Yekuana people

The Yekuana are an indigenous people of the Caribe family. They are also known as makiritare or sanema. Their language is also called Yekuana.

Territoriality

The Yekuana are located in the state of Amazonas in Brazil and in Venezuela; mainly in the upper Caura, Erebato and Nichare rivers; the upper Ventuari and Parú and Cuminá rivers. This territory includes the Jaua-Sarisariñama National Park. Its population is currently estimated to be between 5,000 and 10,000 inhabitants, 7,753 people in the 2001 census of indigenous communities.

The characteristic Yekuana settlement pattern is riverine and scattered. They prefer the jungle to the savannah to establish their communities and farms. The word yekuana symbolizes the group's common origin: according to tradition, their ancestors emerged from the Yekuana Joao, a hill located on the plains adjacent to the upper Cuntinamo River.

Organization

Traditionally, the Yekuana presented a highly autonomous, decentralized form of political organization, in which each community had the highest authority, the kajichanaa or akushana, an authority that it did not transcend its limits. With equal political ascendancy, the magical-religious authority was in charge of the jowai or kadeju and the ña tamuru. Currently, social, political and religious heterogeneity has created both new relationships between communities and new communities. The influence of evangelicalism or Catholicism has created divisions among the Yekuana and has given rise to new values, perspectives, and ways of life.

Economy

Making a curiara.

They have a mixed economy based on horticulture, hunting, gathering and fishing. Women are mostly engaged in agricultural work in the conuco, counting only the male presence for burning and cleaning it. Their experience as navigators and merchants through the fluvial network of the states they inhabit is well known. Their curiaras and paddles are in great demand in those regions. They also stand out in the craft field, having their products in high demand both in the national and international markets.

Mythology

Wannadi and Odosha:

To understand Yekuana mythology, one must first know about the dualism between its two main divinities: Wannadi, the son of the sun, god of light and life, is the creator of everything, represented by the avatar of the bird royal carpenter. Sitting with his magic maraca and smoking his tobacco, he dreamed of our world. When he dreamed it, he came true. After creating the world, he also dreamed of having a mother here on earth, and this mother existed and gave birth to him. From that placenta, which she left uncared for in the earth, from rot and worms, was born Odosha, the lord of all darkness. He hated Wannadi, and since then he decided to destroy his creation and dominate everything, that's why Odosha created hunger, disease and fear among people, so that they would learn what hate is. So much hatred and corruption ended up putting Odosha in the world, that Wannadi was forced to retire to the heavens, taking all the wise spirits with him.

wiyu

It is a great anaconda, the creator and owner of the water of rivers and lagoons and of all the creatures that inhabit it. Dressed in her enormous plume of feathers, turned into a rainbow when she unfurls it to the sun, Wiyu emerges from the depths of the waters to produce great changes in the land, fertilize and renew it. Hence, the Ye'kuana, even today, feel a deep respect and even fear for her power and avoid looking at the sky when a rainbow appears. This mythological being is very similar to Quetzalcóatl (mythological being from Mesoamerica).

Cosmogony:

The Yekuana religion has one of the most complete mythologies of Latin American cultures:

Wannadi, created a universe in which the Earth has a round and flat shape, with an underworld divided into three sections: One is the space of the waters, where the people of the waters live, especially the mawadi (people snake) whose huhai is called Huiio, Mother of Rivers, Owner of Water, is a rainbow snake that brings rain and is the sister of Nuna. There are also the caverns where the neutral spirits live, and Hoiohiña, the spaces of absolute darkness, where the odoshankomos live, which are the spirits of evil that serve Odosha, the personification of darkness.

On this cylindrical-shaped earth is all the conical-shaped celestial space, divided into eight heavens, each one being an important cosmological station, the first seven inhabited by different kinds of wise spirits, and the eighth is where the the god Wanadi with his father, the sun, Shi, who manifests on earth as the sun we know.

