The Make-up of early Atalaya and Kokamas in Southern Ucayali
Wednesday afternoon I arrived in Atalaya (Ucayali, Peru) -- the furthest place a road reaches from the rest of the country -- with the goal of locating Church sacramental records related to the fabled Perara family, one member of which Caquintes have said was the labor boss (Sp. patrón) responsible for selling Western goods to local Asháninkas in the early 20th century in exchange for Caquinte women and children, who then served as prostitutes, slaves, and/or domestic servants here. Baptism and marriage records in the local Parroquia de San Antonio de Padua date back to 1929 -- not as early as I had hoped -- and return no information related to this family. (The shape of the surname is also strange, and it may take further investigation to determine what the name exactly was.) Nevertheless, I have gained an incredible insight into the multiethnic and multigeographic make-up of Atalaya and its surroundings in the late 1920s and 1930s, a crucial period in the history of the region following the decline of the rubber boom, but one in which relations between patrones and their peones were still in full effect.
Baptismal records include children of local Ashéninkas ("Campas") not originally born into the Church -- these are the most numerous -- as well as those of mestizo men and mestizo women, of mestizo men and indigenous women, and of indigenous men and indigenous women from outside the region. In fact, the shere distance between places of origin listed for parents of baptized children or the participants in a marriage ceremony truly give one a sense of the complete social havoc wrought by the rubber boom and its aftermath, during which mestizo men left their home areas forever, and indigenous people were continually moved around as part of forced labor groups. (White men needed indigenous people to locate and tap wild latex-producing trees. They kidnapped thousands of people, imposed impossible quotas, and, when those quotas were not met, tortured their workers in some of the worst ways imaginable.) The following map lists all of the specific localities north of Atalaya that mestizo and indigenous men and women originated from, as given in the information of parents of baptized children in the first 155 entries in Book 1 at this parish, ranging from 1929 to 1933, with a few coming from scattered entries from 1934 and 1935 that I did not have time to extract fully.
Other less specific locations north Atalaya that are mentioned in this same record set are the Javarí, Napo, Putumayo, and Tigre basins, and to the east (e.g., in Brazil) and south the Acre, Embira, Inambari, Manú, Las Piedras, Purús, Tambo, and Tarahuaca basins. Some were from Puerto Maldonado. Some records say simply "Brazil" or "Bolivia". Yet other specific locations seem to be closer to home, but I have not been able to locate them and in some cases the names were quite difficult to transcribe without prior knowledge of what they should be. These are (per my transcription): Soritor, Gaquidana, Huaro, Cumasia (perhaps Cumaseba on the Ucayali), and Callesias. Generally speaking, the lowland locations -- e.g., along the Ucayali proper -- are the origin of mothers, while the highland and foothills locations are the origin of fathers. This clearly reflects a pattern by which men emigrated from the highlands, married in lowland communities, and then moved further south. Some mestizo men, though, were born in the lowlands (e.g., in Requena), themselves the products of prior migrations of male ancestors into the region.
Between July 1929 and February 1933, two priests, L. García and Ángel Arellano, baptized in Atalaya itself and in the nearby communities of San Pablo (November 1929, August 1932), Huaira (April 1930), Puerto Piérola (August 1932), Puntijari (August 1932), Aupiria (sp.?) (August 1932), and Bolognesi (August 1932). (This is not a particularly large zone or ambitious plan on the part of the fathers.) Given common patterns by which labor bosses typically become the godfathers of indigenous children, during this time the families of Jorge Y. and Juan Sabas Díaz (perhaps brothers), Victor and Carlos Michelena (perhaps brothers), Manuel de la Cruz Mori, and Manuel Río Pezo appear to have been in charge in San Pablo; Francisco Vargas and José Ceballos in Huaira; Pedro Ríos Rojas in Puerto Piérola; and Sinforiano Pinedo in Puntijari. (There were certainly others whose role it is difficult to deduce from records.) In Atalaya proper these men were (minimally) Juan Alva, Celso Angulo, Rafael Blanco, Juan Javier de Castellano, Juan Ceballos, Ernesto and Pablo Mori (perhaps brothers), Calixto Otavalo, Miguel Pinedo, and Fabián and Gilberto Rivas. Indigenous individuals who did not traditionally carry their own surnames often took the names of these godparents (and in many cases the surnames of sole godmothers).
