Ethnonyms: Axe, Guayagui, Guayaki
Location and Environment
The Aché live in eastern Paraguay in the southwestern part of the Eastern Brazilian Highlands which is south of the Amazon tropical rain forest. This area sits at a higher elevation than the Amazon Basin and tends to be hotter and drier than the rainforest. The hot and wet season occurs from October to February, while June to September is dry and cool. Precipitation levels vary drastically monthly, October-February rainfall is triple that of June-September, and from year to year. The mean yearly precipitation is 1800mm and the mean high temperature is 37°C (January) and the low temperature is 10°C (July). The temperate and precipitation levels allow for a mixture of land types with grassland savannas, swamps, and nearly 80 percent of the area is the Atlantic coastal rainforest, their preferred habitat (Hill and Hurtado 1996:47).
History
Eastern Paraguay has been occupied since 10,000 BP. Prior to Spanish conquest, several different groups inhabited the area: the Macro-Ge, a band of hunter-gatherers, the Tupi-Guarani, a society of horticulturists, and the Aché, who are speculated to be the direct descendants of the area's original inhabitants. The first recorded contact with the Aché was published by a Jesuit missionary in the 17th Century. During this time, groups of Aché were living west of the Parana River, between Encarnacion in the south and Guaira Falls in the north. It was recorded that these groups did not practice any type of cultivation, unlike the neighboring Guarani to the south.
Contact with Spanish Jesuit missionaries was not peaceful. Most of the Guarani, who practiced horticulture, were absorbed into the Jesuit missions that lay in the south. With the mission to convert the Aché, who they referred to as the Guayaguis, to Christianity Jesuit missionaries and the Guarani actively hunted them.
There is no recorded information about the Aché from 1768, when the Jesuits were expelled from Paraguay, until the end of the 19th Century, when peaceful contact was made from between 1959 and 1979 when independent contact was made with each Aché subgroup. Previous contact had resulted in a depopulation of the area, so by the 20th Century, most of the southern groups of the Aché were extinct or incorporated into missions. As a result, northern populations of the Aché flourished and grew rapidly. Today the Aché are divided into four separate groups, each living in a different area: the Northern Aché (the largest group with about 459 individuals according to a 1987 census), the Yvytyruzu Aché (87 individuals), Ypety Aché (30 individuals), Nacunday Aché (38 individuals).
Interaction with outsiders, such as the Jesuit missionaries, has largely shaped the state of present Aché groups living in eastern Paraguay. During the 1970s, many groups of Aché, around half, moved from the forest to reservations, under pressure from the Paraguayan government as well as Aché groups already living at reservations. Such a dramatic transition in lifestyle immensely altered the Aché way of life, impacting cultural aspects such as subsistence behaviors, social organization, and others. In addition, the Aché have been the subject of many anthropological studies of such behaviors (Hill and Hurtado 1996).
Language
The language of the Aché is a part of the Tupi-Guarani Linguistic Family. Each of the four groups, Northern Aché, Yvytyruzu Aché, Ypety Aché, and Nacunday Aché, speak different dialects where the Nacunday dialect shows the greatest divergence from the others. The language is similar in some respects to Guarani, the langauge spoken by many native groups of Paraguay. In speaking to one another the Guarani and Aché would find the others words to be unintelligible and is as about as similar as Spanish and Italian (Hill 1994).
Subsistence
Hunting and Fishing
The Aché hunt a total of 33 mammal species found in the Atlantic rain forests of eastern Paraguay. While they know of a few other species, they choose not to hunt them. In addition, they eat at least ten species of reptiles and amphibians, and many different birds. The Aché also fish for 15 different species of fish. Aché diet consists mostly of meat. The top ten most commonly hunted animals among the Aché are white-lipped peccary, armadillo, monkey, coati, paca, collared peccary, deer, fish, bird, and snake (Hawkes, et al. 1982:386).
