Guarani Mythology

Jorge Montesino

First Book
The Genesis
Chapter I
In which the figure of Tupã is announced and the way in which creation begins.
Illuminated by his own light, Tupã, in the midst of the primordial darkness, contemplative, seeks a way to create.
the light. His face is serious, but in his gaze a jet black glimmer speaks of the imminent encounter with the
creation.
His colossal body, previously relaxed, begins to tense every one of his muscles with a ray of light. He is dressed
a tunic that falls, cool, over her divine body to which the light of her soul has granted the golden color of
the future harvests.
Tupã rises, attracts to himself the darkest part of those shadows, and condenses the essence in his hands. His
feet, slightly apart, rest firmly in the darkness. Their gaze is directed straight ahead towards
what will come, supported by the firm axis of the nose, straight and proud.
Tupã extends his hands towards the infinite, opens them, and from them, the glow is born with the strength of the futures.
hurricanes flooding everything.
Tupã has built his abode for eternity. He has created the light that was his own, and now the stars shine.
As they pass by, they dance revealing their charms. Now, Tupã delights in contemplation.
Chapter II
In which Tupã discovers Arasy and names her Mother of the Heavens.
From contemplation to discovery there is only one step. Tupã observes with pleasure the consequences.
of his work and discovers, even with more pleasure, the presence of another being that is thanks to his creation. There it is,
invisible and with all its charms.
Tupã feels his soul leaving his body and going to meet the wonder that his eyes
contemplate.
Arasy lifts her gaze and it is as if she lifts the entire universe, and when she lowers it again, it falls like
the sheets fall that are spread over the bed for a wedding night. That look of soft fur has
launched its darts from the moon to the sun, from itself to the center of Creation.
Arasy, wrapped in her hair, is born to new sensations. It is the Creator himself who has seen her with
her airy tunic, her solid mother-of-pearl feet holding the columns that frame the finest steps that
they lead to the honey of eternity. He has seen it and has chosen it.
–Arasy –says Tupã now– and his voice travels in a loving and blue whisper across the entire universe. He has
named and that is enough for her to now be the mother of the eternal blue, Mother of the Heavens.
Chapter III
In which the Poet, enlightened, offers his word in a song of love.
Tupã feels the master of himself, feels like a pledge, and offers him the Kingdom of Heaven.
–You will be queen in your kingdom– says Tupã, and Arasy, dressed in lunar white, kneels down to thank the Creator for the
light that illuminates it.

And that same Precursor Light mounts to the voice of the poet who governs this universe to speak to us with another
word of the magnificent events:

- "Tupã and Arasy,

Soulmates,
Alone in the Light where Darkness once reigned.
Sons of Light:
The Creator and the Mother of the Heavens.
She discovers herself on the white lunar surface.
He uncovers the veils of the God that is and desires it.
Tupã, Creator Light
Arasy, Light of the gaze, sole light
One inside the other,
festival of light and love
One inside the other,
One with another,
One from the other,
One towards the other,
One added to the other,
A projected one on the other: love.
Chapter IV
In which details are given with certainty about the wedding of Tupã and Arasy and the attitude of the Gods.
from distant lands.
The Poet draws the curtains of the bridal bed. In the very midst of Creation, the wedding of Tupã takes place.
Arasy. The stars, the only witnesses of eternal commitment. The stars break free from their orbits. This moment
disobedience is allowed for the first time, but history knows it will not be the last. The poet climbs up
to his swan and lets him fly through the endless space. The stars drop their bright petals before the
an event that occurs. The infinite pact has happened. Tupã lifts the light body of Arasy with strong arms and
It moves through the Universe, and it's as if a jaguar advances in broad daylight without anyone noticing.
With that silence, with that boldness, Tupã and Arasy, who are now one, move towards their golden bed. Planets
Distant ones get drunk with the imbalance of love for a moment and then return to their courses. Meteors
Errant ones stop and hover over the party, forgetting their uncertain journeys. Very long kites.
manes create beautiful drawings in the distant darkness celebrating weddings. The entire universe
stumbles. A gallop is heard fading away; it is the Riders of the Apocalypse fleeing from Life. Love.
drives away Death. Night becomes Day and Day is Joy surprised in all its nudity. Quetzalcoatl
send the Quetzal feathers as an offering. From Olympus, Zeus orders his children to participate in the
celebrations. Mercury, the one with winged feet, is the messenger of Jupiter, Venus blesses the union with her
charms. Vesta helps to kindle the fire of this new home. All the Gods observe the most colossal of
the weddings, the simplest, the most passionate. A blue tiger guards the doors of the chamber roaring every
certain time for it to be known that the sweet dream of the Gods is watched over, the hummingbird lightning-launcher sends his
brilliant colors in subtle rays that turn into small suns. The cabure’i unaware of its future
from dark hideouts offers a sweet nocturnal serenade. But in the midst of the party, there is someone who
hides behind the shadows of the diners of the firmament, someone who for now does not tarnish the
celebration...
Chapter V
In which Tupã and Arasy decide to descend to Earth.
The next morning, after the intoxication of the wedding, Tupã and Arasy with a new shine on their bodies
they contemplate the blue Universe.

There it is, says Arasy, pointing to a celestial sphere that moves not far from the Realms of Tupã. That could be it.
the dwelling of our children.
Tupã gently draws her towards his body and looks at her with tenderness.
Let's go down to see, she replies.

There they go. United in the light, leaving behind a trail of blue perfumes. Divine satellites spin around.
from the Earth. The perfect anatomy of the valleys and hills of Areguá with their green flames has
dazzled.
They descend.
They are now at the top of the hill.
Chapter VI
Culminating moment in which Tupã and Arasy create all things of the Earth.
Tupã and Arasy embrace, and from the embrace arise the waters of the seas.
They kiss, and from their kisses flow the rivers that bathe and nourish the virgin jungles.
A glance, and at her feet, part of the enchanted valley is filled with the enchanted waters of Lake Ypakarai, and
all the waters of the Earth are filled with fish.
They take each other's hands, and from the contact, a huge flock of all species of birds escapes in search of
their own skies.
Take a step into the waters and from the soles of your feet, the land animals, at full speed, begin to
search for the sites of their dwellings.

Swallows search for the highest places to build their nests.

Forming a long and heavy troop, the elephants, panthers, zebras, giraffes, lions, gorillas,
rhinoceroses, leopards, buffaloes, tigers, deer, wildebeests, mandrills, crocodiles, and hippos trot across the
blue waters of the ocean in search of the savannah and the African jungles, places that will accommodate their wanderings.

Part of the large family of pumas and jaguarundis set out in search of the vast lands of the north that
They will shelter among their mountains watched on their path and from above, by the penetrating gaze of the eagles.
imperial.
The great condors prefer to follow the path of kuarahy and move towards the highest peaks in the world.
at extremely high flights above the heads of the llamas and guanacos.
The jurumi, the mborevi, the tagua, the jakare, the aguara, the swamp deer, the karaja, the ka’i, the
flamingos, the herons, the storks, the coatis, the gua’a, the mua, the guasu, the capybaras, the otters, the
they, the nandus, all of them and many more feel a special attachment to these lands and greet
those who depart with their multiple voices, with their races and flights, proud of their colors...
Polar bears, penguins, seals, whales, and sea lions march south and north in search of
the cold polar winds, closely followed by albatrosses and seagulls flying low, very close to the waves in
an eternal romance.
Chapter VII
Moment when Tupã, dissatisfied, decides to create man and woman.
Tupã is satisfied, but he looks around and feels that something is still missing.
Feel the need to recreate yourself.
He gathers himself by the banks of the lake.
In his hands, the primordial clay that turns into mud and dough with the juice of ka'a ruvicha, with the blood of
yvyja'u, with the sensitive flesh of the leaves of the sensitive plant, with the movements of the body of the ambu'a, with the
spring water that rises among the green stones.
The matter of supreme creation is already ready.
Tupã shapes two figures.
He makes them in his own image and likeness and that of Arasy.

The creation is about to be completed.

Time stands still.
The two figures, made with that divine mixture, are exposed to the light of Kuarahy, the light of life. Everyone
creatures of the planet observe. The breath is held. Not a single breath is heard. The silence is total when
Tupã and Arasy give them the breath of life.
The man and the woman have been created.
The one to live with the other.
The story is about to begin.
Chapter VIII
In which Tupã and Arasy name the man and the woman and offer their wise advice to the couple.
primordial
The man and the woman, newly created, kneel before their creators. The entire Universe exhales its breath.
content and starts to spin again. All the animals continue their journey, the waves of the seas
the beaches are being bathed again.

Tupã places his hand on the man's shoulder and says:

Starting today, all things that were created will be at your service. You will be called Rupave, father of the race.
American. You will fulfill your mission by respecting all things of the Earth. You will procreate with the woman who has been
created from the same mixture and that I left by your side. You will seek your own happiness. You will feed on the herbs and
of the animals that I have placed in this kingdom. You will be the leader of this people, and this people will be strong and
noble. You will never forget that good and evil exist. To always remind you, I have placed in the Universe a
Angatupyry, spirit of good, and Tau, spirit of evil. In the balance of their forces, you will find guidance for
All acts of life. The presence of Tau will compel you to make an effort, and in that way, you will understand the value.
of all things. The presence of Angatupyry compensates for the evil of Tau and its strength will pull you out of the
diseases and will help you solve the countless problems of existence.
In the same way, Arasy put his hand on the woman's shoulder and said:
"As you have been born in my image and likeness, I name you Sypave, mother of the American race."
You will have the privilege of being the mother of the first inhabitants of the Earth. You will procreate with the man who has
has been created from your own mixture. You will take care of your children and the Earth. You will especially guard the fruit of
I hereby deliver to you, which will enrich your kingdom.
Then Tupã gave the seeds of the mbokaja to Rupave and gave him many good pieces of advice on how to live in
love and peacefully.
Tupã said to them in a serious tone: "The time has come for you to begin life in this one that will be the
kingdom of you for eternity. From now on you must love each other and reproduce indefinitely. From the
in the same way, they should love the children born from their love, instilling in them respect for the elders, to the
Earth and the balance of all things that are born, grow, and die in it. When the time comes, you,
Those who carry in their blood the blood of this land must return to it. In this way, they will be able to live again.
because covered their bodies in the depth of the earth the plants will feed on them and the animals,
in turn, from the plants. In this way, they will be everywhere, witnessing the wonders that do not exist.
reached to contemplate during life. When you face death for the first time, do it calmly,
Well, life will continue forever. They can take from the earth everything that is in it as long as the
they need. The trees, the fruits, all the plants, and the animals are there to serve you. But, if by chance
they will be punished for it without any need to destroy anything. Always remember that whoever takes away
the life of a brother, will not be able to sleep in peace for the rest of his days. With time and with the effort of
I will reveal to you the secrets with which you can till the land and make the seeds sprout so that
the spirit of each member of the community that they will form, may be calmed and pacified. The work
He is a good advisor. And they will enjoy double when the fruits of the plants they planted are ripe.
Later, Tupã announced the arrival of the karaiete saying to them:
One day, strange men will come to these lands. They will not be anyone's gods. They must not be deceived.
They will be different in the color of their skin, in their customs, in their shape, in the way they speak. Not them.
neither reject them nor take them for gods. They will be men who will come from distant lands and after their arrival
Many changes will happen in these lands. They will mark the future destiny. Many will come to stay among you.
They must respect them and demand respect from them. They will arrive rowing in the waters, in the arms of the wind and eager to see.
the Earth.
Chapter IX
In which it is told how Tupã and Arasy left the Earth.
Saying this, Tupã and Arasy left the Earth, and at that same moment the tajy, the jacarandá, and the chivatos
they were covered with flowers; and the fruits of the orange trees, the grapefruits, the mangoes, the papayas, and the avocados,
Mature and huge ones hung from the branches of their trees. The grass of the meadows transformed into a mantle.
green, velvety with delicious fragrances. The sounds of nature in a wonderful crescendo
they filled all the corners of creation. The fish greeted by jumping out of the water and making
fun flips in the air, only to dive back in. The aguara ran in circles around.
the samu'u that bloomed again and again drunk on celestial aromas. The koati tried amusingly
reverences formed in an endless line. The jakare whipped the waters at the shore forming fans.
that the sun transformed into small rainbows. The anacondas coiled gently around the branches of the
trees lending them the weaving of the colors of their skins. It was the great feast of gratitude after
the great celebration of creation. The light became more powerful and clear and the sky bluer in a clear sign of joy
of Tupã and Arasy.
Rupave and Sypave look into each other's eyes.

In them is that light of the heavens.

In them is the sap of the ka'aruvicha and the essence of the earth.
They are not alone.

Love has awakened them.

Rupave and Sypave embrace tenderly and surrender to love on the grass.
Chapter X
In which it is told about the children that Rupave and Sypave procreated.
Three male children and many female daughters were the fruit of that primordial love. The first was called.
You Arandu, the second was named Marangatu and the last of the males was called Japeusa and was
It was said of him that he was born standing up.

Among the many daughters they bore, four stood out for their virtues and were: Guarasyáva,
incomparable swimmer; Tupinamba, a woman of remarkable physical resistance, Yrãséma, who was called
"murmur of the waters" because she possessed the gift of music and song; and finally Porãsy, a woman of singular
beauty, the most beautiful among the beautiful.

Chapter XI
In which certain data is given about the appearance and qualities of each of the main sons.
of Rupave and Sypave.
Raised in the places of the hill of Aregua, the children of Rupave and Sypave lived their childhood in
harmony and happiness. They lived with the animals they had befriended and from whom they learned the
secrets of each species. They loved the nature that Tupã and Arasy had left them as an inheritance and grew
physically as much as in wisdom.
Tume Arandu, the firstborn, has always stood out not only for his patience to discover and learn the
secrets of nature, but for its calm and measured words. His brothers listened to him
frequently when he sat on a stone by the streams that were abundant in the
region. Then he spoke slowly, as if weighing the effect of each of his words. Since always
he had a great influence over all his brothers. His dedication to the study of plants – he could spend
hours observing the effects of an herb on the animals– did not prevent him from developing a physical strength that
instilled respect in everyone. At a signal from Tume Arandu, his brothers gathered around him to
listen to it.
His light eyes and even more translucent gaze speak of his immense kindness. Yes. He occupies the space now,
Marangatu, the second of the male children. Tall and slender in his physical build, Marangatu
he was a virtuoso of kindness. He never raised his voice and was always willing to give rather than receive. Frugal
in eating and austere in all material things, Marangatu lived for others because it was the only way
to live for oneself.
He was born standing up, unlike all his siblings. The erratic destiny of Japeusa would lead him to an end.
premature. Restless and vigorous, Japeusa kept making mistakes frequently and without finding the truth.
sense of their life.
Due to her skill, one might say she is related to fish, and because of her beauty, that she is a true mermaid.
Guarasyáva knew every stream, every lagoon, every river, navigating them with her agile swimming body. Beautiful
swimmer. There were no secrets in the water for the slender girl with long black hair.
Far from imagining that from his name a race would be born, Tupinamba, runs and roams the surroundings of his
village. Investigate. Climb to the hills. Climb the trees to sniff the horizon with your gaze. Contemplate.
the valleys and then goes towards them. Tupinamba never exhausts. It joins each hunt side by side with the
men of the tribe. All made of fibers. Flexible and strong.
Yrãséma, on the other hand, is a calm young woman. She has found in music her ideal companion. The guitar
is always in his arms. The guitar and her soothing voice that wraps in an exquisite perfume whoever
I heard her.
The youngest of the sisters is Porãsy. She is still far from realizing the sacrifice she is subjected to.
It will deliver. But it carries its weapons in plain sight: its unmatched beauty has no parallel in our race. From her
It will be worth saving his people.
Here are the children of Rupave and Sypave.

With its goodness and its evils, with its lights and its shadows, living peacefully in the place of
the hills of Areguá.
Allied with nature, each one does the work that corresponds to them.
Chapter XII
In which the events leading to the death of Yrãséma are narrated.
All day the whispering voice of Yrãséma has been heard around the majestic lake. Her song has
has been constant, and the animals and the plants and the men have fallen under its spell.
It is already night in the village and yet Yrãséma continues to sing uninterrupted.

Nothing moves when her harmonious voice is heard.

The sound flows like the streams of this land.
It is already late when the beautiful young woman falls silent, curling up in her feather hammock.
Her mother comes to see her when she is already asleep.

Yrãséma tosses and turns uneasily in her bed. She breathes poorly. Her mother touches her forehead. Yrãséma suffers from fever.
very strong. It boils in the middle of the calm starry night that is coming to an end. Sypave sits down
by her side and holding her hand, he watches the last hours of his daughter's sleep. When the first
glimmers begin to stir the life of the mountain, Sypave awakens the restless Japeusa and sends him along with the
lake, to search for agrial leaves and inga peels. But fate was already written and Japeusa, instead of the
plants that his mother had asked him for, he gathers leaves of ka'atái, nettle, and sour orange fruits with which
prepare a potion to give to his sister Yrãséma, whose excesses in singing have caused a
enormous swelling of the throat and their voice has become hoarse. Shortly after drinking the preparation
From her brother, Yrãséma feels her throat closing more and more until she finally exhales.
It dies like the plants that have not received water.
Die gently, as if she herself were the soft lullaby of her past songs.
Die without a stain.
Dies a virgin.
Close your eyes over the memory of their sweet songs.
The dismay is general.
Japeusa, aware of her mistake, flees from the village.
The inhabitants of the village form a circle around the lifeless body of Yrãséma. It is the first time that
they contemplate the death of an equal.

Incredulous, they surround the body with magical flowers. Different objects pose around it with the sole purpose of
to revive the dead. Herbs. Fruits. Amulets. Branches.
They hope that a multicolored butterfly lands on the girl's head and brings her back to life.
They wait without giving up.
They wait without lifting their eyes from the lifeless body.

They wait singing in a whisper.

They hope he gets up and keeps singing.
Chapter XIII
In which Tume Arandu explains the meaning of death to his tribe.
Tume Arandu, amidst the general perplexity, makes a sign with his hands and the whole tribe falls silent.
Tume Arandu has something to say, and he says it like this:

We are all surrounding the lifeless body of Yrãséma and we resist believing in her death. It is the first
once one of us runs out of breath. This is what Tupã and Arasy have wanted. But so that we are not
denying her death with our songs, we must take my sister's body to the place where she will find
rest. Tupã has commanded that every man who dies must be placed in a deep pit made in the
earth. He has said that each of us will have, in his time, his own tyvy.
In the earth is our origin and to the earth we must return.
Let us bury Yrãséma and you will see that Tupã is wise.
When a few moons have passed, no one will remember the dead. For when the remains of the dead are
having mixed with the earth, they will come to live the Elemental Life and will feel everything that the earth feels. Yes, the
the earth is a living being, and its blood is water and its breath is air.
To those who seek revenge, I tell them not to be surprised by the mistake my brother has made.
Japeusa. We all have a destiny that must inevitably be fulfilled, even if we oppose it. Japeusa
he did nothing but respond to his erratic instincts. You all know he was born opposite to all of us and did not
we must expect him to behave like us. It is for this reason that I ask for mercy for my brother and
for those like him who are fulfilling their inexorable destiny.
Chapter XIV
In which the events that occurred at the burial of the young Yrãséma are recounted.
The body of Yrãséma was carefully placed in a clay urn.
Flowers and fruits accompany her inside the jug.
In this position, his body seems ready to strum the guitar and start singing.
She takes her most beautiful dresses to eternity.
His brothers have already chosen the place to bury the body of Yrãséma: it has to be under a guava tree.
very tall trees and golden fruits.
After placing the urn at the bottom of the pit, the entire tribe forms a circle around it and sings the
songs that Yrãséma would sing, thus paying a final tribute to the lullaby of her enchanted voice. Now
Sypave, her mother, takes some of the excavated earth in her hands and lets it fall into the pit.
Imitating her, everyone does the same until they end up covering the hole.
Japeusa is here.
He has arrived for the burial ceremony of his sister's remains; he himself has been the cause of her
death.
Japeusa is here and the tribe, in indignation, shouts against him and demands that the harsh punishment be applied.
death.
Sypave stands between the fury and her son.
It is time to give the floor to Sypave.
The tribe is silent and waits.
Tupã has left us many teachings, but the most important one is the one where he points out
Clearly, we should not take anyone's life. Let's then allow them to be our own gods.
those who apply the punishment to Japeusa. They will know how to do it better than us. No one who has killed a
Brother, even if by mistake one can have a clear conscience. Let's leave Japeusa in peace, that
enough has with his conscience.
Japeusa moves away again.
The whole tribe murmurs.
Japeusa, before the eyes of everyone, throws herself into the waters of the river and disappears.

Chapter XV
In which Jahari dreams of the death of Yrãséma, and runs to her side to protect her.
Startled by a horrible nightmare, Jahari wakes up.
The whole body drenched in cold sweat. He sits in the hammock. Feet on the ground.
In his strange dream, the voice of the gua'a that he himself had given to Yrãséma repeated, 'Jahari, Yrãséma has
dead," the guide repeated the phrase over and over.
Jahari does not believe in superstitions, but the appearance of the gua'a and its phrase has been such a clear image...
Jahari runs like the rhea.
Overcome the obstacles in your path with the strength of love.
Jahari is scared. He feels it in the tingling that makes his hair stand on end.

The village is nearby.

Jahari is driven by fear, by desperation. He runs. A whistle is the only thing that the trees and the
plants and the streams listen when the young man passes by at full speed.
Chapter XVI
In which the tribe discovers the punishment that Tupã and Arasy have imposed on the unfortunate Japeusa.

