Post by WannabeDemonLord on Jul 23, 2020 17:14:09 GMT
I found this here: archive.org/stream/NativeSouthAmericansByPatriciaJ.Lyon/Native+South+Americans+by+Patricia+J.+Lyon_djvu.txt
THE DEMONS OR EVIL SPIRITS
Demons, who are legion, are called kamari, a term applied in a broader sense to
refer to anyone or anything repugnant, malevolent, or reprehensible. If the good
spirits keep themselves aloof from mere mortals, the demons consider human beings
(i.e., Campa) their legitimate prey. Indeed, it would appear that the hordes of evil
spirits in the universe are driven by an insatiable urge, automatically triggered, to
attack and inflict maximum damage upon any human being they encounter. The
breeze stirred by a passing demon ( atantsi kamari ) causes sickness; the attack of a
demon, or even the mere sight of one, causes either immediate death or a form of a
madness in which the victim does himself physical injury until he is finally killed by
his own people out of fear.
Sharinkaveni, the nethermost stratum of the universe, is the abode of vast
numbers of demons and is ruled over by the Lord of Demons, Korioshipiri. Belief in
the existence of Sharinkaveni is probably indigenous among the Campa since it was
reported more than two centuries ago (Adam 1890). But demons also abound on
the stratum of Kamaveni, the earth. Here they inhabit, not the ends of the earth as
do the good spirits, but actual Campa territory itself, lurking in its forests and
teeming in its waters, and thus constitute an ever-present danger.
Among the different kinds of terrestrial demons distinguished by the Campa,
the elite are the mankoite, who reside within the great cliffs of Campa territory.
They are described as human in form, but with mane-like hair, dressed in old
cushmas, with a red parasitic plant ( ananta ) instead of proper red macaw feathers
stuck in their wicker crowns. The mankoite are mighty demons, with powers
approaching those of the gods. A Campa who sees a mankoite can expect instan-
taneous death. Usually, however, the damage they do is to cause sickness by their
atantsi (the breeze of their passing). Living as they do in the cliffs overlooking the
rivers, their specialty is capturing the souls of children voyaging on the rivers with
their elders.
The katsivoreri are demons that live in caves in the hills and go abroad at night.
They are small, black creatures with wings, and each carries a smaller companion on
its back. From such a demon there emanates a light, which can be seen flying
through the air as the demon makes its nocturnal forays. The demon will attack any
human being it encounters, holding him with its powerful grip and driving its
gigantic penis into his body, thereby killing the victim or transforming him into
another katsivoreri.
Sashinti, another type of demon, is distinguished by its extreme thinness, a
quality which the Campa disparage, probably because they associate it with the
emaciation due to sickness. When a sashinti appears to someone, it “breaks” his
body into pieces, then reassembles and blows on them to revive him. The victim,
remembering fully what has happened to him, returns home to sicken and shortly
die.
The irampavanto are demons who raise opempe toucans ( Ramphastos cuvieri ) as
domesticated fowl. An irampavanto may appear to a man alone in the forest in the
form of an attractive woman, with an opempe on her shoulder, and excite him to
coitus. Or it may appear in the form of a man to a woman with the same results.
Afterwards, it informs its victim of the truth, thereby frightening him into helpless-
ness, and beats him “to death.” The victim later revives, returns home with full
remembrance of what has happened, sickens, and dies. Alternatively, the victim
becomes insane.
A mironi is a demon that takes the shape of a large tapir or mule with huge eyes
and a gigantic penis, or alternatively, of a little old man dressed in an old cushma,
carrying a walking stick, and possessing the same genital abnormality. In either
form it is a powerful demon. It will attack a solitary man in the forest, driving its
member into his body. The victim dies and is transformed into a female mironi.
A kasonkati likewise appears either as a large tapir or mule, or in human form.
This demon has a hole in one or both knees, into which it blows to produce a
fearful noise. It likes to kill people by crushing their bones.
The korinto are man-devouring monsters as big as houses. They are no longer to
be found in Campa territory; shamans long ago trapped them all in a cave near the
headwaters of the brook Tsikireni, a tributary of the Ene River.
