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INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY — PUBLICATION NO. 10 



These leaves, which form both the walls and the 

 roof, are placed with the butt end on the ground. 

 As they are about 15 feet long, they bend rather 

 sharply at the top, so that when they have been 

 placed around the whole frame, the house has a 

 somewhat conical appearance. Often the leaves 

 are not long enough to meet at the top, thus leaving 

 a gap through which the smoke from the fires 

 between every two hammocks escapes, and through 

 which the rain enters freely during a storm. The 

 house contains no doors or windows; one merely 

 works one's way in through the palm leaves. 



Nuclear families on a hunting and gathering 

 expedition, when they may be absent from the 

 band for from a few days to several weeks and are 

 rather constantly on the march, take even less 

 trouble in the construction of a nightly shelter. 

 All they build is a rude shelter constructed like 

 one side of the above-described house. The 

 Siriono country is dotted with the remains of shel- 

 ters erected by hunting parties that have stopped 

 there for a night or two in their wanderings. 



Having roamed over an extensive part of the 

 area where the Siriono are accustomed to travel 

 throughout the year, I can report that these are 

 the only types of shelters that I ever saw built. 

 When it rains, a shelter is improved to the extent 

 that a few large leaves of patujii — a wild plant 

 resembling the banana plant but not producing 

 fruit — may be placed between the layers of mota- 

 cu leaves and over the hammock where an individ- 

 ual sleeps, but such improvisations are rarely 

 adequate to give one a dry night of rest if the 

 rain is more than a sprinkle. On occasions 

 when it rains heavily — and this happens on the 

 average about 2 or 3 nights per week during the 

 rainy season — the Siriono grumblingly takes down 

 his hammock and squats by the fire, which is 

 always carefully protected from the rain by leaves 

 of the patujii, until the downpour passes. Con- 

 sequently, he undergoes many a sleepless night 

 during the year. 



The building of a house entails no magical 

 procedure, and it is almost always exclusively a 

 task of the men. Arriving at a new camp site, 

 the women are usuaUy immediately occupied in 

 tending their children, unpacking their gear, 

 carrying water, and kindling a fire for cooking 

 what victuals the day's march and hunt may have 

 yielded. Meanwhile the men work cooperatively 

 in cutting and lashing the poles for the frame. 



The number of leaves placed against the frame, 

 however, is largely an individual matter ; if a man 

 makes no move to cover that part of the frame 

 where he will sleep with his family, no one else 

 will bring leaves to cover his section of the house 

 for him. At best, rarely more than two layers of 

 leaves are placed over the frame. Moreover, a 

 new house is never built larger than a size just 

 sufficient to accommodate the people present at 

 the time of building. If families are away from 

 the band at the time, additional space is not pro- 

 vided to accommodate them, and when they return 

 they themselves will have to add a section to the 

 main house. 



The average house sheltering a band of from 60 

 to 80 people is approximately 60 feet long, 25 feet 

 wide, 15 feet high at the center, and about 5 feet 

 high at the frame. It can be constructed in about 

 an hour's time. Seldom is more than 15 minutes 

 or a half an hour spent in the construction of a 

 lean-to for the night. 



Otber types of buildings, such as cook houses, 

 granaries, and club houses, are not built. A 

 Siriono settlement consists of but a single hut, 

 constructed in the manner described above. 



The determination of why the Siriono maintain 

 such an apathetic attitude toward house building 

 and sheltering themselves from the unpleasant 

 aspects of their environment, such as rain, cold 

 winds, and insect pests, presents an interesting 

 psychological problem. When first traveling with 

 them, I was puzzled at why they even took the 

 trouble to place a few leaves over their hammocks, 

 since these seemed to offer them no visible pro- 

 tection. On closer scrutiny, however, I found 

 that the few leaves placed over their hammocks 

 did protect them from twigs and small branches 

 which are continually falling from tropical trees 

 in the night. Moreover, placing a few leaves 

 over the hammock protects them from the rays 

 of the moon, which are believed gradually to 

 cause blindness if they fall directly on a sleeper. 

 Other than this, the shelters of the Siriono seem 

 to offer them little protection. 



The house is but sparsely furnished. The 

 hammock is the principal article of furniture. 

 Hammocks are suspended across the width of the 

 house with bark-fiber ropes tied to the frame poles 

 and columns. Household articles such as cala- 

 bashes and baskets are suspended with bark-fiber 

 string from the midribs of the palm leaves that 



