The Nahukuá are members of a small, indigenous ethnic group in the upper

Xingu River The Xingu River ( ; ; ) is a river in north Brazil. It is a southeast tributary of the Amazon River and one of the largest clearwater rivers in the Amazon basin, accounting for about 5% of its water. __TOC__ Description and history The fir ...

area of

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. Their population was 146, as of 2010, making them the smallest group in the region.

History

When the Nahukuá people were first encountered by

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...

explorers in the late 19th century, they were initially grouped with two other tribes living in the region (the

Kalapalo The Kalapalo are an indigenous peoples in Brazil, indigenous people of Brazil. They are one of seventeen tribal groups who inhabit the Xingu National Park in the Upper Xingu River region of the state of Mato Grosso. They speak the Amonap languag ...

and

Kuikuro The Kuikuro are an Indigenous peoples in Brazil, indigenous people from the Mato Grosso region of Brazil. Their language, Kuikuro language, Kuikuro, is a part of the Cariban language family. The Kuikuro have many similarities with other Xingu (peo ...

, rather than recognized as their own unique group. Another group of later explorers only mentioned the Nahukuá in passing, speculating about the origins of the Nahukuá people. These explorers, led by a man named Max Schmidt, believed that, because of the

Cariban The Cariban languages are a family of languages Indigenous to north-eastern South America. They are widespread across northernmost South America, from the mouth of the Amazon River to the Colombian Andes, and they are also spoken in small pock ...

ancestry of the Nahukuá, they were probably immigrants to the region, hailing originally from southwestern

Guiana The Guianas, also spelled Guyanas or Guayanas, are a geographical region in north-eastern South America. Strictly, the term refers to the three Guianas: Guyana, Suriname, and French Guiana, formerly British, Dutch, and French Guiana respectiv ...

. Early explorers noted that the Nahukuá had several villages along the Kurisevo and Kuluene rivers. By the 1940s, however, the population of the Nahukuá people had been reduced to only 28. Although the population did rise slightly in the ensuing years, a measles epidemic decimated populations again in the 1950s. By 1954, some believed that the Nahukuá may already have been extinct. At some point after 1948, low Nahukuá populations caused the ethnic group to disband its last existing village at the time. In the 1960s, at the encouragement of the

Villas-Bôas brothers Orlando (1914–2002) and his brothers Cláudio (1916–1998) and Leonardo Villas-Bôas (1918–1961) were Brazilian brothers who worked in indigenous activism. In 1961 they succeeded in getting the entire upper Xingu legally protected, making i ...

, the Nahukuá created a new village to a spot closer to the Kalapalo people. This village was eventually abandoned, due to superstition regarding a murder, which the Nahukuá attributed to

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. In 1977, a new Nahukuá village was set up on the shore of Kuluene river. Nahukuá populations, which had been increasing since the introduction of proper modern healthcare to the upper Xingu River area in the 1960s, continued to increase after the foundation of this new village.

References

External links

Nahukua
''Instituto Socioambiental''
Nahukuá material culture

National Museum of the American Indian The National Museum of the American Indian is a museum in the United States devoted to the culture of the Indigenous peoples of the Americas. It is part of the Smithsonian Institution group of museums and research centers. The museum has three ...

Xingu peoples Indigenous peoples in Brazil Indigenous peoples of the Amazon {{Brazil-ethno-group-stub