White-lipped peccary (image from http://www.cites.org/gallery/speciespics/mammal/white-lipped_peccary.jpg)
Hunting is done either in groups of men, or by a single man. The Aché use bows, arrows, and shotguns to hunt. Sometimes, women will also sometimes participate in the hunting activities by acting as spotters and noisemakers if the men are hunting monkeys or coatis, or the women might watch the exit to burrows if the men are hunting pacas. Fishing is done in large mixed groups, using tree branches to dam the river and trap fish (Hawkes, et al. 1982).
Gathering
Gathering is done predominantly by women, but men also participate, and women and men often work together, especially for the collecting honey and oranges, and exploiting palm resources on a rainy days when there is little hunting (Hawkes et al. 1982:384-385). One example of this teamwork is the gathering of oranges. Men typically climb and shake the orange trees as women gather the fallen fruits (Hawkes, et al. 1982). The Aché gather a variety of insects and plants that are found in their rain forest environment. The most common gathered resources are oranges, honey, palm fiber, palm larvae, palm heart, and palm fruit (Hawkes, et al. 1982:386).
Forest to Reservation
Prior to European contact, the Aché lived as bands of full-time hunter-gatherers, with their primary resources being mammals, palm products, insect larvae, and honey. Many Aché still live in this manner today, though others, who transitioned from forest living to life on missions and reservations, have changed their subsistence behaviors and have become only part-time foragers. These Aché also practice agriculture, cultivating crops like sweet potatoes, manioc, and sugarcane, as well as keep some animals, such as pigs and goats. In addition, those Aché living at missions are supplemented with items like milk, rice, salt, sugar, and flour, and sometimes work for wages on Paraguayan farms. Thus, foraging remains only as a supplement to these other resources among Aché groups living at reservations. These Aché still forage, though typically only on long-range trips with large groups of several families, men, women, and children (Hawkes, et al. 1982).
For those Aché living in the forest, the average 2,700 daily caloric intake of the Aché was broken up as such: 55 percent meat, 25 percent plants, fruits, and insect larvae, 20 percent honey. As they transitioned to living on reservations, consumption of meat decreased dramatically to only 11 percent, with new store-bought products accounting for 9 percent of diet.
Life in the forest required much more subsistence work, with men usually spending 7 hours per day on subsistence work, supplying nearly 90% of calories. Women, however, spent only 2 hours per day on subsistence work, usually gathering, while they spent the rest of their time in other duties: 2 hours on moving camp, and the rest on child care (Hill 1994). Life on a reservation requires less subsistence effort, and is characterized by less division between men and women. During the day, men spend some hours traveling with the women, either moving camp or gathering, then they set off in small groups to search for game. Men and women separate during the day but regroup by late afternoon. During this time the hunted or gathered food is prepared and made ready to share amongst all the band members.
Sharing
Sharing is a major subsistence strategy for the Aché, and provides various risk-reduction benefits, for an individual and the group. Since hunting returns vary daily and for each individual, sharing insures that none go hungry. In addition, an individual might be compelled to share so that in his time of need, others will return the favor. Meat is shared the most, and plant products and other gathered items are not shared as mush or as equally. To emphasize the importance of group sharing, the hunters rarely eat their own kill. Sharing patterns are determined by kinship, with other closely related nuclear families being the primary recipients of shared resources.
Food sharing behaviors of the Aché shifted some as many Aché transitioned from forest life to life on missions. Both lifestyles are characterized by a high level of sharing; in the forest Aché shared an average of 80% of their returns, while on the reservation, returns were shared at an average of 87 percent. Sharing among the Aché occurs between individuals and nuclear family units, with the average number of families one shares with being two or three, in both forest and reservation ways of life. What drastically differs, though, is the amount of those families choosing not to share. Living in the forest, only 3.4 percent of families did not share, while on the reservation, a much larger 33 percent did not share at all with others (Gurven, et al. 2002).
