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Omagua
The Omagua, constituting the Peba linguistic stock, occupied the area near the confluence of the Javari River with the Amazon River in Peru and parts of Ecuador and Columbia. In 1690 they migrated west and were settled between the Napo and the Putumayo. In 1686, a mission was established among the Omagua people and 27 additional missions were founded during the subsequent decade. The settlements included Indians from various tribes, all of whom were indoctrinated in the Christian sacrament and their ways of life. Brutal Portuguese slave raids down river brought fugitives to the Omagua settlements looking for sanctuary. In 1710 slave raids devastated the mission area causing the survivors to withdraw and abandon. In 1731, with a population of 552 San Joachim de Omaguas was reestablished below the mouth of the Ucayali River.
The Omagua language was selected by the missionaries as the official medium for catechism and intertribal communication. The Omagua way of life was nearly extinct by the beginning of the eighteenth century due to slave raids, disease, and missionization. We are lucky, however, that we have in our possession several documents about the aboriginal culture by Carvaja, who recorded the first descent of the Amazon, and Simon who passed through in 1560. Most of the documentation came from Samuel Fritz who served as the principle missionary among the Omagua people from 1686 to 723 and presided over their deculturation and decimation.
Settlements were close together, not more than a crossbow shot away. Omagua houses were rectangular. They had cedar plank walls and palm thatch roofs, a village with a population of 330 consisted of 28 houses, each occupied by an extended family. The interior was furnished with hammocks, large palm leaf mats and pottery vessels. The inside was always kept clean. Men and women wore cloth garments. The men wore long sleeveless shirts that reached down to their knees. Women wore short wraparound skirts. The men usually left their shirts off because they got in the way. The clothes were usually painted with multicolor designs. Due to the Omaguas flattened foreheads they are easily distinguished from other Amazonian tribes. Fritz observed that shaping was done in infancy by “ applying to the [babies’] forehead a small board or wattle of reeds tied with a little cotton so as not to hurt them, and fastening them by the shoulders to a little canoe, which serves them for a cradle” (Meggers 125).
The spearthrower was the principle weapon for hunting, fishing, and gathering. It took the form of a flat board about 40 inches long and three fingers wide with a bone hook at the upper end to secure the projectile. The spear or arrow was about six feet long and had a point of bone or very hard wood which was sometimes detachable, permitting it to remain in the victim. To shoot the arrow is taken in the right hand, with which the spearthrower is held by its lower end, and placing the arrow against the hook, they launch it with such force and accuracy that they do not miss at fifty paces” ( Meggers 127). The shields used in warfare were the height of a man and made of basketry covered with cayman, manatee, or tapir hide. If there was no stone, turtle shells were used for axes and adzes.
Each village had a chief and all the villages in a province were united under one high chief who was described as “ a very great over lord.” At the end of the 18th century, the Omagua leader was called Tururucari, which meant god. At the opposite end of the social scale from the chiefs were the slaves. The slaves were children captures from other villages during raids. They were used for agricultural and domestic tasks.
Newborn infants were buried alive if the mother was still nursing a previous child or if a girl was born when the parents wanted a boy. Marriage involved the payment of bride price as well as five years of service by the groom to the father of the bride. When an adult died the body was wrapped in cotton blankets and interred inside the house. The funeral rites, which lasted several days, featured continual lamenation interspersed with feasting and drinking. Omagua people were into festivals and dances, lasting three to four days.
Additional Reading
Omagua
Tribes of Peru
Tribes of Ecuador
South American Mythology
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