bahamawrecker
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« Reply #4 on: August 30, 2007, 11:04:20 PM »
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Living among the Cumanagotos.
I have been living for 17 years among the Amerindian tribe of the Cumanagotos. For the last 12 years actually within their community.
Unfortunately the Cumanagotos have lost most of their tradition, language and history. Only in very recent times they have regained some interest in their past and started to build some pride in their history.
So it is that sometimes they tell me about some legend, or ask me to help them to uncover their lost history.
I have started to search for historic accounts, starting with Christopher Columbus, who, by the way, stated that this part of the world is truly a paradise. Well, I can attest that he told the truth, I am living in paradise. (Objectively)
But not always do I agree with the historians, even if I am well aware that many things have changed dramatically over the last 500 years.
An example is the account of Sir Walther Raleigh. What did he intend with his fantastic tales about gold and Eldorado? Did he just try to save his neck? Well he lost it anyway.
But some of the, I admit, rather strange stories from my Cumanagoto friends sounded just as incredible. Were they telling a similar story in their own way?
I could not go to check out the tales myself, because of my health, but my partner made a trip to the Guiana highlands to verify some rumors.
The stone tools are from this trip. These tools are made of polished stone. Some seen to be older than the others, at least they show much more �weathering�.
I find it strange that these tools were shaped and sharpened by grinding and polishing, when it is much easier to produce very sharp edges by splitting and chipping the stone.
This is not my field of expertize, but could that possibly mean that these stone knifes and axes were made for ceremonial purpose?
The gold nuggets are also from this trip. Gold is indeed plentiful there.
Here are a few snippets out of Sir Walter Raleigh�s account of his intent to explore the Guiana highlands.
On Thursday, the sixth of February, in the year 1595, we departed England
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I wandered 400
miles into the said country by land and river; the particulars I will leave to the following discourse.
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The country hath more quantity of gold, by manifold, than the best parts of the Indies,
or Peru. All the most of the kings of the borders are already become her Majesty�s
vassals, and seem to desire nothing more than her Majesty�s protection and the return of
the English nation. It hath another ground and assurance of riches and glory than the
voyages of the West Indies; an easier way to invade the best parts thereof than by the
common course. The king of Spain is not so impoverished by taking three or four port
towns in America as we suppose; neither are the riches of Peru or Nueva Espana so left
by the sea side as it can be easily washed away with a great flood, or spring tide, or left
dry upon the sands on a low ebb. The port towns are few and poor in respect of the rest
within the land, and are of little defence, and are only rich when the fleets are to
receive the treasure for Spain; and we might think the Spaniards very simple, having so
many horses and slaves, if they could not upon two days� warning carry all the gold
they have into the land, and far enough from the reach of our footmen, especially the
Indies being, as they are for the most part, so mountainous, full of woods, rivers, and marishes.
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Because there have been divers opinions conceived of the gold ore brought from
Guiana, and for that an alderman of London and an officer of her Majesty�s mint hath
given out that the same is of no price, I have thought good by the addition of these lines
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I found a clift in the same, from whence with daggers, and with the head of an axe, we got out some small quantity thereof; of which kind of white stone, wherein gold is engendered, we saw divers hills and rocks in every part of Guiana wherein we travelled. Of this there have been made many trials; and in London it was first assayed by Master Westwood, a refiner dwelling in Wood Street, and it held after the rate of twelve or thirteen thousand pounds a ton. Another sort was afterward tried by Master Bulmar, and Master Dimock, assay-master; and it held after the rate of three and twenty thousand pounds a ton. There was some of it again tried by Master Palmer, Comptroller of the Mint, and Master Dimock in Goldsmith�s Hall, and it held after six and twenty thousand and nine hundred pounds a ton. There was also at the same time, and by the same persons, a trial made of the dust of the said mine; which held eight pounds and six ounces weight of gold in the hundred. There was likewise at the same time a trial of an image of copper made in Guiana, which held a third part of gold, besides divers trials made in the country, and by others in London.
