Tapirapé: Tribo tupi no Brasil Central

The Tapirapé River flows into the Araguaia from the west at a point approximately 10 degrees 40 minutes south of the Equator. Tampiitaua, a Tapirapé Indian settlement located on the Tapirapé River, was visited by ethnographer Herbert Baldus on two field trips, in 1935 and 1947. The results of these expeditions were reported in the Revista do Arguivo Municipal (XCVI-CV, CVII-CXXIV, CXXVII, São Paulo, 1944-1948) and in O Estado de São Paulo, October/November, 1947. The publication of the present volume not only makes these results more accessible, but also provides an opportunity for Professor Baldus to amplify his observations and to share with his readers the wealth of information which he has gathered over a period of some thirty-five years devoted to studying the past and the present of the indigenous population of Brazil. Also included are the results of a medical examination of the Tapirapé administered by Dr. Haroldo Cândido de Oliveira, Baldus’ companion on his 1947 field trip; and anthropometric data organized by Emílio Willems, based on measurements of the entire adult Tapirapé population—thirty-one individuals—taken in 1948 by Harald Schultz. Chapters are devoted to such topics as the physical setting, the name and provenience of the tribe, contact with whites, contact with other Indians, demography, physical appearance and adornment, the village and the house, subsistence, nutrition, industry, and life cycle of the individual, social organization, religion, games and handicrafts, numbers and concept of time, health, and the visitor-tribe relationship. The bibliography gives a clue to the years of thought and research which inform the author’s appreciation of Tapirapé culture.