The warrior nation of "Mundurukânia," who paddled the Tapajós taking enemy heads they mummified as power-charged trophies and raided from the Madeira clear to the Tocantins.
After fearsome resistance they made peace with the Portuguese around 1795 and turned their war-craft outward, raiding for the Crown; some 14,000–18,000 endure in scores of villages along the Tapajós and Cururu, now leading the fight against Tapajós dams and illegal gold-mining.
The atlas holds 2 border frames for Munduruku —
the shape you scrub through changes in 1768 · 1795.
Moments from the Chronicle
1786The Mura sue for peace Worn down by smallpox and by the rising Munduruku, the once-feared canoe warriors of the Amazon's 'Territory of Fear' end their century-long war with Portugal, accepting settlement between 1784 and 1786 and scattering into mixed riverside villages on the lower Madeira.
1795The Munduruku make peace After generations of head-taking raids that swept from the Madeira to the Tocantins, the warrior nation of Mundurukânia comes to terms with the Portuguese Crown near the close of the 18th century and turns its war-craft toward the colonial frontier — though incursions flicker on into the early 1900s.
Further reading
Mundurucú ReligionRobert F. Murphy · 1958
Murphy's classic study of Mundurucú religion and the warrior society of the Tapajós.
An accessible survey of the pre- and post-contact Americas that conveys the pre-conquest complexity and colonial devastation of Amazonian and Brazilian indigenous peoples.