86

(1875-1876)  as  a  member  of  the  Langsdorff  expedition,  the  Bororo  da  Campanha  had  already  been  “pacified”  and  were
living  on  the  Fazenda  of  their  conqueror,  Joáo  Pereira  Leite,  in  one  or  more  villages  near  Cáceres  (Páo  Seco,  Cacará)
and  in  Cambará  near  Jacobina  on  land  owned  by  Francisco  Correia.  In  1847  Antonio  Leverger,  a  future  president  of
the  province  of  Mato  Grosso,  noted  that  the  fazenda  Cacará  had  more  or  less  fallen  into  disuse  and  that  the  Bororo  da
Campanha  as  well  had  moved  south  to  near  “Escalvado”  where  they  occupied  a  village  of  about  150  or  200  “tame  and
peaceful”  inhabitants  who  were  living  from  hunting  and  fishing  and  the  cultivation  of  corn,  manioc,  and  cotton.  Others
were  living  on  the  Rio  Corixa  Grande  on  Bolivian  territory  (Leverger  1862:294-296)  in  a  village  identified  a  few  years
earlier  by  the  French  explorer  Francis  Laporte  de  Castelnau  (1853:pl.  20)  as  San  Matías.  It  is  likely  that  San  Matías  was
inhabited  by  refugees  from  the  oppression  suffered  by  the  Bororo  da  Campanha  at  the  hands  of  their  fazendeiro. 1
In  1894  Julio  Koslowsky  (1895)  draws  a  shocking  picture  of  the  exploitation  and  abuse  of  Bororo  da  Campanha  living
at  Laguna  between  Cáceres  and  Descalvado 2  by  the  Leite  family.  The  last  published  record  was  provided  by  the  American
anthropologist  Vincent  Petrullo  (1932),  just  a  few  years  before  two  villages  of  the  Bororo  da  Campanha  at  the  confluence
of  the  Rio  Paraguai  and  Rio  Jauru  were  destroyed  “with  fire  and  sword”;  in  1999/2000  some  descendants  of  the  Bororo
da  Campanha  were  found  near  San  Matías,  but  most  had  lost  or  were  concealing  their  indigenous  identity  and  unlike
the  Eastern  Bororo  did  not  occupy  a  reservation  (Ochoa  2001:21-22).

Fig.  1  The  Bororo  da  Campanha  and  their  relatives.
Grey  triangles  represent  the  known  Bororo  da  Campanha ­
  villages  between  the  1820s  and  1930s,  black  triangles ­
  Eastern  Bororo  villages  of  the  twentieth  century
mentioned  in  this  essay,  and  the  white  triangle  the  only
known  village  of  the  Bororo  do  Cobaçal,  documented
in  the  1840s.

'  Probably  in  1825,  when  Father  José  Maria  de  Velasco  came
to  Cuiabá  on  behalf  of  Governor  Sebastián  Ramos  of  the  Bolivian ­
  province  of  Chiquitos  to  surrender  this  province  to  the
Empire  of  Brazil,  Natterer  received  from  him  information  on  the
indigenous  inhabitants  of  Chiquitos  (Natterer  1825).  According
to  Natterer's  notes  there  were  about  2500  Bororos,  Otukes,Guanás,
  and  Zamucos  living  in  the  region  of  Santo  Corazón,  about
the  same  number  of  Bororos,  Zamucos,  and  Guanás  in  San
José,  and  again  more  or  less  the  same  number  of  Bororos  and
Potureros  (Mortôkô)  in  San  Juan  [Bautista];  San  Matías  is  not
mentioned.  It  may  be  noted  that  Castelnau  (1853;pl.  20)  says
that  the  Bororo  living  in  the  Campos  Allegre  southeast  of  San
Matías  had  formerly  inhabited  the  Rio  Jauru  and  Rio  Paraguai
and  had  "in  part  been  conquered  by  D.  Sebastian  Ramos.”
2  The  present  Descalvado  is  often  referred  to  by  the  Spanish
name  "Descalvados"  because  the  fazenda  was  owned  between
1881  and  1895  by  a  rancher  from  Uruguay  who  also  operated
a  factory  for  the  production  of  jerky  meat  that  in  1895  was
bought  by  a  Belgian  company  (http://www.jomaloeste.com
br/?pg=notida&idn=13361).  Because  of  the  amenities  available, ­
  unusual  for  in  a  location  in  the  Pantanal,  Descalvdo  also
attracted  many  naturalists  who  made  it  the  headquarters  fa
their  expeditions.