INDIAN TRIBES OF NORTHERN MATO GROSSO, BRAZIL OBERG 



75 



came back to the village to play tricks on people. 

 The Bacairi did not believe that the ghosts of the 

 dead caused death and, therefore, were not afraid 

 of them. They were, however, afraid of certain 

 evil spirits — for instance, eradupira, who caused 

 death and sickness. 



To become a shaman (pidji), a young unmar- 

 ried man would train with an old shaman for a 

 period of 6 months to a year. During this period 

 sexual intercourse was forbidden, fasts were peri- 

 odically observed, and the novice had to abstain 

 from eating meat. Much of the training took 

 place in the woods, where the old shaman would 

 teach the novice the curative properties of roots 

 and herbs and, also, how to get in touch with the 

 ghosts of dead shamans. The training would be 

 complete when the novice acquired his own spirit 

 helper, which was always the ghost of a dead 

 shaman. Sometimes the revelation was so power- 

 ful that the young novice would fall to the ground 

 in a trance. The spirit that then appeared to 

 him instructed him bow to make a flute (either 

 emini or kanagera), which he kept in the sacred 

 flute house, and gave him a special tune by which 

 he could always call his spirit helper. The novice 

 had then to prove himself by curing some sick 

 person or by finding lost property. If he were 

 successful he became a recognized shaman. 



Before beginning a performance, shamans al- 

 ways fasted for several days and smoked heavily. 

 In curing a sick person the shaman asked his 

 spirit belper for instructions which usually were 

 explanations of how to remove objects from the 

 body which caused the illness. Besides removing 

 objects from the body the shamans prepared med- 

 icines. Headaches and pains in the body were 

 cured by juice of the perneira tuber, and turogi 

 leaves were used for pains in the chest. For 

 healing the wounds made by the scratcher the 

 juice made by boiling the kumatdni plant was 

 used. The Bacairi also prepared aphrodisiacs 

 from the katdino plant and by mixing piqui nuts, 

 honey, and turtle eggs. 



GAMES 



The Bacairi played, and still play, a form of 

 Indian football called toinyameli. The ball (toin) 

 was made by covering a round gourd with native 

 rubber, leaving a small opening. The gourd was 



then crushed, the pieces were taken out through 

 the hole, air was blown into the ball, and the hole 

 was covered over with rubber. The balls varied 

 in size from 3 to 8 inches in diameter. The game 

 was played on a field about 50 yards square with 

 four goals placed midway on each of the four 

 sides. Small white circles (shipiri) marked the 

 goals, and another circle about a yard in diameter 

 (yotdri) was placed in the center of the field. 



The game was played by two teams with equal 

 but varying numbers on each side. One team, 

 called pidto, had the north and east goals, and the 

 other team, called tosdundo, had the south and 

 west goals. To score a point a team had to put 

 the ball across the opponent's goal. The ball could 

 not be carried in the hand but could be kicked 

 over the goalkeeper. Each side had a leader who 

 did not play but encouraged his players. The 

 organizer of the game threw the ball from the 

 center of the field to the pidto side at the beginning 

 of the game or when the ball went out of bounds. 

 The game lasted until the players were tired, the 

 winners being the team with the greater number 

 of points. 



The Bacairi also organized wrestling matches 

 called taddinpudili. The object of the match was 

 to knock down the opponent by pushing or hitting 

 with the shoulders; grasping or hitting with the 

 hands was not allowed. The loser was the one 

 who had the greater number of falls. 



CEREMONIALISM 



Among the Bacairi ceremonialism was highly 

 developed. Although songs and dances were per- 

 formed whenever the people had an abundance of 

 food and economic activities permitted the leisure 

 time, there were special occasions (the ripening of 

 corn, ear piercing of boys preparatory to going 

 into seclusion, the coming out of seclusion of a 

 woman after childbirth, house building, the dis- 

 tribution of cotton by women) during which 

 particular songs and dances had to be performed. 

 At these times it was customary to invite people 

 from neighboring villages to participate in the 

 festivities. 



The musical instruments of the Bacairi con- 

 sisted of rattles and flutes. The drum does not 

 appear to have been used. Rattles were of two 

 kinds: the common gourd rattle (2>dko) and piqui 