While Jahari runs, in the village the tribe searches unsuccessfully for the body of Japeusa. The waters of the river
they have been swallowed. Days go by. The sun and the moon have illuminated the lands of the kingdom of Rupave time and again.
Sypave.
One morning, when the sun rises in the east, Marangatu discovers a skeleton on the sand of the
beach. Crouching, he scrutinizes the bones and among the bones, attached to the skeleton, a strange animal, with skin
So it starts to move. The tribe surrounds Marangatu who observes calmly. The strange animal takes off its
the legs of the skeleton's ribs and begins to walk backward. The villagers all scream at once:
"Japeusa, Japeusa!" The crab moves away on the sand leaving the marks of its hard legs.
The tribe buries the skeleton in the sand and everyone walks away from the place.

There is no doubt that Tupã and Arasy have punished Japeusa by turning him into a crab and forcing him to walk.
backwards for all eternity.
Japeusa has been turned into a crab, and from today, crabs will be called, for this town, japeusa.
Chapter XVII
In which Jahari learns of Yrãséma's death, sings his song, and dies of love.
Stirred by the long race, Jahari arrives at the village.
"Yrãséma!" he calls out loudly, distressed.
The whole tribe, which has already begun to forget the tragedy, looks at him compassionately.

Jahari perceives the gazes and tears filled with sorrow slide down her cheeks. She runs towards the
Yrãséma's room. Sypave goes to meet him. The gua’a that is nearby confirms the phrase from his dreams with
strident voice: 'Yrãséma has died.'
The tears of Jahari run through the village.
They ascend to all the things that belonged to Yrãséma. They roam them, caressing them with their deep sadness,
they fill the jars where the young woman kept the fresh water. They slip on the curve of her hammock and together
They form a torrent that heads towards the tomb of Yrãséma. There, they water the still soft earth and refresh the
flowers that the tribe has deposited. The sadness of Jahari's tears, their infinite moisture makes the flowers
revive.
Jahari next to the grave.
Jahari inconsolable.
Jahari cried all day and all night for his beloved, kneeling in front of the grave.
In her mind, the hours of happiness:
When I heard from afar the soothing sound of Yrãséma's soft voice. When captivated by the strumming of her...
sweet mbaraka rested for hours by his side. When they both promised eternal love to each other in that
sunset sown with shooting stars and wishes. When with joy Yrãséma received the gua'a that now
has announced his death. So many hours of peace, charm, sweetness, and happiness. So many hours of love between
both...
Jahari sings by the grave:
Since you must be next to me,
murmur of the waters,
since your voice has faded in this world,
the lullaby of the winds,
since the night has blinded your gaze,
light of the trills,
since I won't be able to embrace your body in this world,

oh Tupã, oh Arasy,
oh light, oh heavens,
I no longer want to be in this world without Yrãséma.

Take me to visit my beloved.

As soon as his litany ended, Jahari collapsed over the grave of his beloved and there he lay dead.
tribe in the midst of a silence that covers everything, digs a grave next to the tomb of Yrãséma and buries the
heartbroken lover who merges forever with his beloved virgin.
Chapter XVIII
In which it is told how the calm of the tribe is interrupted by Tau's excessive desire.
Since that morning of silences when Jahari was buried, calm reigns in the village. Tume Arandu
continues uncovering mysteries in the herbs that grow in the valley, Guarasyáva takes ownership of the
secrets of water animals. Porãsy, in her reign of beauty and charm, strolls through the mountains.
talking with the birds. Tupinamba continues to conquer hills with its unmatched strength. Marangatu takes care of
his only daughter with infinite kindness and she, Kerana is the nickname of the only daughter of Marangatu, she sleeps.
Because Bella, like her aunts, is in the bloom of adolescence, her eyes have the sparkle of movement.
waters when they play with the sun. Their delicate hands exist only for caresses. Their mouth has the
consistency of the flesh of ripe papayas. Her legs have been shaped by the water and the winds with
infinite sweetness.
Because of her, the very sweet sleeper.

Kerana, the most desired young woman of the whole tribe.

Everyone enjoys the rare moments when the sleepyhead leaves her hammock to stroll around the village, but
No one yet imagines the tragedy that her beauty hides for her and for all the people around her.
From the darkest depths of the nefarious shadows, Tau, the spirit of evil, observes the girl.
He observes her with desire.

He observes her with lustful passion.

She observes it to find the weak points and attack it.
He wants her for himself and is willing to do anything to get her.
The evil spirit now decides to attack. To appear on earth, it transforms its repugnant body into the
of a handsome and elegant young man. Dressed like a foreigner, he happens to pass through the village where Kerana
sleep your sweet dreams. He carries among his hands a magical flute that plays alongside the hammock of
Because. The girl wakes up and sees the young man. She had never seen such a beautiful young man before. The evil genius
he smirks grotesquely to himself, but on the outside of his clever disguise, the smile is almost heavenly
and the gaze gently caressing. Kerana, enchanted by the music, the look, and the smile, listens to him with
place. Later, the young man continues on his way, leaving Kerana in ecstasy. But the strategy of the evil spirit
It is closely observed by Angatupyry, the spirit of good. 'It won't be easy for you!' he thinks to himself.
Angatupyry.
The calm of yesteryear has already been broken. Although on the surface everything seems as it was then, in the skies...
the fight has begun.
Chapter XIX
In which Angatupyry intervenes and Tau confronts him.
Because he sleeps and his dreams are occupied by a single image, that of the young man who passes like the soft
breeze, leaving her a pleasant memory.
But Tau has other traps prepared for the girl daughter of Marangatu. Two days after her first
appearance returns with the sound of his magic flute to awaken Kerana. The girl now hears him
enchanted. It's no longer just music that the young stranger brings. Now he talks to her. He tells her
wonderful stories. She falls in love.
Angatupyry observes the visits of Tau that are now daily.
A walk in the mountains.
The gift of a butterfly of radiant colors.
Gazes of passion.
Angatupyry decides to intervene.
First, sow doubt in the girl. Make her dream scandalously repugnant dreams. In her nightmares,
Because he sees how the handsome and tender young man transforms into a horrible monster, he transforms into the
the very same Tau. But Kerana's innate innocence leads her to share her nightmares with the young man. When Tau
the dreamer realizes that he is being harassed by Angatupyry and decides to confront him. Like so many
At other times, Tau and Angatupyry have been caught in a relentless struggle. They choose the great as their stage.
fields near the hills of Areguá.
Chapter XX
In which the extraordinary struggle between the spirit of good and the spirit of evil is recounted.
The struggle is fierce. For six days and nights, the opposing spirits have been debating, crossing each other.
in furious close encounters. Hurling flames of hatred.
Because he has slept those six full days without getting up or opening his eyes.
Tau and Angatupyry, entwined in fierce combat, continue the fight now. Once again Angatupyry is
overcoming. Exhausted Tau tries to evade the fierce onslaughts of the spirit of good. Once again, the good
will triumph over evil.
In her bed, Kerana begins to calm down.
Tau is withdrawing from his dreams.
Angatupyry smiles seeing his eternal enemy almost defeated.
You bite the dust of defeat. You roll through the field again and again trying to dodge the arrests of
Angatupyry. Its monstrous wounded and aching body can no longer take it, it is about to withdraw from
combat. It is already the seventh day of fighting and Tau finds himself at the mercy of his enemy, but with his last breath he invokes
to the god of courage. He invokes him knowing that he too can die forever with that plea.
"Pytãjovái 63, help me to overcome," groans Tau from the ground.
"Pytãjovái, help me," he repeats desperately as he sees Angatupyry approaching.
A wind of fire halts the attack of Angatupyry. Behind the flames, the horrendous laughter of Tau can be heard.
Pytãjovái has heard the pleas of the wicked and has appeared on the battlefield with all his
Weapons. Grass will no longer grow where the breath of the god of courage has been expelled. Angatupyry lies
Dying. Tau rises and looks proudly with his eyes laden with evil. Kerana suddenly awakens.
Marangatu, who has been observing her daughter's long sleep, tries to talk to her, but the girl asks her to ...
leave alone and climb to the top of a tree from where you can scrutinize the horizon. Tau, transformed once again into the
The handsome young man approaches her without any opposition.
Chapter XXI
In which it is told how Tau kidnaps Kerana and the curse of Arasy.
Because she listens to the sound of the magical flute of the young man who has made her lose her mind. Enchanted, she descends from the
tree and run through the mountain to meet the magical sound. Merged in a long embrace the young ones
greet. Tau, from his guise of innocence, for the first time speaks to him with lust. He speaks to him of his deepest desires.
hidden. He becomes unrestrained, making her the protagonist of the carnal pleasures he imagines. The girl intends
to resist but Tau, driven by his own desires, presents himself to her in all his ugliness becoming
suddenly in the terrible monster that it is. Kerana screams and the whole tribe comes to her call. Tau clings to his
Capture and run blinded. No one can stop him. They see him move away taking the beautiful Kerana with him.
Tau leads the girl to his inaccessible dwelling and persuades her to try to escape.
Don't try it, you will die if you try to leave,
Tau, from then on, quenches his thirst for pleasure in the young body of Kerana.
Surrendered, the girl cries inconsolably and her crying angers even more the terrible spirit of evil. "I will not be
"yours never" shouts Kerana every time the monster possesses her, but the scream is drowned out by the deafening
growls of Tau.
The tribe implores, cries out, asks Arasy to intercede to achieve the miracle of rescuing Kerana.
Indignation and shock have swept over the people who are now demanding exemplary punishment for the kidnapper.
heartless. Arasy hears the pleas and curses Tau, curses him for all eternity and curses all his
descendants.
Chapter XXII
In which it is reported on the births of Kerana, fertilized by the spirit of evil, of the
characteristics of her seven children and the terrible pain of the young woman.

Seven moons have passed since that dreadful day when Kerana was kidnapped by the wicked.
pale with fear, the desperation of the girl was observed. Now Kerana is giving birth. She is expecting a boy.
but the curse of Arasy has caused her to give birth to a monster. Kerana gives birth to a horrible monster with seven
heads. Seven heads of a dog whose eyes emit flames. Seven heads of a dog and a horrible
lizard body. In the future, it will be known as Teju Jagua. Seven dog heads that condemn him to the
inaction. Its ferocity was annihilated by the desire of Tupã and, contrary to its horrendous figure, it feeds
only from fruits and from the honey that his future younger brother, Jasy Jatere, brings to his hideout.
Because, permanently besieged by Tau, she gave birth to a child every seven moons. All were preterm. All
deformed phenomena. All evil.
The second son of evil was born in the form of a great serpent with a parrot's head and an enormous beak. His
bifid tongue, red as blood. Its scaly and veined skin. Its feathered head. Its malevolent gaze.
It is known by the name of Mbói Tui, it wanders around the marshes and protects amphibians. It loves humidity and the
flowers. It can be identified without seeing it because it produces terrible and powerful caws that can be heard from
so many distances.
Because, overwhelmed by grief, crushed by the uncontrollable Tau, gnawed by the certainty of being
giving birth to monsters capable only of doing evil. Hurt because her body is the creator that is
shaping a terrible army, she gave birth to her third child:
He will be known in the world of men by the name of Moñái 66 and just like his immediate predecessor, his
The body is that of a huge serpent. It has two straight, iridescent horns that function as antennas.
Its domains are the open fields. It climbs trees with great ease and descends from them to hunt.
to the birds with which it feeds, whom it dominates with the hypnotic power of its antennas. That is why
He is also said to be the lord of the air. Moñái protects theft and promotes it. Thieves and scoundrels still
Today they invoke him in their misdeeds.

In her fourth month of pregnancy, Kerana feels that there is finally something human in her womb. At seven
months, as has happened with all his previous children, I gave birth to a boy with golden hair and very fair skin,
but the child was born with a golden staff in his right hand. A slight pressure on his magic wand and the
a boy, known as Jasy Jatere, disappears by becoming invisible. The boy horrifies his mother.
disappearing and reappearing in incredible places. Jasy Jatere will be the sprite who, during nap times, sheltered
in his childhood figure, he will besiege young women and girls who dare to go out alone, conquering them and
possessing them with the powers of his magic staff. He will dominate the bees and from them he will obtain the honey with the
that it will feed on, whose remains it carries to the cave where its older brother, Teju Jagua, lives.
Kerana has no comfort. It has been more than two years since she has been imprisoned by the spirit of evil and Kerana continues
counting the days. Her radiant body of yore has been deformed due to the mistreatment it has received in
constant form by Tau.
Now Kerana gives birth to the fifth spawn of evil. Her figure resembles that of Tau, In her features
sharp. In her dark skin, in the wire hair and the big mouth.
He will be known by his name: Kurupi, who will fill young women with fear.
And it will also be known for its main physical characteristic: a huge and very long penis that it has.
wrapped around the waist. His attacks on lone women venturing through the jungle will be much more
fury and cruelty that his brother Jasy Jatere possesses. In those cases, Kurupi rapes and kills his victims. But
their greatest fun is to kidnap virgins, who mysteriously disappear to return pregnant and
ready to give birth at seven months. Kurupi's children, however, die on the seventh day from a strange illness.
*.
Kurupi dominates wild animals and never leaves the jungle where he reigns with the power of his
sensuality, except to abduct its victims.
Tired and disillusioned. Devoted and wilted, Kerana gives birth to her sixth child. Once again a seven-month premature baby.
more monstrous. It will be known as Ao Ao. It has the ability to reproduce on its own and lives in
a large herd in the most inhospitable areas of hills and mountains. The Ao Ao feeds on human flesh and
he lives chasing the people who venture through the hills. The only way to save oneself from the pack is
climbing a pindo. Any other tree in which the pursued take refuge will be uprooted by its
terrible claws and knocked down in a short time but apparently, the pindo has some spell against ferocity
of these monsters. The Ao Ao is quadrupedal but when it attacks it stands on two legs. Its powerful claws
and its fierce head reminds us of a bear, but its body is like that of a sheep, and under that appearance it manages to
that people come closer without fear **.
The seventh birthing of Keraná was as terrible as the previous six. This time, from her womb, was born
a completely deformed creature. Its head, similar to that of a dog, reveals a long row of
sharp teeth of different sizes. Their ears are small and set on the top of the large
skull. Its emaciated and dry body, its limbs half human, half claws give it an appearance
awkward. He will be known by the name of Luisõ.
Luisō lives in the graveyards and feeds on the corpses he digs up there. He can be
listen on full moon nights, when it emits its mournful and terrifying howls perched on the
tombstones of the graves ***.
Luisõ was the last childbirth of Kerana.
Tau seems to now focus on feeding the evil spirit of his offspring and forgets about the maiden.
Devastated and ruined, poor Kerana sleeps more and more to avoid tears, fruitlessly, because
even in dreams she cries...
Chapter XXIII
In which the Jahari gua’a is introduced as the messenger of Tupã and reveals the secret of the magic herb to
You are wise.
Let us for a moment put aside the curse of Arasy, which is being fulfilled in all its extent while
You rejoice with the evil geniuses you have brought forth. Let us for a moment set aside the expansion of evil, the
spirits, the phenomena and the people.
Let's go now to the place where Tume Arandu is located.
By the banks of a luminous waterhole, the sage investigates the leaves of some small plants that grow there.
A strange, shrill voice startles him: 'I have something to tell you,' says the voice. Recovering from the initial fright,
Tume Arandu raises his gaze and sees nothing but the Jahari gua’a perched on a branch nearby. The bird...
Look and repeat the phrase: 'I have something to tell you.' Tume Arandu approaches and offers the back of his hand to the
the way a falconry enthusiast would do it with his falcon. The gua’a lands on Tume's arm.
Arandu speaks to him in his ear.

Judging by Tume Arandu's expressions, from here we cannot hear what he is saying,
It must be something amazing. The guide talks non-stop and Tume Arandu is expectant, far from the landscape that surrounds him.
absorbed, listens to the marvelous words of the bird. Then, with the gua'a on his shoulder like a pirate, he heads
to the other side of the pond and they disappear along a narrow path among the trees of the forest.
The secret has been revealed.
As Tupã had said, the efforts of Tume Arandu have earned the unveiling of the secret.
Tume Arandu already knows the magical herb, the ka’aruvicha, the herb that brings eternal youth. But
it also knows what the conditions for using it are. The use of it carries very strict restrictions.
ka'aruvicha, restrictions that if violated, are paid with one's own life. The man who has drunk the
infusion of ka'aruvicha and comet the angaipa, he will be a dead man. But if he remains chaste, he will maintain his
youth will be immortal, will always enjoy good humor, will be wise and will be safe from all disease.
the woman changes, the baby will strengthen, procreating in a better way and without labor pains.
You prepare the infusion.
He himself must drink it and give it to his sisters and to the gua’a, a marvelous instrument of Tupã,
From now on, he will not be separated from Tume Arandu for a single moment.
Chapter XXIV
In which news is given about the state of affairs promoted by the children of Tau.
At seven years old, the phenomena reach their peak.
His misdeeds constantly torment the people. The frequent abductions of the maidens that he takes to
Cabo Kurupi. The rapes. The robberies and looting of Moñai. The outrages of the cemeteries of Luisõ.
scandalous pranks of Jasy Jatere. The wild chases of the Ao Ao pack and their rites
anthropophages. The croaks of Mbói Tui. the terrible fire gaze that hides in the cave of Teju
Jaguar inspiring fear and superstitions.
Moñai accumulates the product of its pillage in Yvytykuápe.
No one dares to cross the mountains for fear of Kurupi.
The hills are the empire of the already famous Ao Ao pack.
The cemetery is transformed into a place of fear and terror by the work of Luisõ.
The daring of the hunters who seek sustenance in the marshes is punished with death by Mbói.
Tui, the protector of amphibians.
Deaths, outrages, thefts, and rapes predispose the tribe's inhabitants to fight among themselves.
others. To kill each other among siblings. Families attack each other. Villages are set on fire.
Evil, propagated by the triumph of Tau, prevails in the lands that Tupã blessed on that first day.
Now men arm themselves, kill each other, prefer vandalism to kindness. The seed of evil is planted.
throughout the tribe.
 It is in this moment of confusion and fury that the calm and wisdom of Tume Arandu appear to
to say enough. The wise one summons the greedy and the most renowned members of the tribe to come to him
accompany the Ñemono ongáva of Atyha as he has something important to say, something that will solve the
current problems.
Chapter XXV
In which the gathering of the people in the Assembly is discussed and the resolutions that were made for
end the vandalism unleashed by the phenomena.
That day the village had been gathering very early, eager to hear the words of
Tume Arandu. When everyone was attentive, the wise man delivered a brief but very clear message of love,
of unity and companionship. He did it with simple words, the hardest to pronounce in those
occasions. He did so by appealing to the common sentiment and left in each and every one of the attendees the seed
of kindness and hope.
Then, in a secret session, he met with the notables of the tribe and told them:
I'm not telling you anything new by saying that we are living in a time when death is prevailing.
about life. Sadness takes the place that was once reserved for joy. Hatred is the feeling that
replaces love. Blood runs stronger than the water of our streams. The crystal-clear water of the
life becomes clouded in the dark sewers of death. It is evident that in this way we are heading
directly to total disappearance. We must do something.
Tume Arandu took a long pause and then continued in front of the astonished silence of all the notables of the
tribe
I have to reveal a great secret to them.
Everyone exchanges glances and nods.
Tupã has sent a messenger through whom He is with us all the time, giving us the
indications to finally and forever put an end to the evils that plague us.
Hello here, the Jahari gua’a has revealed itself as a messenger of Tupã.
He serves as Tupã, an instrument to be by our side. His words have inspired me a plan.
to destroy the seven phenomena and with the help of one of my sisters, we will be able to carry it out.
The hour of the end has come for the seven brothers. They have no escape. We must take advantage of this.
moment. Tau has marched towards Ruapehu and will not be able to intervene. If we manage to finish them off, we will do
relapse into the evil that casts its cloak over all of us.
A heavy and uncomfortable silence forms when Tume Arandu falls silent.
If we agree to follow the plan that Tupã dictates to us, I must leave to prepare my
sisters and initiate the actions.
The attendees with their gaze fixed on the floor respond with their silence. Fear and disbelief have
they have gained his will, but they cannot prevent the value of Tume Arandu and his sisters from intervening.
wickedness.
Tume Arandu stands up and leaves.
Chapter XXVI
In which Tume Arandu requests the collaboration of his sisters.
Back in the village, Tume Arandu calls his three sisters and asks them to sit around the
fire that he himself ignites with a branch.
Guarasyáva, Tupínamba, and Porãsy, more radiant than fire itself, illuminate the place with their
extraordinary beauty.
Tume Arandu speaks to you now about youth.
It reveals the secret of the ka’aruvicha.
 He tells them about the wonders of Jahari gua’a. He speaks of Tupã's constant concern for his people.
and finally, he tells them the plan to exterminate the seven monsters.
I will go kill him -he says, standing up Porãsy- I will deceive Moñái and escape from his jaws without a
Just a scratch, but if Tupã desires the sacrifice, I will be there to die for my people.
Porãsy, proud, extends her gaze beyond the family circle that surrounds her and circles around the
They are gathered. She is eager to start her task.
The mission does not scare him. On the contrary, it fills him with courage. Porãsy breathes in the renewed air of the evening.
that is falling from the other side of the river. It fills its lungs more with courage and bravery than with air.
I have decided to be the protagonist and so I will be.

