Figure 1.--Here we see a Native American boy from the Amazon basin in Brazil with his face painted. We're not sure about the tribe.

Besides the Inca, there were many other Native American tribes in South America. Many were centered in the Andes or along the narrow coastal plain to the west of the Andes. The Inca were highly civilized, but it should be remembered that they were still a pre-literate stone age people. Even so the developed an agricultural ststem that supported a larger population than is the case of many Andean regions today. The Inca conquered many of the tribes in or along the Andes from Colombia south to Chile. The principal Andean tribe that they did not conquer was the Chincha in what is now Colombia. There were also tribes to the east of the Andes. The coastl tribes in what is now Peru were particularly developed. The primitive tribes in the Amazon still exist, although there numbers are now very small. Scholars differe as to the Native American population and level of civilization in the Amazonian basin before the European Conuest. Other tribes existed south of the Amazonin Basin, both east and west of the Andes. There were also tribes to the north. All of these peoples experienced a catastrophic collapse after the European conquest. Spanish and Portuguese policies were brutal and explotive, but norgig was more destructive than the introduction of Wuropean disases to which these people had no immunity.

Inca

The Inca until the early 15th century were but one of a large number of tribes situated in the Andes and narrow coastal plain from Chile north to Colombia. The tribes shared many common cultural cahracteristoics. The Inca were possessed with a messianic creed which taught that they were destined to dominate the world. They proceeded to conquer and assimilate neighboring tribes in southern Peru around Lake Titicaca. at the beginning of the 15th entury the Inca was just one of large number of Andean and costal tribes. Then there was an amazing explosioin out of their mountain domain and within 100 years carved out an emense empire. Theh absorbed conquered peoples relatively beningly as long as thy accepted the Inca Sun God. The Inca had a genius for public administration, enineering, as well as military strategy. One of their mostal notable inovations was the construction of a road network allowing the rapid movement of armies. Runners operating rather like pony express riders moved messages with great rapidity from th most remote imperial outposts to the capital at Cuzco. Eventually this network streached the length of South America from cebtral Chile to southern Colombia--over 2,500 miles. Terraces were carved out of steep mountains, creating cultivateable land. These teraces were notable engineering achievements. The Inca were master weavers. The nobility wore garments woven from vicuña. The common people wore garments wove from the more course llama wool.

Pacific Coastal Tribes

At the time of the Spanish Conquest there were Native America tribes living in the narrow coastal strip west of the Andes. Some had been conuered by the Inca. The tribes along the coast of what is now Peru had achieved an impresive cultural level.

Chibcha

The most sophisticated Native American civilization in what is now Colombia was the Andean Chibcha culture. They were one of the few Andean peoples not yet conquered by the expanding Inca Empire. The Chincha dominated the highland basins and valleys of the Cordillera Oriental in what is now Colombia. The Chibcha are less well known than the Inca, Maya, and Aztecs, but were an important culture. The Chibcha inhabited the Andean valleys around Bogotá and Tunja in centrl Colombia. The population has been estimated at 0.5 million people. They are believed to have been one of the most politically centralized of the Native Americans, with the exception of the highly centralized Inca Empire. Over time the process of war and alliances had unified the Chibcha into two major states and several smaller ones ones, each with its own hereditary chief. The Inca Empire was a much larger state, but a a result of rapid expansion not as coherent a state as the Chincha. The Chibcha like other Native Americans were a stone-age people, but a highly developed one. The economy was based on intensive highland agriculture. There were crafts, most notably gold working. They were also a trading society. The larger villages held weekly markets where aricultural produce, pottery, and cloth were traded. Gold was used for personal ornamentation and religious offrings. . The arrival of the Spanish cut short the further development and centralization of the Chibcha. The Spanish crushed the Chibcha militarily and by the 18th century the Chibcha language disappeared.

Northern Tribes

The major ethnic group along the northern coast, both the Caribbean (Colombia and Venezuela) and the Atlantic coasts (Guianas) and inland waterays like the Orionoco was the Caribs. The Caribs were not politically centralized people and thus there are many different tribes of Carib origins. In Colomobia alone there are 84 indigenous people, most of Carib origins. One such tribe is the Molitones Bari [singular Molitón Bari] live in the region of Catatumbo (Northern department of Santander. Catatumbo is a strategic region. It is near of the boundary with Venezuela. In the region there is also a lot of oil and coal. Through the time the exploitation of oil and coal caused land expropriations. Today the Molitones Bari's culture could disappear. This is the reason foir a 2008 protest marches.

Amazonian Tribes

One ongoing mystery is that Spanish sources report a very substantial population in the Amazon basin during the 16th century. Francisco de Orellana set out on a quest for gold and soon found himself just trying to survive. He was the first European to travel the entire length of the Amazon and he reported a huge population of very profuctive farmers. Historians at first dismissed the Spanish account as fanciful. Modern anthropolgists have begun to reassess this judgement. Some believe there indeed once was a very large population in the Amazon basin practing sophisticated agriculture.

Southern Tribes

Many tribes lived south of the Amazonin Basin, both east and west of the Andes. We do not know a great deal about these tribes. Many were quite small. The Mapuche inhabited yhe coastal areas west of the Andes in what is now now central and southern Chile. They are probably the best known because they sucessfully resisted Inca armies and then after the conquest the Spanish conquistadores. (Historical and literary accounts often use the term Araucanians.) Without the centralized orhanization of the Inca, they proved more difficult for the Spanish to conquer. The Mapuche even managed to kill Conquistador Pedro de Valdivia (1553). The Mapuche did not have the gold that so attracted the Spanish, but they did control the highly productive Central Valley of central Chile. There are a large number of smaller tribes. Estimates vary because it was often difficult to tell whether related bands were separate tribes or not. The Alacaluf (Halakwulup, Kawésqar, or Kaweskar) was a small tribe living at the tip of South America along and around the Strait of Magellan, including the Brunswick Peninsula, and Wellington, Santa Inés, and Desolación islands). They were a seagoing people which had a society based on fishing and hunting marime mammals.

Created: 5:52 AM 11/24/2006
Last updated: 4:49 AM 1/21/2009