The children born in this period were often born outside of the communities in which they were baptized, and in many cases they were not baptized as early as they would have been had they lived in more established communities -- established at least within the Church's eyes. Although the first 81 baptismal entries do not list places of birth of children, the following locations are given beginning in May 1932 (some specific, some not; all locations are on Ucayali river unless indicated otherwise or followed by <R.> 'river'): Atalaya, Aupiria, Betijay, Bolognesi, Cerro Azul (?), Cumasia [sic] (?), Inahuaya, Lagarto, Madre de Dios (R.), Magnolia (?), Napo (R.), Nauta (Marañón R.), Orellana, Pacaya, El Pajonal (the great Ashéninka-dominated grasslands to the west of Atalaya), Las Piedras (R.), Puerto Piérola, Puntijari, Purús (R.), Putumayo (R.), San Francisco (Purús R.), San Pablo (?), Shepa [sic] (?), and Urubamba (R.). This suggests frequent movement between residence locations.
The oldest baptized person in this period was an Ashéninka woman named Victoria, born in an unknown place to unknown Ashéninka parents c1879 and baptized November 19, 1929 in Atalaya. The person baptized in this period who was born the furthest distance away is also the second-oldest baptized person, a Huitoto woman born on the Putumayo River to unknown parents c1882 and baptized Josefa (and who took the surname Vásquez) on October 4, 1932 in Atalaya. When indigenous people did not adopt a Hispanic surname (recall, often that of a godparent), they would occasionally take the exonym used to refer to their ethnolinguistic group as a surname. Surnames of this sort from the 1929-1933 period and outside in Atalaya baptism records include: Amahuaca, Campa, Chama, Cunibo, Huitota, Iquito, Machiganga/Machiguenga, and Pira; others are toponyms or hydronyms like Pajonal or Unini. More specifically, the Ashéninkas that the priests baptized during this period and in the few years after came from numerous nearby river drainages: Anacayali, Anaquiria, Ene, Pachitea, Perené, Pitza, Tambo, Ucayali, and Unini. It appears that many of these drainages did not come within the sphere of influence of Atalaya priests until a major set of expeditions in 1944 (which constitute baptism book 4). At this juncture one begins to see villages from further afield (e.g., Mayapo on the Tambo), and new indigenous surnames (e.g., Chumatari). A lot about Ashéninkas early contacts in this period could be gleaned from further study of this book.
Out of the first 155 entries, 20 were Ashéninkas with unknown parents (usually orphaned children but in a few cases adults). Yet others are children born to an Ashéninka mother and either an unknown or mestizo father. There are 16 more baptisms of this sort, yielding 23% of the first 155 baptisms being Ashéninka. Yines, an unrelated Arawak people, constitute the next most numerous group in this set, followed by Matsigenkas, an Arawak group fairly distantly related to Yines although in close geographical proximity.
In the remainder of this post I want to zoom in on a set of Kokama families who were present in three nearby communities in February and March of 1935 (caseríos dominated by mestizo individuals). Kokamas are traditionally a Tupí-Guaraní people of the lower Ucayali and Huallaga rivers, having spread throughout the lower Marañón in the first decades of the 19th century; their identity can be deduced from very unique surnames that have been in use at least since the early 19th century. These include at least the following couples, grouped by community of residence, with place of origin in parentheses:
Charara (Iparía River)
-Andrés Tamani (Nauta) & Teresa Arimuya (Nauta)
-Juan Tamani (Nauta) & Ignacia Yaicate (Nauta)
-Trinidad Tamani (Nauta) & Juana Silvano (Nauta)
-Santos Huanuiri (Nauta) & Paula Tamani (Nauta)
-Pedro Pacaya (Nauta) & Ana Silvano (Nauta)
Tabacoa (Ucayali River)
-Marcial Ahuanari (Nauta) & Sivania Pacaya (Nauta)
-Antonio Pacaya (Nauta) & Juana Silvano (Nauta)
-Santiago Silvano (Nauta) & Martina Ahuanari (Nauta)
-Antonio Silvano (c1909, Nauta) & Lucía Ahuanari (c1913, Nauta)
-Benito Pacaya (c1915, Nauta) & Elena Silvano (c1917, Nauta)
Cunchuri (Ucayali River)
-Santiago Murayari (Nauta) & Guillermina Aquituari (Iquitos)
-Antonio Murayari (Caballococha) & Juana Maricahua (Lagunas)
-Felix Pizango (Nauta) & Asunción Murayari (Bolivia)
-Cruz Murayari (Caballococha) & Rosa Ahuanari (Manú River)
-José Murayari (Caballococha) & Eugenia Sánchez (Contamana)
We see that all individuals in the Charara and Tabacoa groups were born in Nauta. The men of the Cunchuri group were born in either Nauta or Caballococha, while each of their wives was born in a different location. Out of all of the locations in the Cunchuri group, only Nauta and Lagunas (and, to a degree, Iquitos) are within traditional Kokama territory -- all others were probably born around the turn of the century in locations to which their families had been removed by caucheros ("rubber tappers").