Chapter XXVII
In which we learn how Porãsy reaches Moñái's cave and convinces him to gather his
brothers.
The sun has not yet risen and Porãsy is already heading towards the cave where Moñái lives and gathers the spoils of his plundering.
She walks alone in the darkness of the jungle. She knows every stretch like the palm of her hand. Every heartbeat
each living being becomes an ally that exhales its strength to accompany the young woman.
younger of the sisters of Tume Arandu marches, and in herself accumulates all the desires of the tribe, of the
forest, of the skies and of the rivers. Everyone wants to be free from the evil they have endured for so many years.
Porãsy advances.
As it approaches the Kavaju 79 hill, where the monster rests in its cave, Porãsy redoubles the
care. His walk is now imperceptible. It's like a shadow that enters the cave. Just a
Distant glow reveals the existence of a torch of fire lit on the walls of the grotto.
Porãsy enters without making the slightest noise.

Porãsy knows that Moñái, even asleep, will soon notice his presence.
The fetid smell of the dimly lit cave, like a vermin, slithers and tries to envelop the young woman,
but the power of the jungle aromas repels decay and the girl remains unscathed. Moñái moves
its long and viscous body. Its horns light up with every movement.
Suddenly, he lifts his head and, sticking out his bifid tongue, with a voice like thunder says:

Who are you, what are you doing here?

I have come to see you. So much is said about your feats. So much is said about your agility. So much is said about your
Value. So much that I have fallen in love and decided to come to see you to tell you, Moñái,” replies the young woman.

Disconcerted, the monster crawls to a place where it can better see the beauty of Porãsy.
Their hot huffs release clouds that can be guessed to be white in the dim light of the cave.
You say that the tales of my agility and my feats and my bravery have reached you.
That's right.

And you say that you have fallen in love with me.

That's right.

Then you will be willing to be mine right now.

That's why I'm here, but it is my wish, before we connect, to meet your brothers and celebrate.
our wedding alongside them.
Moñái, dazzled by supreme beauty, circles around the girl making his long and zigzag.
scaly body. Distrust sows its seed in the nascent morning that extends its first lights
at the mouth of the cave.
Moñái thinks.
In their iridescent horns, the light goes back and forth from top to bottom. However, desire weighs more than the
doubt in that strange balance that moves in the gloomy interior of Moñái. His eyes are the reflection of the
cave in which he dwells and in them there is no place for anything other than the extreme beauty of Porãsy.
 Moñái now speaks:
You will know that Teju Jagua, one of my brothers, cannot leave his cave due to his deformity, but
If you really love me, as you say, then we can leave immediately for Jaguaru 80 and celebrate the wedding.
in that place.
The Tume Arandu plan begins to take shape.
The journey to Jaguaru, foreseen by the sage, is imminent.
Porãsy responds immediately and without hesitation:

"I completely understand, and if that is your wish, we will depart immediately."
Without any precautions, the beast sets off towards Jaguaru accompanied by the beautiful Porãsy.

There they go.

She is elegant and beautiful.

He crawled and was ashamed to walk like this in the light of day, but anxious to possess the one who reigns over the
beauty of the earth.
Chapter XXVIII
In which the wedding of Moñái and Porãsy in Jaguaru is recounted.

Ten days have passed since that morning when Porãsy arrived at the first cave, the one of Moñái.
Now he is in the second cave, which serves as the dwelling for the feared and harmless Teju Jagua. He has waited
the girl for days next to the deformed seven-headed one. Finally, Moñái has returned with the rest of his
brothers.
Now they are all gathered.
Porãsy dressed in a gown of fog and waterfalls, knows that the moment is approaching when her
The performance must be completely convincing. Before their eyes, as no one has seen them before, are the seven.
brothers: Kurupi, Jasy Jatere, Moñái, Teju Jagua, Mbói Tui, Luisõ and Ao Ao. The postcard is terrifying but everyone
They are strangely cheerful. The chicha flows and the monsters drink monstrously.
Outside the cave it is a dark night.
The moon is the great absent one at the party.
Tume Arandu and his companions surround the hill in silence.

The trap is being set and the end is near.

Inside, the grotesque party shines in the light of the torches. The monsters become rough and
swaying in the darkness of alcohol. Porãsy awaits the moment to act. Observes the
seven brothers. Observe the drunkenness knowing that their tribe is waiting for a signal from them to act.

Climactic moment: Porãsy believes the time has come and tries to escape.
He reaches the door and is about to leave.
From the outside, they are already pushing the large stone that will cover the entrance.

Moñái warns of the movement and, like a lightning bolt, emerges from the shadows and envelops with its body of
the serpent the fragile body of the girl throwing her back to the bottom of the cave. Its open jaws
unduly to let out a terrifying scream: 'Betrayal!'. The scream of Moñái's fury. The scream
desperate from Porãsy: "Shut the cave, I can no longer save myself!" The tribe seals the entrance and the fire
exterminator begins to rise on the hill.
Chapter XXIX
In which the ascent of Porãsy to the heavens is narrated.
A huge lighthouse. A giant torch that lights up the day in the very center of the night.
The tribe circles around the hill. They walk hand in hand. They sing, overshadowing the terrible screams of
the seven monstrous brothers.
You are Arandu with your back to the fire.

The poet seeks the face of the sage and notices two translucent pearls rolling down his cheeks. Porãsy has
sacrificed. The wise one clears from his mind the images of his little sister in the hands of the monsters.
Let the terrible images out as little tears.
The monsters are being consumed by the fire.
Arde Porãsy and its small body enters the final transformation.
Spirit of Mua, the spirit of Porãsy, bright and clear, concentrates upon itself.
Near dawn, the whole tribe witnesses the ascension of a small, intense light that from
then they called Mbyja Kofi 81. Since then, Tupã assigned the spirit of the little Porãsy to
to illuminate the dawn of all the mornings in history.
Chapter XXX
In which we learn about the fate that befell the seven monsters far from the face of the earth.
Seven days and seven nights the hill was under the sea of fire, fervently fed by the entire tribe. At last,
the seven evil ones ascended to the heavens transformed into seven small stars that we now know as
the constellation of the Pleiades or The Seven Little Goats. The tribe gave them the name Eichu and even today they are still referred to as such.
known by that name.
Consumed are the horrible bodies of the monsters and purified are their spirits, resting forever in the
high sky.
When the light of the eighth day clears the last remnants of the dense haze, Tume Arandu opens the cave.
the wind carries away the ashes forever and the tribe returns to breathe the clean breeze that Tupã left behind
principle.
Chapter XXXI
In which the song that the Poet dedicates to Porãsy is transcribed.
The happiness and great joy that the whole tribe feels now, liberated from torment and fear.
provoked by the wicked, it is overshadowed by the sacrifice of Porãsy. Her former suitors weep.
His sisters cry. The wise Tume Arandu cries in silence. The jungle and the rivers and the afternoon air cry.
mountain birds. It is the pain of having lost the one who ruled over all the beauty of the world. And the
sorrow is expressed with painful tears.
The poet weeps and threads the tears of the whole tribe into his fine pen, to embroider with words a
song of praise and joy that wipes away tears and eases pain.
The voice of the poet finally manages to express its song and says:

Nature expresses itself joyfully

when you appear, beautiful star.
White flower of dawn, how good you were
That in wanting to save us you died burned.
Daughter of Arasy, pearl of the sky,
your fresh dew comes from the sky.
Tears of fog filled with essences,
the flowers open before your presence.
Oh beautiful little star, when the day dawns
by looking at your shine you give us joy.
From your eternal journey, we find comfort.
knowing that you are spoiled by the heavens.

And if the frosts whiten the fields

 your shining light becomes a charm.
You are the enchanted star from heaven,
you were born beautiful and you are revered.
Chapter XXXII
In which the return of Tau and his vengeful fury are narrated.
Days passed, and calm seemed to return to the land. The men worked hard to make peace and
forget their resentments. In many places bonfires were lit that represented the end of hatred and war.
The plundering and the trickery were gradually disappearing. Spring, with its splendor, was beginning to make
to shine on the jungle plants that crackled with aromas and colors.
One morning when the wonderful orchestra of creation was preparing to begin the first notes of
great spring concert, suddenly the sky dressed in black. The sun that had begun to stretch its
Golden rays faded and became trapped beyond the densely thick layer of stormy clouds that advanced.
from the east rushing in fury.
Tau was back.
He knew it before anyone else, Tume Arandu through the gua’a.
The tribe knew it because violence and feuds immediately intensified.
The mountain knew it when a destructive wind descended upon it with the force of a thousand hurricanes.
ground with flowering foliage and rotting everything.

The river knew it whose waters were stirred against its will and threw thousands of dead fish to the
banks.
Tau roared atop the hill and Kerana wept inconsolably.
Tau promised revenge and the revenge began with that overwhelming storm that not only shook the outside
from the earth but ignited the darkest fires of the spirits of the village's inhabitants.
Since then, a difficult time began in those areas.
Tau descended from the hill and ran at full speed in search of the architect of the destruction of his children. He went to
searching for Tume Arandu without thinking that he was already waiting for him.

Tau runs through the mountains and in a trice finds himself by a lagoon where the wise man is bathing.
Tau, beside himself, summons him with his vengeful cry. Tume Arandu spins around while still in the water and looks.
fixedly at Tau. She looks at him calmly. She looks at him fiercely. She looks at him in a unique and inconceivable way.

Tau, embarrassed, flees the place.

The wise man has once again set a trap for him.
They have empanadaed him.

The power of ka'aruvicha has once again yielded results against the abominable evil of Tau.
In his flight, Tau finds himself in front of the Ita Oñeangecháha and before the sight of his own distorted image.
Furious, she fogs the smooth and shiny stone with her breath and draws an ostrich footprint on it as a sign of
threat and curse to the generation of Tume Arandu.
Chapter XXXIII
In which the sad death of Kerana is told.
No one knows the whereabouts of Tau now. Everyone knows they will encounter him sowing discord. The
Gossip about their evils runs back and forth. Discord and evil are sown.
patiently and eagerly for Tau in all corners of the earth. The evils multiply like never before
before. The chaos is now greater than when the malevolent brothers organized their parties. Tau is going to
running in forays, from the jungle to the mountains, from the mountains to the villages, from the villages to the rivers, from the
Rivers to the islands and their wickedness seems to have no end.

At the top of Jaguaru hill, Kerana continues with her bitter weeping.
 He/She cannot stop.

Her tears are uncontrollable.

No one who saw her now would say that this thin, pale, and awkward woman was just a few years ago a
young beautiful and proud, admired by the whole tribe.
Her once radiant hair is now in tatters, tangled strands on a head that is
The emaciated face inspires pity and horror.
Because it cries.
He/she cries for his/her bitter fate.

He/She cries for having been deceived.

She cries for having given birth to those seven monsters.

She cries for herself and for her tribe.

She cries until the source of her tears runs dry and finally, fainting, she lets herself fall upon herself.
taking a last breath.
Because he has died and at the site of his death a tiny spring flows a thread of water to
all eternity *****.
Chapter XXXIV
In which the story of the great fire is narrated that led Tupã to impose a great punishment on the
men.
Converted into countless characters, Tau travels to all the places where it is possible to sow the seed of
the evil. Thus, today he is a kind foreigner who stops to ask for a little water and after a while finds himself
at another distant point, transformed into a cheerful young man who, armed with strange instruments, is capable of
to play charming melodies. Later he transforms into a quarrelsome man who incites fights
among brothers and then he is a skilled swimmer who arrives in the town through the river from remote areas.
lands.
Deceit is a constant and wherever it appears, it sows, in one way or another, discord.
provokes the quarrels.
But in the end, this role also bores Tau and he decides to do a great evil.
Decide to take revenge by destroying creation.
Tau prepares his powerful force and, taking advantage of the absence of his eternal opponent, Angatupyry, decides
burn it all.
Now imagine Tau the flames of the fire and as he imagines them, the flames are born in different places.
places on earth. They are weak and small at first but occupy strategic locations. The men and the
women of the tribe in their different villages easily extinguish the first shoots. But the sun gets each
more insistent on the dry grasses and the flames begin to reproduce at great speed.
The fire spreads.
Now the llamas are the height of a man.
The fire advances, grows, multiplies.
Tau laughs with loud laughter. Tau laughs and his laughter transforms into more and more flames that feed the fire.
mad. A huge red sea begins to sweep away the villages. The men flee. They abandon their
Elders. They leave the children to their fate.
Great tongues of fire pushed by the red breath of Tau rise up to the height of the tallest trees
high. There they go. Indestructible, the fiery monster gallops fiercely, consuming in that race the
beauties of creation. Among the crackling of the vegetation, the desperate roars of the beasts can be heard,
the screams of the monkeys and the cries of men and women who are caught by the fire.
The great fire entertains Tau, who is filled with joy.
Hours have passed and Tau lies down to rest on the flames.
Then the flames, like a horse whose saddle has loosened the reins, ease their wild run.
They still run, but now they are no longer urged by anyone.
Seven days must pass until the very few survivors of hell cease to feel the flow of fire.
near you. A great scorched desert, from which small threads of smoke rise impassively.
towards the sky, has remained after the great disaster.
Despite the misfortune, disunity and discord are multiplying again.
There is no peace for the tribe and Tupã decides from his throne to put an end to so much cruelty.

Terrifying signs and messages will be given from the high heavens and it will be very soon.
Chapter XXXV
In which it is told how Tupã gave instructions to Tume Arandu and how he carried them out.
Now Tume Arandu knows everything. The gua’a has spoken to him with the voice of, resting on his shoulder.
Tupã has shown the way to follow from now on.
The fury of Tupã is great and to put an end to the horrible visions that men have subjected him to.
he has been submitting, Tupã has called upon Tupã Amaru, the father of the waters, and has ordered him to strike the face
from the earth with a long and torrential rain that covers everything.” These were the first words of the gua’a,
but they were not the last.
It is the will of Tupã that Tume Arandu builds a ygarusu to face the flood and that together with
his sisters Tupinamba and Guarasyáva sail in it until the waters recede. It is essential that Tume
Arandu keep all this in the utmost secrecy. You, Arandu, and your sisters will be the starting point.
from a new generation that is more pure and obedient, Tupã will ensure it is so.
The rest of the sayings of the gua'a referred to the same things, repeating them over and over again in order to
may everything turn out just as Tupã had ordered.
Now you know it.
Tume Arandu ventures into the forest.
Choose the tree with which you will build the ygarusu.
Now he is seen focused on his work. He must do it alone and with his own hands. That is the
condition that Tupã has imposed.
Tume Arandu secures the tree with a multitude of ropes before attempting to cut it down. He has placed in
an ingenious pulley system whereby when the tree falls, it will remain one meter off the ground.
horizontal form. The wise one uses axes and strangely shaped tools in the construction that advances day by day
Every day. In the same way, the calluses on Tume Arandu's hands are becoming more and more.
skilled in the art of constructing vessels.
Ten days have passed and Tume Arandu is putting the final touches on the ygarusu.

Chapter XXXVI
In which the rare phenomena of the eve of Yporu are attempted to be explained.
The deadline of Tupã has passed and cruelty continues to be a constant in the villages of the tribe.
violence, deaths, brawls, disputes, blood...
The afternoon sun, in its descending curve, moistens its golden host figure in that blood and gets stained.
It turns dark and its reddish hair becomes more noticeable to the human eye.
The flames that are inherent to it move constantly in a flutter that can announce nothing good.
As if it were bleeding, the blue sky also begins to be stained with dark red.
The wolves circle around trying to bite their own tails. All the wildlife in the woods is getting desperate.
animals run aimlessly. They begin to feel that they are no longer masters of themselves. From the fiercest ones
even the most insignificant ones scream and tremble with fury and fear.
The men of each village, fearful, make peace with their enemies.
 Wars come to an end when the warriors, frightened by the signs from the sky, break their
arrows and bury them in the mountain.
The evening is falling and everything seems to be lit up.

Every thing and every living being is a glowing ember, a wound.

When the darkness of the night kills that bloody vision, a dense shower of stars is unleashed.
about the region. The natives seek refuge, and those who do not find it become victims of the nervousness of the
beasts that devour them in the blink of an eye.
No one fully understands what is happening, but everyone knows that the end is near.
In the presence of the gods Arasy, witnessing the repentance in men, asks for mercy.
to Tupã and implores him to lift the punishment. But Tupã, severe and serious, only responds that postponing the penalty
capital is impossible.
Amidst the general nervousness, the night goes by.
Closed and mysterious.
Without the moon and blind the night passes.

Tume Arandu leads his sisters to the place in the forest where he has hidden the ygarusu and inside
from him the tense wait begins. Tume Arandu speaks to them in the meantime about the designs of Tupã and of the
horrible things that you will inevitably have to see when the Yporu occurs.
The morning woke up imposing the same fear as its predecessor.
The sun, the dwelling of Tupã, did not show its joyful and warm face as it always did. It covered its eyes
a jaguar. Evidently Tupã did not wish to contemplate what was to happen.
Chapter XXXVII
In which the events that occurred when the Yporu descended upon the earth are recounted.
Now the sun, with its eyes blindfolded, disappears completely.
Clouds that look like living beings rush, clouding the sky. Like hungry beasts they advance.
clashing against each other and causing the same noise that a herd of millions would make
Rhinoceroses. They are not black clouds. They are clouds of an indescribable color. They are clouds the color of death.

The air is becoming thin. It stinks of dead cockroaches. The sky is covered by a great skeleton that
moves as if it were alive.
Fear and confusion are one in the faces of the natives. The great monster of destruction them
look ahead and there is no one who can stop him.
Lightning strikes like enormous arrows splitting the oldest trees in the land in two and
raising wild fumes. Pieces of thick clouds like a grayish and deadly broth rush to
land leaving misshapen craters on the rock of the hills.
A heavy wind rises, tearing the already wilted foliage from the trees. A hot breath that
It causes burns in its wake and kills with its demonic caresses. The sky is collapsing.
It is the end.

It starts to rain.
With a contained fury, the water falls upon the earth. The water forms steel-tipped spears that do not
First, they pierce and embed themselves in the ground, only to later melt from the force of more and more.
lances that fall one over another. Then the water begins to cover everything. Then the blood of the
the dead shine on the surface of the water. Then the living flee to higher areas with
desperation. Then the ygarusu of Tume Arandu and his sisters drift aimlessly in that sea that begins
from whose surface rise waves as high as the hills. Furious waves. The men, the
women, the beasts climb seeking the peaks. They bite, they scratch, they devour each other. The law of
The strongest is the one that shapes at this moment. Gigantic serpents strangle the jaguar, the jaguar
they devour the natives and carry them in their jaws. The natives kill each other and thrust their spears either into the
hot bodies of the beasts, now on the slopes of the hills to help themselves climb. The bewilderment is
total. Each person plays the music of their own salvation. Each person fights for their life in their own way and without
everyone feels that the sentence will reach them equally. Tume Arandu, sitting at the back of the
the vessel covers its face with both hands. Beyond its wisdom, beyond the immortality of which
it has provided the magical herb, the ka'aruvicha, Tume Arandu would not tolerate the spectacle of destruction
total. Only the poet can tell us the most terrible. And so they do.
All song that sings to extermination
speaks at the same time with the holy voice of the child
that with the end, is born, and at the beginning,
begins to walk cautiously in the waters
where the sacred incense is burned.
But the sacred light must shine
and life will be reborn on the earth
how sacred it was from the beginning
and blessed in the words of Tupã.
Night falls and the waters roar. The waves, agile as deer, leap aboard the ygarusu flooding the
bottom of the great pond. These waters are now fresh. They move away from death. They approach life. Death is
a mere memory. The waters cover everything. The land has completely vanished. The Yporu, the sentence
sacred, it has been fulfilled. Tupã Amaru has completed his mission and, as he returns to his abode, he leaves
orders for the rains to continue unabated until boredom.
Chapter XXXVIII
In which the end of the Yporu and the first events in the new lands are recounted.
The crew of that great boat built by Tume Arandu cannot remember how long they lasted.
rains. Tupã took away their sense of time. There was nothing but a single twilight. Neither the darkness of the
nights, nor the clarity of the days.
It could have been a single day or an eternity.
The only certain thing is the water that covers everything and has left nothing standing, except the ygarusu, which is a small boat.
in that immensity of water that extends to touch the skies in all directions.
It has stopped raining and now a dense fog accompanies the advance of the ygarusu that seems like a specter.
sliding over the calm and silence still laden with mystery.
Days later, with the mist cleared, a cool breeze barely ripples the waters.
The gua'a, which accompanies the three survivors in the ygarusu, tells them that it will no longer rain and that the waters
They will start to slowly decrease. Tume Arandu and his two sisters see in the clarity of the first day the
peaks of certain hills on which some animals have been saved. We will know later, from the mouth of
poet, that those animals were the ones that later made up the Guarani fauna.
Months later, the waters reveal the land.
Tume Arandu, his sisters, and the gua'a descend from the ygarusu and venture into the mountains. The trees full
Algae and remnants of aquatic life greet them with their vegetable fragrances. Everything is new to them. The
The landscape is not very different from what they already knew, but now they feel a particular respect for nature.
After all, nature is Tupã and Tupã is nature.
The few birds and animals that, huddled on the mountaintops, managed to survive the flood now
they appear greeting the wise man and his two beautiful sisters with their songs and sounds. They walked this
first day with caution the brothers. They were waiting for an indication from Tupã, a sign, a word, and they looked at
I take it to the water that the beak would not open.

