Candoshi

ETHNONYMS: Kandoazi (Kandoasi: subgroup, Chapara, Chapra, Shapra [the name "Chapara" will be used exclusively to refer to the Chapara people])

Orientation

Identification. The name "Candoshi" has no meaning apart from the name of the Candoshi people and the language spoken by them and by the Chapara people. Both the Candoshi and the Chapara, however, will say of any Indian that "he is Candoshi."

Location. The heart of Candoshi and Chapara territory lies between the Pastaza and the Morona rivers, 4° to 4°30′ S and 76°30/ to 77° W, in the department of Loreto, province of Alto, Amazonas, Peru. The Candoshi live on tributaries of the Río Pastaza, the Chapara on tributaries of the Río Morona.

Demography. At the beginning of the twentieth century the combined Candoshi and Chapara population may have been as high as 10,000, but by 1950 the combined population, decimated by war and disease, had fallen to less than 2,000. In the late 1980s the population stood at approximately 3,000.

Linguistic Affiliation. Candoshi is not closely related to any other language in the area. There is evidence that the now-extinct Chirino and Sacata languages, once spoken in the department of Cajamarca, were related to Candoshi.

History and Cultural Relations

It is possible that the Candoshi slowly migrated from northern Cajamarca; linguistically and archaeologically they are an anomaly in their present location. Their oral tradition, however, includes no account of such a migration. Christian elements in Candoshi folklore and traditional women's clothing, introduced to the area by Catholic missionaries, suggest early contact with the Catholic church, probably in the eighteenth century. The Candoshi are surrounded by Jivaroan groups: the Ashuar to the north and east and the Huambisa and Aguaruna to the west and south. The Candoshi say that the Ashuar taught them how to obtain spirit powers and to shrink heads as war trophies. Interfamily blood feuds were the predominant cause of warfare. In avenging a relative's death, a chief and his followers killed all the males of a community and captured the females.

Until the beginning of the twentieth century warfare was sporadic because the people used stone axes to clear gardens, making food production a constant struggle. With the introduction of steel axes and machetes, large gardens were cleared quickly and the men had more time for warfare. Killing was accomplished with spears until firearms were introduced, during the 1930s. By this time the Candoshi were continually at war among themselves and with the Ashuar and Huambisas. Agents of the Amazonian rubber companies exacerbated the situation by exchanging firearms and ammunition for war captives. In the early 1930s many of the Chapara youth of the Río Situchi were abducted in a launch by agents of the rubber companies. This provoked a two-year war between the Chapara and the army. In the early 1940s war chiefs met in an attempt to stop the wars, which were rapidly decimating the population, but fear and suspicion continued and the peace pact lasted for only a year. During the late 1940s a measles epidemic reduced the total Chapara population to less than 100 people. The survivors gradually united and settled on the Río Pushaga.

In 1950 members of the Summer Institute of Linguistics (a Protestant group that converts Indians and translates their languages) made contact with the Chapara, Aguaruna, and Huambisas. By 1955 parts of the New Testament had been translated into these languages. The Candoshi already associated the Christian God with their traditional Creator-God, Apanchi (Our Father), and Jesus Christ with the son of Apanchi, also a leading figure in Candoshi mythology. Some people began to obey the teachings of Christ as taught in the New Testament. A leading war chief stopped killing, and although his village was attacked, two of his men were killed, and he was wounded, he refused to take revenge. Word of this spread and, as there was a strong desire for peace, more people decided to obey Christian teaching. Over a period of twenty years the war raids gradually stopped. Bilingual schools, opened in the late 1950s, began the spread of literacy among the people. Bringing indigenous teachers from enemy groups together for teacher-training courses also helped to promote friendly relations.

Settlements

The Candoshi live in extended-family settlements of approximately 150 people. Ideally, the houses should be at least a five-minute walk apart with gardens between. Communities on the same river are from a two-to five-hour walk apart. Enemy groups are usually at least a two-day or, more commonly, a one- or two-week walk away. The traditional Candoshi house is an oblong structure with a palmleafed roof, without walls. It can be as large as 150 square meters, but the average home is approximately 30 square meters. Modern Candoshi homes have a bark wall around the sleeping area.