Social Organization
Settlement Patterns
While living in the forest, the Northern Aché lived in about 10 to 15 different camps with a home range of nearly 20,000 km, and each camp consisted of 3 to 100 hundred persons. Although adults had access to the entire home range, they spent most of their time in core areas. Campsites tend to be within 50m of good patches of palm trees which could be exploited for resources, both sustenance and tools. After a big kill, the camp would move closer to the kill in order to avoid transporting the catch. In the instance of rain, small huts were constructed, and people slept on the bare ground, palm and fern leaves, or on palm leaf woven mats. Aché camps moved nearly every day of the year but oral history shows that in earlier periods camps would remain in the same location for seven to fifteen days. Bands/camps formed around a core bilocal kin group and sometimes one or two important men's names were used to identify the camp. The bands were not permanent and would frequently disperse into small, family-group camps and later reunite into the large band again (Hill 1994).
Degree of Equality
The Aché are an egalitarian society, in which members are valued equally relative to one another. Individuals within the group possess the same amount of power, and resources are shared among them. Though they remained egalitarian, the transition from forest life to life on a reservation has altered some Aché relationships. Decreased sharing on the reservations results in some nuclear families hoarding goods. This also has the effect of distancing families from each other (Gurven, et al. 2002).
- In the forest, bands have no formal leaders, rather a few, one to three, powerful men may be identified by the group and referred to as its leaders. The power of the 'leaders' is limited to simply having some more weight in decision making. Even though there are informal male leaders, adult members of both sexes may give their input in decision making, where individuals who care most about the outcome of the decision or have the most investment in the outcome will have the most influence.
- On the reservation, there are 'chiefs' who lead discussions but do not make decisions without the support of the group. These chiefs are elected by vote of adults and can be removed easily. Young men are also increasing their power within the group as they become more educated and make connections with the outside world (Hill 1994, Hill 1996).
Gender Relationships
Though there is some separation between Aché men and women, such as in the division of labor, both sexes are generally viewed as equals. In the forest, the Division of Labor of the Aché was set up as such:
- Men hunted and extracted honey.
- Women moved the camps, gathered plants and insect products, while taking care of the children. It has been shown that the importance of childcare in the dangerous forest environment has put constraints on the ability of females to participate in subsistence activities, thus women supply less calories.
- Men and women both constructed the tools necessary for hunting and gathering, with men constructing the former and women the latter, and women tending to manufacture the bow string that men used in hunting. There were no social taboos concerning men and women using the other sexes' tools.
- Men built the huts when they were necessary and both sexes were involved in food preparation.
On reservations, many of the sexually-assigned duties remain the same, though the sexes share more in their duties. Men help more often in childcare, house activities, and food preparation. With the addition of agriculture as a major subsistence strategy, men do most of the farm labor, and women harvest the manioc (Hill 1994).
Marriage and Kinship Patterns
Marriage among the Aché is a union of two partners who reside together, share food and possessions, cohabit openly, engage in sexual intercourse, and is reflected by a wife carrying her husband's possessions in her basket. In Aché society there is also a kind of courting period before the marriage. There are distinct differences in marriage patterns of the Aché pre-contact forest lifestyle and the reservation period. In the forest, Aché females usually marry early, about a year before menarche, where the average age was 15.2 years. Aché males are discouraged from marrying early by male elders and could not marry until completing puberty rites. The mean age of males at first marriage was 20.2 years. Marriages are usually not arranged by parents among the Aché, rather the daughter or son choose their own partner. Marriage is forbidden between siblings, cousins, and those who had a godparent-godchild relationship. While parents may have some influence in their child's decision, it is not formal. Most marriages are monogamous, though polygyny and polyandry do occur, usually in short-term relationships. The divorce rate among the forest Aché is drastically higher, at 61 percent, than those living on reservations, with a declining divorce rate of 26 percent. This can be attributed to the influence of neighbors and missionaries. Marriages among the Aché vary in duration and age difference. Marriages have been recorded lasting from several hours to 47 years and some post-reproductive women reported a mean of 12 spouses in their lifetime. Postmarital residence in the Aché is usually matrilocal, though deviation from this is common (Hill and Hurtado 1996:226-235).
