Sateré-Mawé
Three narratives by members the Sateré-Mawé people:
Eve's brother
By Vidal (Rio Manjuru/ AM - 1996):
In
the old times we did not die, because all of us, Indians, lived
there in the nusoquen [rock terrace]. That was the land where
we first lived. But it was later that death came to exist, after
his sister died, when he abandoned that first house, that he invited
Adam. Tupana ordered them to leave it, of those thereabouts. "Look,
Adam, call your people to go away from there, from those thereabouts".
This is what he said: "Adam, call your people to move on,
to go away, to leave here. There will be lots of fruit in the
forests you are going to cross. But I do not want you to get distracted
with them. I'll go ahead".
He insists: "You are going to have lots of fruit, but you
will not get distracted." But Adam is stubborn. When he got
there, in a fruit tree, he climbed it in order to cut off a branch
of the fruit tree. There, his people got distracted, when they
moved on, and on and on. In the evening, already, they ran into
a sorveira (cow tree). It was full of fruits, he knocked them
down and they were delayed once more. They were already traveling
but they kept getting distracted here and there. They also ran
into a caramuri tree, and Adam climbed it too. And instead of
moving on, without getting distracted, no, they stayed by the
fruit tree until it got dark. They camped there and, when the
day came, they moved on. They soon found a bacabeira (a kind of
palm tree) and picked much bacaba. There they got distracted,
made a pitcher of wine and drank it all. There they built a shack,
once again, so they could sleep.
When they remembered that God had ordered them to go in front:
"You may leave, on such and such day I will go there".
Then, in that remembrance he said: "Did I not tell you to
go? So that when I arrived you would already be on the margin,
waiting? And that, when I arrived, I would build a boat, a canoe".
The old man took the same way they had taken. The same way they
had taken, God passed too. There, he found again a fallen tree.
"Oh, darn, they did not hear me. I told them not to get distracted".
He walked a little further and found once more a fallen tree.
There, what he found was also the shack. "They stayed here".
He walked further and further and found another fallen fruit tree.
"Oh, darn; Adam did not hear me when I said that he was not
to get distracted with his people. I told them that in the afternoon
I would join them. When I got there I would be ready to go away".
He found them where they had gotten distracted: "Gee, Adam,
you did not hear what I told you. I told you to come. So I'm going".
So he moved on and they were left behind. "They were left
behind because Adam did not hear what I told him". During
his trip, he told a weitapin bird "Spread some wood chips
on the path so they cannot find out which way I took". So
suddenly his tracks were covered and they no longer knew how to
follow him.
When he reached the margin of the river he crossed it - he is
powerful, right? It was a rather wide river. All of a sudden he
made a rock into a swuift current and they could not get across.
They got to the edge of the water and there they would run back
and forth, screaming: "Hey! Where did you go!? Where did
you go!? How did you get across!?". And they heard the thump;
the boat was being built for them to go now, to go away. Because
God made that boat for them to go. But Adam did not hear the advice,
he stayed. And he called and called. Until finally God answered:
"Look, Adam, did I not give you an advice? For you to follow
me with your people, but you did not hear me. So you stay".
He called again and again and God answered from the other side:
"Look, Adam: I thought it would be best if you stayed. Because
if all of us leave our land it would not work. You people have
to work. You people have to go back. You have to tell your wife,
tell Eve: It is best that we go back to our home. Because he invited
us, but we did not hear his advice and we have to go back, we
have to work a lot because we have a lot of planting to do [sese
motpap ipoityp mikoi]". Then they made sure they went back
to where they had come from. If they had listened to God's advice
we would not be where we are now, in the forest. We would not
work in planting. But we took advantage of nothing, nothing.
Those who went with God are working to leave. But not them, those
who stayed got distracted with the fruits. She remembered it and
said: "I have a brother who has given me axes, machetes,
iron for planting, and I left them there; that is why we must
leave again [go back]". That is what Eve said, convincing
her husband to go.
The tikwã bird [Mimus gilvus. Mimidae] was saying, singing
on top of their boat: "tikwã, tikwã":
"Look, hurry up: the rain is about to fall". Then the
Emperor, who was God's secretary, the old man, said: "But
what in the world is this bird divining!?". And he started
to scold it, thinking that the bird was way too impertinent. So
he said a few things to the tikwã. And the bird answered:
"No, this boat of yours is about to leave, so you go".
The Emperor ordered the bird to stop singing near him. God took
the book from under his arm. He pulled it and the Emperor looked
on and said: It is correct, what God said is correct. This is
the day indeed. And then shortly the rain fell. And then there
was that big water, where the boat was. It rained, and rained,
and rained until that boat was able to leave the place where it
was, on the ground. Then they went on board and left, thus hiding
themselves from death.
They left in order to hide from many diseases. It is the wind
that carries diseases: from very far away comes fever, the flu,
all kinds of diseases. They wanted to hide themselves from all
that, but it was not possible.