The three brothers think and advance when upon leaving the mountain towards a wide and green clearing, they notice the
presence of two men sitting by the fire.
Tume Arandu, with the gua’a over his shoulder, approaches them ahead of his sisters. The men,
tall and vigorous, they stand up and greet Tume Arandu and his sisters Guarasyáva and Tupinamba.
Karaive and Mahory, they claimed to be the men who, on the other hand, were young and strong. Both invited to
Tume Arandu and his sisters sat around the fire and told them his story.
Karaive and Mafihory had been inhabitants of the luminous Halánte 90, the most beautiful city of a great country.
that was located in the middle of the sea. Halánte had also been devoured by the waters and the two brothers
They were providentially saved upon finding a small boat that they boarded and in which they withstood the deluge.
After seeing their maritime condition, Tume Arandu nicknamed Karaive "Paragua" and Mafihory.
with the nickname of Amaraso, which endured through time. They were known by those names for
Always. With those names, they discovered many years later the place where Halánte once stood,
but that is another story and the poet will tell it when the time comes.
Tume Arandu retired to meditate in a beautiful area of the forest and the four young people engaged in
a friendly relationship. They discovered streams that sang a new music and birds that they already knew of
before, they played with them. The sun shone high like never before and love became present. Later on
Amaraso married Tupinamba and Paragua with Guarayáva. Tupinamba and Amaraso decided to depart towards
the lands of the north and settled near a great river that would be known as the Amazon. Guarasyáva and
They procreated near another great river that was located to the west and that would be known as
Paraguay.
Many stories occurred between that moment and the arrival of the Karaiete that Tupã had announced to
Rupave and Sypave that first day. Many extraordinary and magnificent stories. But those stories deserve
another place so we can only say that Tupinamba was the mother of the Tupi and Guarasyáva race
mother of the Guarani. Two powerful tribes were the Tupi and the Guarani, each with their own characteristics and with
their similarities. Between them they covered almost the entire continent and both tribes wrote, as
protagonists, a fabulous story until the Karaiete arrived in these lands and terror settled in
for a long time among the natives.
* The strange evil referred to in the text is tetanus. Rosicrán says in Our Ancestors: 'Tupã
It was ordered that seven days after birth, their belly button would deteriorate, ultimately leading to death from the disease of seven.
days (tetanus).
It is evident the existing relationship between the Ao Ao and the 'famous' wolf in sheep's clothing that appears in
numerous writings of literature of all times.
The Luisõ, also called Huicho in Guarani, is the local version of the lobizón or werewolf that so much
abounds in the fantasy literature of much of the world and has become a universal myth.
Narciso R. Colmán states that at the summit of Cerro Jaguaru there is a very small spring that filters
a thread of water that evokes the mournful tears of Kerana.

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 View from the summit of Kavaju hill.

Book Two(Part I)
The Indigenous and Mythological Legends
The legend of Karãu
The evening was preparing for sleep, leaving behind the multicolored party dresses that
I had carried it during the day. As always, rumors of birds in retreat completed the
closeness of the night. The grand lady in black was preparing the sequins of the universe for
stroll at ease. The moon was at that moment barely a thread of silver, a very fine bracelet
woven with sunlight, rising from the other bank of the river.
Cold.
August reigns.
Today the pink floral fields of lostajyhan have burst, but under the beautiful blanket of flowers.
they flit the dark shadows of the beyond.
They gather around the young Indian who is preparing for the big ceremony.
They gather around the elderly woman who is preparing for the afterlife.

They float around the hut and the trees and the flowers and the stars that surround the
the strength of the young and the agony of the old woman.

The elderly woman cries out for the son who at that moment has no ears for his mother.
The young warrior now only hears the beats of his desire. He senses the romantic encounter.
It foresees it in the drums that resonate in the newly born night, in the sounds of the animals.
that slide in search of their prey, in the barely audible buzz of the flowers that
they fertilize each other. The young warrior does not have ears for the cry of his mother. And his mother
is dying.
The village doctor holds the old woman's hands between his and closes his eyes to avoid seeing.
to the messengers from beyond who come to take her away.
The young warrior clings
to his feathered staff and
part, leaving behind the
hut where he lives. Still
there exists a moment in which
doubt and stops. The
stars look at him
hopeful, the flowers of
the lapachos scream: come back
next to your mother! The young man
warrior turns his proud
head and look in the direction
from the hut that has just Supposed cave of the Moñái on the slope of the Kavajú hill,
abandon. His mother located in the Cordillera department.
call: come back, my son,
I just want to say goodbye. But the young man has not heard her. Blinded by the passion of his youth,
resumes the path and the stars shed celestial tears.
Now the steps of the young man are firm.
As it progresses, the night closes in on him and the drums bring closer sounds.
powerful. On the soles of his bare feet, Karãu, the young warrior, feels the pulse of the earth
to throb in unison with his chest. The scents of the fire begin to reach his skin and initiate the
process of energizing each of its muscles. His gaze ignites when he reaches the circle.
in which the tribe dances its dreams.
Proud of his garments, proud of his body, Karãuse makes a place in the circle of fire,
he leans on his feathered cane and with his lightning-launching gaze begins to search among the
the most beautiful young women to the one who has been calling him without knowing it.

There it is!
The gaze of that woman has crossed, for a brief instant, her river glimmers with the gaze.
of the vain warrior. It has blinded him, drives him to conquest. Elusive, the young woman disappears.
immediately in the cluster of fire-dyed females.
Karãududa. It has been like an apparition that now returns to be seen only by a
moment. The warrior steps out of the circle and walks with determination around the outside of that little sun.
tribal that the Indians form in their New Moon festival. Walks stealthily like
the jaguar is on the branches of the trees. It would seem that its eyes, its skin, its steps, all of it roars
every time the apparition plays to incite him.
Suddenly, what seemed like an apparition is in plain sight of everyone.
Has she jumped, or has the magic of her extreme beauty simply placed her there, next to the
fire? Karãuse stops and enters the circle. Only fire separates them. Only fire unites them.
Anyone else would burn. They, on the other hand, are there as if they were in their element.
natural.
Their bodies create the fire.
Who will hunt whom?
It is the woman dressed in flames who starts the movement, and the drums, which had fallen silent
to listen to the crackling of those flames, they start a tam-tam increasingly intense. Karãuse
move in the opposite direction, he will not let the papers be reversed. He wants to be the hunter and goes
to the meeting of the young woman on the opposite side. He catches up to her and encircles her small waist.
young man with his right arm. She throws her arms around the young man's neck and he lifts her off the ground.
like pulling out an exotic plant from the riverbank.
Now they dance.
Everything spins at high speed.
The hands on the drums. Karãuy's young feet. Their bodies. The fire. The stars.
fine curve of the moon. The circle of the tribe.
All things spin at high speed.
They run wild.
The soul. The hearts. The flesh. The thoughts. The passion.
A solitary shadow stands still in the midst of the wild race.
A shadow behind Karãu.
Your mother is dead, says the shadow, and the drums fall silent. The air of the night becomes mute and everything
what was spinning abandons its momentum and lets go in a final movement that no longer pays attention to
movement...
Your mother has died, repeat now in the midst of silence the still shadow.
Don't bother, old man. Now is not the time. Now is not the time to cry.
Karãu, her words dyed by the sensual clamor of the moment, does not understand that her mother has
dead. The entire tribe does not understand Karãuy's heartbreak, feeling guilty, each one
of those present, hides her gaze on the dirt floor. The flames recede, yield in the
bonfire making way for the reign of ashes. The young woman, the object of unrestrained desire.
deKarãu, escapes into the forest. Karãu forgets the party, his dead mother, the old doctor who
he has warned her, and runs after her.
The persecution is no longer symbolic but real: the jaguar is chasing the beautiful gazelle.
The scent of the young woman lingers in the air and enters the forest.
As if it were a premonition, the trail of flowers that it leaves behind after its long
lunges, it comes undone and the flowers, once fragrant, fall withered and with a stench of
dead. Internal karãuse in the mountain that is becoming thicker and thicker. Falls repeatedly
times tangled among the vines that now proliferate everywhere. There are no longer flowers or soft
fragrances, all is impenetrable darkness. The ground he walks on is sticky mud.
A crack, the song of a bird, a movement of leaves and Karãu changes direction.
He/She will no longer know how to return.

The sky, now absent, knows it, but Karãuya cannot see the sky, only a closed ceiling of
leaves that prevent him from orienting himself. As if it were a siren's song, any noise it
He is only thinking about the beautiful young woman who has escaped from his arms.
Love another man now. The desire has transformed into obsession first and then into despair.
after. He has lost his precious feathered cane. His body scratched by the vegetation
presents traces of blood. His face has swollen due to insect bites. His
temple is now obstinacy.
All night after an impossible.
Now it appears to a clearing, see a low sky shut by dark clouds.
New hopes are brought to him by the misty swamp that lies ahead.
Go ahead.
The putrid waters up to the waist.
Appearances in the fog.
Look at the young woman who walks softly away over the filthy mud.
Go to the dead mother that emerges from the waters and sinks again. Listen to her screams:
Save me, son! Save me, please!
Again and again, the beautiful young woman and the dead mother appear and disappear before the astonished eyes.
deKarãu. Again and again, Karãu tries to reach the women with his voice, but from his throat, it does not
only one sound comes out.

The water is now up to his neck and yet Karãu keeps moving forward.
He/She can no longer stand.

These are the lands of Carapeguá,

city located in the department
Paraguari: stage of the legend of the pombéro.

Dive in and return to the surface in the swamp.

He is no longer a man.
Just an amorphous mass in the mud.
Suddenly a mournful cry lifts its skinny body and from among the reeds a black bird spreads
its wings and gets lost in the mist. A bird doomed to wander in the swamps. The body of
color of the clay. The cry of the color of late remorse. A sad bird: elkarãu.
The Legend of Pombéro
In the middle of the night, Itiver awakened with the feeling that something was lurking around his hut. He stepped out and
he walked around the mountain for a good while with stealthy steps but could see nothing nor
Listen. Only some nocturnal birds, brief flutters and barely perceptible croaks.
Itivere thinks of Guyravera, his beloved wife.
Guyraveradescansa, enormous is the curve of her womb. Inside it dwells the life of a new being that
Soon it will shine for them. Guyraveras dreams of paradises of peace and even in dreams he does not glimpse it.
misfortune that fate has delivered to them a long time ago.
They will look up at the sky face to face with the jaguar that seems to be still, but he knows that soon
he will go. He gazes confidently at misfortune, challenges it. He believes that by confronting the star, misfortunes
They will flee dead of fear. Trust in their power. In their strength, there is something natural that has always been
brought to light in the most pressing moments. Trust in your own strength.
Itivereno has heard the loud and sharp whistles that have surrounded for several moons the
village and particularly its hut. A whistle that seems to come from the very darkness of the night.
A whistle loaded with magic, something that Itiveredesprecia.
For hundreds of years, the akahendymerodean were around the Guarani villages. Always with the
hope of engendering in a woman of supreme beauty that improves the strange characteristics
of their race. Losakahendy, small homuscled, never discovered the different forms of
generate the fire. On the darkest nights they steal the embers from the fires and take them to their
villages. They are experts, indeed, in preparing elixirs and potions with herbs and honeys. They are experts in
that magic that comes from the power of herbs.
The bodies of these small beings, which do not exceed the height of a ten-year-old child, are
covered with hair of great softness which even grows on the palms of the hands and
on the soles of the feet.
A resentful people, the losakahendy, mark their victims by touching them with their hairy hands. A
imperceptible caress that causes a stinging sensation of strange feeling in girls and makes them
friends of the shadows forever.
They move faster than the wind and to avoid being discovered, they blend in as if
they were ostriches incubating, or like dry logs or like bushes. The shape of their body and
Their strange garments made of hides, feathers, and leaves help them confuse their enemies.
Capable of friendship, the people await the offering of the towns nearby.
They leave cane, tobacco, and honey for the bushes. The response is generally immediate.
They repay the offerings with bird eggs, hives full of honey, and others.
delights of the mountain. But they are also very vengeful when the offering does not arrive.

Guyraveraya feels the first symptoms of labor. She lies down inside the hut and soon
Time, around midnight, a girl is born. It hears a long and deep whistle. It goes out.
Let's see, he hears footsteps and a burning ember escapes from the village towards the mountain at great speed.
speed. Itiverelo understands everything. Losakahendyhan has stolen the fire of life from its little one.
daughter. Filled with rage, he tries to chase the goblin but his strength runs out quite soon. It is
impossible to chase someone who runs faster than the wind. Despairing, he returns to the village. His
the girl is more beautiful than he could have imagined but he knows that the fire of life no longer
It belongs to him. It has been touched by the icy hands of theakahendy.
Itiverese stirs in its own impotence. It knows that it cannot achieve it through force.
So he decides to win his friendship. Perhaps this way he can free his daughter from
maleficio. Itiveredeja offers to the goblins. Time and again the offerings disappear but not
they are rewarded. A clear sign that friendship will not be given.
The girl has grown. Her father watches her with sorrow. He tries to follow her movements but as
A slight neglect may cause her to lose sight of her loved ones. The girl prefers the dark places of
mountain. The twilight is its ally and it is irresistibly drawn to it.
One afternoon when Iramarase has detached herself from her father's watch and finds herself in the
dense of the mountain climbing up an old tree, is surprised by a little man who presents himself
before her suddenly and celebrates her taste for shadows.
If you like the shade and darkness of the mountains, then you will also like honey,
as much as I do,” says the little man.
The girl accepts the honey that the goblin offers her and feels that the presence of that being makes her
feeling more secure. Less weird. Accepted and flattered, the girl engages in a smooth conversation.
with the goblin that is not limited to just that afternoon, but to many more afternoons.
The little man gives her constant gifts and the girl feels comfortable with him.
Now, Iramara is a beautiful teenager. A lot of time has passed since that first one.
meeting with Timbe, the goblin, and they have become very good friends.
 The little man has been enchanting him with the magic of his potions. Iramaraya is ready.
for the great expedition they always talk about when they are together. To depart to distant lands,
to abandon the village to which nothing and no one ties her, to leave along the paths of the mountain... Iramaralo
feels in his blood young in which desire also begins to boil, not only for development
natural Sino, and above all, for the potions that Timbele provides.
ItivereyGuyraverase have become taciturn from so much sadness. Their daughter, the light of their eyes, them
despises. Does not answer their questions. Is enclosed in a self-absorption in which they see the
finished. Both have decided to leave the village. To take Iramara far away from there, to tear her away from the claws
of theakendyy start a new life beyond the horizon. They have thought about it a lot and at
They have finally decided. They cannot find another way to save the life of their beloved daughter.

But the losakahen have also decided regarding the life of Iramara.
"The moment has arrived," says Timbea to his peers.
"Today I will bring Iramara," repeats the goblin and a multitude of little men howl with pleasure.
they unleash senseless laughter while rolling around in the bare field.
Tomorrow we will depart,
The woman is silent, sensing that everything will be in vain but will not contradict her husband.

It watches over its hut. Sleep Guyravera. Sleep Iramara. But the night does not sleep.
darkness of dense black clouds is covering the sky. A whistling can be heard. The moon already
has disappeared from the sky. Some lightning strikes in the distance like needles of fire.
Just a moment of carelessness and the girl has disappeared. He discovers the empty hammock. He doesn't remember.
having fallen asleep. Wake up Guyravera. Iramara is gone.
"She will return," says the mother. But the girl will not return.

Near the swamps, in the darkest area, you can see what ItivereyGuyraverano
they want to imagine. There they are IramarayTimbe. The goblin convinces her to leave. He gives her to drink
the magic juices and takes her away. The girl is sitting on a kind of throne that theasakahendyhan
built on two poles. Several little men take turns carrying the poles on their shoulders.
When they arrive at their destination, the land and the trees and the bushes seem to awaken. From all
from the sides more and more little men emerge. Stinking and ragged. Excited by the presence of the
beautiful teenage girls surround the small throne with deafening frenzy. Screams. Stomps. Laughter.
and a foul smell that nearly makes Iramara faint. Again, Timbele reaches for magical juices and the
the girl enters a state of stupor from which she will never emerge. She cannot imagine what it will be.
Fecundated by these little monsters, she does not fully understand what is happening, she does not understand the
lascivia of the devilish little men. But she is there in the middle of the crowd and cannot do anything.
Itivere, at dawn, seeing that his daughter has not returned, decides to gather his tribe and set out on his journey.
search. There go the brave Indians in search of the lands of Karapegua, in search of
They walked for two days to reach the plains to exterminate them.
deKarapeguaque have in front of them. It dawns again and the chief, Itivere, feels the
proximity of his daughter. He sees her and running to meet her, he takes her in his arms and leaves the
goblin circle, setting everything on fire. The Indians set fire to all the brush and the fire
immediately spreads around the little hellish men.
Now they are where they should be,
walking by the bank of a river. The revenge is done and the warrior feels that his daughter is
except that he watches her tremble in his arms. A cold sweat covers the body of the girl who
Shortly after, she dies. Her father, with uncontrollable tears, buries her by the river and returns defeated.
to his village.

AlthoughItiverey believed to have destroyed the race of the akahendy with that monumental
fire, some of them managed to escape. ItivereyGuyraver died shortly after.
sorrow. The survivors of Losakahendys were distributed across different lands and still today
They continue to do their mischief in the outskirts of the towns. They are known by the name
dePombéro, due to his hairy hands, continues to provide protection to those who approach him.
offering of tobacco, cane, and honey. They appear in the places where they are named and attack from time to time.
when adolescents insist on their mania of impregnating beautiful women to improve
their race. They are found alone, and they wear filthy rags as clothing, almost
always a tattered straw hat that covers their face.
The legend of Ñanduti
Like the smoke from large burnings, a low ceiling of black clouds covered the village of
the Warriors of the Sun. The clouds were dragged blindingly by the force of the winds. The
tribe inhabitants knew that this darkness was temporary and were preparing for the
next splendor of the Sun. No one was sad because they knew that the golden star would shine again
over their heads rising with all their strength. No one, except Ñandu Guasu, the son of the chief of
the great ostriches
Dislocated, he writhes in his fiber hammock.
How long has this been going on?

How long has your mother been trying spells to free you from that torment?
"Oh, Sapuru, beautiful indigenous nymph, leave this land and never return!" he thinks to himself.
the mother of Ñandu Guasu, seeing her son suffer from unrequited love.
Sapurudesafía to the Sun.
Paradox: Sapuru sends his message of hope riding on the clouds and in the wind.
"Sapuruse wants to get married and has told his parents," said the malicious tone of the speaker.
hearing from Ñandu Guasu. Immediately the warrior is standing up listening to what the old woman comes to
Tell him. 'Sapuruse will marry the man who gives her the rarest and most valuable gift.'
Lamachuhizo takes a pause to gauge with his squinted eyes the reactions of Ñandu Guasu. "Of course.
it will be very difficult to surpass those that have already been received –added lamachu– although they say that the gift
what brings Jasy Ñemoñarees is even more beautiful and rare. It brings necklaces, earrings, and bracelets of
a rare, white and shiny metal, and they say he brought it out from the moon itself one night when
he ascended there with his magic as a direct descendant of the queen of the night.
Ñandu Guasula listens and feels devastated by the old woman's verbal evidence.
Ñandu Guasupi thinks about death.
In his death.
Sing the old woman's Guasuhuye, of song and of death.
The young warrior runs through the forest.
Run with your steel legs.
Run, chasing away the black clouds, the evil chant, the omens of the old witch, to the
wind that twists the sky. Climb up the trees, it passes through them. Crosses the springs and above
All things are extending with fury, the fury of the Sun. Everything is illuminated in its wake.

Run through the day until night falls.

Now, Ñandu Guasu, with a leisurely pace, traverses the forest that he has made his own during the day.
He senses the discovery, he smells it in the air. It's a very fine perfume, almost imperceptible. A smile
he is drawn on his man's face. He has arrived next to the dead tree. The tree that the lightning of the
heavens have destroyed with their fire. Ñandu Guasu caresses the dead trunk and in the place that has
A small green sprout is born. Ñandu Guasu raises its gaze, noticing the presence.
live from the most charming work of nature that I had ever seen. A white fabric and
brilliant, drenched in dew, full of reflections, made with drawings of celestial perfection.
A cloak born for Sapuru. Undoubtedly an unbeatable gift.
Suddenly, from among the foliage, the figure of Jasy Ñemoñare emerges. He also wants
aSapuru. Ñandu Guasuno has weapons but faces it. A duel for love. For love
despair. Rodeos. Fierce glances. The opponents roll. The moon watches them. A stone, a
mortal wound, blood flows and the moon cries because her son has died. Jasy Ñemoñare lies under
the light of the moon
Now Ñandu Guasutrepa goes towards the branches that hold the coveted mantle. His face illuminated
for the certainty of having aSapuru forever. The young man stretches out his hands and the very fine fabric
undo into a sticky and shapeless goo. It is a spell. It is a chimera. It is an impossible. Never
I will be able to hold the beautiful Sapuru in my arms, he laments in his thoughts, Ñandu Guasuy.
Tears of rage roll down his face.
With a leap, he is on the ground and runs towards his village.

Run with your steel legs.

Runs covering the moonlight with a black mantle that darkens everything.
Run driving away spells, death, and the cold light of the moon.
Runs through the night with its cry until the day is born.
Now Ñandu Guasuse stirs in his hammock. Terrible dreams agitate his spirit. He speaks in
strange languages while sleeping. He screams. His mother, distressed, wakes him up. She takes him out of
hell. Ñandu Guasucalla. He does not recount his journey through the mountain. He is seen with a countenance
shadowed by sorrow and anger. The sun is already high in the sky when the young man decides
to be honest with his mother. They sit together by the river, and with a distant gaze, he recounts what happened.
happened: the journey, the clearing in the mountain, the death of Jasy Ñemoñare, the jewel of that fabric,
the final discomfort.

The mother gets up and simply says: "Take me to that place."

The young man looks at her, first surprised and then with a hopeful smile.
"Trust me," says the mother, and they depart.
They do not run through the forest; they soar over it with the strength of love.