In the Charara group, Andrés Tamani and his wife Teresa, although both themselves born in Nauta, had been in the upper Ucayali for a number of years: their son José, who married Luisa Silvano in 1941, was born in Manchari (yoper Ucayali) circa 1920; a younger set of twin girls, Clara and Julia, were born on the Iparía in April 1934. Similarly, Trinidad Tamani and his wife Juana had been in the region at least since circa 1920, when their daughter María was born on the Sheshea River. A younger daughter Lucilda was born on the Iparía in November 1934. Less is known about Juan Tamani, Santos Huanuiri, Pedro Pacaya, and their families, although they each had children born on the Iparía in 1934. At least one mestizo family in this community was the Olórteguis.
In the Tabacoa group, Marical Ahuanari and his wife Sivania were in Nauta as late as c1913, when their daughter Lucía was born there (she married Antonio Silvano in February 1935 in Tabacoa); but they were in Tabacoa by March 1934, when a son Marcos was born there. Antonio Pacaya was in Tabacoa by May 1934 (when daughter Rosa was born there), as was Santiago Silvano (when daughter Lucila Victoria was born there). Santiago and Antonio Silvano were probably brothers who married sisters. At least Antonio was born in Nauta c1909, son of Mariano and Mercedes Tamani. Benito Pacaya was born in Nauta c1915, son of Juan Pacaya and Paulina Mozombite (as was his wife Elena Silvano c1917, daughter of Mariano Silvano and Presentación Tamani), but he was in Tabacoa by October 1934, when son Benito was born there. He and Elena didn't marry in the Church until February 1935, in Tabacoa. At least one mestizo family, that of Emilio Vargas, was present in this community at this time.
The Charara and Tabacoa groups, which appear to be related to each other through the Silvano family in particular, are set apart from the Cunchuri group by the uniqueness of surnames among the latter, and their disparate birth locations. (This is with one exception, the Ahuanari surname.) Antonio and Santiago Murayari (perhaps brothers) were in Cunchuri as early as March 1928 and September 1929, respectively, when their children were born there. Felix Pizango was there as early as January 1930, and Cruz and José Murayari (perhaps brothers) as early as August 1929 and June 1932, respectively, when their children were born there.
Back in Atalaya, there were the families of Felipe Pacaya and Manuel Tamani. The former was born c1918 in Nauta to Luis Pacaya and Catalina Ahuanari, and married María Tamani in Atalaya in 1938. She was born c1920 on the Sheshea River to Trinidad Tamani and Juana Silvano. Manuel Tamani, the latter, was born in Manchari (upper Ucayali) c1920 to Fernando Tamani and Narcisa Silvano, both of Nauta, and married Amelia Saavedra in Atalaya in 1941. She was born c1923 to María Lila del Águila in Zamoya (exact location unknown). Fernando Tamani was probably a brother of Andrés Tamani of the Charara community: their sons were married on the same day, July 29, in Atalaya, suggesting a double wedding of first cousins.
Finally, we can see different points among sets of siblings in these groups. Antonio and Elena Silvano of the Iparía community are brother and sister, children of Mariano Silvano and Mercedes Tamani. And one José Tamani, married in Atalaya in 1941, is yet another child of Andrés Tamani and Teresa Arimuya, also of the Charara. And José's wife, Luisa Silvano (born in Tabacoa c1926), is the daughter of Miguel Silvano and Paula Tamani. Miguel is probably related to Mariano.