Toran
The Emperor was an Indian
By Alfredo Barbosa (Ponta Alegre, rio Andirá/ AM
- 1996):
The first person to ever be born was tapuya, then it was the
karaiwa. That is why the tapuya-in remained the owners of the
forest na´apy kaiwat, they live on the very land. Later
a person appeared, the 'Emperor', who said they should not stay
in the forest but should go to yarupap ["the place where
are/dock the boats"].
The Emperor said: "Let's go downwards, to the outside".
There they went, they walked, but they ran into fruit trees and
got distracted and no longer walked. The Emperor went ahead and
got where the boat is and waited there for a long time. But since
the people did not arrive he invited the waçaria nation
["Toads", one of the numerous clans - ywaniaria - that
constituted the Sateré-Mawé people] to row with
him. At the time motors did not exist. And they left for ywysasare
[an old expression, translated as "towards the outside"].
The Emperor was an Indian. He gave education we´eghap [knowledge].
He said: "You will learn how to make many things ".
Those who rowed, the toad nation [waça], remained in the
city [tawa wato: big village] and we remained here in the forest.
They gave origin to whites like you, to the Japanese, Americans,
they are all magka´i, that little white toad. There he gave
them intelligence to make airplanes, radio, television. He figured
it would be good that the tapuya stayed in the forest taking care
of so many riches and said that one day he would order someone
to bring them shotguns, axes, machetes, machines, new axes, to
exchange. It is the 'regatão' (itinerant trader of the
Amazon Region). He said that someday he was going to contribute
with those things that today exist in the cities and that the
'regatão' brings. Morekuaria mit po'oro koi, that is what
authorities send.
Toran
Uruhe'i e Maripyaipok
By Dona Maria Trindade Lopes (Vida Feliz, rio Andirá/
AM - 1996):
There
were once a brother and a sister who were coming down when the
Emperor called them to come down to the outside: Uri was the woman's
name, but because when they were about to come down she whispered
['he´i-´he´i] in his brother's ear that she
had forgotten something: her stool, she was called Urihe´i:
Uri whispered: Urihe´i-he´i. Her brother was called
Mari, but because he went back, also because of his sister's call,
he became known as Mari-aipok: Mari went back: Mari py aipok:
[Mari's foot went back].
Uri was Eve's name in the Sateré language. From her came
all the Sateré.
Toran
About the narratives
The narratives above were collected and edited by Alba Lucy
Giraldo Figueroa (anthropologist, Fundação Nacional
de Saúde – National Health Foundation – Funasa).
They are part of her Doctoral dissertation Guerriers de l'écriture
et commerçants du monde enchanté: histoire, identité
e traitement du mal chez les Sateré-Mawé (Amazonie
Centrale, Brésil). The first narrative was translated
by Silvia de Oliveira and the third by Brito de Souza.
The Emperor of the Sateré-Mawé
By Alba Lucy Giraldo Figueroa:
Old accounts [sehay poot´i] collected in several
sites of the Andirá-Marau Indigenous Area refer to the
saga of a mythic god that the Sateré-Mawé recognize
as their ancestor. In one of these versions, the name given to
the demiurge is “Imperador” (Emperor in Portuguese).
The term Emperor was used in the context of the sateré-mawé
language, and Emperor is the only Portuguese word in the original
account. The narrator, as well as to the listeners, considered
it part of their own language. They added that his full name was
"Imperador Dom Pedro". In other contexts what is used
is the noun morekuat, a generic name for ‘chefe’ (chief,
boss in Portuguese), today used mostly to refer to public officials.
The narrative, in its various versions, is essential for the
comprehension of how several themes are seen by the Sateré-Mawé,
such as their ethnic identity and the place and role attributed
to the social category of whites (karaiwa) in their representations
of the world and in those referring to the power relations with
the institutions of the Brazilian State. They substantiate, on
the other hand, the religious sentiment imbedded in the Sateré-Mawé’s
sense of territoriality and in their political practices. A common
point in all accounts is the permission explicitly given by the
Emperor to the option made by the Indians of remaining in their
lands.
Whites are associated with two kinds of white, or whitish, toads:
one called kaingkaing [unidentified], the other called
manka'i [Hyla venulosa - cunauaru]. There
are other associations made as well. One of them is with the wahue
monkey "caiarara" [Cebus albitrons unicolor],
because it is "all white and shameless". The other is
with the tiapu or tiapii [Cacicus cela], "japiin",
[oriole, a bird of the Icteriad family, Psarocolius]. In
this last case, the trace that seems to stand out is the habit
of collective, numerous living, as well as the great singing versatility
of the bird. Some narrators point out, in order to justify this
association, the multi-instrumental characteristic of Western
music. Whites are thus depicted as descendants of those who followed
the Emperor, and the Sateré-Mawé of those who stayed.
The word toran, pronounced with emphasis by the narrators
after a final pause each time they narrate a myth, marks a temporal
sequence during which it is expected that the attitude of the
audience is one of reverent silence in the face of the sehay pot'i:
old words, taken by the old men as words of goodness and beauty.