They are now at the site of the discovery. The mother observes the body of Jasy Ñemoñaré covered with
insects and then directs his gaze to the wonder of the fabric up high. The strength of the sun seems
having given more life, more shine, more light. The mother observes carefully, she does not take the risk to
touch the fabric, knows that the slightest brush will destroy it. She limits herself to watching the constant movement of the
small animal. Its comings and goings. Its continuous hanging and unhooking, almost without pauses.
Ñandu Guasuse has slept.
On a branch, it replenishes the forces it has expended during the night.
The mother learns the warp of the marvelous weave. She follows the steps of the spider. The mother
begins to weave a cloak made in the image and likeness of the one before his eyes. He weaves it with
his own gray hairs. He weaves it with love. He weaves it knowing that it will make his son happy.

When Ñandu Guasudespierta wakes up, his mother discovers before her eyes the fabric she has made with her
canes. The surprised young man looks at his mother's work and looks at the fabric caught in the branches: they are
identical. With fear, the young man takes the very soft warp in his hands. The mother counts
how he did it and the son, with his natural ingenuity, says to him: 'we will call it ñandu ati.'
“Go and deliver this offering to Sapuru,” says the mother.

The descendants of Ñandu Guasuy Sapuru continued weaving that delicate lace that today
we know as ñandutí, an eternal homage to the talent and wisdom of the mother of Ñandu Guasu, and
they named the spiders, natural and primordial weavers of that marvel, with the name
describing with which we today know them in our Guarani language.
The Legend of the Urutau
It is the calm hour of the nap, when the shadow barely reaches our feet. Uruti, the daughter.
delmburuvichade losguaranisale de la aldea. His steps are guided by the passion for a man. A
warrior. A solitary one who has challenged the forces of nature with the power of his ancestors.
Urutillega next to the altaiflorido that is on the edge of the thick foliage. There they must meet.
There waits for the beloved. There, restless and passionate, Uruti sits and stands up again and again.
cool shade of the lapacho. Jaguaraingano is arriving. Something has delayed him.

When Uruti is about to withdraw, the lone warrior appears eager to see his beloved.
The afternoon ignites again and the storm clouds that filled the soul of Uruticon
disenchantments disappear as if a giant had blown them away with force, distancing them for
always.
I am here, watching them. Beautiful Urutila, Guarani princess, and Jaguarainga, the strong warrior, commoner.
but proud to be a descendant of the first inhabitants of these lands. He does not know,
let us know, that his mother has been the sister of the great jefeguarani.
The sugary dialogue of the young. The caresses.
He has brought him a still-warm tiger skin as an offering and some wounds on his arms and in the...
chest, scratches from the beast it has had to fight in broad daylight, to reach alongside
to his beloved. Proud of his triumph, the warrior rests in the lap of his beloved. She heals his
wounds with ceibo leaves and words of love.
The lovers feel footsteps and voices.
The girl is scared.
The warrior asks for calm.
"It's my father's voice, I must leave," says the girl.
"It is too late for escapes, let's face the situation," replies the warrior.
Both stand up and in this way receive the delegation that is approaching them.
The father firmly reprimands the daughter, and she tries to make excuses for the presence of the
warrior beside her. But Jaguarainga, proud and confident in himself, faces the situation and
confesses his love for Urutial the great chief guarani.

Indignation is what he has achieved with his love confession. An indignation that hides a hatred.
Ancestral. The tribe to which Jaguarainga belongs is a slave tribe of the Guarani.
arrogance, Arakare, the father of Uruti, mistreats and belittles the warrior. The young man defends himself.
remembering the old chief that his tribe had already owned these places when yours did not yet exist
as a people and warns him that distancing himself from the advice of nature by placing above
The anxiety of power will weigh on him in the future, in a very near future.
Today they can be owners of these lands and enslave the ancestral tribes, today they have the power,
but if they continue to distance themselves from mother earth, they will become slaves in a very short time," he says
the young man. The old chief curses him and bans him from his presence.
The girl returns to the village with her parents and her parents send her to the main temple to.
priests conjure the damage of passion and the fervor of their soul. Urutide must be consecrated as
temple virgin and distance herself from all men forever.
She resists, while the other vestals of the temple encourage her, telling her that she will soon forget.
the events. That the sacrifices, the fasts, and the discipline will turn her into another woman.
Time passes and Urutiha has surpassed the trials to be consecrated as a vestal of the temple.
Today is the day.
His father and mother are present in the temple.
The priests perform the initial rites of the ceremony.
Uruti, dressed in white like the other vestals, is ready for the spiritual dance.
The melodies of the gods resonate in deep echoes and the vestals begin their circular dance.
When the music stops, the vestals remain with their gaze fixed on the temple ceiling. There is something
there that draws the attention of the virgins. But before anyone can realize it, they already
women have lowered their gaze. Only Uruti, as if listening to a music from beyond, begins a
strange dance to the holiness of the temple, strange to the vestals, strange to the priests. It is a
dance of a sensuality like never seen before. Her body transformed in the flames of a great
bonfire. Each movement is a hint. The wavering movements of Uruticesan of
suddenly and falls to the floor fainted.

The priests, alarmed by Uruti's lustful expressiveness, gather and understand that the
the spirit of chastity has not penetrated the soul of the young woman. What to do?
The anger awakens in the great chief Arakare.
How is it possible that from his seed such a low woman has been born, who refuses to be chaste and pure?
for eternity. A bastard chases. What kind of daughter has she had?
Minutes later, the temple guards demand the presence of the priests outside.
from the place. They have surprised an Indian climbing on the roofs of the temple. They have surprised
The jaguar is spying on the ceremony of the vestals. Trying to prevent the consecration.
he has succeeded. Immediately, Arak condemns the damned to death and his daughter to
witness the punishment.
He will die. The executioner will crush his head, cut his body into pieces that will be devoured by
the tribe and its bones will be thrown into a clearing in the forest so that its soul may have no rest,” those
these are the words used by Arakare to sentence Jaguarainga.
The warrior tries to defend himself but no one listens to his complaints. He invokes the love for Uruti.
It further inflames the great chief: 'Take him and tie him to the tree. Offer him women, delicacies, and wine,
so that enjoying earthly pleasures one suffers more at the hour of death.
The preparations for the punishment-sacrifice begin immediately. The guards bring women,
delicacies and drinks to the prisoner who rejects everything. The Vestals and Uruti, meanwhile,
They prepare a plan to free the warrior. They mix pink poppy juice into the drinks and
blue nymphs. Once everyone starts drinking, because without that step there is no ritual, they begin
to fall asleep like logs. It is here that Uruti reappears on stage. He arrives to
free the prisoner. Untie the ropes that keep him tied to the tree and then after indulging in
Caresses and declarations of eternal love escape from the place filled with hope. They wish to move away.
as soon as possible until the anger of Arakarese calms down. They head towards the sunrise. They go
united in love. They flee but in the flight there are no grudges. In their souls there is no space for another
nothing more than for love.
Days later, a large delegation of three hundred armed Guarani arrived fully equipped.
led by the chief of the warriors of Arakarey, ancient pretender of Urutiatrapan to the
fugitives are returned to the temple. Now the punishment is double. AJaguaraingase imposes the same.
form of death that was sentenced by the great chief and aUruti, the punishment for the vestals
defiled, which is as terrible as that: to be devoured by the temple boa. A terrible and
gigantic python with powers of an augur. The mother of Uruti begs for her daughter, implores.
Before Arakare reports the life of Urutipero, he will not forgive the affront. The die is cast.
A terrible roar shakes the entire temple, is the sentence being fulfilled? Where has it come from?
that terrible roar came which still from the echo continues to make the mighty tremble
Walls? What is happening out there? Two horrified guards enter the temple.
and warns: Juaguaraingaha has killed the giant serpent. It has split it in two after
freeing herself from her ties. Upon seeing the snake coiling around Amada's feet, she managed to free herself from
the ties and how in one process he snatched the axe from one of the guards and with a single blow split
in two to the terrible boa. Its two parts are still shaking and staining the walls with blood
of the temple.
Jaguaraingacontinues to fight with the guards until he finally surrenders.
Arakareperdona the life of Urutia, advised by the priests and ratifies the sentence.
from Jaguarainga, a sacrifice that must be witnessed by Uruti. The sentence is fulfilled without
ritual. The executioner crushes his head, tears apart his dead body, and throws the bones. After the
sacrifice frees Urutique runs towards his father. Urutillora, cries out and curses his father who
he remains unmoved in the face of the fruitless claims of the beautiful Uruti.
She follows the march of the temple followed by her mother, Ojampi, who decides to follow her daughter wherever she goes.
go instead of taking care of the old and evil chieftain of the Guarani. The signs of disaster for
the Arakareno tribe makes them wait. The priests let them know, but the old chief has
lost the ability to understand those things and does not pay attention to the warnings. "The bad omens are
They only fulfill the cowards and I am a brave man,” says Arakare. “Nothing and no one will.
"will double." The gods, to make her solitude even more painful, decide to turn the beautiful Uruti into a
nocturnal bird that cries every night and rests during the day and its mother in a tree
dry on which the urutau will rest.
The old Arakareya cannot sleep. His tribe has been losing its possessions and he was
losing power. Arakare aged rapidly and died alone, listening to the terrible lament
he haunted during every night of his life and even after death.
The legend of the Guavira
The early days of colonization are rushing. They run like the first horses that crossed.
the ocean sea. They run like the clouds that are pushed by the same winds that
they widened the sails of the first caravels. They run as they have done in all times,
without stopping, always moving towards the unattainable future.
The brave Indians of this land confront the conquerors who come with their arrogance.
search for Eldorado. Willing to do anything for a piece of gold, the men from across the sea
they are confined in the forests of the new lands and confront the natives face to face.
In one of those battles, a Spanish warrior falls prisoner to the feared chief Jaguati.
Jaguatí had a very beautiful daughter sought after by several of his best warriors whom
she had rejected one by one.
When the white man arrived at the village, he was locked in a cage.
There, embarrassed and fearful, he spent his first days without tasting a bite. He was thinking of his sweet ...
beloved that I had left in the now distant European lands. I imagined that I would never return to
he suffered for her. He felt sacrificed by those savages whom he did not understand.
not even the language. She cried in silence.
In those thoughts, he was when he felt the penetrating gaze of Apykasu, the young and beautiful daughter.
deJaguati. She sweetly handed him a jug of fresh water and he, thirsty, accepted.
So it was Apykasu who brought the food intended for the prisoner. His figure had...
impacted to the point of feeling totally in love with the foreigner.
Apykasu then spoke with his father. He asked him to hand over the prisoner because he had
In love with him, he forgave him for his life. The chieftain was condescending towards his beloved.
Daughter. How could he deny her a wish? Besides, he wanted his daughter to give him descendants.
The seduction of the foreigner began. In response to the young woman's attentions, the man became
seemed kind but distant and did not show any signs of reciprocating. As if he were in another
side and not in that village.
She made blankets and decorations. She prepared special dishes for him. She made him understand that she loved him and
At last, defeated by the misery of unrequited love, Apykasu ordered that he be sent to the
bonfire. It was a regrettable mockery as the prisoner, even on the brink of the flames, did not
immovable. He preferred death over being unfaithful to the promise he had made to his beloved. He preferred
to die rather than break one's word.
Once the farce of the bonfire was over, Apykasu tried by all means to communicate with the
the handsome young man finally managed to understand each other. Then she pleaded for his love over and over again.
But he, with absolute sincerity, confessed to her that he could not love her, that he was grateful for what she
he had done for his life but it was an impossible because he had given his word to another woman.
Apykasulloró a lot that day locked in her hut.
Her father tried to console her but she insisted that she was in love with the foreigner.
A friendly voice that Apykasuno recognized pulled her out of her sad crying. 'Go see Lakuña Paje.'
someone murmured through a gap in the hut in the middle of the night. Apykasu went out to see.
who advised him but only found the silent dream of the village.
Immediately, Apykasuse started up. Upon arriving at the witch's house, Apykasu found
that she was waiting for him. "I thought you weren't coming anymore," she said. "I've been here for days.
waiting for you. Tell me everything," said the sorceress as she settled into her armchair.

Apykasule recounted his misfortunes and sorrows step by step without forgetting any detail.
It's very simple what you must do,
I want to know now!
Tomorrow early in the morning you will invite the foreigner to take a walk. Take him to the foothills of the
the first elevated hill you see. There you will find a parrot that will ask you what you are looking for. Tell him
What you want to find the fruits of delguaviray and he will lead you to the trees where you can
Take the fruit. Feed those fruits to your foreigner abundantly. They have a
magical property: he/she will forget everything lived in your lands and then will be left to you
will. The rest you will have to do yourself.
Smiling and comforted by the sorceress's words, the young princess returned to her village with
the changed spirit. The next morning, Jaguatino could believe the cheerful spirit of his
daughter.Apykasuse woke up in a good mood and did as the sorceress instructed. She invited the foreigner.
to take a walk. He spotted the hill. He headed towards it and found the talking parrot that spoke to them.
tenderly before the astonishment of the foreigner. Later guided by the animal, they found the
juicy fruits of the guava tree, from which the foreigner took the biggest ones, delighting in them
they.
It goes without saying that the spell came true. The foreigner stayed forever in the village.
Jaguatí had a large offspring as a result of the love between his daughter and the white man.
The Legend of the Jaguar
The renowned rower navigates close to the coast. His eyes scrutinize the topography of each place.
He feels the owner of the river, but that doesn't stop him from exploring its shore, its depths, its secrets.
She looks in awe at the strange cave that opens before her eyes.
It's like a monstrous and dark mouth waiting over the cliff. Nothing can be seen of its
interior. Total darkness. Guarán lines up his canoe towards the opening. At first nothing
can see. The absolute blackness. Now, accustomed, he begins to perceive the walls of the cave. He
I would say that it possesses, like bats, a vision that comes from echoes. Guarán is guided more by
the noise of their oars in the water, here shallow. The smell is nauseating in this pigsty. It
the young Guarán endures everything in the pursuit of knowledge. But there comes a moment when he must
to return. A lot of distance has already been traveled and judging by the echoes, there is still much ahead.
Guarán decides to take counsel from his elders. His adventurous spirit does not prevent him from being wise.
the unknown. Guarán returns without any inconvenience and finally, after a long stretch,
manage to get back out to open water again.

Guarán has arrived at the village. He is heading towards the hut of the eldest member of his tribe.
sits in silence next to him. The old man offers him a tea that is boiling on the stove. They drink. "What
"Have you discovered it now, Guarán?" the old man asks as if reading the young man's thoughts.
I have found a cave dug into the riverbank. I have entered it and it seems to have no
End. But from what it smells like there, it must be occupied by some huge animal. I would like to.
"Catch him," Guarán responds anxiously. "Bad thing you have discovered, boy, bad thing..."
Surprised by the response, the young chieftain awaits the continuation. A long silence remains.
suspended in the air as if levitating until it gently landed on the ground. Then the old man
Many, in my time, searched for that cave and could not find it. Many
strong and noble warriors waited for the monster from that inaccessible cavern for years next to
the riverbank, but the monster always caught them off guard. In that cave lives
the jaguar, I have no doubt about that. The descent helped you but the merit is yours. Now we already know.
Where is it but what can we do? We will never be able to surprise him. That is the law...
But what kind of animal is the jaguar?, asked Guarán. "I wouldn't be able to tell you that but it is
enormous and horrifying. No one who has seen it face to face has lived to tell the tale. They say it
It looks like a gigantic lizard. They say it has the head of a tiger. They say it swings its tail with a
unseen strength, uprooting trees with a single blow, they say it feeds on
both of young women... they say so many things about the jaguar.
Guarán remembers having heard some story about the jaguar when he was very young and a
a shiver runs down his back. Why didn’t he keep moving forward? He could have surprised the monster and
I would have killed him, saving his entire people from the terrible threat.
Days and weeks went by.
Guarán wandered around the place where he discovered the cave but could no longer find it.
"I am sure it exists, I did not dream that cave," the chief affirmed to himself. There had been
I kept the secret but I couldn't avoid the spot by the river where I suspected the cave was located.
Several moons have passed since that mysterious discovery.
Guarán feels that something is about to happen. He himself in person, along with the strongest warriors.
from the tribe, marches toward that place. They see nothing special. Only the riverbank and calm.
A lot of calm. Each heron in its place. The birds in absolute tranquility. Not a single fish jumps out.
of the water. The calmness is so pronounced that it seems suspicious, but the young chief can say nothing. Nor
a sign before the eyes of the warriors.
It is sunset. They are back in the village.
Everyone attends to their tasks until, as night falls, the village gathers in the
dream. Jukyete, Guarán's wife, feels that the young man is not well. She sees him sleeping restlessly. A
cold sweat runs down his body. Suddenly he jumps up startled, stands up and looks at
around him. Only the night and the silence. In the distance, the lament of the urutau is heard. Guarán
he fervently wishes that his gaze penetrates into the darkness. Jukyete fervently wishes that
her husband can rest in peace. She rubs ointments that she has prepared herself until finally
the warrior sleeps peacefully. Now it is she, the woman, who feels within her body that
huge anxiety that woke her husband. She kneels beside her husband. She would like to
run around the village, such is the fever that has been trapped in the body. The gentle
The ripple of the breeze is for her like a hurricane on her skin. The systems of her work.
body in an exaggerated way.
Jukyete observes the descent of the flames in the bonfires. She observes the dream of her husband and of the
warriors in their hammocks. Their alert body now feels the shake of the foliage towards the river.
It must be the wind, thinks the woman. It must be the wind...
Jukyete, defeated by fatigue, falls curled up next to her Guarán.
Beyond the trembling of the nests, beyond the cracking of the broken branches, beyond the
steps that make the mountain tremble, the tribe sleeps. A shadow of mud. A head of
clay. A body of clay. A clay monster is the one that shows its open jaws in the middle
from the silence of the night. Nothing moves. The stench of the monster invades everything, covers everything.
Everything delays. The phenomenon rises and shows a white, apparently vulnerable chest.
He thrusts his head forward, protecting himself and attacking all at the same time. In the blink of an eye,
the eyes of the mouth of the monster surround Jukyetey and trap her. The terror overwhelms the young woman who does not
doesn't even have time to scream. The monster makes a feline leap, shaking its long tail with fury and
it disappears just as it has come. The warriors remain in the dream. Some old people see it passing by.
scared shadows but their legs do not respond and they cannot warn anyone.
A storm is brewing high in the sky.
The clouds clash against each other. Sparks of the duel leap and fall broken and
verticals over the river. The tribe awakens with the first lash of the storm. Guarán searches
with his arm around his wife but cannot find her. He stands up and shouts her name. He interrogates each
one of his men. No one has seen anything. Finally, an old man appears who claims to have seen the
silhouette of the monster taking a woman. Guarán has lost her forever. His scream is
torn. Guarán, crazed, promises revenge.
Since that day, the young chief prepares his warriors. He promised revenge, and so he will do.
Subject the best to a tough training. Day and night they are alert. They have dug a pit.
to catch the damn one. They navigate the river searching for the damned cave but cannot find it. They know
that at some point, the beast will have to come out. They wait.
Guarán listens in the cloudy night to the rumbling of the foliage and smiles. The time has come for the
revenge. Wake up the few warriors that sleep and each one takes their place. The
The beast approaches. It is fed. It comes for more. As if sensing the trap, the monstrous
The animal approaches slowly, as if feeling out the terrain. The elders lock themselves in their huts.
The children sleep. The women spy through the cracks. The men, tense, wait for the arrival.
of the one who pants above their heads. The movements of the
monster, puts its feet on the footprints it has left. It stretches its neck looking for the victim
but this time he doesn't find anyone. This time he encounters a surprising attack. Ropes and bolas
enormous ones imprison its legs. the monster falls sideways, collapses into the hidden pit.
with herbs. Its enormous weight collapses and clouds of whitish dust rise, preventing the
vision. From among the clouds of dust, a chilling roar rises, burning the air. It is Guarán
who drives a huge spear into the jaws of the monster. The spear reappears splashing
the stinking blood on the beast's neck. The arrows fall like a tremendous rain on the target
chest staining it forever with blood. With the spear of Guarán embedded in the mouth he...
The monster collapsed.
An image on the back wall of the Yaguarón temple immortalizes the tremendous struggle.

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Book Two(Part II)
Indigenous and Mythological Legends
The Legend of the Irupé
The tribe fulfills its rituals in the middle of the night.

The moon accompanies every step. The virgin maidens dance around the fire. Runs among the
men the cassava wine. The tribe sings and dances. The spirits are excited.
The young Chirucu tells his feats. He has just returned from the city of gold. He recounts everything in detail.
details and the fantastic adventures occupy all of their speech. Nothing that happens there seems
to have a lot of charm after having stepped on those golden lands.
The virgin maidens dance around the fire.
Crowned with flowers, they dance in their pure white outfits.
The flames that rise with a crackling force dye the skin of the young women a red
incandescent and furious that irritates the spirits. He whistles at the maidens. He looks at a maiden
Especially. The youngest. The most beautiful. The most golden. Looks at her with uncontrollable desire.

