::01

Below, we will present a synthesis of the Ikpeng itinerary, which is told in greater detail in my work, In name of the others. Classification of social relations among the Txicão of the Upper Xingu (see the item Sources of Information).

In Ikpeng discourse, Kantavo is the original demiurge, about whom the stories refer to a time when these people had great enemies, but counted on the solid alliance of the Txipaya people. Their relations with the Txipaya were friendly and helpful, although the Ikpeng say that they took a group of them prisoner and brought them up, and that it was from this group that they learned the forms and ways of making baskets, the weaving of cotton, among other techniques. Besides that, they admit to having obtained various ritual songs and elements that were integrated to their rituals. Consistent with this, older sources (such as Nimuendaju, 1948 e Snethlage, 1910) indicate that Ikpeng were present among a Xipaya group which inhabited the banks of the Iriri, principal tributary of the Lower Xingu, leading us to believe that the Ikpeng would have inhabited that region.

By around 1850, the Ikpeng occupied an area characterized by many converging rivers, where they made war with a series of groups. But the names they give to the rivers do not allow us to identify the region. The general formation on the hydrographic basin, the description of certain natural resources (such as cashew nuts) and geographical features, as well as evidence from names and characteristics of their enemies, allow us to suppose that it was the Teles Pires-Juruena river basin, and more precisely the intermediary zone between the confluence of the Rio Verde-Teles Pires and the confluence of the Teles Pires-Juruena.

As for their enemies, they mention the Tapaugwo and the Abaga, the latter possibly corresponding to the Apiaká, which in this period (between 1850-1900) occupied an area between the Juruena and its tributary the Arinos. They also make reference to the Kumari, which does not correspond to the known designation of any people of this region, but perhaps refers to the Kaiabi. They also comment on the presence of a group of whites, who had horses and cattle, and from whom the Ikpeng captured one or several people. Curiously, the Ikpeng call the latter group Tupi. These permanent hostilities, although irregular, caused successive moves of Ikpeng villages.

A little before 1900, pressured by their adversaries, who, in turn, were pressured by the advance of the colonization frontier along the Teles Pires, the Ikpeng crossed the Formosa Mountains, an insignificant natural barrier that marks the division between the Teles Pires-Juruena and Alto Xingu basins. In this region, they seem to have been confronted once again by their enemies from the Teles Pires - Abaga and Kumari - besides a group that they called Pakairi, comprised of "whites and several blacks". Evidently this refers to the Bakairi of Paranatinga (a greater probability than those of the Rio Novo), who already were experiencing the consequences of contact with non-Indians, clothed as whites and raising cattle, mixed with caboclos -[descendants of Indians and whites]

The series of Ikpeng villages in the region of the upper Xingu - around 12 during the first half of the 20^th Century - were all situated near the small tributaries or dead branches of the Jatobá or the Batovi, at approximately 13^o latitude south. Around 1930, they began attacks against the more southern Xingu villages: wauja, nahukwá and mehinako. Thus, one may suppose that the history of Ikpeng territorial occupation corresponds to their inhabiting of the region of the Iriri at least until the first half of the 19^th Century, followed by a migration to the upper Tapajós and, after several decades, their move to the upper Xingu, between the end of the 19^th and beginning of the 20^th centuries.

	::02

The pacification of the Ikpeng successfully completed by the Villas-Bôas brothers represents a definite rupture in the history of these people, which contributed to creating a new relation with the other ethnic groups of the region. Their fame as attackers and feared warriors changed drastically in 1960, when the Ikpeng captured two young Wauja girls. The girls were carriers of the "white man's" death, for the Ikpeng began dying from respiratory diseases caused by a flu virus. Besides that, the Wauja decided to seek revenge and got hold of firearms from a Brazilian. The conflict caused 12 deaths among the Ikpeng, but the Wauja were not able to get the girls back. Due to sickness and the "white man's diseases", the Ikpeng thus lost half their population within a few months.

	::03

In 1964, the Villas-Bôas brothers found them to be in a very precarious situation, sick and malnourished. They then sought to assist them and provided them with metal tools. But the non-indigenous groups who invaded the region presented ever greater threats to their existence, bringing them new diseases, and, in 1967, the Ikpeng accepted transferral to another territory, within the boundaries of the Park.

	::04

Under the protection of the authrorities of the Xingu Indian Park, the Ikpeng began a new phase of dependence. From the health and nutritional point of view, they received daily support from the indigenous post. Besides that, the indigenists encouraged the other peoples of the Park to be generous with their old enemy. Thus, the Ikpeng dispersed for a short period, each familial group going to live in a different village. But their relations with their hosts were difficult, since the bad feelings resulting from the period of wars were still latent.

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But the main objective of the Ikpeng lately has been to regain their territory prior to their transferral to the Park, in the region of the Jatobá River, contiguous with the Xingu Indian Park, but outside its borders. In September, 2002, Ikpeng made an expedition to this territory, for the purpose of reconnaissance and to bring back resources such as medicinal plants and shells to make earrings.