the first phase of the initiation ceremonies for young boys
in which religion is emphasized, the initiates learn how to
contact the dead. This knowledge is acquired in a race in
which each person to be initiated carries a wooden block that
is said to be the ghost of a dead ancestor. In the funeral ritu-
als, the men carry much larger blocks in a similar race.
The cult of the dead is not only an impressive ritual but
a basic foundation of the culture of the Kaingán, the south-
ernmost Ge tribe. The objective that lies at the core of this
ritual is the elimination of the ties that connect the living and
the dead. This ritual insures that the souls of the deceased
will finally arrive at the resting place in the underworld, lo-
cated in the west.
A cult of the dead among the indigenous people in the
southern regions of South America, including the Gran
Chaco and the southern Andes, contains few authentic reli-
gious elements. At a funeral, the surviving family members
sponsor a large feast in honor of the dead relative. The vari-
ous ceremonies that take place during this feast—for exam-
ple, eating and drinking bouts, lamenting, playing of music,
feigned attacks, riding games, and speeches—are intended to
drive from the village the dreaded spirits of the dead or the
death demons, who are responsible for the death of the tribal
member, to prevent them from causing more harm. Among
the people in the Gran Chaco, an attempt is made to console
the dead and to pacify them in their anger at having passed
away. The mourning ceremonies, which begin immediately
after a person dies, are meant to serve this end. Often an in-
valid is set outside or buried before having actually died. Lit-
tle has been recorded regarding beliefs about life of the soul
after death among the peoples of the Gran Chaco.
INITIATION RITES. Among the Indians of Tierra del Fuego
there is no trace of a cult of the dead to be found in the funer-
ary practices. In this region, socioreligious emphasis was
placed on rites that are generally associated with the initia-
tion of members of both sexes and particularly on those ritu-
als connected with the acceptance of young males into men’s
organizations (the Kloketen of the Selk’nam and the Kina of
the Yahgan). During these rites, a chain of men came out to
frighten the women. The participating men wore conical
masks made from bark or animal skin that covered their
heads and faces. Their bodies were painted black, white, and
pink in various patterns. Although they represented specific
demons and spirits of the sea, forest, and animals, there was
apparently no ghost of the dead among them.
The appearance of masks so far south is correctly attri-
buted to the extensive influence of the Tropical Forest cul-
tural areas. Between the Tropical Forest and Tierra del
Fuego, there are no gaps in the appearance of masked dances
in connection with initiation celebrations, as for example the
Anapösö, or Forest Spirit feast, of the Chamacoco. In this
region of the Gran Chaco, the performers representing the
forest spirits were elaborately decorated with feathers. These
spirits are believed to have been ruled by the dog demon Po-
hitschio, who was the consort of the great mother, Eschetew-
uarha. Formerly the performers wore artistically intricate
feather masks that were later replaced by sacks worn over the
head with eyeholes cut in them. In either case, the women
were not allowed to discover that these spirits were in reality
men from their own tribe.
The Lengua of the Gran Chaco use a masked dance to
represent symbolically the supernatural danger that threatens
women at the onset of menstruation. In this dance, the single
men, wearing rhea-feather belts and masks, approach the
young women during a typical female puberty celebration.
The young women believe them to be the bad spirits. They
are eventually driven away by the adult women after they ha-
rass and threaten the young girls.
CONCLUSION. Because of the extreme variety of time periods
from which information about these tribes is drawn, the only
perspective that can be achieved in such an overview is of a
diachronic nature. To close this survey of the various forms
of religion, I shall briefly indicate phenomena that are partic-
ularly characteristic of the individual cultural areas.
The central Andes of pre-Columbian times is character-
ized by a belief in high gods and their respective cults, by the
worship of ancestors and of the dead, and by agrarian rites
directed to a female earth deity. The peoples of the region
of the Amazon and Orinoco rivers occasionally display signs
of high-god worship (Witóto, Tupi-Guaraní). Along with
the vegetation cults (northwestern Amazon) that are typical
of crop-cultivating peoples, there is a markedly large number
of ceremonies and rites associated with deities of the hunt
and of wild animals (including fish). The Ge of eastern Brazil
exhibit clear signs of worship of astral deities—the Sun and
Moon. The cults of the dead and of ancestors dominate
much of their religious life. The Gran Chaco, by contrast,
is noticeably lacking in religious ceremonies and rites in the
narrow sense. First-fruit ceremonies related to hunting and
fishing predominate; there are no agrarian rites. In the Pam-
pas and Patagonia region a number of socioreligious rites are
attested. The Selk’nam and Yahgan of Tierra del Fuego Ar-
chipelago believe in a high god, but there is little indication
of cult worship. The regions of southern and central Andes
share many aspects of religious life. The high-god cult (Nge-
nechen) is associated with a cultivation and fertility ritual.
A highly developed form of shamanism is also prominent.
Throughout South America outside the Andean region, the
shaman remains the pillar of the religious life.
SEE ALSO Amazonian Quechua Religions; Ethnoastronomy;
Ge Mythology; Inca Religion; Inti; Jaguars; Lord of the An-
imals; Mapuche Religion; Selk’nam Religion; Shamanism,
article on South American Shamanism; South American In-
dians, articles on Indians of the Andes in the Pre-Inca Peri-
od and Indians of the Gran Chaco; Supreme Beings; Te-
huelche Religion; Viracocha; Yurupary.BIBLIOGRAPHY
Baldus, Herbert. Die Allmutter in der Mythologie zweier sudameri-
kanischer Indianerstämme (Kagaba und Tumereha). Berlin,
1932.SOUTH AMERICAN INDIAN RELIGIONS: AN OVERVIEW 8585