Now the maidens stop their dance and, agitated, rest by a tree.
She expresses her desire to a man who is by her side.
The man warns him that those maidens cannot be touched. The curse of Tupã will fall.
about whoever dares to touch the virgin maidens of the tribe.
Chiru, agitated by the spirits of wine, approaches the young woman and offers her his arms for him.
well-deserved rest. The young woman refuses the offer. The boy insists. He harasses her. He approaches her.
The young woman flees. She gets up and runs through the mountain. Chiru, blinded by denial, chases her.
Away from the fire and running through the forest, the girl, silvery in the moonlight, looks like a specter.
delighted. She is not willing to surrender to the arms of that drunken Indian. Filled with fear,
Trembling but determined, she moves away with her agile legs. She has almost lost sight of him. Chiru,
drunk, he does not find the path that the young woman has taken but his desire is uncontrollable and he does not
stops. Stubbornly moves forward. The girl stops by the river. She has climbed on a jutting rock and
there it captures in its hands the talisman that defends virginity. At that same moment, it sees
appear through the foliage at Chiru.
"I finally caught up with you," shouts the boy possessed by the spirits of alcohol.
We'll flee together. I will take you to the city of gold. We will travel without rest and the adventure will be
our only guide. I offer you the paradise that lies beyond the hills.” The young man pleads before
the silence of the girl who trembles holds her amulet even tighter. The man approaches her.
He tries several times to climb the stone on which the little maiden stands upright.
He approaches from below, whispering continuously about love and abandon.
Silence is the protection of the girl. Look at the river full of stars. A living reflection. The moon.
huge on its surface. Everything seems to talk to it, incite it.
I climb the Chiru.

Now it is about to catch up.

The girl doesn't hesitate for an instant. She jumps and immerses herself in that mirror of stars and reflections. She jumps behind.
the boy, guided by desire.
The girl slides toward the deepest part.
I will save you and you will be mine” the man mutters as he plunges into the dark waters in search of the
maiden. Again and again she goes back and forth from the surface to the depths until she finally achieves
reach the girl's body. He holds it tightly and heads towards the surface, but upon coming out to
Flote discovers that what he is holding tightly is a flower. Large and in the shape of a crown. Amber in the
center and dyed with pink colors on the edges of each petal, wide and fleshy. Surprised
first and furious later, he chopped the flower and without noticing its great beauty, threw it far away from him.

Chirusiguió submerged himself with the hope of finding the object of his desire, but it was futile.
In the end, without strength, he was carried away by a backwater that took him forever to the depths.
The gods had given their punishment to the importunate young man and rewarded the goodness of the maiden.
turning it into a beautiful flower that would eternalize by naming the river it populates, because
Paraguay means river of crowns and those crowns bear the name Irupé.
The legend of Jurunda
Near the river, the little ones fish. They cast their makeshift hooks where some dance at the tip.
worm and, attentive, wait for the bite. Many times hours pass until they can deceive
some fish. Most of the time, the fish come close to the hook, looking at the worm that is
they still return under the water, they sniff her and perhaps leave laughing at the naive way of
fishing for those kids.
But they are happy.
Being by the waters of the river makes them happy.
Once in a while, they get tired of waiting and then they take a dive.
Of course, they do not dare to approach the calm spot that from the bend of the river watches them with its
black eyes. But in the quiet spot is where fishing gives the most pleasure. There you can catch the
best fish. The eddy is for the boldest and only one of those kids dares to
fishing in that place. The risk of slipping and falling is great. And if you fall there...
He gets angry and drags you down to the bottom of the river, buries you in the mud, covers you with
branches, it drowns you and no longer lets you return. They won't even find your body if you fall in there...” he says
one of the friends to the boldest.
But the little boy doesn't pay attention.

What he likes the most is tempting the stillness.

He always arrives alone and there he casts the line with the hook. Once he even pulled out a dorado from there.
Of course, his father congratulated him on the fishing but also warned him that he should not take risks.
So, 'Ypora may get mad at you if you are so stubborn,' he said.
Every challenge, every warning was in vain.
The little boy had no ears for recommendations; he obeyed more than anything to the call of the
blood. He was born adventurous and nobody could stop him. That is what his father thought. Although not
she would stop paying attention to him and caring for him whenever she could.
One day he was walking arm in arm with his mother to a party in the village. He seemed very happy to...
to accompany him, but the truth is that at the first carelessness, the little boy disappeared. Where could he be?
The mother did not despair, knowing her son's temperament, but as the hours passed and she did not see him
Returning began to get scared. Where could he have gone? the mother asked now desperately.
In the end, he decided to look for him by the riverbank.

When the mother arrived, the boy was no longer on the shore; he had fallen into the water, the calm had taken him.
dragged but he had managed to cling to a trunk and was spinning and spinning in the backwater. The mother to
he let out a scream of terror and without thinking that he could help him better in another way, he threw himself into the
water to save him. "No, mother!" shouted the little boy who knew the strength of the eddy. But already
It was late. The mother was already being dragged by the relentless whirlpool. The circles of water were
they tightened their grip on her chest and dragged her to the bottom. She still had time for one last look at her
beloved son who, with tears in his eyes, contemplated the inevitable.
The fresh water of the river was wetting his body.
The salty water of the tears soaked her face.
He looked into the depths of the river and saw two green eyes looking back at him from the bottom of the water.
A terrible gaze that emerged from the total darkness of the waters.
You have been punished,
dead. Get used to the sentence: from today you will be required to follow the course of the rivers, intricate
like your wishes. Fishing was your joy, for you will fish all your life and even more. I will put feathers on you.
In colors, you will fly just above the water and chase the fish. But boys like you will...
they will pursue forever. You will not be able to sing, but every time you try a caw
dry will come out of your throat to remind you that your mother has died because of you.
The luminous gaze from the bottom of the river vanished. And the kingfisher that was now perched
it flew away over the sound of the waters.
The legend of the muembe
The man waits, stealthily circling around the village. The chief of the village is missing.
to his word and the young Indian is lurking. He does not want to confront the chief, he simply arrives.
up to here to take his beloved away from lies and deceit.
Several moons ago, the chief promised Chihyla the hand of his daughter, but he broke his word.
now the delivery to the highest bidder, a powerful chieftain from the shores of the Paraná. An alliance that
the tribe needed and the princess is given to another man. That Chihyno will never allow.
Wait, Chihy, to erase the bitter tears from the princess's face.
She does not know of her beloved's presence so close to the place but keeps the secret hope.
that he makes himself present and rescues her. Like a ghost, the young lover seeks the
better place to monitor the village movements and be able to enter without being seen. Two large
dogs and an old woman guard the door of the hut where the princess's anguish rests.
Look closely, Chihy.
Think of a plan to rescue the princess.
Think of a plan to unite with your love.
The night lays its black eyelids over the mountain.
Chihy, sheltered in those shadows, comes down from his hiding place. The dogs are alert. The old woman...
She has fallen asleep but has a light sleep. This has already been verified by Chihy during the day.
Perhaps helped by the goblins of love, Chihyve finally frees his path. He succeeds in entering the hut.
and gently waking the little princess, she reveals herself.
"I have waited for you with great hope," the girl says to him. "Be quiet. We must go," he replies.
the cautious Indian and they go out to confront the jaws of the nocturnal monster. Not a sign of life.
The dogs bark in the distance, they are surely chasing some animal that distracted them. Return to
sitting on the porch the old woman dozes off again.
The couple of young lovers now runs trying to get as far away as possible from that.
place. 'Your father has deceived me,' he says. 'He has deceived me too,' the young woman replies, 'he has deceived us all.'
the two of them. I couldn't believe he was capable of doing this to me. The only thing that matters is that now we are
"together," says Chihy. "Forever," replies the princess.
Their gazes brush against the infinite.

Their bodies burn with desire.

Their hearts are stirred with passion.
All night they have escaped putting their heart in the strength of their legs. At dawn
fatigued from the escape, they stop in front of a spring of crystal-clear waters. There they quench their thirst and
They lie down to rest. They are not being chased immediately, but they fall asleep.
They wake up when the sun is high and greet them with all their vigor.
We must leave soon,
They rise from the grass and observe that on the other side of the spring the birds flee in
flock. Someone is coming towards them. They try to escape from the other side but realize that
they are surrounded. The shouts of the groups chasing them can already be heard. They communicate with each other
They. They arrive from all directions. Escape is impossible. The quick footsteps can be heard that
they are getting closer to them. They still can't see them but they can already smell those expert hounds in the
hunting.
Chihyabraza the princess and kisses her passionately.
When the hunters arrive, they find nothing in the clearing. Just a beautiful and
strong and a weak plant embraced by a fragile plant, clinging to its stem like a tender
princess embraced by her lover.
The love of Chihy and the princess, by the grace of Tupã, has become eternal.

The Legend of the Toad

He saw with envy from his abode of darkness how Tupã, releasing beams of light,
I built a funny and beautiful bird. It turned out very small and very lovely.
the main one is Tupãpuso to bring joy to the air of the earth.
Immediately and with great eagerness, the King of Darkness set to work thinking of creating
a creature that surpasses her in beauty. She wanted a dazzling creature but forgot that in her
the kingdom lacked light. In his effort, he mixed the substances that seemed most appropriate to him.
for its creation. He applied himself to this task for a long time and when he was finally satisfied,
just like Tupã threw the figure he had in his hands so that it could take flight
herself.
The dark creation, instead of fluttering, fell heavily to the ground and moved away giving some
heavy and grotesque jumps. The planned chirps turned out to be low and awkward screams.
Crawling and jumping, the frog sought the dampest and darkest places to inhabit on the land.
In his zeal, he created a figure made of shadows and darkness.
The legend of Ypakarai
You Arandues are one of the few men who know about the arrival of the oskaraiete.
Tume Arunduteme the arrival of those strange and ruthless beings who intend to bring new
paths to their village. Fears those unknown paths. Fears those unknown people. Fears
because Tupãlo has announced in the first hour and it is already written in the Guarani destiny.

On the invisible balance in which you weigh the idea of leaving this world, the next
the arrival of the loskaraietees is a topic that tilts the plate until it touches the ground.

Tume Aranduno wants to witness that extraordinary arrival, the breaking of traditions.
He does not want to be part of the indigenous people massacred by civilization. But that is also part of it.
from a divine design and must be respected. The plea of Tume Arandu was written.
So, before surrendering to the transformations of death, Tume Arandu pleads with Tupã.
He speaks to her simply and asks that when that fateful moment arrives, she makes disappear for
always of the earth the beautiful and sacred city shining. Make it disappear
He blesses all the people who live there and enjoy the unquenchable light.
Tupã hears the pleas of his beloved son.
Listen to the words of Tume Aranduy, who is ready to fulfill your wishes.
Tupãse moves through history.
Move towards the future at lightning speed. Reach the moment when they are
landing the Karaieteen on the American beaches. It reaches Mbaeveraguasu, where the
descendants of Paraguay carry out their sacred rites. One can hear the three cannon shots of
the conquerors and unleashes the end for the people of Mbaeveraguasu.
The inhabitants of Mbaeveraguasu watch in amazement as the power of Tupã Ykua grows. The water
jumps increasingly faster and in greater quantity. The phenomenon is striking but does not
It is a primary concern. Every hour that passes, the spring multiplies its forces.
The water now gains strength. It draws ferocity from its own falls and bounces back renewed.
against every obstacle. The lowest areas of the city are starting to flood.
The surface of the water grows and with its growth, it acquires waves that come and go between the
buildings. The waters cause some stones to fall. They drag away people's utensils, their
belongings. The water is gaining ground and becoming relentless. Now it begins to drag away
the weakest inhabitants. Swallows the children. Turns to the women. Drowns the elderly. The
men are trying to save their families. Mbaeveragua is getting submerged. They are looking for a
the impetuous currents leaving, sweeping through all the rooms that just a few hours ago
they were places of happiness and joy. Who cursed us? some think without knowing that everything that
It happens because of the plea of one of their own, one of the founders. They do not understand the extermination.
arranged by his god. They do not understand the violence of the waters. But Tupã knows that it could not be
do it differently. And now we also know that. It doesn't take two days when already the
The shining city is completely underwater and a large part of its inhabitants
also. Very few were saved from the fury of those waters.
Tupãvuela once again towards the future, anticipates events.
The waters are about to surpass the impassive resistance of the hills.
Now a friar newly arrived in the region for evangelization approaches the still roaring
waters. The Tupã Ykuano has not stopped for even a minute. It has not given a break. They lie at the bottom
the muddy wetland of the small sea the thousands of men, women, and children of the
lostMbaeveraguasu.
The friar approaches the waters. The waves hit the slopes of the hills. Then the friar
bless that great body of liquid and the waters calm down. The friar baptizes the place with the name
The waters sleep a placid and tranquil dream.
Tupã returns to other times where he is needed immediately.
Lake Ypakaraí is starting to become a legend.
The Legend of Suinana
The brave people of Pyturus had suffered many casualties in the recent confrontations with their
Enemies. The danger of impotence spreading among the tribe members was imminent.
The chiefs and priests then gathered in one of the sacred places to deliberate on the
steps to follow. The people awaited eagerly the resolutions of their leaders.
Someone had to infiltrate the enemy territory in disguise and bring back reliable news about the
movements that prepared to surprise them and deal a definitive blow. Who was the
indicated for that mission? Would it be better to send a group of warriors or just one of them?
men? How long did they need to have knowledge of those movements? These
questions were asked by the members of the tribe council, who were, as usual, the most
elderly. They poured all their experience into helping the strength of the young warriors.
"Chopodebe should be our envoy," said the chieftain of the tribe. The others nodded in agreement.
silence. Chopoera was the right man. The women of the tribe hated him, but that did not
it was no problem. The feeling was driven by the rejection of the warrior who did not
I found no attraction in them. His reputation as an ascetic was well known. He seemed made
for the war. Nothing bound him. He felt no affection for anyone other than the abstract entity of his
nation. He was brave, strong, and well-intentioned. Chop should infiltrate the enemy camp.
That was the determination.
Then they would set their traps to catch and defeat the enemy.
He was called Chopoy with the message of the task that the elders entrusted to him. He was instructed.
clearly from the objectives of your mission, on how to carry it out without danger to your life and
how to gather the precise information that the Pyturus people needed.
Chopoorgulloso, proud of the appointment, prepared for his dangerous mission and did not waste any time.
he embarked on the journey. He crossed streams and rivers. He navigated hills and plains until he reached the lands
from his hated enemies. Chopose perched in the high branches of a tree during the day and upon arrival
the night came down to inspect the place.
Some huts scattered in a clearing of the mountain made up the village. Very close to there, there had been
lost the forgettable battle that led them to make such drastic determinations. By
Hello, Chop was there. When the night completely absorbed the colors, Chop went down.
his spy site and approached one of the houses in complete silence. Through a crack
Open in the adobe of the hut, she could see a single hammock and in it, a woman.
Curious, Chopopenetró entered the hut and, first with great stealth and then more boldly, he
he began to observe the woman who was sleeping peacefully. She was a young woman and was sleeping soundly.
Naked. The effluvia of femininity that had not previously caught Chopop's attention appeared.
irresistibly attract him. Absorbed, the spy gazed at the woman all night. Her target
the body attracted the warrior.

Before dawn, Chopo returned to his tree. He climbed again to the highest branches and stayed there.
there watching that hut in which he had taken pleasure in contemplating that creature
hermosa. Chopono attended, much to his chagrin, to the movements he had come to monitor.
As night fell again, Chopoes hoped that the men would retreat to rest and when
he thought it prudent to go back down. He reached the adobe hut and entered it to return.
to delight in the pleasure of the gaze. What Chopos felt was something new. He had never before experienced it.
experienced that shiver in the contemplation of a woman.
Thus, in an unchanging manner, the actions of Chopose repeated day after day. When the moment arrived
Upon returning, Chopin began his journey with sorrow. He thought about the woman and also contemplated what would be
the reports he would bring to his people. A feeling of guilt invaded him and it was because of that and his
self-absorption that several times lost the way.
When he arrived at his village, they were waiting for him with anxiety, but Chopos could only give reports.
imprecise and vague that helped little to his tribe. The old wizard of the tribe called him aside and
He suggested that he knew what was happening inside him. Chopo then confessed the truth of his
adventurous and for that he was severely reprimanded. But the old wizard who was a profound
The one who understands the human soul comprehended the situation in which the warrior found himself.

If that woman occupies your mind so intensely, you must go seek her and retreat to other lands.
to live with her. Otherwise, you will never have peace in your spirit,” the magician told him.
He was glad of those words. He needed that breath, and the understanding from the old man had given it to him.

Don't think it will be easy for you. Kidnapping your enemy's wife is as risky as confronting him.
at a disadvantage,” said the magician. “That is no obstacle for Chopo,” replied the
confident warrior. "I will give you something so that your mission does not fail - continued the old man - you will carry this
bag always with you. If you ever find yourself in danger you can use the talismans in it
enclosure. If they are chasing you and you want to throw off your followers, you should use this magpie egg.
breaking it against the ground. If you find yourself in danger again, you can use the second talisman.
What is like the tip of a stag's antler. But you must be careful not to use the last one.
This that is wrapped in this piece of cane has severe instructions, only in case of danger.
mortal you will be able to use it. And for that you must plant this cane in the ground. Then I will find you and
I will break the spell. You must reach the lands of Ka'aguasu, only there will you find peace. But
remember the dangers of the road.
He took the bag hanging from his neck and set off in search of that woman who had given him.
removed the sleep. He crossed the same streams and rivers. He crossed the same hills and plains until
to reach that tree which served him as a safe refuge for so many days.
At this point, it is worth mentioning that Chopo was a handsome man and there was a time when
he was highly sought after in his own tribe by the most beautiful young women. His appearance had always made him
given an enviable fluency and security. Now Chopo is up in the tree and waits for the night.
come to his aid. He hasn't seen the woman who keeps him awake yet, but he knows she is there. He perceives
its aromas with its fine hunter's sense of smell. When the goddess in black spread her blankets and darkened
the sky, Chopob carefully climbed down from the tree. With steady steps, he headed to the hut. He first spied
through the crack and then entered the small room. There was the radiant and beautiful woman.
White and shining. Naked. Chopo held his breath and gently covered her mouth to
avoiding any untimely shout woke her up. The first thing she saw in Chopo's gaze was that
woman was the fear of the possibility of being assaulted, especially with words
Chopole explained his plan and she agreed to leave that village. Chopo took her.
in his arms and ran away with her.

On his journey, he necessarily had to encounter dangers that forced him to use his talismans.
The first time, when a horde of savages pounced on him. Then Chopor broke the egg.
of magpie against the floor and immediately his pursuers found themselves engulfed in a kind of
bluish and very dark ash that prevented their vision and disoriented them. The second when some
bandit raiders intended to take his wife away from him. Then Chopoprendió set fire to the
talisman that looked like the tip of a deer antler and immediately a dense fog of smoke
surrounded his enemies. It was at that moment when the third talisman, without Chopose realizing it,
the account fell into the fire and began to burn. Chopoy and the woman embraced taking advantage of the
hazy smoke and then Chopo obtained from that creature that he considered of a
celestial beauty her first kiss. A passionate kiss that produced intense waves in her
blood. He was reminiscing about that unique moment in his life while his third talisman was burning in the
fire.
Chopono had time to realize the strange transformation in those two bodies.
a united force was being produced. A supreme force coming from the depths of the earth
he was sucking his body, settling it into the ground. He was becoming a thick and
massive trunk and the woman in sparse and scarce foliage.
Thus, united for all eternity remained Chopo and his beloved white woman. The magician of his tribe
He felt in the distant lands of the Pyturusulo that something was happening but he could never help them.
well, Chopono had buried the little piece of cane and instead had consumed himself in that fire
of the first and only kiss of his life. Transformed into the tree that is now known by the name
deChopooSuinanacuya bark participates in a mixture that produces states of mind
unreal just like hashish.
The legend of Sa Guasu
The jungle spread luxuriantly in that valley.
From time to time, some unwary traveler would venture into the thickets, the groves and
the tangled plot. Those who saw him enter those dangerous places knew that this
the traveler would no longer advance. He would not continue his journey. They knew that Sa Guasuno forgave and that
Inevitably, anyone who entered those domains would perish.
No one had ever seen him, but everyone knew his appearance.
Sa Guasuera is a terrible character. Enormous in his entirety. Sa Guasutenía had very short legs.
and the very long arms ending in very sharp claws. Its face with a single eye in the middle
the forehead produced fear just by imagining it. It had a huge mouth with two rows of
sharp uneven teeth. Its hairy and dirty appearance made it even more terrible. It smelled of
carrion and fed exclusively on human flesh. Hundreds of unsuspecting had
surrendered in their claws and had been destroyed by their jaws. History made it
immortal and thus he remained. Many times the men from the nearby villages tried to
to destroy it. None of them ever returned.
No one knew the formula to eliminate that living scourge that spared neither men nor
women. No one imagined the end of the terrible monster. It was an impossible dream. But one day a
The adventurer crossed the jungle back and forth without anything happening to him. 'Rumors,' said the traveler.
that jungle does not inhabit any monster. The people of the village then knew that the monster had
similar. They could finally live in peace. They would no longer have to avoid those evil paths. Already
There were no reasons to fear. Fear distanced itself from the villagers in the area.

I know what happened with Sa Guasuy and that's why I want to tell it.
One afternoon, the monster was perched in a very tall tree and, like a lookout on a ship, he contemplated
the paths adjacent to his reign of terror. It became increasingly difficult for him to obtain his food, but
In the end, there was always someone distracted who would dare to walk those paths.
repeat their banquets. In the time I speak of, Sa Guas was hungry.
From high above, one summer afternoon when the sun raised lights like dust and distorted
the images of everything that exists, Sa Guasud saw a woman dressed in white who
he was approaching the place. Immediately, the cannibal's mouth watered. He descended from the tree.
with the speed of lightning gripping one branch after another with its enormous claws and long arms
they looked like hammocks. The terrible monster stalked its prey and when it was close enough
He launched himself strongly to catch her. She had escaped through the land. The woman had freed herself.
with a simple movement and their white dresses billowing in the rarefied air floated a
instantly and they vanished. The phenomenon could do nothing. The woman continued on her way each time
faster. Ethereal. She Guasupensó in a mirage but discarded it immediately. That jungle does not
it was a desert and there was no mirage but the certain possibility of a feast.
He chased his victim in Guasufue, but she ran faster and faster. The monster stumbled.
climbing the slopes after the graceful woman who at no moment stopped or looked back
back. It seemed to follow a sacred design. The view ahead. Face hidden under a cloak
white.
In Guasula, they continued with determination. They traveled leagues and leagues until they reached an arid area.
total. The jungle was behind and now Sa Guasusupo found themselves in an area
inhospitable. She suspected again the real existence of her victim but she had already walked
too much to go back without its prey. The monster propelled itself again with strength.
He attacked the woman, but just when it seemed he had her within reach of his claws, she slipped away again.