Aché bands were defined by kinship groups, with the bands formed around a bilocal kin group. Kinship terminology did not distinguish between parents, aunts, and uncles nor between siblings, cross-cousins, and parallel-cousins.
Religious Beliefs and Ritual
- Aché religious beliefs are influenced by their environment and the world around them, and animals and inanimate objects have spiritual meaning.
- The Aché believe in supernatural beings and spirits, each having different characteristics and diverse properties. The most important spiritual being in the Aché mythology is Berendy who has both a human and comet/meteor like form. Berendy gives animals their properties and abilities. Another spiritual being is Krei'i, who takes the form of shadows or wind and is involved in dreams and healing. Anjave is an evil spirit that hurts people and causes accident. These beings are possibly derived from Christian influences that reached the Aché by way of the Jesuits.
- Aché beliefs about the afterlife are diverse. The Northern Aché have little or no belief in an afterlife only that once a person is killed, he or she may return to haunt the area where he or she died, possibly for retaliation. Because of this worry of angry spirits the Aché burned the bodies of the dead, especially those that were mean,wicked, powerful, or who died in a violent manner, possibly to avoid confrontation with the angry spirit.
- Often, when the most important individuals within the society died, they were buried with small children that were sacrificed.
- The average Aché person was buried in the ground and a small group hut was built on the ground over the grave (Hill 1996).
Ceremonies
Birth Ceremony
At birth, an Aché child is given the name of an animal that the mother had cooked and eaten during pregnancy, typically one that is large, rare, or in sudden abundance. Also, a man cuts the umbilical cord with the woman who cares for the newborn, and others who are washing and tending to the mother. These helpers form the jary (god-parents) and remain in a close ritual relationship to the child and the parents throughout their lives.
Puberty
Ceremonies marking the start and stages of puberty involve body scarification. During this time young men's lips are pierced and their bodies are scarred. Aché boys form a special relationship with the men that cut their lips. Between the ages of 14-18 young men are required to participate in clubfights. After the clubfights, women line up and the boys ceremonially hit them while the women cry out. The men whom have killed another must be separated from the group and are given little food.
When a girl reached menarche she was treated like a newborn child- held, lifted, carried, massaged and washed by adults of both sexes. These adults took on a special relationship with the girl. If the girl had sexual intercourse prior to menarche, as most did, men who had sexual intercourse with the girl were also washed at this time. The girl was covered head to toes with woven mats and forced to lie and/or sit still for several days or weeks. The girl could not show her face to anyone and could only move in order to perform bodily functions. After this period, the girl underwent scarification and would receive cut lines on her back, legs, arms, buttocks, and stomach while holding the trunk of a felled palm and charcoal dust was rubbed into the cuts (Hill and Hurtado 1996).
On The Reservation
In 1989 the Aché still continued their foraging way of life but in later years most have begun to live on reservations or mix the foraging lifestyle with reservation life and agriculture. Four out of the five settlements have religious affiliation with either Protestants or Catholics. In the reservation, the economy consists of swidden agriculture, some foraging, and wage labor. Hunting has seriously diminished in importance in recent years. Even with experimenting with cash crops and an increase in wage labor, the mean net worth of each house continues to be low. Today, slash and burn agriculture and the raising of domestic animals are the main subsistence strategies of the Aché on reservations. These slow economic changes have also brought about social changes. Firstly, marriage is more monogamous and divorce rates have diminished (through the influence of the Church). Some rituals have been abandoned, such as lip-piercing, scarification, and clubfighting and other cultural traits are decreasing such as puberty ceremonies, singing, body decorations. Also, the Aché language is disappearing as Guarani, the lingua franca of rural Paraguay, is often spoken (Hill 1994).