Ultimately these relationships should be quite easy to ascertain, as the baptismal records in the parish at Nauta survive in full back to the 1850s, and Kokamas have been largely Catholic for some time. What we see in general, though, appears to be two extended family groups, one spread across Charara and Tabacoa, and another at Cunchuri. This probably goes part way in explaining why the Wikipedia page for the District of Iparía claims Kokama heritage (thanks Kelsey Neely for pointing this out), but more importantly points at a much wider spread and understudied phenomenon in the historical linguistics of South America, namely the degree to which sizable populations of speakers of indigenous languages survived outside of their traditional territories in the decades immediately following the collapse of the rubber boom. (And we can be sure from other ethnolinguistic facts that any Kokama born in Nauta in the late 19th or early 20th centuries would have been a dominant speaker of Kokama, at least before they left the region.) This would have been a dialectalogically fascinating period to be a linguist -- i.e., the 1910s through 1940s -- but unfortunately speakers in these far-away places swiftly shifted either to more regionally dominant indigenous languages or to Spanish or Portuguese. I've written a little bit about this in the case of one Omagua family, the Huaníos in the upper Purús, here. In the 21st century it seems that the most we can do is assume that certain groups would have been speakers based on the locations of their birth and the time period, with little to say, though, about how rapidly shifts to other languages of these various regions occurred.
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| Baptisms, Book 1, Parroquia de San Antonio de Padua, Atalaya (1929-1938) |
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| Origins of Parents of Children Baptized in Atalaya (1929-1933) |
Between July 1929 and February 1933, two priests, L. García and Ángel Arellano, baptized in Atalaya itself and in the nearby communities of San Pablo (November 1929, August 1932), Huaira (April 1930), Puerto Piérola (August 1932), Puntijari (August 1932), Aupiria (sp.?) (August 1932), and Bolognesi (August 1932). (This is not a particularly large zone or ambitious plan on the part of the fathers.) Given common patterns by which labor bosses typically become the godfathers of indigenous children, during this time the families of Jorge Y. and Juan Sabas Díaz (perhaps brothers), Victor and Carlos Michelena (perhaps brothers), Manuel de la Cruz Mori, and Manuel Río Pezo appear to have been in charge in San Pablo; Francisco Vargas and José Ceballos in Huaira; Pedro Ríos Rojas in Puerto Piérola; and Sinforiano Pinedo in Puntijari. (There were certainly others whose role it is difficult to deduce from records.) In Atalaya proper these men were (minimally) Juan Alva, Celso Angulo, Rafael Blanco, Juan Javier de Castellano, Juan Ceballos, Ernesto and Pablo Mori (perhaps brothers), Calixto Otavalo, Miguel Pinedo, and Fabián and Gilberto Rivas. Indigenous individuals who did not traditionally carry their own surnames often took the names of these godparents (and in many cases the surnames of sole godmothers).
The children born in this period were often born outside of the communities in which they were baptized, and in many cases they were not baptized as early as they would have been had they lived in more established communities -- established at least within the Church's eyes. Although the first 81 baptismal entries do not list places of birth of children, the following locations are given beginning in May 1932 (some specific, some not; all locations are on Ucayali river unless indicated otherwise or followed by <R.> 'river'): Atalaya, Aupiria, Betijay, Bolognesi, Cerro Azul (?), Cumasia [sic] (?), Inahuaya, Lagarto, Madre de Dios (R.), Magnolia (?), Napo (R.), Nauta (Marañón R.), Orellana, Pacaya, El Pajonal (the great Ashéninka-dominated grasslands to the west of Atalaya), Las Piedras (R.), Puerto Piérola, Puntijari, Purús (R.), Putumayo (R.), San Francisco (Purús R.), San Pablo (?), Shepa [sic] (?), and Urubamba (R.). This suggests frequent movement between residence locations.