The shape of this universe corresponds to the shape of the dwelling of the tribe (churuata), as a circular structure with a conical roof, supported in the middle by a pillar, which in the equivalent of the universe is represented by a high mountain.

• Jahuakudahana: This is the first level of the sky, there live the Attitiudi Hana, the owners of the breath, the word and the rhythm. They never sleep or eat. They teach the huhai to listen and sing in other languages.
• Iadekuna: The second sky, home to the Setawa Kaliana, teachers of the huhai. They don't eat, they don't sleep, they talk and they don't work. They just sit with their hands on their heads and elbows on their knees. Come all things and teach the huhai to see how others see.
• Mahekunahana: House of people bat, the Dedewashihiamo. Maracas owners, which are for the Yekuana sacred instruments. Unlike others, bats do not need wirikis (magic quartz stones) in their maracas, for they are able to make them sound empty.
• Iadiñakuna: Fourth heaven. Known as the most beautiful of all, it is a crowned place with the great blue lake Akuena all over the middle, whose water is known as akene. That water is healing, just like the grass that grows around and is called Kaahi. In this sky live the morphoazul butterfly, Mahewa; Muna, (interpreted by some translators as a tonine, and by others as a manatee) and the fish Dinushi, the electric eel. These three spirits helped Wanaddi in his creative work. By dying people on earth their spirit ascends to this lake where they are healed and part of the life of heaven.
• Ennemadi: In this sky live the Weweyeenas, the guardians of wirikis, the quartz crystals that form part of a magic maraca. With these quartzes you can use the maraca to capture and destroy Odosha spirits.
• Marawahuña: The sixth heaven is the home of the three sacred birds, which the shamans convoke with their maracas when they need their spiritual help. These are Muddo, the pavita; Tawaadi, the aguitacamino and Hohottu (or Hohooti) the gavilan. When these go down to the earth, the shamans and healers use their power to catch or destroy spirits that are making people sick.
• Shiriche Kumenadi: This is the seventh heaven, home to all stars.
• Motadewa: The eighth heaven is the supreme heaven, where Wannadi lives alongside his entire family. This is the final destination for the blessed. This is the true heaven, where, like on earth, there are mountains, waters and trees. Yet there is neither hunger, nor death, nor disease, nor pain, for all this can only be done by Odosha and their spirits, and they cannot go up to heaven.

The Yekuana explain why we cannot see all these skies because the sky we see is a false sky, since in the true sky there is no night or storms, and light does not come from stars, but of Wannadi himself, and it floods everything. Wannadi, leaving the earth, left the sun (Shi) and the moon (Nuna). Both men. He is never feared because he is a man-eater.

According to the chants of the Watunna, which are the sacred songs sung by the Aichuriaha of the tribe, one day Wannadi will return to earth and then Odosha will be defeated and we will all live in eternal peace. The stars originally settled on the earth, but after the events of the second flood, which was caused by Kuamachi, they joined the sky that we see.

Marahuaca:

The Marahuaca is a tepuy whose myth they also share with the Yekuana, the Piaroa, the Yanomami, etc. Also the myth varies in each tradition.

The myth around this tepuy says that originally Iamancade (Owner of the yucca and all the food) was the one who brought food to the men. After Odosha, she had to go to heaven. A man named Kuchi went to look for food at his house. In her orchard, Iamancabe had a tree with all the fruits. He wanted to steal, but was discovered. Although Iamancabe forgave him, he stole a splinter and planted it in the ground. He grew a big tree, and they called it Dodoima.

A woman, Maduñawe, asked Kuchi for a stake, and when she planted it, a large tree grew which they called Marahuaca. It was an immense tree where all the existing fruits grew. At first they were happy: the fruits fell to the ground and humans and animals ate from there, but it was so high that the fruits hit people on the head and killed them, so they begged Wannadi for the fall of the tree. He sent the birds, led by Semenia, who taught them the ways of community work with which the tribe is currently managed. Under her direction, they first treated the toucans, but they hurt themselves, which is why toucans have saw-like beaks. Then the carpenters came, joined by Wannadi and Semenia himself. They all cut down at the same time, but the tree was so huge that they were all exhausted. Then Semenia gave the idea of doing it in turns, and so, although he took more time, they came to knock him down. It was Wanaddi who dealt the last blow.

