Curtis holding a Huaorani Spear
On our recent trip to the Ecuador Amazon Rainforest, we learned about the indigenous peoples living in the area, mainly the peaceful and very populous Kichwa, the Huaorani and un-contacted Tagaeri tribes. Most of the modern history of the indigenous people only goes back a few decades. Prior to that there was some westerners, or outsiders, who traversed the area in the 19th century, mainly to capture the natives and ship them off to be slaves in the rubber production camps downstream along the Amazon. Those who were captured were never heard from again by the local indigenous population. This lead to rumors about the “outsiders” actually being cannibals. This in turn caused the locals, like the Huaorani tribes, to become very aggressive and violent and fight outsiders fiercely. They just didn’t want to be eaten. Read more →