The imposhitoniro and shonkatiniro are water demons who live in the whirl-
pools and bad passes of the river, where they wait to drown and eat voyagers
passing by. The father of the shonkatiniro is Tsomiriniro, who collects the souls of
drowned Campa in his stomach and then transforms them into virakocha to be the
husbands of his daughters. The keatsi are spirits in human form who live in the
rivers and lakes. They are not actually demons, for some are good and some are
bad. When a drowned person’s soul does not return to make noises, it is presumed
that the person still lives but has joined the keatsi.
In the foul places of the rivers and streams reside demons in the form of
zungaros marked with longitudinal stripes. They collect food wastes thrown into
the water and practice witchcraft with them, bringing sickness to those who ate the
food. A rainbow is the smoke from the campfire of one of these demons, or else,
some Campa believe, is the demon’s cushma. Both the demons and rainbows are
called oyechari or, alternatively, tsavirentsi . 4
Another kind of partially visible demon is the small whirlwinds or dust devils
that kick up dust and leaves and swirl around the clearings of the Campa settle-
ments from time to time. They are variously called kavionkari , tivionkari, and
shinkireri and are believed to cause atantsi sickness.
A number of insects are demons. The morpho butterfly ( Morpho sp.), called
santa or ankaro, is one example. Another is the owl butterfly ( Caligo sp.), called
maatsarantsi or “old clothes” because it has the drab color of old cushmas and is
supposed to be what becomes of the old clothing of a bad person when he dies. The
adult ant lion or shienti (fam. Murmeleonidae ), with its thin body, is also a demon.
All these insects cause sickness. In addition, the scorpion ( kitoniro ) is a demon, and
all verminous insects are believed to be of demonic provenience.
A number of birds are demons, including all owls ( mamaro ), the vulture ( tisoni ),
and the aroni, an unidentified large black bird of rapine with a white breast. The
drab-colored hummingbird tsnsanti is unique among the hummingbirds in being
regarded as a demon. Several other species of birds are also believed to be demons,
as well as a number of animals including jaguars (rnaniti ), bats (pihiri ), and rabbits
( kima ).
The Campa have also adopted the widespread pishitako belief of the Peruvian
Highlands, according to the Campa form of which there are diabolical Caucasians in
the towns who kill Campa to extract the grease from their bodies for use in
automobiles and airplanes. The Campa, indeed, cast a suspicious eye on all Cau-
casians; there is something demonic about them, for they are powerful yet not
benevolent, wealthy yet not generous. Are they human, are they mortal? There
appears to be a tendency for the Campa to consider the virakocha as mankoite.
Witchcraft constitutes a special category of demonic activity. The Campa term
for witch is matsi, and the Campa believe in the existence of both human and
nonhuman witches. Nonhuman witches are the various species of ants and bees.
They take food refuse and exuviae to their nests to practice witchcraft upon them,
producing sickness in the individual from whom the materials came. The symptoms
vary with the species of ant or bee involved. When someone falls ill, and the
shaman’s diagnosis is that a particular species of ant or bee is causing the sickness
by witchcraft, the members of the community go out to search for the nests of
these insects in the vicinity, to destroy them and with this hopefully the materials
being used for witchcraft.
Human witches are almost always children, usually girls, who bury such mate-
rials as pieces of mat, bones, and manioc cores around the house; these materials
then enter someone’s body and make him seriously ill. Children are seduced into
witchcraft by any of a number of species of demonic insects and birds. The
katydids shiinti and tsinaro (fam. Tettigoniidae) and the cricket tsivivinti (fam.
Gryllidae) are demons that teach witchcraft to children. There is also supposed to
be an insect which only witches can see, called tsempokiririti, that does the same.
The birds tsivani (the squirrel cuckoo, Piaya cay ana) and eentiopeti (unidentified)
are likewise demons that teach witchcraft to children. When they appear to children
for this purpose, they do so in human form. A child approached in this way is
innocent but defenseless, and once it becomes a witch it is a social menace. When a
shaman diagnoses an illness as being due to human witchcraft, he designates some
child in the community, perhaps even in the victim’s family, as the witch. This child
is treated brutally and forced to dig up the materials it has buried. If the victim
recovers, the accused child may be let off with a warning to desist from further
witchcraft; if the victim dies, however, the child is killed or traded to the Cau-
casians.
The demons of the Campa universe are both real and imaginary beings that
embody some combination of repulsiveness and harmfulness. The qualities which
the Campa consider demonic can be identified with particular clarity in the demons
that are not wholly imaginary. Whatever can do serious physical harm to human
beings is a demon; thus jaguars and blood-sucking bats are demons. Whatever is
excessively thin, thereby recalling the emaciation due to severe illness, is a demon;
therefore the extremely thin shienti (adult ant lion) is a demon. Whatever has the
drab color of decay— the color that the Campa call kamara or kamarari— is a demon;
therefore the drab-colored hummingbird tsiisanti and the butterfly maatsarantsi are
demons. 5 Whatever appears to be other than it is— whatever presents a false
app earance— is a demon; therefore the katydids shiinti and tsinaro, insects that look
like leaves, are demons. Whatever would serve as a bad example for human
imitation is a demon; therefore the tsivani, a bird that is not only ugly in Campa
eyes but also a slovenly nest-builder, is a demon. The same qualities, in various
combinations, are attributed to the imaginary demons as well. It is the imaginary
demons who do the greatest harm in inducing sickness, madness, and death; if they
wear clothes, it is old clothes ( maatsarantsi ) with their characteristic kamara color;
and one important category of demons— sashinti— is distinguished precisely by its
extreme thinness.
Certain other characteristics which are repulsive or even frightening to the
Campa are attributed to some of their imaginary demons. Among these character-
istics are old age, with its decay and presentiment of death, and excessive sexuality;
thus some demons are seen as little old men, and some are visualized as possessing
enormous genitalia. The Campa themselves, of course, do not make such interpreta-
tions as these; they are content to recognize the several categories of demons with
their distinguishing characteristics. But Campa demonology does appear to lend
itself to this kind of interpretation.
THE DEMONS OR EVIL SPIRITS
Demons, who are legion, are called kamari, a term applied in a broader sense to
refer to anyone or anything repugnant, malevolent, or reprehensible. If the good
spirits keep themselves aloof from mere mortals, the demons consider human beings
(i.e., Campa) their legitimate prey. Indeed, it would appear that the hordes of evil
spirits in the universe are driven by an insatiable urge, automatically triggered, to
attack and inflict maximum damage upon any human being they encounter. The
breeze stirred by a passing demon ( atantsi kamari ) causes sickness; the attack of a
demon, or even the mere sight of one, causes either immediate death or a form of a
madness in which the victim does himself physical injury until he is finally killed by
his own people out of fear.
Sharinkaveni, the nethermost stratum of the universe, is the abode of vast
numbers of demons and is ruled over by the Lord of Demons, Korioshipiri. Belief in
the existence of Sharinkaveni is probably indigenous among the Campa since it was
reported more than two centuries ago (Adam 1890). But demons also abound on
the stratum of Kamaveni, the earth. Here they inhabit, not the ends of the earth as
do the good spirits, but actual Campa territory itself, lurking in its forests and
teeming in its waters, and thus constitute an ever-present danger.
Among the different kinds of terrestrial demons distinguished by the Campa,
the elite are the mankoite, who reside within the great cliffs of Campa territory.
They are described as human in form, but with mane-like hair, dressed in old
cushmas, with a red parasitic plant ( ananta ) instead of proper red macaw feathers
stuck in their wicker crowns. The mankoite are mighty demons, with powers
approaching those of the gods. A Campa who sees a mankoite can expect instan-
taneous death. Usually, however, the damage they do is to cause sickness by their
atantsi (the breeze of their passing). Living as they do in the cliffs overlooking the
rivers, their specialty is capturing the souls of children voyaging on the rivers with
their elders.
The katsivoreri are demons that live in caves in the hills and go abroad at night.
They are small, black creatures with wings, and each carries a smaller companion on
its back. From such a demon there emanates a light, which can be seen flying
through the air as the demon makes its nocturnal forays. The demon will attack any
human being it encounters, holding him with its powerful grip and driving its
gigantic penis into his body, thereby killing the victim or transforming him into
another katsivoreri.
Sashinti, another type of demon, is distinguished by its extreme thinness, a
quality which the Campa disparage, probably because they associate it with the
emaciation due to sickness. When a sashinti appears to someone, it “breaks” his
body into pieces, then reassembles and blows on them to revive him. The victim,
remembering fully what has happened to him, returns home to sicken and shortly
die.
The irampavanto are demons who raise opempe toucans ( Ramphastos cuvieri ) as
domesticated fowl. An irampavanto may appear to a man alone in the forest in the
form of an attractive woman, with an opempe on her shoulder, and excite him to
coitus. Or it may appear in the form of a man to a woman with the same results.
Afterwards, it informs its victim of the truth, thereby frightening him into helpless-
ness, and beats him “to death.” The victim later revives, returns home with full
remembrance of what has happened, sickens, and dies. Alternatively, the victim
becomes insane.
A mironi is a demon that takes the shape of a large tapir or mule with huge eyes
and a gigantic penis, or alternatively, of a little old man dressed in an old cushma,
carrying a walking stick, and possessing the same genital abnormality. In either
form it is a powerful demon. It will attack a solitary man in the forest, driving its
member into his body. The victim dies and is transformed into a female mironi.
A kasonkati likewise appears either as a large tapir or mule, or in human form.
This demon has a hole in one or both knees, into which it blows to produce a
fearful noise. It likes to kill people by crushing their bones.
The korinto are man-devouring monsters as big as houses. They are no longer to
be found in Campa territory; shamans long ago trapped them all in a cave near the
headwaters of the brook Tsikireni, a tributary of the Ene River.
The imposhitoniro and shonkatiniro are water demons who live in the whirl-
pools and bad passes of the river, where they wait to drown and eat voyagers
passing by. The father of the shonkatiniro is Tsomiriniro, who collects the souls of
drowned Campa in his stomach and then transforms them into virakocha to be the
husbands of his daughters. The keatsi are spirits in human form who live in the
rivers and lakes. They are not actually demons, for some are good and some are
bad. When a drowned person’s soul does not return to make noises, it is presumed
that the person still lives but has joined the keatsi.
In the foul places of the rivers and streams reside demons in the form of
zungaros marked with longitudinal stripes. They collect food wastes thrown into
the water and practice witchcraft with them, bringing sickness to those who ate the
food. A rainbow is the smoke from the campfire of one of these demons, or else,
some Campa believe, is the demon’s cushma. Both the demons and rainbows are
called oyechari or, alternatively, tsavirentsi . 4
Another kind of partially visible demon is the small whirlwinds or dust devils
that kick up dust and leaves and swirl around the clearings of the Campa settle-
ments from time to time. They are variously called kavionkari , tivionkari, and
shinkireri and are believed to cause atantsi sickness.
A number of insects are demons. The morpho butterfly ( Morpho sp.), called
santa or ankaro, is one example. Another is the owl butterfly ( Caligo sp.), called
maatsarantsi or “old clothes” because it has the drab color of old cushmas and is
supposed to be what becomes of the old clothing of a bad person when he dies. The
adult ant lion or shienti (fam. Murmeleonidae ), with its thin body, is also a demon.
All these insects cause sickness. In addition, the scorpion ( kitoniro ) is a demon, and
all verminous insects are believed to be of demonic provenience.
A number of birds are demons, including all owls ( mamaro ), the vulture ( tisoni ),
and the aroni, an unidentified large black bird of rapine with a white breast. The
drab-colored hummingbird tsnsanti is unique among the hummingbirds in being
regarded as a demon. Several other species of birds are also believed to be demons,
as well as a number of animals including jaguars (rnaniti ), bats (pihiri ), and rabbits
( kima ).
The Campa have also adopted the widespread pishitako belief of the Peruvian
Highlands, according to the Campa form of which there are diabolical Caucasians in
the towns who kill Campa to extract the grease from their bodies for use in
automobiles and airplanes. The Campa, indeed, cast a suspicious eye on all Cau-
casians; there is something demonic about them, for they are powerful yet not
benevolent, wealthy yet not generous. Are they human, are they mortal? There
appears to be a tendency for the Campa to consider the virakocha as mankoite.
Witchcraft constitutes a special category of demonic activity. The Campa term
for witch is matsi, and the Campa believe in the existence of both human and
nonhuman witches. Nonhuman witches are the various species of ants and bees.
They take food refuse and exuviae to their nests to practice witchcraft upon them,
producing sickness in the individual from whom the materials came. The symptoms
vary with the species of ant or bee involved. When someone falls ill, and the
shaman’s diagnosis is that a particular species of ant or bee is causing the sickness
by witchcraft, the members of the community go out to search for the nests of
these insects in the vicinity, to destroy them and with this hopefully the materials
being used for witchcraft.
Human witches are almost always children, usually girls, who bury such mate-
rials as pieces of mat, bones, and manioc cores around the house; these materials
then enter someone’s body and make him seriously ill. Children are seduced into
witchcraft by any of a number of species of demonic insects and birds. The
katydids shiinti and tsinaro (fam. Tettigoniidae) and the cricket tsivivinti (fam.
Gryllidae) are demons that teach witchcraft to children. There is also supposed to
be an insect which only witches can see, called tsempokiririti, that does the same.
The birds tsivani (the squirrel cuckoo, Piaya cay ana) and eentiopeti (unidentified)
are likewise demons that teach witchcraft to children. When they appear to children
for this purpose, they do so in human form. A child approached in this way is
innocent but defenseless, and once it becomes a witch it is a social menace. When a
shaman diagnoses an illness as being due to human witchcraft, he designates some
child in the community, perhaps even in the victim’s family, as the witch. This child
is treated brutally and forced to dig up the materials it has buried. If the victim
recovers, the accused child may be let off with a warning to desist from further
witchcraft; if the victim dies, however, the child is killed or traded to the Cau-
casians.
The demons of the Campa universe are both real and imaginary beings that
embody some combination of repulsiveness and harmfulness. The qualities which
the Campa consider demonic can be identified with particular clarity in the demons
that are not wholly imaginary. Whatever can do serious physical harm to human
beings is a demon; thus jaguars and blood-sucking bats are demons. Whatever is
excessively thin, thereby recalling the emaciation due to severe illness, is a demon;
therefore the extremely thin shienti (adult ant lion) is a demon. Whatever has the
drab color of decay— the color that the Campa call kamara or kamarari— is a demon;
therefore the drab-colored hummingbird tsiisanti and the butterfly maatsarantsi are
demons. 5 Whatever appears to be other than it is— whatever presents a false
app earance— is a demon; therefore the katydids shiinti and tsinaro, insects that look
like leaves, are demons. Whatever would serve as a bad example for human
imitation is a demon; therefore the tsivani, a bird that is not only ugly in Campa
eyes but also a slovenly nest-builder, is a demon. The same qualities, in various
combinations, are attributed to the imaginary demons as well. It is the imaginary
demons who do the greatest harm in inducing sickness, madness, and death; if they
wear clothes, it is old clothes ( maatsarantsi ) with their characteristic kamara color;
and one important category of demons— sashinti— is distinguished precisely by its
extreme thinness.
Certain other characteristics which are repulsive or even frightening to the
Campa are attributed to some of their imaginary demons. Among these character-
istics are old age, with its decay and presentiment of death, and excessive sexuality;
thus some demons are seen as little old men, and some are visualized as possessing
enormous genitalia. The Campa themselves, of course, do not make such interpreta-
tions as these; they are content to recognize the several categories of demons with
their distinguishing characteristics. But Campa demonology does appear to lend
itself to this kind of interpretation.