INDIAN TRIBES OF NORTHERN MATO GROSSO, BRAZIL — OBERG 



13 



Leonardo then set about attending to the sick. 

 We found that about 75 percent of the villagers 

 had "grippe." Whether this is a form of influenza 

 or just a bad cold I do not know. It certainly 

 affects whites worse than a common cold and 

 among Indians it is a major killer. In any case, 

 a dozen or so of the older people were hammock- 

 ridden and running high temperatures. While 

 Leonardo went from house to house taking tem- 

 peratures, feeling pulses, and administering aspirin, 

 Fernando and I had time to look over the village. 



THE VILLAGE (IRETAM) 



Built on the edge of the forest belt which rises 

 abruptly above the flood plain, Tuatuari is sur- 

 rounded by forest except to the south where it 

 overlooks a broad stretch of flat, grassy plain 

 covered by water during the rainy season. At 

 first sight the houses look like huge dome-shaped 

 haystacks set in a circle around a plaza about 

 100 yards in diameter. On closer examination, 

 however, it becomes clear that the six large houses 

 differ in shape, one actually being rectangular with 

 a gable roof. More or less in the center of the 

 plaza is the small half-built rectangular flute 

 house. As it was still without a roof, the flutes 

 were kept in one of the other houses. Young men, 

 however, painted themselves in front of this house 

 and nearby we observed them wrestling. We were 

 thus not able to obtain a full account of the flute 

 house and its function among the Camayura. At 

 the back of the houses were platforms 4 or 5 feet 

 high used for drying balls of grated manioc and 

 rectangular babracots for broiling fish. The plat- 

 forms and babracots, however, are not permanent 

 structures but are put up when occasion demands. 



While the plaza is kept clear of weeds and litter 

 and is beaten hard by the constant passage of the 

 people, the area surrounding the village gradually 

 merges into the second growth where gardens once 

 spread, and later into the cultivated fields and 

 finally into the virgin forest some 300 or 400 yards 

 away. Near the village grow gourds, calabashes, 

 cotton, and uracil, particularly along the paths 

 that lead to the fields and to the river. Firewood 

 is obtained from the garden clearings, where the 

 fires never consume all the timber felled, and water 

 is obtained from the river. In the dry season the 

 river is about 30 minutes' walk from the village, 



but during the rains the river is only 200 yards 

 distant. 



These first impressions and elementary facts 

 Fernando and I were able to gather before dusk. 

 After the sun had set, Tamapii invited us to 

 gather at a fire lighted in the center of the plaza 

 around which the old men gathered to discuss 

 plans for the following day. Low stools carved 

 in the form of birds were brought near the fire 

 for us to sit on. Long native cigars were rolled 

 by the old men, lighted and puffed, while Leonardo 

 in his broken Tupi explained that the sick should 

 accompany us back to Jacarei for further treat- 

 ment. After a couple of hours of discussion every- 

 one retired to his hammock, and as there was little 

 room in the houses for all of us I agreed to sleep 

 out. Nilo obligingly set up two posts on the edge 

 of the plaza for my hammock. For a long time 

 I could not go to sleep, for never in my life had I 

 beard so much coughing and hawking. It seemed 

 that all the hundred or more people were coughing. 

 It was a clear moonlight night, and I remember 

 partly waking and thinking to myself that I must 

 get up and turn off that electric light. 



THE HOUSE (HOK) 



The next morning while the Camayura were 

 making preparations for the journey to Jacarei 

 we were able to make a closer examination of the 

 village and the houses. The information gained 

 on this trip, amplified by future studies, enables 

 us at this point to give a general account of the 

 Camayura house and its construction. 



Although most of the houses are ellipsoidal in 

 ground plan, the rectangular type also occurs. It 

 was difficult to determine whether the rectangular 

 form of Tamapu's house and the half-built jakui, 

 flute house, are original Tupian forms, for they 

 have been built since 1947 with the assistance of 

 the Expedition. However, as the majority of the 

 Camayura houses are ellipsoidal, as among the 

 other Upper Xingu tribes, we are safe in assuming 

 that this is the predominant house form. About 

 the shape of these ellipsoidal houses we might also 

 add this: the smaller the house the rounder it 

 becomes. On the other hand, as the house in- 

 creases in size it goes through a true ellipse to 

 straight-sided house with rounded ends. This 

 may show a development from a small beehive- 