Today, the political structure has changed some as young men now have the greatest influence in the community. Also, Aché who lived with Paraguans, whom tend to be better educated and aggressive, are wielding their power to put down the Aché of the forest. The elders continue to wield their power by grumbling and complaining, but they do not get involved in formal leadership roles. There are three chiefs who represent the community legally and settle disputes. Even with the powerful religious influences in their daily lives, the Aché continue to engage in extra- and premarital sex, they sometimes commit infanticide, they lie, steal, cheat, gamble, and beat their wives. They continue to share their food, even with discouragement from missionaries, divorce frequently, drink alcohol, and use tobacco. The chants and songs that the Aché used to sing in the forest and during ceremonies have almost completely disappeared as the people were told by the missionaries that the chants were evil.
Even with the changes in subsistence strategies and changes in political structure, many aspects of the Aché continue to be the same. Births are still public, men and women flirt and touch each other, many children have multiple recognized fathers, there is frequent spouse switching, matrilocal residence, the female puberty ceremony is still practiced but without scarification, but the male puberty ceremony and club fights have been abandoned (Hill and Hurtado 1999).
Image from http://www.unm.edu/~kimhill/NPTC/photo2.jpg
Links
- Native Peoples and Tropical Conservation Fund is an organization that provides help for indigenous South Americans, such as the Aché. This organization is co-conducted by A. Magdalena Hurtado and Kim Hill, two anthropologists who lived with and studied the Aché for many years.
- La Liga Nativa por la Autonomía, Justicia y Ética (Native League for Autonomy, Justice and Ethics) is an indigenous organization that was formed in 2000 by Ache activists in order to combat poverty, violence, and to keep alive the Ache culture. The website is in Spanish.
Research Background
While the first description of the Aché people appear in the records of missionaries from the 1600's, there were no significant ethnographic studies until the mid-1900's (Hill and Hurtado 1999:92). Cadogan published his ethnographic research of the Aché in 1965, and Clastres published his work during the early 1970's. The most significant publications since that time have come from the ecological studies conducted mainly during the late 1970's and early 1980's by Hill, Hurtado, Hawkes, and Kaplan. The study during the early 1980's followed the Northern Aché who had started living in mission communities and practiced swidden agriculture along with up to two weeks of foraging each month (Kaplan et al. 1984:113). Hill, Hurtado, Hawkes, and Kaplan have produced over forty publications since the late 1970's from their work with the Aché.
References Cited
Gurven, M., K. Hill, and H. Kaplan.
2002 From Forest to Reservation: Transitions in Food-Sharing Behavior among the Aché of Paraguay. Journal of Anthropological Research 58(1): 93-120.
Hawkes, K., K. Hill, and J. F. O’Connell.
1982 Why Hunters Gather: Optimal Foraging and the Aché of Eastern Paraguay. American Ethnologist 9(2): 379-398.
Hill, K.
1993 Sixteen Years of Research with Aché Hunter-Gatherers. Anthroquest; The L.S.B. Leakey Foundation News 48: 9-11.
Hill, Kim and Magdalena Hurtado.
1996 Aché Life History. New York: Walter de Gruyter, Inc.
Hill, Kim
1994 The Ache. In Encyclopedia of World Cultures Volume 7. Johanes Wilbert ed. Pp. 3-7. Boston: Hall-Macmillan Press
Hill, Kim and A.M. Hurtado
1999 The Aché of Paraguay. In The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Hunters and Gatherers. R. Lee and R. Daly eds. Pp. 92-96. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Links to References
- From Forest to Reservation: Transitions in Food-Sharing Behavior among the Aché of Paraguay by M. Gurven, K. Hill, and H. Kaplan
- The Ache by K. Hill
- The Aché of Paraguay by K. Hill and A.M. Hurtado
