SOUTH AMERICAN INDIAN CULTURES — KRIEGER 409 



cupying the Amazon and Orinoco River valleys. Numerous tribes 

 belonging to the Carib today occupy Guiana and northeastern Vene- 

 zuela. From the mainland they have within historic times even pen- 

 etrated the islands of the Lesser Antilles as far as Puerto Rico 

 and eastern Hispaniola, everywhere battling and defeating the 

 Arawak inhabitants. Outposts of the Caribs in Colombia on the 

 Rio Cesar and Venezuela are the fierce Motilones. The Karijona 

 and the Uitoto live on the Yapura, one of the northern tributaries 

 of the Upper Amazon. 



The Carib is the least influenced by Negro or white traits, retain- 

 ing in some villages the peaiman, or medicine man. The fringed 

 breechcloth and the ligaturelike leg and arm bands of woven cotton 

 are retained. Bows and arrows are still used, baskets are woven, 

 and ceremonial dances are held in which feather crown headdresses, 

 teeth necklaces, and cotton head ornaments are worn, and in British 

 Guiana the ceremonial wooden club is retained, as is also the blowgun 

 and poisoned darts. 



The Maipure (Nu-Arawak) linguistic stock appears to consist of 

 the two branches of the " Nu " tribes, so named from the prefix 

 " Nu " which they bear in common, and of the Arawak tribes. To 

 the Arawaks proper of the Guianas belong the Goajiro, who occupy 

 the peninsula of the similar name in extreme northern Colombia. 

 At the time of the discovery of America the Nu-Arawak occupied 

 the coast land of Colombia and adjoining countries as far eastward 

 as the mouth of the Amazon ; also the great West Indian islands of 

 Puerto Rico, Hispaniola, Cuba, and Jamaica. In the Goajiro Penin- 

 sula of extreme northern Colombia, the Goajiro have maintained 

 their independence to the present day. On the Orinoco, the Maipure, 

 and in Guiana, the true Arawaks still constitute a striking and 

 important element of the population sharply contrasted with the 

 neighboring Carib tribes. 



In the vicinity of the mouth of the Amazon, the Nu-Arawak tribes 

 are practically exterminated, but their speech has been preserved 

 and the burial offerings recently uncovered in the Island of Marajo 

 testify to the richness of their ancient culture. From the Orinoco 

 and the Guianas the Nu-Arawak tribes extend in a broad band to- 

 ward the southwest to the mountain valleys in which the tributaries 

 of the Upper Amazon take their origin. They have also extended 

 their territory farther toward the east to the source of the Xingu 

 and to the southeast to northern Paraguay. The Carib and the Nu- 

 Arawak make a flat bread from manioc (Cassava) meal and under- 

 stand the weaving of hammocks. The Caribs weave their hammocks 

 of cotton, but the Nu-Arawaks use woven bast fiber. The Carib 

 tribes are among those noted for their efficient poison darts and 

 their beloved hunting weapon, the blowgun, which, however, is also 



