IDNO

P.19867.WHI

Description

On Catalogue Card for duplicate image LS.26756.WHI: "N.W. Amazon. 175.73 - 76.
(Tribes not identified)
4 groups.
(4 slides).”

A large group of Resigero men and women, sitting and standing in front of a malokas (Indian communal house). The man with a rifle, sitting at the left, is one of Whiffen’s “carriers”.
The image has been heavily retouched to provide detail of the men's and women's figures. [TC 09/06/1999]

Place

S America; Colombia; North West Amazon

Cultural Affliation

South American Indian; Witotoan; Resigero [Rosigaro; Ressigaro; Ricigaro; Rrahanihin; Mehinaku]

Named Person

Photographer

Whiffen, Thomas William

Collector / Expedition

Date

1908 - 1909

Collection Name

Whiffen Collection

Source

Format

Print Black & White

Primary Documentation

Other Information

This print was found in a small envelop marked C90/3/, in a large envelope marked C90/ by the cataloguer. Prior to re-housing, C90/3/ contained eight photographic prints, now accessioned as P.19862. to P.19885., and P.21235. to P.21239.

C90/ was previously stored in large wooden drawer I.

Related Image: A duplicate print is at the RAI, reference 36182, and annotated by Whiffen in pencil on the reverse as "A Resigero tribe with carrier and rifle on left."
Photocopies of Whiffen prints at the RAI are in the UCMAA archive, reference W19/1/3. See Whiffen Collection record for further details on RAI collection. [JD 02/10/2019]

Bibliography Reference: Whiffen’s discusses his“carriers” (Whiffen, T. W., 1915: 2-4). He explains that at the beginning of his expedition he “collected eight Indian carriers, two half-castes, and eight “rationales”, or semi-civilised Indians, armed with Winchesters, together with three Indian women, wives of three of the rationales” (ibid: 3). [TC 01/06/199]

Bibliography Reference: Whiffen discusses Indian communal houses (malokas) at length (Whiffen, T. W., 1915: 40-48). He notes that in the homestead "there is but one great house, thatched and ridge-roofed like a gigantic hay-rick ... this is the home of some three score Indians" in which "there are no divisions for each family" (ibid: 40). He notes that the house is a temporary dwelling which falls into disrepair and is burnt every two to three years, at which point the inhabitants move to new location (ibid: 41-42). He then discusses how the site is chosen and the building constructed (ibid: 42-44). He notes that "the far end of the house - where there is usually another small entrance - is the portion reserved for the chief and his family" (ibid: 46) and that "each family has its own fire" (ibid: 47), with their hammocks slung around it and possessions slung in the rafters above. He explains that "at ordinary times there will be possibly from fifty to sixty people in the tribal house, but on the occasion of any festivity as many as two hundred will crowd in" (ibid: 48). He also provides plans and diagrams of the house (ibid: 41, 43, 45,46) and an illustration of the type of palm used for thatching (ibid: pl. VI). Menimehe houses, he notes, are "more open" than those of other groups (ibid: 51). [TC 01/06/199]

Bibliography Reference: Steward also discusses Witotoan villages and houses, explaining that "the typical Witotoan community consists of a single large multifamily house, though some villages have several large houses" and that these are built on "a dry site ... some distance from the river" (1963: 752). Plate 81 depicts a "Witoto communal house" similar to those depicted in the Whiffen Collection photographs. Steward notes that "the sociopolitical unit is the exogamous, patrilocal community which usually occupies a single large house and is divided into family groups. Local exogamy seems to prevail even when the community has several houses" (ibid: 755). Steward and Faron (1959: 314) also discusses Witotoan houses. More recent analyses, such as that by Hugh-Jones on Barasana cosmology, demonstrate that the Indian house can be interpreted structurally as a significant metaphorical representation of the cosmos, myth and society (Hugh-Jones.S. 1979). [TC 01/06/199]