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The Caribbean Indians lived throughout the southern half of Central America, the northern
parts of what are now Colombia and Venezuela, and on the islands of the Caribbean Sea. Although this region lies in the tropics, sea breezes or high altitudes make the climate pleasant throughout the year.
Before European contact. Important Caribbean tribes included the Arawak of the islands and coastal areas, the Lenca and Cuna in Central America, and the Chibcha in Colombia. Most Caribbean Indians lived in thatched houses that stood around the center of the community. In the center were the chief's or king's dwelling and the temples. A palisade surrounded many towns. The chief was the leader of the town, but sometimes brave warriors were chosen to lead the tribe in war.
Warfare played an important part in Caribbean life. Success in battle led to higher rank for men, and the chief and other leaders had special privileges. The chief, for example, was expected to have several wives, and other members of the tribe cultivated his land. Warfare also enabled tribes to take captives and make them slaves.
Agriculture provided most of the food, but much came from the sea and rivers. Both men and women helped raise avocados, beans, cassava, corn, peanuts, peppers, pineapples, and sweet potatoes. Most of the tribes of the Caribbean area brewed a type of beer from corn.
Most of the people wore clothes of cotton cloth, which they wove on looms. The Arawak made their clothing of netting. The Caribbean Indians created excellent pottery and shaped gold and copper into a variety of ornaments and tools. Their weapons included spears and spear throwers, slings, clubs, and blowguns. Some tribes also used the bow and arrow.
The Caribbean Indians had elaborate religious beliefs and practices. Many worshiped tribal gods in the form of idols called zemis. The idols were made of such materials as bone, wood, or gold. The people had zemis in their homes, but the chief kept his in a temple. The people often made offerings to the chief's zemis, which they believed to be particularly powerful. Tobacco--either smoked or inhaled as snuff--was used in religious ceremonies.
After European contact. Columbus explored the Caribbean region on his four voyages, and Spanish explorers followed him. Thus, the Caribbean people were the first Indians to come into permanent contact with Europeans. The diseases brought by the Europeans killed many Indians, and many more died as slaves. Whole tribes were wiped out, and others fled to remote areas to escape the
Europeans people.
Soon, only a few Indian groups remained. But even these no longer lived as they had before the
Europeans arrived. Food was not so plentiful as it once had been, because the Europeans had driven the Indians onto poor land. The Indians no longer made pottery or wove cloth. They used whatever European manufactured goods they could afford. Their religion became a combination of the Roman Catholic faith and their earlier beliefs. Little of the Caribbean Indians' original way of life remains today.
Arawak, a once-predominant
group of Native Americans originally inhabiting an area that stretched from
present-day Florida down through the islands of the West Indies and the coastal
area of South America as far as southern Brazil. The group is in the Arawakan
linguistic family. The Arawak were the first natives of the Americas encountered
by the Italian-Spanish navigator Christopher Columbus.
A number of Arawak tribes have been extinct for several hundred years. Those of
the Lesser Antilles were subjugated in fighting with the Carib peoples in the
late 15th century. The Arawak population in the West Indies fell from a probable
2 to 3 million to a few thousand by the early 16th century; by the end of that
century, island Arawak were extinct. This catastrophic mortality rate was due to
the introduction of European diseases, damage to the Arawak's food supplies, and
Spanish brutality and enslavement.
Before the Spanish conquest, the large-island ecologies, offering bountiful
harvests and abundant fish, combined with the compact and stable island
populations, permitted the development of an elaborate political and social
structure. A class of hereditary chiefs ruled three other classes, the lowest of
which was composed of slaves. Conflict between classes was apparently minimal.
In this matrilineal society, rulers were succeeded by their eldest sister's
eldest son. Religion offered a hierarchy of deities parallel to the social
structure.
The Arawak tribes of South America better survived European contact because
their groups were smaller and more scattered. Their social structure was also
matrilineal but much less complex. Mainland Arawak traded with the Dutch and
English. In the 17th and 18th centuries they made a transition to plantation
agriculture.
In the 20th century the existing Arawak began to accept wage-paying jobs as a
supplement to farming, hunting, and fishing. Although their present-day culture
reflects various non-Arawak influences, this group has been noted since
pre-Columbian times as skilled potters, weavers, and wood- and metalworkers.
Today some 30,000 Arawak live in Guyana, with smaller numbers in Suriname and
French Guiana. Arawakan-speaking groups are also widespread in other parts of
South America.
Carib, tribe of Native
Americans of the Cariban linguistic stock, occupying various regions of South
and Central America. The Caribbean Sea is named after them. The Carib, who
probably originated in the valley of the Orinoco River, were noted for their
ferocity. The tribe practiced cannibalism; in fact, the word cannibal is derived
from the Spanish term for these Native Americans, Caníbales. During the late
15th century, the Carib inhabited most of the islands of the Lesser Antilles and
the coast of what is now Venezuela, territories from which they had expelled the
Arawak people.
Carib men valued exploits in combat above all else. They were not organized into
a hierarchical structure under a chief, but fought as individual warriors and
raided other peoples. Male captives were tortured and eaten; female captives
became slave-wives.
The Carib were expert canoeists, and their fleets sometimes included 100
sail-fitted, dugout canoes. On land, they lived in small settlements, farmed and
fished, and hunted game with blowguns and bows and arrows. Carib communities
were generally made up of several matrilineal kin groups.
In the 17th century, when several European countries struggled for control of
the Lesser Antilles, the Carib were all but eliminated. Groups remained only on
the islands of Saint Vincent and Dominica. In 1796 the British government
deported almost all of the 5000 remaining members of the tribe from Saint
Vincent to Roatán Island off the coast of Honduras. They spread over the
neighboring mainland and today survive in Guatemala and on a reservation in
Dominica.
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