Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 16, 2025
But the Guaranís, though a very wide-spread family of South American aborigines, were neither a conquering nor a wandering race. They occupied that part of the continent situated between the rivers Paraguay and Paraná, from where these two rivers join the river Plate, northward, to about latitude 22° south.
Their dances, though in a certain degree graceful, consist chiefly in stamping on the ground, balancing on one foot, and staggering in different attitudes as if intoxicated the music being generally monotonous and dismal. Mr Brett describes a curious trial of strength which the Guaranis exercise at their drinking bouts.
This region was the home of the Guaranís, a people indolent, sensual, and peaceful, among whom the Jesuits, in the eighteenth century founded a religious republic, which toward the end of that period counted 33 towns with a total population of over one hundred thousand souls.
The language of the Guaranis, a nation living on the banks of the Paraguay, is a dialect of it, and hence it is called by philologists the Tupi- Guarani language; printed grammars of it are always on sale at the shops of the Para booksellers.
When symptoms of puberty appeared on a girl for the first time, the Guaranis of Southern Brazil, on the borders of Paraguay, used to sew her up in her hammock, leaving only a small opening in it to allow her to breathe.
The two languages are still spoken in various parts of the country. The Guaranis were superior in civilisation to numerous other intervening and more isolated tribes, who had sunk by degrees into greater barbarism. Like the Quichuas, they were agriculturalists cultivating mandioca, maize, calabashes, and potatoes.
Thus they have become the facile tools of every leader who, by greater audacity, craft, or determination, has risen to authority among them. The Guaranis were the principal nation dwelling on the eastern portion of South America. They were probably the same race as the Quichuas, who inhabited the western shores, and a large portion of the Andes, under the rule of the Incas.
The tribes of the Guaranis, or Waraus, who once inhabited the eastern side of the continent, from the La Plata to the Orinoco, still exist, sunk still lower in barbarism even than formerly.
San Bias is the patron saint of the country, It is said he won for the Paraguayans a great victory in an early war. St. Cristobel receives much homage also because he helped the Virgin Mary to carry the infant Jesus across a river on the way to Egypt. Asuncion was for many years the recluse headquarters of the Jesuits, so of all enslaved Spanish-Americans probably the Guaranis are the worst.
"Well?" he said, "what is the latest news in anthropology?" "A very remarkable phenomenon," replied Challis. "That is what I have come to see you about." "I thought you were in Paraguay pigging it with the Guaranis " "No, no; I don't touch the Americas," interposed Challis. "I want all your attention, Elmer. This is important." "Come into my study," said Elmer, "and let us have the facts.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking