PRIMITIVE PANAMA TRIBE.

Shannon News, 19 August 1924, Page 1

PRIMITIVE PANAMA TRIBE.

The British Museum has required a remarkable ethnographical collection of objects used for domestic, religious, and warlike purposes by a tribe o& Indians living in a remote part of the isthmus of Panama, of whose, existence, it appears, nothing has hitherto been known. The tribe was discovered by Mr F. A. Mitchell-Hedges and Lady (Richmond) Bi>own, who have been engaged for two years in exploration and deep-sea research work in tlhe Caribbean Sea to the north of Panama. Landing from their yacht at the Gulf of San Bias, about '2OO miles east of the Panama Canal, they had. been engaged for some days giving medical aid to sick San Bias Indians (a comparatively' well-known tribe) f when the news of their magical ’powers, penetrating inland, brought' to the coast four men of adifferent tribe of Indians. They were known to the San Bias Indians as “Chucunaques,” but, according to the explorers, not even the white population of the Panama Republic, the territory within which they live, know anything of them. The explanation given of the seclusion and obscurity of the tribe is that few white people visit San Bias, as the uncharted waters of the gulf are difficult to navigate, and that the habitation of the Chucunaques is separted from San Bias by about twenty miles of dense and almost impenetrable forest and bush. If the Chucunaques had been heard of at all in Panama proper the talk was so vague and uncertain that their existence was regarded as mythical. The purpose of the visit of the four men 1 of the tribe to San Bias was to in- 1 vite the two explorers, as “magic I workers/’ to visit the tribe, among which, it was said, sickness was very rife. Smallpox Prevalent. Mr Mitichell-Hedges and Ladj Brown decided to undertake the expedition, and, with some San Bias Indians as interpreters, and the four Chucunaques as guides, they succeed* ed in reaching the place in two days, travelling partly by water and partly' on foot. The Panama Isthmus—that narrow neck of land connecting the American epntinents —is at its narrowest point at San Bias, being no more than 21 miles wide, so that the home of the Chucunaques—a clearing in the dense jungle—is rather near tlhe shore of the Bay of Panama, an arm of the Pacific on the south.

The explorers found smallpox very prevalent in tlie tribe. For ethnographical purposes, or the scientific study of the races of men t the most remarkable discovery was that the. Chujcunaques are a most primitive people, knowing nothing of tlhe uses of metal or even of stone. All their belongings, whether for domestic or other purposes, were of wood of bone, ‘ save for some pottery of the rudest kind that can be made by hand from clay. Living in the twentieth century, they recall a time antecedent to the Stone Age. The men and women of the tribe number about 6000, and there are numerous children. The average height of the adults is 4ft 6in. They live in open huts, and wear the scanty clothing common among the Indians of the Panama, and in their habits and customs resemble, to some extent their mor e civilised neighbours at San Bias. > Vividly-Coloured Cloths. Among the objects brought back by' Mr Mitchell-Herges and Lady Brown and presented to the museum are earthenware braziers, necklaces made of the bones and teeth of rodents and sharks, also of quills and shells, and such weapons as wooden clubs, bows and arrows. A most interesting part of the collection is a large number of vividlycoloured .cloths of applique work, with intricate patterns, purely formal or representative of human beings, beasts, birds, and reptiles. The materials are obtained by trade with the San Bias who get them from Panama or some other part of America. But the patch-work designs with which they are decorated are done ?)y the Ch’ucunaques by cutting narrow strips of the cloth and stitching them with needle and thread on the orange, crimson, and blue backgrounds. They show a barbaric taste in colour and design. The use to which the clothes are put is obscure, but' it is supposed they are related in some way to religious rites and ceremonies. hzsomtheaingthfl2m dlofewkir ya..O The collection also includes some human figures rudely carved in wood, which, no doubt, are the gods of the tribe. All these are about the same size and no more than a foot and a half long. One of them resembles a parson of the eighteenth century in a low, broad hat and a long coat, (which suggests that a missionary once found his way to the Chucunaques; and another is like a sailor, indicating likewise some touch with the white man, as an explorer, at one time or another.