CHAPTER X 
WEAPONS: HUNTING AND FIGHTING 
Shields (116). 
Blowgun; Of two complete tubes (117) ; outer tube of two split halves (118) ; 
single tube (119). 
Darts (120). 
Dart and arrow poison: Curare (121); manufacture and uses (122) ; mancé- 
linier, rappu, markuri, ete. (123). 
Quivers for darts (124). 
Bow: Timbers utilized (125); manufacture (126); bowstring (127). 
Arrow manufacture: Head (128) ; fixation of barb (129); shaft (130); varia- 
tions in manufacture (131) ; feathering (132); nock (133). 
Classification of arrows: Head simple, pencil (184); jagged (185) ; composite 
and fixed, pencil (136) ; lanceolate (187) ; knobbed (138) ; barbed (139-141) ; 
composite and detachable (harpoon arrows) (142-144). 
Arrow release (145). ; 
Arrow shooting, practice and skill at (146). 
Spears (147). 
Harpoon spear (148). 
Clubs: Natural forms (149); timbers utilized (150); spatulate type (151) ; 
paddle type (152) ; block type (153) ; dagger type (154). 
116. Shields, variously manufactured, were met with in the 
Guianas, though references to them are comparatively few. Among 
the earliest travelers, Wilson speaks of ‘ wooden swords and 
bucklers” (JW, 345) and Harcourt of “ Targets very artificially 
made of wood, and painted with Beasts and Birds” (HR, 373). 
Manati hide was employed by the’Orinoco Indians in Gumilla’s day, 
to protect themselves from arrows in warfare (G,1, 289), as well as on 
the Amazon when first discovered (AC, 85), whereas tapir hide is used 
at the present time on the Apaporis, a branch of the Yapura River, 
by the Yahuna (Betoya stock) and neighboring Arawak tribes. These 
tapir shields are large and round with a box-like center, made for- 
merly with five layers of skin, which a bullet could hardly pierce, but 
now usually with but two (KG, um, 287). Wickerwork shields are 
similarly recorded from the Orinoco and Amazon, both the main 
stream and its tributary, the Rio Negro, and appear to have been 
employed for fighting and dancing purposes. Thus Gumilla talks 
of the Orinoco Indians weaving shields (feven rodelas) (G, u, 89), 
and elsewhere employing the same term (vodela) to denote a Carib 
fighting weapon (G, 11, 91; 1,201). Acufia had previously stated that 
for defensive weapons on the Amazons they [natives] make use of 
144 