But the tree didn't fall. They did not understand what was happening and sent the squirrel to find out. It turns out that the tree was so big and leafy that its branches were buried in the sky as if they were roots. Semedia gave him an ax and the squirrel cut down the branches. Thus Marahuaca fell and a great tremor filled the earth. The people, frightened, hid. Then, when they came out, they saw that it was raining. They didn't know what it was. It was the first rain. It fell like waterfalls from the sky, and from that water the Orinoco rivers and the rest were formed. Thanks to this water the earth turned green, and the jungle sprouted.

The trunk of the Marahuaca was divided into three parts, which are now the tepuy of the same name.

Shikiemone and Iureke:

This story begins when Wannadi sees that there are very few people in the world and decides to go find a Huehanna (cosmic egg that contains all the new souls to be born). He mentions it to Nuna (the moon) and he decides to go look for it in Kahuña (the sky) before Wannadi to be able to eat all the people inside. Once Nuna returns to her house, her secret is discovered by her sister, Frímene. She decides to want to save those humans from being eaten by her brothers and hides the Huehanna in her womb, dreaming with the idea that those humans will be like her children. Nuna realizes the lack of the egg and suspects her sister, and at night, while she sleeps in her hammock, he tries to rape her at night by getting into her bed, trying to get the Huehanna out of her, but she doesn't allow it..

Though she thinks it's her brother, she can't identify her attacker. The next day Frímene decides to paint herself with caruto oil (a black oil made from the fruit of the [[[Genipa americana|[genipa americana]]]]). Nuna returns that night and, again, fails to do her task, but being stained, the next day Frímene manages to see the dark spots on his face and her hands (that's why the moon is stained). Frímene decides to escape and not return to her brother's house. He reaches the Orinoco River, and not finding how to cross it superficially, he decides to swim across it. It is then that he transforms into a large aquatic snake. Since then she has been called Huiio, the Owner of the Waters.

Wannadi, finding out that the Huehanna has been stolen, gets angry and asks everyone about it. Nuna accuses her sister as the thief and everyone goes after her for her. Wannadi goes looking for her, accompanied by Hohottu and Mudo. She now lived at the bottom of the river. When they ask for the Huehanna she refuses to give it back, and they start a hunt where she dies and the Huehanna ends up broken, and all those unborn humans are lost in the waters turning into fish. Only two fell on the shore, Shikiemona and Iureke. They were adopted by a frog and a jaguar, who tried to eat them. They both fled, but not before killing both parents in their attempt to murder them. They discovered the mystery of fire and how to cook with it. A secret that his adoptive mother, the frog, did not want anyone else to know.

The Lady:

In this mythology there are two great floods, but the first one is the most similar to the common myth of the universal flood. This is known as the "Lady".

Shikiemone and Iureke discovered the truth about Huiio in a dream where she communicated with them. Once they saw all the men who had murdered her gathered together, they went to the bottom of the river to her mother's house and took out her mother's totuma with caruto oil and threw it towards them. This magical action caused the waters of the river to overflow and flood everything. They both fled, turned into fish, and everything was covered by the Dama (what remains of the Dama is the current sea, and that is what the Yekuana call it). The two brothers swam and they only found two Moriche palm trees and they stayed there for a while. When the waters receded into what is now the sea, they both went down and found that the whole land was muddy. Only a few survived from that disaster and managed to take refuge under the mountains. Only the best people managed to save themselves.

A second myth also speaks of a son's revenge for his mother's death. This is Kuamachi.