The oldest baptized person in this period was an Ashéninka woman named Victoria, born in an unknown place to unknown Ashéninka parents c1879 and baptized November 19, 1929 in Atalaya. The person baptized in this period who was born the furthest distance away is also the second-oldest baptized person, a Huitoto woman born on the Putumayo River to unknown parents c1882 and baptized Josefa (and who took the surname Vásquez) on October 4, 1932 in Atalaya. When indigenous people did not adopt a Hispanic surname (recall, often that of a godparent), they would occasionally take the exonym used to refer to their ethnolinguistic group as a surname. Surnames of this sort from the 1929-1933 period and outside in Atalaya baptism records include: Amahuaca, Campa, Chama, Cunibo, Huitota, Iquito, Machiganga/Machiguenga, and Pira; others are toponyms or hydronyms like Pajonal or Unini. More specifically, the Ashéninkas that the priests baptized during this period and in the few years after came from numerous nearby river drainages: Anacayali, Anaquiria, Ene, Pachitea, Perené, Pitza, Tambo, Ucayali, and Unini. It appears that many of these drainages did not come within the sphere of influence of Atalaya priests until a major set of expeditions in 1944 (which constitute baptism book 4). At this juncture one begins to see villages from further afield (e.g., Mayapo on the Tambo), and new indigenous surnames (e.g., Chumatari). A lot about Ashéninkas early contacts in this period could be gleaned from further study of this book.
Out of the first 155 entries, 20 were Ashéninkas with unknown parents (usually orphaned children but in a few cases adults). Yet others are children born to an Ashéninka mother and either an unknown or mestizo father. There are 16 more baptisms of this sort, yielding 23% of the first 155 baptisms being Ashéninka. Yines, an unrelated Arawak people, constitute the next most numerous group in this set, followed by Matsigenkas, an Arawak group fairly distantly related to Yines although in close geographical proximity.
In the remainder of this post I want to zoom in on a set of Kokama families who were present in three nearby communities in February and March of 1935 (caseríos dominated by mestizo individuals). Kokamas are traditionally a Tupí-Guaraní people of the lower Ucayali and Huallaga rivers, having spread throughout the lower Marañón in the first decades of the 19th century; their identity can be deduced from very unique surnames that have been in use at least since the early 19th century. These include at least the following couples, grouped by community of residence, with place of origin in parentheses:
Charara (Iparía River)
-Andrés Tamani (Nauta) & Teresa Arimuya (Nauta)
-Juan Tamani (Nauta) & Ignacia Yaicate (Nauta)
-Trinidad Tamani (Nauta) & Juana Silvano (Nauta)
-Santos Huanuiri (Nauta) & Paula Tamani (Nauta)
-Pedro Pacaya (Nauta) & Ana Silvano (Nauta)
Tabacoa (Ucayali River)
-Marcial Ahuanari (Nauta) & Sivania Pacaya (Nauta)
-Antonio Pacaya (Nauta) & Juana Silvano (Nauta)
-Santiago Silvano (Nauta) & Martina Ahuanari (Nauta)
-Antonio Silvano (c1909, Nauta) & Lucía Ahuanari (c1913, Nauta)
-Benito Pacaya (c1915, Nauta) & Elena Silvano (c1917, Nauta)
Cunchuri (Ucayali River)
-Santiago Murayari (Nauta) & Guillermina Aquituari (Iquitos)
-Antonio Murayari (Caballococha) & Juana Maricahua (Lagunas)
-Felix Pizango (Nauta) & Asunción Murayari (Bolivia)
-Cruz Murayari (Caballococha) & Rosa Ahuanari (Manú River)
-José Murayari (Caballococha) & Eugenia Sánchez (Contamana)
We see that all individuals in the Charara and Tabacoa groups were born in Nauta. The men of the Cunchuri group were born in either Nauta or Caballococha, while each of their wives was born in a different location. Out of all of the locations in the Cunchuri group, only Nauta and Lagunas (and, to a degree, Iquitos) are within traditional Kokama territory -- all others were probably born around the turn of the century in locations to which their families had been removed by caucheros ("rubber tappers").
In the Charara group, Andrés Tamani and his wife Teresa, although both themselves born in Nauta, had been in the upper Ucayali for a number of years: their son José, who married Luisa Silvano in 1941, was born in Manchari (yoper Ucayali) circa 1920; a younger set of twin girls, Clara and Julia, were born on the Iparía in April 1934. Similarly, Trinidad Tamani and his wife Juana had been in the region at least since circa 1920, when their daughter María was born on the Sheshea River. A younger daughter Lucilda was born on the Iparía in November 1934. Less is known about Juan Tamani, Santos Huanuiri, Pedro Pacaya, and their families, although they each had children born on the Iparía in 1934. At least one mestizo family in this community was the Olórteguis.
