintenance.