edited by Johannes Wilbert (Los Angeles, 1970–), published
as part of the “UCLA Latin American Studies” series. Sepa-
rate volumes have been devoted to the Warao (1970),
SelkDnam (1975), Yamana (1977), Ge (1979), Mataco
(1982), Toba (1983), Boróro (1983), and Tehuelche (1984).
Extensive compilations of South American myths are Theo-
dor Koch-Grünberg’s Indianermärchen aus Südamerika
(Jena, 1901), which does not include the Andean civiliza-
tions, and Raffaele Pettazzoni’s Miti e leggende, vol. 4, Ameri-
ca Centrale e Meridionale (Turin, 1963).Other sources are included in more restricted ethnological studies
or in anthologies devoted to Indians of a single country, such
as the following works: Walter E. Roth’s An Inquiry into the
Animism and Folk-Lore of the Guiana Indians (Washington,
D.C., 1908–1909), which has myths of the Arawak, Carib,
and Warao; An Historical and Ethnological Survey of the Cuna
Indians, by Erland Nordenskiöld in collaboration with
Ruben Pérez Kantule, edited by Henry Wassén (Göteborg,
1938); Herbert Baldus’s Die Jaguarzwillinge (Kassel, 1958),
with myths from Brazil; Fray Cesáreo de Armellada and Car-
mela Bentivenga de Napolitano’s Literaturas indígenas vene-
zolanas (Caracas, 1975); Hugo Nino’s Literaturas de Colom-
bia aborigen: En pos de la palabra (Bogotá, 1978). The
Taulipan and Arekuna are represented in Theodor Koch-
Grünberg’s Von Roroima zum Orinoco, vol. 2 (Stuttgart,
1924); the Marikitare, in Marc de Civrieux’s Watunna: An
Orinoco Creation Cycle (San Francisco, 1980). Myths from
some tribes of the huge Amazonian area are included in C.
Manuel Nunes Pereira’s Moronguêtá: Um Decameron indí-
gena, 2 vols. (Rio de Janeiro, 1967); Gerardo Reichel-
Dolmatoff’s Amazonian Cosmos: The Sexual and Religious
Symbolism of the Tukano Indians (Chicago, 1971); Gerald
Weiss’s Campa Cosmology: The World of a Forest Tribe in
South America (New York, 1975); Manuel García-
Renduelas’s ‘Duik Múum’: Universo mítico de los aguarunas,
2 vols. (Lima, 1979); Stephen Hugh-Jones’s The Palm and
the Pleiades: Initiation and Cosmology in Northwest Amazonia
(Cambridge, 1979), on the Barasana, important for the study
of the Yurupary myth; Mario Califano’s Analisis comparativo
de un mito mashco (Jujuy, Argentina, 1978), based on ver-
sions from three groups of southeast Peru; Peter G. Roe’s The
Cosmic Zygote: Cosmology in the Amazon Basin (New Bruns-
wick, N.J., 1982), on Shipibo mythology. Classic studies in
Guaraní mythology are part of Alfred Métraux’s La religion
des Tupinamba et ses rapports avec celle des autres tribus Tupi-
Guarani (Paris, 1928) and Curt Nimuendajú’s “Die Sagen
von der Erschaffung und Vernichtung der Welt als Grundla-
gen der Religion der Apapocuva-Guarani,” Zeitschrift für Et-
hnologie 46 (1914): 284–403. For the Kamayurá and other
tribes of the Upper Xingu: Orlando Villas Boas and Claudio
Villas Boas’s Xingu: The Indians, Their Myths (New York,
1973). The myth of the “twins and the jaguar,” widely dif-
fused in the Amazon, is studied in relation to early Andean
civilizations by Julio C. Tello in his article “Wira Kocha,”
Inca 1 (1923): 93–320, 583–606. Two recent anthologies of
Andean myths are Henrique Urbano’s Wiracocha y Ayar: Hé-
roes y funciones en las sociedades andinas (Cuzco, 1981) and
Franklin Pease’s El pensamiento mítico (Lima, 1982). The
best edition of the Huarochiri traditions collected by Fran-
cisco de Ávila is Jorge L. Urioste’s Hijos de Pariya Qaqa: La
tradición oral de Waru Chiri: Mitología, ritual y costumbres,
2 vols. (Syracuse, N.Y., 1984). Many South American
myths, or parts of them, are included in the first three vol-
umes of Claude Lévi-Strauss’s monumental Mythologiques,
translated as The Raw and the Cooked (New York, 1969),
From Honey to Ashes (New York, 1973), and The Origin of
Table Manners (New York, 1978), also useful for its extensive
bibliographies.
There is no large-scale treatment of South American mythology
from the point of view of religious studies. The best overview
is Harold Osborne’s South American Mythology (London,
1968). A survey of the field since the publication of the
Handbook of South American Indians, 7 vols., edited by Julian
H. Steward (Washington, D.C., 1946–1959), is found in
Juan Adolfo Vázquez’s “The Present State of Research in
South American Mythology,” Numen 25 (1978): 240–276.
Although dated in many respects, the Handbook has not been
replaced as a general work of reference. Invaluable for the
ethnological background to the mythology of many tribes,
it also includes brief summaries on religions and mytholo-
gies, and an article by Alfred Métraux, “Religion and Sha-
manism” (vol. 5, pp. 559–599). The article “Inca Culture at
the Time of the Spanish Conquest” by John Howland Rowe
(vol. 2., pp. 183–330) provides an excellent introduction to
the subject and includes sections on Inca religion and my-
thology. The chapters on archaeology can be updated by
consulting Gordon R. Willey’s An Introduction to American
Archaeology, vol. 2, South America (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.,
1971). The field of South American linguistics has been sur-
veyed by different authors, among them Cestmír Loukotka
in his Classification of South American Indian Languages, ed-
ited by Johannes Wilbert (Los Angeles, 1968).
The following periodicals have published many myths from South
America: Amérindia (Paris, 1976–), Anthropos (Mödling,
1906–), Journal de la Société des Américanistes (Paris, 1895–),
Journal of Latin American Lore (Los Angeles, 1975–), Latin
American Indian Literatures (Pittsburgh, 1977–1984) Revista
do Museu Paulista (Sa ̃o Paulo, 1895–1938, 1947–), and
Scripta Ethnologica (Buenos Aires, 1973–).
New Sources
Bierhorst, John. The Mythology of South America. New York,
1998.
Gutiérrez Estéves, Manuel, ed. Mito y ritual en América. Madrid,
1988.
Fischer, Manuela. Mito Kogi. Quito, 1989.
Manuela de Cora, María Kuai-Mare. Mitos Aborigenes de Venezue-
la. Caracas, 1993.
Morales Guerrero, Enrique Rafael. Mitologia Americana: Estudio
preliminar sobre mitologia clásica. Santafé de Bogoté, 1997.
Urban, Greg. A Discourse-Centered Approach to Culture: Native
South American Myths and Rituals. Austin, 1991.
JUAN ADOLFO VÁZQUEZ (1987)
Revised BibliographySOUTH AMERICAN INDIAN RELIGIONS:
HISTORY OF STUDY
Systematic study of South American indigenous religions
began with the arrival of the first Europeans. Almost imme-8592 SOUTH AMERICAN INDIAN RELIGIONS: HISTORY OF STUDY