In the Tabacoa group, Marical Ahuanari and his wife Sivania were in Nauta as late as c1913, when their daughter Lucía was born there (she married Antonio Silvano in February 1935 in Tabacoa); but they were in Tabacoa by March 1934, when a son Marcos was born there. Antonio Pacaya was in Tabacoa by May 1934 (when daughter Rosa was born there), as was Santiago Silvano (when daughter Lucila Victoria was born there). Santiago and Antonio Silvano were probably brothers who married sisters. At least Antonio was born in Nauta c1909, son of Mariano and Mercedes Tamani. Benito Pacaya was born in Nauta c1915, son of Juan Pacaya and Paulina Mozombite (as was his wife Elena Silvano c1917, daughter of Mariano Silvano and Presentación Tamani), but he was in Tabacoa by October 1934, when son Benito was born there. He and Elena didn't marry in the Church until February 1935, in Tabacoa. At least one mestizo family, that of Emilio Vargas, was present in this community at this time.
The Charara and Tabacoa groups, which appear to be related to each other through the Silvano family in particular, are set apart from the Cunchuri group by the uniqueness of surnames among the latter, and their disparate birth locations. (This is with one exception, the Ahuanari surname.) Antonio and Santiago Murayari (perhaps brothers) were in Cunchuri as early as March 1928 and September 1929, respectively, when their children were born there. Felix Pizango was there as early as January 1930, and Cruz and José Murayari (perhaps brothers) as early as August 1929 and June 1932, respectively, when their children were born there.
Back in Atalaya, there were the families of Felipe Pacaya and Manuel Tamani. The former was born c1918 in Nauta to Luis Pacaya and Catalina Ahuanari, and married María Tamani in Atalaya in 1938. She was born c1920 on the Sheshea River to Trinidad Tamani and Juana Silvano. Manuel Tamani, the latter, was born in Manchari (upper Ucayali) c1920 to Fernando Tamani and Narcisa Silvano, both of Nauta, and married Amelia Saavedra in Atalaya in 1941. She was born c1923 to María Lila del Águila in Zamoya (exact location unknown). Fernando Tamani was probably a brother of Andrés Tamani of the Charara community: their sons were married on the same day, July 29, in Atalaya, suggesting a double wedding of first cousins.
Finally, we can see different points among sets of siblings in these groups. Antonio and Elena Silvano of the Iparía community are brother and sister, children of Mariano Silvano and Mercedes Tamani. And one José Tamani, married in Atalaya in 1941, is yet another child of Andrés Tamani and Teresa Arimuya, also of the Charara. And José's wife, Luisa Silvano (born in Tabacoa c1926), is the daughter of Miguel Silvano and Paula Tamani. Miguel is probably related to Mariano.
Ultimately these relationships should be quite easy to ascertain, as the baptismal records in the parish at Nauta survive in full back to the 1850s, and Kokamas have been largely Catholic for some time. What we see in general, though, appears to be two extended family groups, one spread across Charara and Tabacoa, and another at Cunchuri. This probably goes part way in explaining why the Wikipedia page for the District of Iparía claims Kokama heritage (thanks Kelsey Neely for pointing this out), but more importantly points at a much wider spread and understudied phenomenon in the historical linguistics of South America, namely the degree to which sizable populations of speakers of indigenous languages survived outside of their traditional territories in the decades immediately following the collapse of the rubber boom. (And we can be sure from other ethnolinguistic facts that any Kokama born in Nauta in the late 19th or early 20th centuries would have been a dominant speaker of Kokama, at least before they left the region.) This would have been a dialectalogically fascinating period to be a linguist -- i.e., the 1910s through 1940s -- but unfortunately speakers in these far-away places swiftly shifted either to more regionally dominant indigenous languages or to Spanish or Portuguese. I've written a little bit about this in the case of one Omagua family, the Huaníos in the upper Purús, here. In the 21st century it seems that the most we can do is assume that certain groups would have been speakers based on the locations of their birth and the time period, with little to say, though, about how rapidly shifts to other languages of these various regions occurred.
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