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The indigenous people of Brazil ( Portuguese: Povos indígenas) comprise a large number of distict ethnic groups who inhabited the country's present territory prior its discovery by Europeans around 1500 CE. Like Christopher Columbus, who thought he had reached the East Indies, the first Portuguese explorers called them índios (Indians), name that is still used today in Brazil.

The Brazilian indigenous peoples were mostly semi-nomadic tribes who subsisted on hunting, fishing, gathering, and migrant agriculture. Many of the groups which existed in 1500 died out as a consequence of the European settlement, and many were assimilated into the Brazilian population. The indigenous population has declined from a pre-Columbian high of an estimated 5-6 million to just 100,000 in 1950. Only a few tribes still survive in their original culture in remote areas of the Amazon Rainforest. However, changes in government policies over the past 50 years have managed to afford some protection to the remaining native Brazilians, and the population has risen again to some 300,000 ( 1997), grouped into some 200 tribes.

Brazilian natives made substantial and pervasive contributions to the country's material and cultural development—such as the domestication of cassava, which is still a major staple food in rural areas of the country.

1 Origins

The origins of the first Brazilians are still a matter of dispute among archaeologists. The traditional view, which traces them to Siberian migration to America at the end of the last ice age, has been increasingly challenged by South AmericaSouth America is a continent crossed by the equator, with most of its area in the Southern Hemisphere. South America is situated between the Pacific Ocean and the Atlantic Ocean. It became attached to North America only recently, geologically speaking, win archaeologists. AnthropologicalAnthropology (from the Greek word ANTHROPOLOGIA consists of the study of humankind (see genus Homo . It is holistic in two senses: it is concerned with all humans at all times, and with all dimensions of humanity. Central to anthropology is the concept of and geneticGenetics is the science of genes, heredity, and the variation of organisms. Humans began applying knowledge of genetics in prehistory with the domestication and breeding of plants and animals. In modern research, genetics provides important tools in the i evidence indicates that most Native American peoples descended from the "first wave" of migrant peoples from north AsiaNorth Asia is a subregion of Asia. It consists entirely of Siberia, which lies in the Asian part of Russia. By some definitions, not all of Siberia is part of North Asia''. See Siberia for more information''. Other subregions of Asia East Asia Southeast A ( Siberia) who entered America across the Bering StraitThe Bering Strait is a sea strait between Cape Dezhnev, the eastmost point of the Asian continent and Cape Prince of Wales, the westernmost point of the American continent, about 85 km in width, with a depth of 30 50 m. The strait connects the Chukchi Sea in at least three separate waves. In Brazil, particularly, most native tribes who were living in the land by 1500 are thought to be descended from the first wave of migrants, who are believed to have crossed the " land bridgeThe Bering land bridge also known as Beringia was a land bridge roughly 1600 km (1000 miles) across, which is believed to have joined present-day Alaska and eastern Russia at various times during the ice ages. The sea floor under the Bering Strait is shal" across the Bering StraitThe Bering Strait is a sea strait between Cape Dezhnev, the eastmost point of the Asian continent and Cape Prince of Wales, the westernmost point of the American continent, about 85 km in width, with a depth of 30 50 m. The strait connects the Chukchi Sea at the end of the last Ice Age around 9000 BCE.

A migrant wave around 9000 BCE would have reached Brazil around 6000 BCE, probably entering the from the Northwest area around the Amazon RiverThe Amazon River (occasionally River Amazon Spanish: Rio Amazonas of South America is one of the two longest rivers on Earth, the Nile River of Africa being the other. It has by far the greatest total flow of any river, carrying approximately 56 times as. (The second and third migratory waves from Siberia, which are thought to have generated the Athabascan and Eskimo peoples, apparently did not reach farther than the southern United States and Canada, respectively.)

This traditional view above has recently been challenged by findings of human remains in South America, which are claimed to be too old to fit this scenario—perhaps even 20,000 years old. Some recent finds (notably the Luzia skeleton in Lagoa Santa) are claimed to be morphologically distinct from the Asian genotype and are more similar to African and Australian Aborigine natives. Some feel that these "American Aborigines" crossed the Atlantic and/or Pacific Oceans and arrived in South America; this theory is still resisted by many scientists because of the long distances from Oceania and Africa. Proponents of the theory say the natives were later displaced or absorbed by the Siberian immigrants. The distinctive natives of Tierra del Fuego, the southernmost tip of the American continent, may have been the last remains of that aboriginal populations.

In any case, the bulk of the surviving archaeological evidence dates from the period after the Asian migratory waves. The Brazilian natives, unlike those in Mesoamerica and the western Andes, did not keep written records or erect stone monuments, and the humid climate and acidic soil have destroyed almost all traces of their material culture, including wood and bones. Therefore, what is known about Brazilian history before 1500 is what is inferred from small-scale archaeological evidence, such as pottery and stone arrowheads.

The most conspicuous remains of pre-discovery societies are very large mounds of discarded shellfish (sambaquís) found in some coastal sites which were continuously inhabited for over 5,000 years; and the substantial "black earth" (terra preta) deposits in several places along the Amazon, which are believed to be ancient garbage dumps. Recent excavations of such deposits in the middle and upper course of the Amazon have uncovered remains of some very large settlements, containing tens of thousands of homes, indicating a complex social and economical structure.