Head Shrinking and Power Seeking: The Jivaro Indian Tribe

The shrunken heads or better known as the Tsantsa of Jivaros’, an artifact left to us from many tribes ago. These heads not only symbolize barbaric living, but horrific rituals that have taken place in history. This tribe unfortunately was not the only ones in history to take off another’s head to show power over one another. Although, head shrinking was indeed only unique to the Jivaro Indians and was not repeated by any other tribe in history. The process that had to be performed, was either taking off another’s head during a bloody battle or taking off an enemy’s head for a religious significance. Most of the heads that were left in time are donated to museums or kept because some …show more content…
They not only resided on the tip of the Andes, but they also have inhabited Ecuador, Peru and also Brazil. The Jivaro’s were worshippers of many Gods; they believed that every part of nature had some kind of power deeper than the plant, to help them grow. They lived in huts and each home had a watchtower to see what was going on in the riverbanks below them. Not only were they known for shrinking heads, they also hunted with a vengeance. They would force their wives to hunt with them using a blowgun and a poisoned dart; the venom was made from vine juices they would mix together from the Amazon. This dart was full of such a strong poison; it would instantly stop the heartbeat of any animal that it came in contact with. Their appearance was a dark complexion and a strong build. They would walk around nude from the waist up and would have murals on their bodies in paint made from berries. As if that wasn’t enough they would wear crowns that they made from various bones of animals, teeth of animals and feathers from the birds of the Amazon. On their bottom half they would wear some sort of cloth that was put in place with human hair. It seems as if this tribe had a little obsession with human hair. It was either used for …show more content…
But after all of this precise work, to this day some of the heads reside in museums across America. Some people are so fascinated with them; they spend thousands of dollars on real and replica ones on the Internet. There was even some suspicion that when the heads were being made a hundred years ago, for trade and money. Trades of shrunken heads have become so popular there are people making fake ones proclaiming to be real and selling them for over twenty thousand dollars. You can even purchase them in the Ripley’s believe it not catalogue. “ Not all genuine tsantsas have been made for commercial purposes. Rivet illustrates a passable counterfeit made by an Ecuadorean medical student, and in 1893 an Austrian doctor named Hein described four, which he has prepared from the heads of deceased patients. In both these cases the motive was to test the technique of reduction as reported by the travellers. Hein’s attempt to shrink a fifth head by drying in the sun failed completely.” This statement by an anthropologist in the book Man shows that people other then Jivaro tribe would try to replicate these shrunken heads because they are in such demand and to show how long the process is to make a replica. You can even catch Captain Jack Sparrow wearing a shrunken head around his belt in the movie of the Pirate’s of the