CRUZ DAS almas: a BRAZILIAN VILLAGE — PIERSON 



13 



the area also at one time produced some gold and, 

 more importantly, served as a base of departure 

 for the extraction of large quantities of gold, sil- 

 ver, and diamonds in other regions, as ■well as the 

 procural of Indian slaves; (g) the maintenance, 

 since shortly after the appearance of the Portu- 

 guese, of effective political control of European 

 character; (A) the effective assimilation of In- 

 dians and Africans and the gradual disappearance 

 of first the Indian cultures, then the African cul- 

 tures, until today the most diligent and persistent 

 research is able to turn up only a few vestiges of 



either group of cultures; {«") a iandeirante move- 

 ment which, using the community as a base, ex- 

 plored vast areas of the central portion of the 

 continent; (j) a close identification of collective 

 life with religious activities; (k) a limited reduc- 

 tion of a general condition of isolation from the 

 influence of the cities by means of the far-voyag- 

 ing tropeiros and, in later years, the truck and 

 the railroad, although even after the appearance 

 of these latter agencies, the condition of local 

 roads long continued as a rather effective barrier 

 to communication. 



THE ECOLOGICAL BASE 



Wlien considering any society or culture, one 

 not only has to trace the roots which run back 

 into the past but also to give attention to certain 

 basic physical and biological facts. Obviously 

 no society or culture emerges without the agency 

 of a population group, the interaction of whose 

 members constitutes the society and produces, as 

 well as is conditioned by, the culture. Moreover, 

 this jDopulation group always occupies a habitat, 

 in terms of wliich its struggle for existence, which 

 underlies and to some extent conditions both col- 

 lective behavior and cultural forms, is carried on. 

 Ajiy account of a given society and cidture which 

 seeks to be realistic must therefore take into con- 

 sideration those elements of a physical and bio- 

 logical character with which the inliabitants have 

 had to deal. It must also take into consideration 

 the techniques which the inhabitants have de- 

 veloped to reduce competition with other living 

 forms occupying the same habitat, and to utilize 

 natural resources to supply basic needs ; techniques, 

 some of which are material in character but others 

 of which involve knowledge, attitudes, and be- 

 havior, especially as these enter into and cause to 

 function economic processes and institutions. 



HABITAT 



The general character of the area is that of a 

 one-time plain, now extensively eroded into a pro- 

 fusion of furrowed, round-topped hills, with an 

 occasional wide valley. As, from a point of van- 

 tage, the eye roams over the area, the surface seems 

 almost continually to shift, now rising, then fall- 

 ing, then rising again. The ground sometimes 



falls away quite sharplj', the slope in a few cases 

 becoming as much as 45° or 50°. The hills at times 

 reach 400 to 500 feet in height. An occasional large 

 rock or, more rarely, a huge granite boulder or a 

 series of boulders, stick up out of the generally 

 porous soil. The altitude varies from about 2,300 

 to 3,600 feet, with an average around 2,500. 



Seven miles to the east of the village, in sharp 

 perspective when the atmosphere is clear, or dimly 

 seen through haze or mist, Mt. Itacolomi rises 

 some eight hundred feet. To the northwest, ap- 

 proximately an equal distance away, the Morro 

 do Palambi, a long flat-topped ridge, over which 

 come many of the rainstorms which reach the 

 village, dominates the sky line for the third part 

 of a quadrant. 



SOIL 



Local inhabitants distinguish between three 

 kinds of soil which they call, respectively, massape, 

 sangue de tati'i, and carrascd. Massape is pre- 

 dominant in the community. It is a dark, rich, 

 porous soil of considerable depth. When wet, it is 

 quite slippery. Sangue de iatu or, literally, "the 

 blood of the armadillo,'' is a reddish soil of medium 

 value. The carrascd, which a villager referred to 

 as "land which grows only ferns and sape^'' ^^ is a 

 shallow, clayey soil with some sand. The excellent 

 terra roxa, preferred for coffee planting, does not 

 exist here. Land on a steep hillside is called locally 

 perambeira. 



In 1945, the State Secretaria da AgricvXtura 

 estimated that of the land in the distrito of which 



2" A coarse wide-bladed grass, used for thatching. 