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there were five of the lords or little kings, which they call caciques in the West Indies,
in one chain, almost dead of famine, and wasted with torments. These are called in
their own language acarewana, and now of late since English, French, and Spanish, are
come among them, they call themselves captains, because they perceive that the
chiefest of every ship is called by that name. Those five captains in the chain were
called Wannawanare, Carroaori, Maquarima, Tarroopanama, and Aterima. So as both
to be revenged of the former wrong, as also considering that to enter Guiana by small
boats, to depart 400 or 500 miles from my ships, and to leave a garrison in my back
The empire of Guiana is directly east from Peru towards the sea, and lieth under the
equinoctial line; and it hath more abundance of gold than any part of Peru, and as many
or more great cities than ever Peru had when it flourished most. It is governed by the
same laws, and the emperor and people observe the same religion, and the same form
and policies in government as were used in Peru, not differing in any part. And I have
been assured by such of the Spaniards as have seen Manoa, the imperial city of Guiana,
which the Spaniards call El Dorado, that for the greatness, for the riches, and for the
excellent seat, it far exceedeth any of the world, at least of so much of the world as is
known to the Spanish nation. It is founded upon a lake of salt water of 200 leagues
long, like unto Mare Caspium. And if we compare it to that of Peru, and but read the
report of Francisco Lopez and others, it will seem more than credible; and because we
may judge of the one by the other, I thought good to insert part of the 120. chapter of
Lopez in his General History of the Indies, wherein he describeth the court
That is, �All the vessels of his house,
table, and kitchen, were of gold and silver, and the meanest of silver and copper for
strength and hardness of metal. He had in his wardrobe hollow statues of gold which
seemed giants, and the figures in proportion and bigness of all the beasts, birds, trees,
and herbs, that the earth bringeth forth; and of all the fishes that the sea or waters of his
kingdom breedeth. He had also ropes, budgets, chests, and troughs of gold and silver,
heaps of billets of gold, that seemed wood marked out13 to burn. Finally, there was
nothing in his country whereof he had not the counterfeit in gold. Yea, and they say,
the Ingas had a garden of pleasure in an island near Puna, where they went to recreate
themselves, when they would take the air of the sea, which had all kinds of gardenherbs,
flowers, and trees of gold and silver; an invention and magnificence till then never seen. Besides all this, he had an infinite quantity of silver and gold unwrought in Cuzco, which was lost by the death of Guascar, for the Indians hid it, seeing that the Spaniards took it, and sent it into Spain.� [Footnote 13: Rather, �split into logs.�]
And in the 117. chapter; Francisco Pizarro caused the gold and silver of Atabalipa to be
weighed after he had taken it, which Lopez setteth down in these words following:-�Hallaron cincuenta y dos mil marcos de buena plata, y un millon y trecientos y veinte y seis mil y quinientos pesos de oro.� Which is, �They found 52,000 marks of good silver, and 1,326,500 pesos of gold.� Now, although these reports may seem strange, yet if we consider the many millions which are daily brought out of Peru into Spain, we may easily believe the same. For we find that by the abundant treasure of that country the Spanish king vexes all the princes of Europe, and is become, in a few years, from a poor king of Castile, the greatest monarch of this part of the world, and likely every day to increase if other princes forslow the good occasions offered, and suffer him to add this empire to the rest, which by far exceedeth all the rest. If his gold now endanger us, he will then be unresistible. Such of the Spaniards as afterwards
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But Martinez, not desirous to stay, obtained the favour of Inga to depart; with whom he sent divers Guianians to conduct him to the river of Orenoque, all loaden with as much gold as they could carry, which he gave to Martinez at his departure. But when he was arrived near the river�s side, the borderers which are called Orenoqueponi17 robbed him and his Guianians of all the treasure (the borderers being at that time at wars, which Inga had not conquered) save only of two great bottles of gourds, which were filled with beads of gold curiously wrought, which those Orenoqueponi thought had been no other thing than his drink or meat, or grain for food, with which Martinez had liberty to pass. And so in canoas he fell down from the river of Orenoque to Trinidad, and from thence to Margarita, and so to St. Juan del Puerto Rico; where, remaining a long time for passage into Spain, he died. In the time of his extreme sickness, and when he was without hope of life, receiving the sacrament at the hands of his confessor, he delivered these things, with the relation of his travels, and also called for his calabazas or gourds of the gold beads, which he gave to the church and friars, to be prayed for.
[Footnote 16: Ere.]
[Footnote 17: �On the Orinoco.� Poni is a Carib postposition meaning �on.�]
This Martinez was he that christened the city of Manoa by the name of El Dorado, and,
as Berreo informed me, upon this occasion, those Guianians, and also the borderers,
and all other in that tract which I have seen, are marvellous great drunkards; in which
vice I think no nation can compare with them; and at the times of their solemn feasts,
when the emperor carouseth with his captains, tributaries, and governors, the manner is
thus. All those that pledge him are first stripped naked and their bodies anointed all
over with a kind of white balsamum (by them called curca), of which there is great
plenty, and yet very dear amongst them, and it is of all other the most precious,
whereof we have had good experience. When they are anointed all over, certain
servants of the emperor, having prepared gold made into fine powder, blow it thorough
hollow canes upon their naked bodies, until they be all shining from the foot to the
head; and in this sort they sit drinking by twenties and hundreds.
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and saved among those that escaped; who witnessed what opinion is held among the Spaniards thereabouts of the great riches of Guiana, and El Dorado, the city of Inga. Another Spaniard was brought aboard me by Captain Preston, who told me in the hearing of himself and divers other gentlemen, that he met with Berreo�s campmaster at Caracas, when he came from the borders of Guiana, and that he saw with him forty of most pure plates of gold, curiously wrought, and swords of Guiana decked and inlaid with gold, feath-ers garnished with gold, and divers rarities, which he carried to the Spanish king.
After Hernandez de Serpa, it was undertaken by the Adelantado, Don Gonzalez
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Although, as I am persuaded, Guiana cannot be entered that way, yet no doubt the trade
of gold from thence passeth by branches of rivers into the river of Amazons, and so it
doth on every hand far from the country itself; for those Indians of Trinidad have plates
of gold from Guiana, and those cannibals of Dominica which dwell in the islands by
which our ships pass yearly to the West Indies, also the Indians of Paria, those Indians
called Tucaris, Chochi, Apotomios, Cumanagotos, and all those other nations inhabiting near about the mountains that run from Paria thorough the province of Venezuela, and in Maracapana, and the cannibals of Guanipa, the Indians called Assawai, Coaca, Ajai, and the rest (all which shall be described in my description as they are situate) have plates of gold of Guiana. And upon the river of Amazons, Thevet writeth that the people wear croissants of gold, for of that form the Guianians most commonly make them; so as from Dominica to Amazons, which is above 250 leagues, all the chief Indians in all parts wear of those plates of Guiana. Undoubtedly those that trade [with] Amazons return much gold, which (as is aforesaid) cometh by trade from Guiana, by some branch of a river that falleth from the country into Amazons, and either it is by the river which passeth by the nations called Tisnados, or by Caripuna.
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