At the Edge of the World, an Almost Lost Culture

     Last Thanksgiving,I shared images of the Ona Tribe of Tierra del Fuego in South America as a reminder of the cultures that have been destroyed because of a lack of respect for differences between us humans. 
     This Thanksgiving, I wanted to share images and stories of the Yaghan people, another tribe from Tierra del Fuego. As of 2017, only one native speaker of the Yaghan language remains alive. 

"Then, further westward, among the steep, mountainous defiles of the Strait, on either side, the smokes of the treacherous canoe Indians, the Alaculoops and Yahgans, were stenciled blue against the dank, somber woods which clothe most of the mountains of these islands to the height of a thousand feet."
​ -Charles Wellington Furlong, 1911

     The first European contact with the Yaghan came with Sir Francis Drake in 1578, and as Anne Chapman writes in her book European Encounters with the Yamana People of Cape Horn, Before and After Darwin, Darwin called them stunted, miserable savages, without actual knowledge of the people he was describing. Later, some anthropologists did seem to show more respect for the Yaghan, although it was in the patronizing "noble savage" way, and linguists researched the complexity of the Yaghan language.
         When Charles Furlong visited Tierra del Fuego in the early 1900s, he observed that the Yaghan (which is alternately spelled Yahgan and Yagan, and also called Yamana) lived on island of Cape Horn and near the channel of water that separates Argentina and Chile. Furlong expressed how dangerous the waters where the Yaghan fished were in his article in "The Outing Magazine." 
     Furlong doesn't really come out and say it, but as he describes life around the Yaghan, you can see where the lives of Europeans, Chileans and Argentinians come into conflict with the indigenous peoples. The boat Furlong charters is steering by an Austrian who transports sheep to ranchers (ranchers whose sheep will take over the land that the tribes of Tierra del Fuego trekked across) and that he trades rum for otter and seal skins of the Yaghans (which might have been a fair trade, but maybe not the best trade).  ​​

The Yaghan lived on the southern most islands of South America,
below the Straight of Magellan. 

Yaghan canoes were lined with sod so they could build a fire inside, a convenience for nomadic sea-fearing people. 

Like the Ona, the Yaghan were nomadic. 

Yaghan women wearing European clothing, taken 1924-1925, image courtesy of the Smithsonian Institution.

     He does observe that many of the Yaghan wear European style clothing and asks, "Why should we wish to make Indians look like white men?" without perhaps the thought that the tribe is trading seal skins, which they would have used to make clothing, for the rum. 

Yaghan Fisk Mask, collected in 1924-1925, currently in the Smithsonian collection. The Yaghan used masked like these in their ritual ceremonies. Lothrop writes that the wearers of these masks would paint their bodies, like the Ona/ Selk'nam, but I haven't been able to find any photos.

     Furlong thought that at the time he visited Tierra del Fuego, there were only a few hundred Yaghan. By the time Samuel K. Lothrop visited in 1925, he estimated that there were only 40-50 Yaghan. According to the 2002 Chilean census, there are over 1,500 members. The last "full-blooded" Yaghan, and the last native speaker of the language is 89 year-old Christina Calderon. Here is a video of Mrs. Calderon speaking Yaghan:

     In Anne Chapman's book, she writes that she believes the more people learn about the Yaghan and how they have adapted, the more people will respect and admire their culture and history. I hope that's true. 

Further learning:
Samuel K. Lothrop's book on the native peoples of Tierra del Fuego offers an in-depth look at the lives of the Ona and Yaghan people around 1925, even though it includes some analysis of the physiology of the indigenous people that were common in the 1920s that we find bizarre and unacceptable today. 
​A video from the Chilean government about Christina Calderon.