Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 2 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
- Page 96 of 208 - First - Home
We Did Not
Arrive Till Very Late At The Foot Of The Great Cataract, In A Bay
Called The Lower Harbour (Puerto De Abaxo); And We Followed, Not
Without Difficulty, In A Dark Night, The Narrow Path That Leads To The
Mission Of Atures, A League Distant From The River.
We crossed a plain
covered with large blocks of granite.
The little village of San Juan Nepomuceno de los Atures was founded by
the Jesuit Francisco Gonzales, in 1748. In going up the river this is
the last of the Christian missions that owe their origin to the order
of St. Ignatius. The more southern establishments, those of Atabapo,
of Cassiquiare, and of Rio Negro, were formed by the fathers of the
Observance of St. Francis. The Orinoco appears to have flowed
heretofore where the village of Atures now stands, and the flat
savannah that surrounds the village no doubt formed part of the river.
I saw to the east of the mission a succession of rocks, which seemed
to have been the ancient shore of the Orinoco. In the lapse of ages
the river has been impelled westward, in consequence of the
accumulations of earth, which occur more frequently on the side of the
eastern mountains, that are furrowed by torrents. The cataract bears
the name of Mapara,* as we have mentioned above (* I am ignorant of
the etymology of this word, which I believe means only a fall of
water. Gili translates into Maypure a small cascade (raudalito) by
uccamatisi mapara canacapatirri. Should we not spell this word
matpara? mat being a radical of the Maypure tongue, and meaning bad
(Hervas, Saggio N. 29). The radical par (para) is found among American
tribes more than five hundred leagues distant from each other, the
Caribs, Maypures, Brazilians, and Peruvians, in the words sea, rain,
water, lake. We must not confound mapara with mapaja; this last word
signifies, in Maypure and Tamanac, the papaw or melon-tree, no doubt
on account of the sweetness of its fruit, for mapa means in the
Maypure, as well as in the Peruvian and Omagua tongues, the honey of
bees. The Tamanacs call a cascade, or raudal, in general uatapurutpe;
the Maypures, uca.); while the name of the village is derived from
that of the nation of Atures, now believed to be extinct. I find on
the maps of the seventeenth century, Island and Cataract of Athule;
which is the word Atures written according to the pronunciation of the
Tamanacs, who confound, like so many other people, the consonants l
and r. This mountainous region was so little known in Europe, even in
the middle of the eighteenth century, that D'Anville, in the first
edition of his South America, makes a branch issue from the Orinoco,
near Salto de los Atures, and fall into the Amazon, to which branch he
gives the name of Rio Negro.
Early maps, as well as Father Gumilla's work, place the Mission in
latitude 1 degree 30 minutes. Abbe Gili gives it 3 degrees 50 minutes.
I found, by meridian altitudes of Canopus and a of the Southern Cross,
5 degrees 38 minutes 4 seconds for the latitude; and by the
chronometer 4 hours 41 minutes 17 seconds of longitude west of the
meridian of Paris.
We found this small Mission in the most deplorable state. It
contained, even at the time of the expedition of Solano, commonly
called the expedition of the boundaries, three hundred and twenty
Indians. This number had diminished, at the time of our passage by the
Cataracts, to forty-seven; and the missionary assured us that this
diminution became from year to year more sensible. He showed us, that
in the space of thirty-two months only one marriage had been entered
in the registers of the parish church. Two others had been contracted
by uncatechised natives, and celebrated before the Indian Gobernador.
At the first foundation of the Mission, the Atures, Maypures,
Meyepures, Abanis, and Quirupas, had been assembled together. Instead
of these tribes we found only Guahibos, and a few families of the
nation of Macos. The Atures have almost entirely disappeared; they are
no longer known, except by the tombs in the cavern of Ataruipe, which
recall to mind the sepulchres of the Guanches at Teneriffe. We learned
on the spot, that the Atures, as well as the Quaquas, and the Macos or
Piaroas, belong to the great stock of the Salive nations; while the
Maypures, the Abanis, the Parenis, and the Guaypunaves, are of the
same race as the Cabres or Caveres, celebrated for their long wars
with the Caribs. In this labyrinth of petty nations, divided from one
another as the nations of Latium, Asia Minor, and Sogdiana, formerly
were, we can trace no general relations but by following the analogy
of tongues. These are the only monuments that have reached us from the
early ages of the world; the only monuments, which, not being fixed to
the soil, are at once moveable and lasting, and have as it were
traversed time and space. They owe their duration, and the extent they
occupy, much less to conquering and polished nations, than to those
wandering and half-savage tribes, who, fleeing before a powerful
enemy, carried along with them in their extreme wretchedness only
their wives, their children, and the languages of their fathers.
Between the latitudes of 4 and 8 degrees, the Orinoco not only
separates the great forest of the Parime from the bare savannahs of
the Apure, Meta, and Guaviare, but also forms the boundary between
tribes of very different manners. To the westward, over treeless
plains, wander the Guahibos, the Chiricoas, and the Guamos; nations,
proud of their savage independence, whom it is difficult to fix to the
soil, or habituate to regular labour. The Spanish missionaries
characterise them well by the name of Indios andantes (errant or
vagabond Indians), because they are perpetually moving from place to
place. To the east of the Orinoco, between the neighbouring sources of
the Caura, Cataniapo, and Ventuari, live the Macos, the Salives, the
Curacicanas, Parecas, and Maquiritares, mild, tranquil tribes,
addicted to agriculture, and easily subjected to the discipline of the
Missions.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 96 of 208
Words from 97003 to 98036
of 211397