Desperate, he recognized the place they were in. Nearby was the
famousItakua, the abyssal crack from which no one returned. But that was nothing for such a feared.
character. He continued forward. The woman did too. Again and again she slipped away.
She finally approached the crack and driven by a terrible fate, she jumped into the Itakua.
the monster was not going to be intimidated by that. What it had was supernatural and that which was mortal.
For humans, it was not at all for him. Sa Guasuse launched himself after his future victim.
The silence reigned.
After the fall of both, only the wind.
The wind and a pebbled stone that fell pushed by it into the depths.
That strange woman, I tell you because I know it for a fact, was the ghost of one of their
victims who returned to take revenge. Now that valley where the monster lived terrorizing the
people call it Mbae Sa Guasu, but there are no more anthropophagous monsters in it. Plantations
and Chacras cover what was once the dwelling of the terrible one-eyed homunculus.
The legend of Manaka
March through the jungle, the troop of indomitable ones. Mbarakajul leads his own. Unmatched warrior. There is no
who equals her in physical endurance, in archery, and in handling the mbarka. The mother
nature has been generous with Mbarakaju.
The troops of Mbarakajupasan pass through the villages and in each place they paint the sign of domination.
No one can resist him. Mbarakaju, as a good shooter, is also an excellent hunter. Test.
From it is its collar where no more jaguar teeth can fit. It has hunted hundreds of these.
animals in their short life.
Mbarakajuen its fullness.
Now pursue a wounded beast.
He separates from his own. He moves through the jungle following the trail of blood.
The night surprises him and Mbarakajuopta decides to rest. He looks for a good place and there he spends the night.
night. Mbarakaju has a light sleep. At the slightest sign of danger, the warrior is alert.
At dawn, he continues his march, finds the tiger roaring in pain and ends it. He continues.
adding up the accounts on her necklace. It seems that the harvest of fangs will never end.
A heavy and torrential rain falls over the jungle now and washes away all traces of blood. How
to return to his loved ones? The young Indian's ability to navigate and his intuition are not enough.
to overcome the tangled vegetation that rises before him like a wall.
Mbaraka begins to walk.
He retraces his steps. He feels like he is going around in circles.
No. It cannot be. At last, Mbarakaju, exhausted, lies down on the grass in search of sleep and the
restorative rest. The warrior sleeps. Sleep and dream of a beautiful young girl. The girl him
Speak, he is now calling you: 'come closer' he says in his bright dream.
Mbarakajudespierta when the sun is declining. A clear and fresh dew falls on his body.
Upon joining, he discovers that the clear and fragrant dew falls from a yunsapy, the tree of happiness.
Good omen, thinks the warrior and advances once again through the jungle as if guided by a
spirit more powerful than his will. Mbarakajuescucha hears distant sounds of drums. He hastens the
Step. Now you can hear voices. It is evident that you are approaching a village.
The Indian, hidden in the density of the jungle, observes the village. Everything is movement there.
They are preparing for a celebration. They are resting the delicacies and drinks in large quantities. With eagerness.
look at everything that extends before your eyes like an apparition. They come and go the
hurried women with the preparations. The bonfires are lit. The afternoon is giving way to the
darkness. The men prepare their instruments. They begin to drink.
Mbarakajudecide to join the party. He moves toward the village. As he passes, the people of the tribe
They stop their actions. Mbarakaju arrives along with the musicians. He extends the skin of the tiger that ends up
to kill. It tears from the hands of the musician the elmbarakay sitting on the skin begins to
execute the instrument and narrate the story of Prince Chimboi. His song, beyond the form
In that it arrives at the place, striking and mysterious, it gathers the attention of men and women.
The song tells that Prince Chimboi, chief of the karios, proud and solitary, lived in a
white palace, permanently sighing for a beautiful and virgin woman. The skill
deMbarakajupara, the sung tale leads you to mix the charming plot of the prince with
the tribe in which it is singing. It mixes reality and fantasy and does so
premeditatedly. He tells in his song that the prince Chimboi believes he is going to find
that woman of his dreams, a symbol of human perfection, among the maidens of that
tribe. The young women of the tribe look at each other, comparing themselves. Which of them will be the chosen one?
deChimboi? But the prince is just a creation of Mbarakaju, born from his ingenuity and there he lives.
After finishing his song, Mbarakajues was accepted into the party. The harvest is celebrated.
cassava and the coming-of-age celebrations. The families of the young women have adorned their virgins and
Each one of those who pass in the parade seems more beautiful than the other.

He is overwhelmed when he sees the woman he has seen advance in that initiatory parade.
dreams. His face lights up, already aglow from the warmth of the bonfires. The dreams have
the meeting is anticipated. Mbarakaju has desires to act. He takes once again in his hands
elmbarakay dedicates a song to the young woman. The parade stops but seems suspended over
the notes and the words of the song. It is a moment touched by divinity. At the end of its
cantoMbarakaju, deceitfully said: 'This will be the wife of Chimboi.'
Koetise the sweet girl was called. The girl's grandmother, Chiro, then remembered the signs from the sky.
that on the day of Koetih's birth a path strewn with stars had been marked. A life
grandiose and eternal. The elderly woman thought she saw in Mbarakaju's words part of that design.
divine. "Guide us to the palace of Chimboi," said the old woman to the foreigner. The brothers
deKoetis opposed, but at a word from the elder, they moderated their anger and suppressed their
decisions. Mbarakaju, ChiroyKoetipartieron left the next day for the nonexistent white palace
where Chimboi lived. The three advanced. Mbarakaju with a firm step, the old woman agile as a
young and the strangely clumsy girl. As if she didn't want to move forward. With reluctance and fear.

They stopped after a long walk. Mbarakajucaz shot a deer and put it to the
fire. Koetidormía in his hammock. When the meat was ready, the three ate in silence.
The old woman asked, "When will we arrive at the palace of Chimboi?" "When I want," replied.
Dryly, Mbara-kaju. Immediately the old woman reproached the warrior for his promise, after the...
Mbarakaju said: “I am Chimboi, Mbarakaju is just my war name.”
The old woman couldn't believe what she was hearing. She had been deceived. Perhaps she had rushed.
when deciding to take this trip with a stranger.
"Leave the girl and go. I don't need you," said the warrior to Chiro.
He calms down and rubs ointment on his granddaughter's forehead, cheeks, and chest.
green that extracts from a small container. Mbarakaju observes the farewell of the woman and
happy that he does not resist. The elderly woman walks away and when Mbarakaj returns his gaze
towards Koetic understands the meaning of those ointments. The old woman leaves but leaves her
spells. Mbarakaju wants to shout something but his voice does not respond. Something makes him dizzy, it prevents him from
The gaze. Koetíse becomes foggy before his eyes, it disappears. It transforms. The warrior feels
that his body weighs like an elephant. He cannot move from his spot. Helplessly he observes the
transformation of the girl. Now she manages to get closer to the young woman. She tries to hug her but is surprised
he himself hugged to the trunk of a tree. Surprised, he looks at the tree searching for any
signal indicating the place of Koeti. Nothing around. Koeti has disappeared. Chiro has also.
Only in that desolate place Mbarakaju sits under the tree, with his back leaned against it.
trunk. A gentle fatigue invades the warrior. His legs no longer weigh him down, but a strange drowsiness
he invades him until he defeats him.

Mbaraka wakes up.

It is dawn and the sun appears gently.
Mbarakajuse stands up and hits the lower branches with his head. A rain of petals falls.
at his feet. The tree was covered with flowers. The warrior searches everywhere for some clue that
It led you to Koeti. Useless is its search. Defeated, he flees from that enchanted place.
He believes that the foreigner is leaving the place and returns to undo the spell on his young granddaughter.
The elderly woman contemplates the beautiful flowering tree and feels a strange dizziness. The beauty overwhelms her gaze.
tired. Suddenly, from the neighboring trees, a small and multicolored bird emerges. Like an arrow
it reaches the flowers and there, suspended in mid-air by the rapid movement of its wings, inserts its
picking in one flower and another drinking the delicious nectar. The flowers are tinted with pinks and light purples when
the contact of the long beak that insults them. One would say that they blush and stain their whiteness with deep colors
colors. Chirono dares to hunt that little bird that goes from flower to flower. His granddaughter
she was still beautiful, but she was no longer a mermaid. This is how the woman understood it and considered it useless
to rid of waste. Thus it remained among our trees, the manakaque with its beautiful flowers blushes
having lost my virginity to that mysterious bird said to be a prince
delighted.
The legend of Mua Mua
The washers in the arroyoMbokaja.
They work and laugh. They are happy beyond the misfortunes of love that they have all experienced.
sometime. Bonichualas observes. She offers filters for love. The laundresses tell their
stories. They change herbs that will attract the loved one through some dresses. They offer their products and
They carry very close to their skin those herbs that will bring them happiness.
Now a man descends towards the stream dragging a dead deer. He has hunted it and comes to
wash off the blood that stains the body. Asukapees is his name and he carries a powerful talisman.
hanging around his neck. Unaitakaru encloses the talisman, the mysterious stone that Asuka has.
extracted from the magical mines of Juty. The stone that grows by feeding like living beings.
She feels her body shiver in the presence of that handsome young man.
Bonichua is an old, ugly, toothless woman and carries a huge goiter like a condemnation.
throat. All the women in her family have had that terrible appearance caused by goiter.
raised. All the women in her family have been witches. All have brought closer to the
lovers with their herbs and have destroyed those men who wanted to escape from their
influence.
Bonichuavive lives in a cave near the creek.
There he takes the herbs he collects at night and in it he boils his magical broths.
stormy nights conducive to destructive effects. The men who approach until the
cave to ask for herbs and potions that help them win over their loved ones stay in the
place for one or several days and return sullen and withdrawn. They return without having resisted the
artificial enchantments of the witch. Those who dare to despise her or mock her powers
They wake up dead anywhere or remain idiots forever.
Bonichua, when he talks to the washers, boasts about his powers and laughs with them.
The washerwomen know that it's better to have her on their side.

But now Bonichu has set his eyes on that young man who walks away with the deer on his shoulder.
From then on, the old woman tries to attract the boy with all kinds of magical tricks.
but strangely the young man endures what others could not even for a moment. There are several
the times that Bonichua faces the young man with arrogance, relying on his filters. But this one
he continues on his way as if nothing happened. The secret of the young man is suitakuruy all precautions that
starts since realizing the witch's pursuit.
Asukapetiene is a young and beautiful woman. The young woman's name is Avatikyse. Asukapele has said no.
adventures alone along the paths of the town. Let her not stray too far, but her wandering nature
she takes you to explore the sites of the village and to reach the stream. There, sitting on a stone, the
feet in the water, sings a love song where she names her beloved. The witch comes out of her
cave and observe the creature. She comes out determined. She tries to trick it and lure it to her cave but it
young girl has objections so Bonichuala kidnaps her, dragging her with his terrible strength until the
darker than the cave.
Avatikyinsulta to the old woman, offers her jewels... but the witch wants the love of Asukapey, not anything else.
Avatikyle says that she will never be able to have it, not even if she were the only woman left in the world.
land. Bonichuaenceguecida takes an axe and cuts off an arm. The young woman's scream reverberates with
great strength within that dark place and remains there hovering, suffocated, unable to escape to the
exterior. It is a safe refuge that cave for the witch. The old woman completes her work. She silences the
screams of Avatikyhachazo blow after blow. It grinds and in the end, tired, wraps the pieces in a
canvas and goes outside. The moonless night shines like a black monster. Bonichuaarroja with
monster strength the bag with the remains of Avatiky towards the top of the hill.
That bag had not finished falling when hundreds of them magically leaped from the place.
small blinking lights that seem to float in the air and move with life
own. Bonichuamira looks at the phenomenon with surprise. She gets scared. What is this? Where do these come from?
lights like tiny will-o'-the-wisps that move by themselves? Who has ordered this
spell? Bonichuatemerosa is preparing to destroy the signs of crime but at that moment
the moon appears over the hills. A white and radiant crescent moon. It will no longer be able to destroy those
Signals. Those lights that interfere once again between her and the love of Asukape.
Night after night, Bonichuaper chases the little fireflies without being able to catch them.
destroy them. Every day there are more and more lights on the slopes of the hill. The small insects, symbol
from the light of love that can never be exterminated, they bear witness to the horrible crime of Bonichua.

The legend of the lavati

Hounded by hunger, two large columns of Indians walk across the desolate plain. They search for
best lands to settle. They seek salvation.
Many hardships have had to be faced during this time. The drought has eaten everything.
First, all the water from the rivers and streams was taken.

Then he ate the fruits from the trees.

Later, he ate all the green grass.
The animals began to die by the dozens.
At last, TupiyAvatide decided to leave those areas where they lived. They did it together,
to march with more strength. They united the tribes and began the search for better
horizons. But the search has been, so far, fruitless. Nothing but grass
burned, dried trees and dead animals have been found on the road...
Just a thread of water now and then or a dirty puddle where some quench their thirst. The Indians that
They die along the way. They no longer even care about their dead.
One night that could be this one we are seeing now, Avatis climbed a nearby hill.
camp that they had set up and asked Tupãque to help them on their journey.
"O sacred father, you who have always guided our steps, lead us to the good lands,
give us the opportunity to join our forces and earn our living,” cried Avatien
summit when suddenly a luxuriously dressed warrior, tall and strong, appeared before him. His
the voice was respectful but threatening:

I am a messenger of Tupã,
They will need to fight against me and defeat me. That is the wish of Tupã.
with the forces reduced by the pilgrimage, he descended to the camp and conveyed what had happened
aTupi.
Despite not understanding the meaning of such a proposal, the leaders decide to fight against it.
warrior sent by Tupã.
"On the other side of the hill," indicated the envoy when they were ready.
The fight was relentless.
All night the chiefs and the messenger rolled over the dry earth again and again. Again and again.
they fell and got up until the envoy hit Avatiy on the head
he fell dead, then took the opportunity Tupiy finished with the envoy by nailing him with a
launch in the heart. Then Tupip could observe the miracle. The sent one as if it had never been
existed, disappeared and from the place where it fell, a green and slender plant arose.
that quickly matured, producing fruits similar to corn.
There, before their eyes, the corn that served as food for all their people grew all at once.
the pilgrimage ceased because the next morning the rain poured down on that place and the plants
Devices quickly reproduced, calming the hunger of those Indians.

The legend of Kaure’i

The morning has yet to fully wake up. It stretches its barely luminous arms over the fog that
He rises from the riverbed and strolls through the fields and hills. He stretches slowly.
A young woman, beautifully dressed, runs through the hills towards a hut located at the foot.
from a hill populated with trees.
At the door of the hut an old man. A fragrant smoke fills the interior of the humble.
room.
The little old man, an ancient wizard from those areas, knowledgeable about the properties of the
plants and capable of creating filters that cure all ailments of the body and soul, drink now one
hot infusion on a cool morning. Calmly, at the door of his house, he sees the woman approaching and
she receives it. Immediately she knows that it is a high-ranking unambyay. She discovers it by its
ornaments and their clothing.

The woman arrives desperate and asks for help. A tribe of savages has kidnapped her and she has
could have escaped, but now they are pursuing her. She wishes for the old man to communicate to her husband, the
caciquembya, the place where she is.
The woman and the wizard enter the hut. Using his magic, the old man communicates with the husband.
from the woman and reveals to her the place where she is now. She prepares one of her magical broths in a
decorated vessel of colors that is placed on the endlessly burning hearth. Three times it plunges its
stick in the jar and then anoint Lambya's forehead with a green substance, repeating words
magics that the woman does not come to understand because they are spoken in a strange language and
very ancient.
You can hear the tantrum that the pursuers of the hut are causing along the way.
woman. The war cry is heard calling for the woman. They are animalistic screams. They have little.
Those voices are little human. Those savages have little of human.
The woman has disappeared from inside the hut. A small bird flies out through a little window and
he stays watching the barbarism from the branch of a tree. The magician has laid down on the ground as if
he was dead. The savages enter the hut and smash his head with an ax. They search
to the woman. They destroy everything in their path. They set the hut on fire. They focus on their violent orgy of
destruction. The little bird watches the scene in horror.
The troops of the cacique arrive. The husband of the beautiful woman comes in search of her and finds the
cruel feast of the savages. They take prisoners of the wicked. They search and search through the
surroundings. There are no traces of the woman. Only the corpse of the old wizard, with his head crushed.
and now carbonized. Elmbyamanda to whip the savages, but they know nothing more than him. The
a woman has disappeared. Suddenly, the chief meets the little bird, looks at it.
and the bird flies until it lands in his hand. The chief watches it in astonishment. He had never seen
a bird like that. The colorful feathers it has on its head are identical to the decoration of its
woman. Elmbyalo understands everything. He calls his men and begins the journey back to his village.

The cacique knows that the enchantment cannot be undone because the one who has done it has
dead and there is nothing on earth that can unleash a magical enchantment but the one itself
wizard.
The chief returns sad to his village.
Upon arrival, he hands the bird to a servant of the tribe. An old, crooked, and toothless woman. He asks her to...
take care of it as your greatest treasure. The chief retires to his place of rest, but the only thing there
he manages to become even more restless. He gets up and goes out to wander through the woods.

Day after day, the only words he speaks are directed to the little bird that sings beautiful melodies for him.
as his wife used to do in the past. The chief becomes gruff. Distant. He no longer wants to relate.
with no one. Avoid the young women of the tribe. And only talk to the servant to whom he gives the
orders to take care of the bird.
Some time later, during one of his restless walks in the woods, he feels the blood boiling. The desire
It has reached him. He knew that sooner or later this would happen, but he didn't expect it to be from the
way in which it is presented. The chieftain burns with desire for the toothless and cross-eyed servant girl and without
to avoid it he runs towards the hut where she lives.
Since then, the hottest afternoons and nights are lived with that woman scorned by
all the men of the tribe. The young women of the village, outraged, do not understand the
behavior of their chief and conclude that the old woman has made a page.
Meanwhile, the bird becomes increasingly sad. It hardly sings anymore and flies from branch to branch.
Rama on short flights only during the nights. She looks distressed.
The young Indian women convinced that the old woman has attracted the chief with a page, head towards
to visit a wise woman who lives behind the hills. Once there, the old woman reveals the secret.
Whoever possesses the bird or even a feather from it, will possess the chief. Happy with the
discovery and all determined to seize the magical bird, the women return to the village.
That night, without delay, they capture the bird and each one of them takes a feather for herself.
The passion awakens in the chief who generously gives himself to the women of his village.
One night when the chief is literally lying in his hammock, already tired of his sad
situation and unable to govern himself, listens to the song of the bird. The same song as before.
but renewed. Now it sounds stronger. The chieftain stands up and, as if hypnotized, follows the
sound that leads him through the mountain. He walks like a sleepwalker. There goes the man behind the
melodies that your wife would gift you with so much affection in the good times. There he goes behind the
happiness. So concentrated and alive one feels that they cannot see the ravine that
faces. Finally loses his footing and falls into the deep channel of a dry torrent.
From there, tearing through the night air, a bird identical to the one he had brought from his search emerges.
The bird rises and rises until it encounters its equal who was singing melodiously to it.
waiting. Together, as they have always been, as they will always be, they march in the night.
Together in the melody of love that no one could separate.

The Legend of Ka’i

He ran through the village like no other boy. He always seemed to be propelled by some strange
a machine that wouldn't let her stop. She had anthills under her feet or it simply was about
of a naughty and restless boy. Whatever it was, it was always him with his scrawny little body.
who led the adventures of the village children around the surroundings.
Adventures of importance were counted among his achievements.

Many times his parents had to scold him for overdoing his games.
They called him 'buzzer' because he was always buzzing around.
The truth is that the little boy always had a witty response on the tip of his tongue. One would...
He would say such and such a thing, and he would disarm one with a response that called for laughter.

This is how the days went by, swimming by the riverbank. Climbing trees. Going up the hills.
Hiking in the mountains. Stealing nests. Collecting snails. Making little ducks on
the water with flat stones.
Many had told him that that way of being would bring him misfortunes in the future but he
the little one did not pay attention to the words of the elders. He would respond with another joke and
he disappeared to continue his adventures.
One afternoon, they discovered a large group of guavira trees on the other side of the hill and
Since it was very late, they planned everything to attack the fruits early the next day.
As they had planned, the next day the boy and his friends went on an excursion.
Early in the morning. They reached the other side of the hill and located the deguavira pytã trees. Without thinking about it
not a moment and making a great noise they climbed the trees and started to eat the
delicious fruits. An old man passing by from other lands happened to come by. His provisions were
they had finished and I needed something to satisfy my hunger. So, seeing the crowd of kids
he stopped about the trees and in a pause from the jokes they were throwing at each other, he said to them:
Children, I come from very far away and I have no supplies left, as you can see I am old and I could not climb.
to the trees, would you be so kind as to bring me some fruit to satisfy my hunger?
Once the old man had finished his order, the laughter resumed. This time the center of the
mockery and banter was the old man. They invited him to climb trees, to play with them, he was missing the
respect... But someone was watching them. There it was, not in front of them, for it would never have been
shown before the children, but seeing them. Elka’aguy could no longer bear that and a
only a ray from his eyes was cast towards the children who were turned into ka'i. The little ones
they still tried to communicate with each other without realizing that they had lost their speech. Only
horrendous squeaks were coming from their throats. Their new bodies allowed them to dedicate themselves to
always joking, but never enjoying the superiority of humanity. Thus, once again,
Elk'aguy was applying justice in the mountain.
The Legend of Chahã
The girls wash and have fun by the riverbank. Their laughter, before fading away in the
the thickness of the mountain jumps over the stones of the stream, they take a dip that cools them and
they let themselves go from leaf to leaf until they are lost in the waves of the breeze.

