Ore tãre gai
Ceremony to remove ‘blood guiltiness’:
When a jaguar is killed, the one that killed it draws a rectangular figure on the ground to represent the jaguar:
- First he draws the head of the victim.
- After he draws the figure, the lines of the figure are erased by stepping on them – tac, tac, tac.
- The hunter walks around the rectangle until he reaches the circle that represents the head.
- Then he erases the head
- He stops at certain parts and as he progresses he chants: HE-ah-kay, HE-ah-kay.
- As he goes around it, the first place to rub out is at the part of the rectangle where the paws of the jaguar would be.
- And then he keeps going and the rest of the lines are rubbed out.
- It’s like a song.
- The erasing of the rectangle is done to a rhythmic dance that is done while chanting.
- It’s like singing a tune.
- You have to do it all and not let any of it escape. If you do it wrong it will bring on sickness.
(Additional commentary: They can only hit downward with their hands as they dance around the victim’s image. If they hit sideways it is dangerous and can cause them trouble.)
Contamination with blood – Diyoi Ditaite:
When they kill a wild animal they are contaminated and have guilt. So they go to young girls, and they exchange food and honey with them, and afterwards when they’ve finished the exchange they move about. And then the girls lay down with their husbands (sex implied).
Contamination of weapons – Ditacho ditai, corãchade:
When they kill a wild animal with something, that thing is a contaminated thing.
Or if they pierce a wild animal with their lance, the lance is a contaminated thing.
Or if it’s with his arrow that he has killed a civilized person, the arrow is a contaminated thing.
If they kill a wild animal then they must get rid of the weapon.
They abandon it as part of the cleansing ceremony from contamination. They now throw their weapons away and abandon them and have nothing more to do with them in the future. They replace their weapons with other weapons. When a weapon is contaminated then it it not used any more, and they make another one.
Cajoidé – Campo Loro, Paraguay – 1985.
Transcribed and translated to English by: Maxine Morarie.