Economy

Subsistence and Commercial Activities. Basic crops are plantains, cassava roots, sweet potatoes, and maize. Fish are abundant in the rivers as game is plentiful in the forest. A conservation law passed in the 1960s put an end to the traditional sale of pelts. Oil companies on the Río Morona today provide a market for the produce of some Chapara groups. Other Chapara communities grow rice as a cash crop, but the two-day journey by outboard motor to marketing towns is costly. The Candoshi depend largely on the sale of salted fish and wild meat for a cash income. Some individual logging is done, but again, marketing is very difficult.

Industrial Arts. Pottery and baskets are occasionally sold to traders passing through the area, but they are not a steady source of income.

Trade. The trading-partner system between individuals of potential enemy groups enabled a man to travel safely to the home of his trading partner. The main items of trade were stone axes, salt, blowguns, dart poison, and goods from the outside world: beads, blankets, and, later, machetes, axes, shotguns, and shells. Although Spanish-speaking traders have gradually become the source of outside goods, the trading-partner system continues. Many Candoshi now market their own goods in Spanish-speaking towns on the Río Marañón.

Division of Labor. Men and women work together clearing the forest for gardens. Women do the planting. Each woman has an extensive garden and is responsible for its upkeep, in addition to caring for the family. Men build the houses, provide meat, and make baskets used to carry home produce from the gardens. From time to time they work at some activity that will provide money to clothe the family.

Land Tenure. Land was not a problem for the Candoshi as long as they could clear new garden plots when the weeds could no longer be controlled in existing plots. This has changed with the national population explosion. The government has granted land titles to many of the indigenous groups, including the Candoshi, allowing them sufficient land for cultivating and hunting. These titles are highly valued. If the Candoshi population continues to increase at the rate of the 1970s and 1980s, however, the next generation will find themselves short of land.

Kinship

Kin Groups and Descent. Candoshi kin relations are strictly sanguinai. Those with a common grandparent are maachirita (relative), those with a common great-grandparent can be considered maachirita when convenient or tonaari (unrelated) when not convenient. Although descent is bilateral, children belong to the father and to his family.

Kinship Terminology. First person, genitive forms are: grandfather, pachiri; grandmother, komari, father, apari; mother, aniari; brother, male cousin, or nephew of a man, sovanchi; sister, female cousin, or niece of a man, isari; brother, male cousin, or nephew of a woman, wawari; sister, female cousin, or niece of a woman, pamoni; wife, isanchi; husband, saranchi; father-in-law, gosari; mother-inlaw, komini.

Marriage and Family

Marriage. When a girl reaches the age of 7 she is made responsible for her own garden. When she shows sufficient responsibility, she is ready for marriage. A boy is considered ready for marriage when he can fish and hunt by himself. The marriage of a man and woman who have a common grandparent is incestual. During the war years 90 percent of marriages were polygynous because captured women were kept as wives. War chiefs commonly had five or six wives. About 20 percent of the men now have two wives. Sister-exchange is the preferred marriage arrangement. A man without a sister is required to work for his father-in-law for several years after the marriage. Once the bride's father has agreed to the marriage, the couple are counseled by both fathers and by the mother of the bride; this constitutes the wedding ceremony.

Domestic Unit. The Candoshi domestic unit consists of a husband and wife with their unmarried children. Widowed or orphaned female relatives of the husband may also live with the family, or, less commonly, male relatives of the wife. Married daughters with their husbands stay in the home for a year and then build a house nearby.

Inheritance. Adult sons generally share their father's goods and daughters their mother's goods. If the children are minors when a man dies, his brothers will inherit his goods.

Socialization. The hours before dawn are used for talking among the family and for telling the children stories of their ancestors—impressing on them the importance of family ties and of being wary of others. Grandfathers spend hours telling the children stories spun from folklore. The father is responsible for training his children; discipline is usually done by shaming. Boys are taught to be independent and to work hard. Girls are taught domestic skills and submission.

Sociopolitical Organization

Social Organization. Each nuclear family is an independent social unit in which the father is the authority. In the past women were kept in total subjection by the threat of death; only the very old women had social status. In most families today, women are treated with more respect.

Political Organization. The Candoshi are an egalitarian society. The independence of each adult male is highly respected. Group decisions are made by consensus, but those who disagree are not pressured to conform. In the early 1970s the Peruvian government told all the indigenous groups to elect chiefs from among their own people. The Candoshi usually elect one of the older men. The main duty of the chief is to keep peace within the community and between communities.