The people of the stars, the Shidishe, following the idea of the jaguar Ma'ro, killed and ate a woman they found in the jungle. When they opened it, the child she had in her womb rolled and fell into the river. Tiny as he was, he got eaten by a sardine. There he grew up, until he no longer fit and had to leave. Then he was eaten by a peacock, and the same thing happened again, and he ended up living in the belly of a stingray. Out of hunger, he entered a conuco that turned out to be his grandfather's. Upon recognizing each other, both reconcile and live together, and both promise to seek justice for what happened to Kuamachi's mother. After killing the jaguar and the other animals that participated in the hunt, she decides to go after the Star people, but they were too many and too powerful so she invited them to pick dewaka (a fruit). They accepted, but when they were eating it, Kuamachi threw one of these fruits from which the water that caused the great flood arose. Kuamachi thought of a canoe and it appeared. He and his grandfather, Mahanama, stayed in the canoe. Mahanama threw the baskets that he brought into the river and they turned into anacondas, crocodiles, alligators and other deadly animals. Kuamachi set fire to a termite nest and the jungle filled with smoke. They searched a cave for bows and arrows and killed those who had survived by mounting the trees. Dangerous animals were waiting for the people of the village of the star when falling from the trees. But Kuamachi and his grandfather ran out of arrows and could not kill Udlaha chief of the star people. With seven arrows that he managed to recover thanks to Ahishama (the turpial), Udlaha made himself a ladder through which he and the rest of the survivors of his town climbed up to heaven. Finally Kuamachi went up too, along with other good gods. He asked Kahshe, the piranha, to cut down the ladder so that the evil spirits could not climb up. Being above, Udlaha asked for peace and Kuamachi accepted. Udlaha and his people became the Pleiades and Kuamachi is now Venus and Ahishama (the turpial) is Mars.

In the animated film Dream Tales, published by Acorn Media Publishing, the creation myth according to Yekuan traditions is presented, among others.

Huhai:

The concept of "Huhai" for the Yekuana it refers to the religious leader and doctor of the tribe with the ability to communicate and understand the heads of other families and houses. Being an animist religion, it believes that all elements, animals and plants have a spirit (akató), life and consciousness, so each family of animals, plants and spirits had their own huhahis.

Medatia:

Medatia is the main hero of the Yekuana, being the first man who climbed and traveled the first seven heavens, being in the eighth impermissible passage for humans. Medatia ascended in search of a solution to the evils that Odosha caused on earth through oblivion and ignorance.

On his journey he became the first huhai of humans, learning from the Attitiudi Hana (The Masters of Song) to understand and speak the languages of other people, and from the Setawa Kalihana (Sages of Sight) to how to see things as others see them. In addition, he also learned how to teach this to his own.

In order to access the first of the heavens, I first had to face five tests: First, he faced strong winds that blew very hard; then he had to go through the house of scissors, which tried to cut him, but since he was pure in heart, he only had to order them to stop and they did. Then he passed by the house of Madenawa, a captivating female spirit who tried to seduce him, but he did not give in and continued on; it is said that if he had stayed, Madenawa would have transformed into a jaguar and killed him. He finally confronted Nuna (the moon), a man who tried to devour him. Finally, he crossed a mighty river and found himself at the crossroads where there were two roads: one leading to the land of the odoshankomos and the other leading to the first heaven. Medatia chose the white path and was thus able to finally access heaven.

In heaven, Medatia learned from the Attitiudi Hana (Owners of Song) to speak and understand the languages of others, and the Setawa Kalihana (Sages of Sight) taught her to change her eyes and see things as others see them. Only in this way, understanding and being able to communicate with others, is how he could become a huhai. The huhai of all humans.

In addition to that, he learned the mysteries of the rattle with the wirikis, which are mystical quartz crystals that had the power to trap the odoshankomos inside.

He came down to Earth and taught his tribesmen his knowledge, he was able to understand the animals, plants and spirits of the earth and taught his people how to avoid evil, cure disease and avoid famine.