cucamas

Updated: May 9, 2025

The good fellowship of our Cucamas seemed to arise not from warm sympathy, but simply from the absence of eager selfishness in small matters. On the morning when the favourable wind sprung up, one of the crew, a lad of about seventeen years of age, was absent ashore at the time of starting, having gone alone in one of the montarias to gather wild fruit.

Henry Walter Bates - The Naturalist on the River Amazons

None of them were tattooed or disfigured in any way and they were all quite destitute of beard. The Cucamas are notorious on the river for their provident habits. The desire of acquiring property is so rare a trait in Indians, that the habits of these people are remarked on with surprise by the Brazilians.

Henry Walter Bates - The Naturalist on the River Amazons

Our crew was composed of ten Indians of the Cucama nation, whose native country is a portion of the borders of the upper river in the neighbourhood of Nauta, in Peru. The Cucamas speak the Tupi language, using, however, a harsher accent than is common amongst the semi-civilised Indians from Ega downwards.

Henry Walter Bates - The Naturalist on the River Amazons