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The building of longhouses is a custom shared among the different indigenous societies of the Upper and Middle Rio Negro. For many years these constructions were the object of attacks on the part of missionaries, which resulted in their abandonment by the majority of the communities located on the Brazilian side of the region. Actually they are being recovered in several places, such as on the upper Tiquié and the upper Uaupés, in the context of a process of recovery of traditions and as a badge of identity for the indigenous movement, as is the case of the longhouse at the headquarters of the Foirn (Federation of the Indigenous Organizations of the Rio Negro), in São Gabriel. Traditionally, the longhouse was divided into various side compartments, each one occupied by a nuclear family. The general rule was that the chief of the local descent group lived in the compartment nearest the wall of the back of the house, to the left side of whoever entered the back door, and his younger brothers, as they married, occupied contiguous compartments, from the back to the front of the house. The unmarried men, already initiated, had to leave the compartment of their parents and hang their hammocks from the center beam in the middle of the house towards the front. Finally, the aggregated inhabitants who were living in the house provisionally or on an exceptional basis, and visitors, had to remain in the front part of the house. During the festivals and above all in the more formal cerimonies, that involve dances of the adult men, the longhouse space is re-arranged, the center of the longhouse being the most important area, where the dance takes place. The Salesian missionary Alcionilio Brüzzi made a detailed description of the longhouse of São Pedro, on the Rio

"It was built according to the old ways. It was rectangular, measuring 27.60 metres in length and 18 in width. The roof was sloping on two sides, with a marked decline, to facilitate the quick flow of rainwater. Inside it measured 7.30 metres in height at the center beam, but sloping down to 90 cm from the ground, such that the side walls measured only 1. 52 meters in height. The thatched roofing extended out a bit more on the part corresponding to the doors, for protection from the rains. The main walls were made in the classic style, that is, out of treebark up to 2.5 meters in height, and tied together with açaí. The side walls were made of pehé.

It was solidly built on five pairs of poles [the three center poles and the other two which held up the front and back walls of the longhouse], which marked the central nave. They were rounded poles, rectilinear, rustic (without removing the bark), although quite regular and proportional, as also were the beams and rafters.

The whole wooden frame was solidly tied with vines. Inside, the supports, all well aligned, divided the space into five naves [from one side to the other]. The three center naves are for common use: transit, meetings, dances, visits and work. There, more to the back, the utensils of common use were kept, such as the large vessels of fired clay and the wooden troughs for the fermentation of the caxiri beverages, and the oven for the cooking of manioc flour. It was in this area that the dances were held on the occasion of the festivals. The two outside naves, which correspond to the lower part of the sloping roof, along the border, are set aside for family residences: each nave has four divisions.

In the residence of the chief, the separation is a bit more pronounced, but not enough, however, to hinder a view of inside the longhouse. In several longhouses, absolutely no separation exists. One can thus say that they are imaginary divisions, corresponding to the wooden beams and poles of the longhouse" (1962:175-7).

Today, most of the Indians who live along the banks of the main rivers are organized into “communities”, a name that has been used for decades by the Catholic missionaries – and also used by the Protestants - to refer to the villages which came to substitute the communal longhouses. The community is generally comprised of a set of houses built on a wide open plaza, with walls of treebark, mud walls, or boards and rooves of thatch or sheets of zinc, A community also has a chapel (Catholic or Protestant), a small school, and, in some communities, a health post. Each community has a captain [ capitão], always a man,  whose role is to bring the group together, “animating it" to perform community tasks and also answering to the general demands linked with such tasks. One is not dealing, however, with an all-powerful chief or commander who gives orders and can punish. In most cases, he only guides, without imposing his point of view. He is also the preferred interlocutor with the whites.