Social Control. The penalty for killing a man, within the community, is still death. Traditionally, couples caught in adultery were killed by the woman's husband and those caught in premarital sexual relations were killed by the girl's father. This has changed only in individual cases. A man who habitually causes conflict within his community can be forced to move his family away.

Conflict. Traditional conflicts between villages usually erupted in war raids. Shamans, suspected of causing death, were common targets of killings. Most extended communities had some degree of internal conflict, often evident in drunken brawls, and all communities were overtly at war with various Ashuar and Huambisa communities. Individual enmities and threats of killing are still common, but fear of the old cycle of war is a strong deterrent.

Religion and Expressive Culture

Religious Beliefs. The Candoshi believed in one Supreme Being, Apanchi (Our Father), the genesis of all that exists. Apanchi is a force controlling the universe, but traditionally he was neither worshiped nor appeased. Evil spirits, yashigo, cause death, but their power can be manipulated to one's advantage (specifically for the power to kill and for protection in war) and shamans invoke them for healing and bewitching. The yashigo are appeased by the observance of taboos. In the beginning Apanchi lived with people, but they continually disobeyed him, so he went back to the sky. Traditionally, times of peace and plenty were attributed to the help of Apanchi, and when the people were suffering, Apanchi was said to be punishing them. The yashigo cause all sickness and death by capturing human spirits. A shaman can attempt to retrieve the spirit, but if he fails the person will die. Some yashigo live in trees, some travel in the wind. They occasionally appear as phantoms, and anyone who sees a phantom yashigo will die. Approximately 30 percent of the people claim to be Christians.

Religious Practitioners. There are no priests among the Candoshi. Shamans use their powers to cast disease-causing spirits out of people or to cause these spirits to enter people. Modern-day Candoshi Christian teachers are not professionals. They are either self- or community-appointed.

Ceremonies. Private ceremonies to obtain spirit power are carried out by individuals in the forest. Spirit power is preserved and strengthened by killing, not by additional ceremonies. Shamanic ceremonies for healing are performed on request. The meetings of Christians are informal gatherings in which all participate.

Arts. Designs representing birds and insects are woven into belts. Originally belts were made from homespun cotton in white and black thread, but commercial thread is now also used. Candoshi music is on a four-tone scale. Womens' songs are lullabies and love songs sung in falsetto. Men's songs are basically rhythm talk sung to the beat of a drum while drinking. Christian songs are a mixture of Candoshi, Spanish, and Quechua music.

Medicine. Families used herbal remedies and consulted a shaman only when the herbs failed to help. Herbal remedies are still extensively used, but modern medicine is preferred when available.

Death and Afterlife. Death was caused by evil spirits, either indirectly (by murder) or directly (by sickness). The cause and effect of disease is now somewhat understood but not necessarily accepted. Traditionally, the ideal state after death was to reach the place of Apanchi in the sky, but nothing done in life could assure this. Christians now believe that their spirits go directly to Apanchi. The spirit of a sick person may be caught up by the spirits of the storm and carried along by them forever. This is the death that is feared most. Other spirits of the dead wander aimlessly in the forest. The bodies of the dead are put in canoes and dried on a scaffolding over a fire. They are then put in the rafters of a vacant house, not to be buried until two or more years have passed.

Bibliography

Chirif, Alberto, and Carlos Mora (1976). Atlas de comunidades nativas, 102, 184. Lima: Direción General de Organizaciones Rurales.

Steward, Julian H., ed. (1948). Handbook of South American Indians. Vol. 3, The Tropical Forest Tribes, 615-650. Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 143. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution.

Tuggy, Sheila C. (1985). "Candoshi Behavioral Change." In Five Amazonian Studies on World View and Cultural Change, edited by William R. Merrifield. Publication 19. Dallas, Tex.: International Museum of Cultures.

Wallis, Ethel Emily (1965). Tariri: My Story. New York: Harper & Row.

Wise, Mary Ruth (1985). "Indigenous Languages of Lowland Peru: History and Current Status." In South American Indian Languages, edited by Harriet E, Manelis Klein, and Louisa R. Stark, 194-221. Austin: University of Texas Press.

SHEILA C. TUGGY