The girls splash water on each other's faces. They run to get wet. They chase each other with pumpkins filled with
sparkling water. They play and are happy in their own way singing a trendy refrain:

They play and have fun

in their own way.
That's life
of the laundresses.
But that afternoon, the lives of the young laundresses would change forever. Jasy had decided
descend to the ground to take one of her usual walks and was accompanied by Mbyja. The
two, when they visited the rural sites, they became little farm girls who went from
journey through the mountains in search of his parents.

Jasyjunto and Mbyja managed to pass by that stream where the washers used to wash and play.
Exhausted and thirsty were the two young women and they arrived next to the washers. "Could you
"give us some clean water to quench our thirst," said Jasy. The washers, laughing, said to him.
they answered that there was nothing there to quench their thirst. Then Jasy and the little one continued on their way.
path.
Suddenly, the seemingly remorseful laundresses called the two young girls, showing them
two pumpkins in which there was supposed to be fresh water. But upon reaching them
they found that the pumpkins were full of foam and the girls left again, now the
smaller: I was choking on thirst. The laundresses burst into laughter more and more
thunderous. Loud laughter that, when trying to jump from stone to stone, fell forcefully into the water.
from the stream disintegrating, foamy laughs that could not advance even with the help of the wind.
Jasy then raised his gaze to the skies as if to ask for help, and before his eyes appeared
the fortune teller who said to them: 'There is a spring of fresh water there, go and drink' and approaching
He told the washerwomen: 'And for you, here goes this punishment.'
The laundresses tried to flee frightened from the water, but they didn't have time. One of them
managed to say "jaha" which came out as if he said "chahã" due to the fright, but in the act they were
converted into two identical birds, with flesh soft as soap bubbles and, due to their inattentiveness
what were once human, today are forced to monitor the other inhabitants of the
mountain. That is why the chahã lives in pairs and in constant vigilance, warning of dangers to
rest of the animals.

Unable to access external links.

Book Two (Part III)

Indigenous and Mythological Legends

The legend of the Mandio
A strange tremor runs down Mandi's back.
Send me a vestal from the tribe of lasmarahyva. A tribe of women who rejected the
contact with men and that they remained unblemished in the Pindorama.
A strange and new tremor runs down Mandi's spine.
The young virgin thinks of a man. Sinful but inevitable thought. The young thinks
on the punishment of the vestals who violate the laws of chastity. She, who tended to the python
sacred, he knew very well how the huge snake crushed its victims. He had seen some
you saw how it devoured those who had committed some sin in the field of love.
Inevitable, time and time again, the strange sting would appear in the body of Mandial himself.
Time that the image of Mborotúva. The name of Guakaraca sounded louder every time.
filling the soul of Mandi.
The young woman was exempt from the tasks of hunting and fishing. Those were activities reserved for
the common. She was a priestess and had devoted herself body and soul to the cult of the moon. She knew
that his tremor and the name of delguakar constituted an impossibility for his condition.
The Lasmarahyva accepted carnal union with men once a year and only with the tribe of
theguakara. They lulled the snakes that guarded the doors of Pindorámay
they welcomed the warriors. The children conceived during that night of libations and love, if
male children were sacrificed or removed by their parents. The female daughters, on the other hand,
they would become part of the community of lasmarahyvay, and the most beautiful would become vestals.
sacred design.
Mandi, surrendered to the moon, had contemplated its cold light and had thrilled in its beauty.
reflected in the waters of the strong torrent rivers that surrounded the Pindoráma. Mandipensaba
on the moon more than on her own but now her sacred thoughts, her worship had
diminished product of that strange tingling that ran through his entire body when the light of
jefeguakarase lit up in his memories. He had seen it just once but that was enough.
I looked at the moon with different eyes now, almost with indifference. On that silver disc, I...
it reflected not the face of divinity but the face of Mborotúva.
The day of the meeting with the guakara has arrived.
Mandijunto, along with the other vestals, leaves the place escorted by the elders of the tribe.
they do not participate in the day of love and lasciviousness in which the hunters immerse themselves
warriors, but a burning something tells him that he must be there.
The Pindorama shines in the moonlight. The manes of the palm trees gleam in the middle of the
starry night. It is a party where the sky embroiders with skillful hands and the tears of
dew is a crystalline cloak that beautifies everything. Pleasure sits on the throne for once in the
year and organizes the fantastic orgy. The Losguakarase hand over the young marahyvaa knowingly that
that is your only chance. Only Mborotúva is silent in a secluded space of the party.
Mborotú feels in his body the same tremor that Mandis feels locked in the temple.
He will come to him.
He knows it since that day when their gazes crossed for the first time.
There he is. He has evaded the watch of the trusting elders and arrives next to the chief who...
waits impatiently. Without a word, the boss guakarale says: “Let’s flee, in the river I have
"Ready a canoe faster than the wind, no one will be able to catch us." The young woman feels that her
the soul tears apart. She knows she will not be able to escape from the sacred serpent. She knows that any escape would be
useless. Keep quiet. The chief guakara, anxious, walks in circles around him admiring the
perfect and unique beauty of that young woman, willing to give herself, but resigned to the fate that awaited her.
has been imposed. At last she answers him. "We will never be able to escape, go away." Mandihuye towards the
temple again. She returns alongside the other vestals. The elders have not noticed her absence.
and they also do not see her reintegrating into the group. But Mandi knows that no one can deceive the serpent.
sacred. Mandise feels condemned and the only thing that lights up her soul is the face of the
warrior.
Since that moment of tension, love, and fear, Mandiya cannot rest in peace.
Every time it approaches the boa, it writhes with movements that present destructive qualities.
The girl pales day by day. She languishes. The glassy eyes of the python have fixed the image of the
the trail that the canoe of Mborotú has left in the river and the tremble of the girl's body.
Sensible like no other animal, the snake waits for the moment. Mandilo knows.
But the disenchantment for lost love can surpass the sideways glances of the boa.
Disappointment and sorrow ultimately kill Mandi. Mandi dies lying in her hammock. No one
No one will ever know about her love. No one will ever know that the mysterious disappearance of Mborotú was due to...
to the pursuit of the sacred serpent. No one will know about that strange tremor that settled in
the body of Mandia from a casual crossing of glances. No one will ever know that she belonged
not to the moon, but to the warrior to whom he gave his soul.

Mandifue placed in a vessel and buried alongside their most cherished belongings.
Some time later, in that place, a previously unknown plant grew. Lasmarahyvala
they called it Mandi'óga. The plant had swollen and strong roots. More than roots, those
they gave the impression of being underground fruits. With the disappearance of the marahyva,
the Guarani inherited that almost sacred root that served as food for the whole people.
that root the Guaraní called Mandio. The name of the small enamored vestal has
eternalized thus to our days and the love of that girl comes to our table renewing that
such deep submission.
The legend of the mainumby
Concert of colors at the spring.
The wild lilies with their blushing crowns. The ferns in greens only imaginable to the
time to write these pages. Aquatic plants revel in spreading their leaves in the
clarity of the spring. Vines with blue and red flowers climb the trunks of the trees
who bathe in the constant splashing of the spring. From above, one can be amazed by the
show. Only where water flows can the tremendous variety that now
we have in front of our eyes.
The smallest flowers, white like pearls or the clusters of flowers falling from the orchids
giants, all the plants contribute their instrument as if this were a great concert of
colors whose only rumor came from the water that springs spontaneously from the rock, from the water that
It rises in the sap of the plants, from the water that emerges in the transpiration of the leaves.

The water. Always the water.

Not far from there, Itakuéra rests with his sweet daughter and two of his maids.
Rest under the shade of a samu'u tree from time to time, it drops its white flowers and
fluffy over the tender grass that grows around it.
Itakuéra is the mother of great warriors. Yvotyjuru is the youngest daughter of Itakuéra.
The woman sends one of her maidens for water to the spring.
Hastily, the young girl leaves with a hollow pumpkin to bring back the liquid, but she does not return.
We see her there by the spring, as if hypnotized. One would say she is in a trance. She was barely there.
Next to the water, a playful shadow caught his attention. A shadow that is not gray like all the others.
shadows but multicolored. They are fixed in their plumage, as if they were feathers woven by
some mystical goldsmith what covers that tiny heartbeat, the colors of that beautiful place.
The maid does not return. Then Itakuéra sends her other maid to see what has happened, why not.
She returns with fresh water, but she doesn't come back either. What could be happening down there?
They go down to see what is happening. They arrive at the small stream and find the
of maidens just as we described. Hypnotized by a little bird that moves restlessly
from flower to flower. The fine sword of its beak now pierces a lily, now a jasmine, now the
thoughts of the maids. Mother and daughter have been left stunned in front of the bird of
shining colors.
The four women do not speak for themselves. The beauty of the little bird is so great that they have
left stunned. They see him go and come until at a moment of enchantment
Elmainumby arrives with the daughter of Itakuérae, introducing the beak between the red virgin lips.
A whirlwind of light. An incessant fluttering. An infinite touch and the girl transcends the boundaries of what
human. She also flies now with the same appearance as the bird that has enchanted her.
The legend of the Virgin of Ka'akupe
It is the forest sown with lights, shadows, screams, and songs. It is the bright afternoon of golds and
bluish greens. It is paradise for the Indian boy who has ventured into the woods in search of
of suitable woods for the work. The Indian has left the missions with that objective and
walks through the mountain observing the trees, the magnificence of the landscape, the lights, the shadows, the
chirps, the songs. The birds and the animals have caught his attention and he has moved away from the
missions perhaps too much. The Indian has collected some woods that he carries with him but,
Ecstatic has gone back and forth losing the way. He hides the wood he has gathered in
a place that seems safe to him and he starts to look for the way back.
José is the Christian name of the Indian. The missionaries gave it to him when they baptized him.

José is young and strong. He moves forward confident in himself. Confident in finding the way back.
Hours pass and José cannot find the way, the forest is so dense that he has gotten lost.
I could no longer say for sure even where he left the woods he has collected for the
sizes that were proposed to be addressed.

He has learned the craft of carving wood and everyone in the missions considers him an artist. José
He is happy there. He works for himself and for others. He learns new things. He honors God and does not...
There's nothing missing. What more could I ask for?

José and the mountain, beautiful and steep.

Suddenly José feels that someone is following him.
He hears whispers. José quickens his pace. He tries to distance himself from those voices. Have they heard him?
Have they seen him? José fears they have and tries to mislead whoever is following him.

Now run. Move through the vines and the bushes that hurt your skin.
José runs. He is unfamiliar with the mountains in this area and each time it feels like he is venturing into regions
more distant and gloomy.
He is being pursued by a group of warriors. The tribe that has not made friends with the missionaries.
tribe that rejects evangelization. Terrible and powerful are the mbya warriors.
José senses that it is them. They have discovered him and are chasing him like the hunter chases
to his prey. They surround him. They yell. They communicate in a language that José does not understand.
The chase is long. José is exhausted. He wouldn't know how to continue. He stops in a clearing.
Where will these warriors come from? Will I be surrounded? thinks José. And he rushes again towards the
thickness blindly. He has managed to escape again from the circle that the lizards pose.
On the verge of fainting, José arrives at a large tree. He stops, leaning against its trunk.
huge. It cuddles. José prays now.
Implore. Cry out to the Virgin Mary. Make your promise.
If I come out of this alive, I promise you, Virgin, that I will carve for you a beautiful image with the
wood from this very tree that now protects me, José says to himself.
Listen to the footsteps of the warriors. They can smell it. He is sure of that. José is hiding in a
crack that the trunk has towards its large roots.
The voices of the warriors can already be heard approaching.
The circle is getting smaller and smaller.
Now José can see them. They are coming towards him. There are seven warriors. They are armed and they are strong.
young people. They are furious to have discovered an intruder on their land. José prays silently.
Losmbyapasan next to the tree sense the presence of the stranger but do not see him.
The warriors pass by José without seeing him and, suspicious, continue their search heading towards.
other places in the forest. José breathes relieved and thanks the Virgin. Losmbya, judging by its
shouts and signals that are heard from afar, have lost the trail.
Once the mbya have disappeared into the distance, José tears off a good piece from the tree.
wood and takes the path back. Now he thinks he recognizes the place where he is and without
problems return to the missions.
Immediately, José set out to fulfill the promise made to the Virgin and began to carve a
image with that wood. Weeks later, José had two images of the Virgin ready. One,
intended for public veneration and another smaller one for personal worship. The first rests
Today at the altar of the church of Tobatí is the smallest miraculous image venerated by
hundreds of thousands of people from all over the world at the Basilica of Caacupé.

The legend of Ka’a

Sitting on the rocky edge of the stream, a beautiful young woman plays by dipping her feet in the water. The
drops that are lifted return to the stream brighter than before, as if touched by a wand
magic. A bird with white feathers drinks at the edge of the stream. The girl watches the bird.
Time seems nonexistent at this hour of the afternoon. No one else is seen in the vicinity.
bird drinking in small sips, pecks at the water. Plays with the water. The girl's feet and
the water of the stream is the only thing that moves. There is not a drop of wind. The plants seem
expectant.
On the other side of the stream, a tangled vegetation of brilliant greens. On this side, the
stones and a wide expanse of golden sands. The land seems to stop to observe the
image of the girl in the stream. Suddenly, a small caravan emerges from the thicket. It goes
headed by a tall and haughty young man.
He warns the caravan because a moment before it appears, the bird takes flight scared.
leaving in the air a quack that now floats overhead of those crossing the stream
about the stones. The man leading the caravan catches Ka’a's attention. He is tall and
strong. His gaze is , but Ka'ano knows exactly where. His gaze
It is irresistible for the young woman who, with her feet in the water, observes the outsiders. None of
They seem to notice the presence on the coast. They pass very close to where Ka’apero is.
nobody directs a greeting or a glance. The man's long steps delve into a narrow
path and they get lost in a bend.
Later, Ka returns to the village and when night falls, he tries to rest. The fierce gaze of the
The outsider he has seen during the afternoon is troubling him. He has lost his usual tranquility. There is a
strange vibration in the young woman. She has never felt that way. She spins in her hammock without
being able to fall asleep for hours. When the night is already very advanced, sleep overcomes her.
and falls into a kind of stupor. In dreams, the black eyes of the outsider penetrate his heart.
The sun stretches its luminous body when Ka' awakens. It possibly awakens upon hearing a
unknown voice. Her father is talking to someone. Ka’ase remains still in her hammock. Her father.
talk to the man from the caravan. And the man whom you can now see up close is
relating the objectives that have brought him to the lands of Ka’a.
I have the mission to travel these lands in search of a great offering for the
temple of Mbaeveraguasu. It is well known the wealth in precious metals that is found in these
lands and we want to travel through it without bumping into anyone.

"Take it for granted," replied Ka'a's father dryly.

Ka'ano could not avoid the fascination that the gaze of that young priest awakened in her and
she was watching him through the fabric of the hammock in which, now awake, she tried not even to
breathe so that no one would notice his presence. In that uncomfortable position, Ka’are remembered everything.
what I had heard about them in the past. They said they believed they were unbeatable and that
none of them, much less the savages, married people from other tribes. So elevated was the
self-love of the women. Ka'ase said to herself that it shouldn't matter to her, since
that would try to conquer the one who had been looking at her and entered her dreams all night.
Elavarese bid farewell to the chieftain, telling him that throughout that day he would be observing the
surroundings without straying too far. Ka’aque was all ears and stood up as soon as the priest had finished
withdrawn from the place and walked around the outskirts of the village in hopes of
to meet with the one who had come to visit her in dreams.
He walked like this for several days and many were the times when the young people crossed their
glances. It agreed with the ardor of the avare. I noticed it in the imperceptible and mysterious things that
they only become known when love awakens. They crossed paths several times in the forest and in the
streams, they elevated their own looking for precious stones. Ka'ab was looking for the priest.

One gloomy afternoon, Ka'ase learned that he would return to his village. Pain pierced through the
heart of the young woman. Faced with the certain possibility of losing it forever, Ka’asa went in search of the
he was hesitant to express his love.
Determined lover. Willing to use all the weapons of seduction to awaken passion.
what is hidden in the soul of the priest. A strange force governs every step of
the girl who walks towards the stream as if she knows she is going to meet the elevator there.
He stands in front of the man.
Everything indicates that she will be reciprocated. Elmby feels that her blood is boiling. She suppresses it. She fights.
against his own feelings. He struggles against the passion that floods his body.
Asceticism against passion.
Ruthless is the struggle within a man who, on one hand, is blinded by love for
the young woman and on the other hand has a mission to fulfill for which she has been trained for a long
time. She descends to the sand and dances to elevate. Her body moves with grace.
waking up each time with more intensity the desire to wash.
Now Ka'ase slides through the stones. She approaches the man. She confesses her love to him.
hug. There is a moment that becomes eternal when Ka'a's words intertwine in the
priest's robes. It is in that eternal moment when asceticism takes advantage of the distraction and
It annihilates passion. The young priest takes the stone axe he carries with him and without thinking
Not a single time does the whip strike Ka’aque's head as he collapses without a single groan. The blood
of the young stain the stone. Elmbyasin doesn't even look at her, puts away his weapon and leaves.
back to passion and love forever.
Years have passed.
The tribe's pain over Ka’aya's death is hardly remembered.
An old priest arrives in that village. The man comes with his back bent by
the years. The man comes bearing the weight of the death of passion in his soul. He stops at
that stone by the brook. He sits there to rest. A bush with unknown leaves for
the wise priest offers his cool shade in the scorching summer afternoon. From the bright
From the bush's leaves an aroma is released that makes him take a few leaves and chew them.
The juice from the leaves penetrates his body like an elixir of life. There are no more doubts, the old man
the priest has come to meet his last moment in the only place where he knew life
with fullness. There where in his youth he lost the possibility of love once and
forever. The traveler who journeys towards love. The herb that has been tasted for the first time.
it is nothing but the embodiment of that sweet young woman who confessed her love to him. Now the elevated journey
his infinite and final journey to reunite with his beloved. He carries in his mouth the strong taste of the grass
mate.
The legend of Laguna Sirena
The young Indian used to roam the banks of the Yhaguy stream. There, some used to come to wash their clothes.
girls who responded with laughter to Kavare's daring words. The Indian sweetened them with his
ease of versifying and telling fantastic stories where they were the main protagonists
flowers, trees, and animals.
A nap in which Kavareno found no one in the stream, moved a little away from the current and
he ventured into a nearby small grove. He was greatly surprised when he discovered that behind the
there was a lagoon of still waters among the trees. Skilled in swimming, Kavareno did not lose even a
second and he jumped into the lagoon.

Nothing the relaxed boy.

It glides gently over the silver surface.
Upon arriving at the very center, a strange force pulls him into the depths. Kavarese leaves.
to take. Skilled in "eddies" knows that in a few moments the water will bring him back to the surface.
But the bottom of the lagoon seems not to exist and the young man loses consciousness. When he wakes up
He is in a new room for him. A young woman gently speaks into his ear and then walks away.
leaving him in the company of several women who attend to him, providing him with food, drinks, and
everything necessary so that he does not feel overwhelmed by the change. Every night the young woman of the
an exquisite voice visits him and asks for his favors. The young man, delighted with the new situation, does not
he/she worries too much about the things of his/her previous life.

One day, Kava asks the woman why she only appears at night. Then she confesses to him.
that if he saw her face in the light of day, she would disappear from his life forever. Terrible.
words that awakened Kavare's natural curiosity. The young Indian's thoughts
They long for the forbidden. He never thought what the young woman said would be true.
two hard stones and, when night arrives and with it the young woman to visit him, Kavaregolpea the
stones together and let a pile of dry straw that had been previously gathered, burn with the
sparks. The light of the campfire breaks the spell: immediately the young woman disappears from sight and a
a rainbow sets over the lagoon. A rainbow that shines as if twisting in its own
colors until sinking into the waters.
Kavaredespierta.
He/She is now at his/her parents' house.
Count the events lived so recently. The parents listen attentively and nervously.
“Son, his mother says, you have been captivated by a Siren.” A time that for him was no more than
some days, in human reality it occupied a space of two years. "You have been lucky in
"go back," says the father now and prepares to tell old stories from when some of his uncles
they were kidnapped by the same strange woman, far away in a lagoon called...
The legend of Ka'aguy Póra
A group of horsemen advances through the hills.
They recount their exploits and, jokingly, they tempt one another. For those who observe them from
The foliage makes it clear that these men are under the spicy effect of the cane. They have drunk and have
let loose in the wild in search of prey. They do it to compete among themselves. Whoever catches the prey
the mayor will hold onto the glory for a moment. The others will have to wait for a new one.
opportunity.
Armed with large shotguns, they advance through the mountain.

The horses are showing signs of restlessness. They sense something wrong.

The men stop in a clearing and surrounded by their dogs, leave their mounts and set off to
foot between the chircal. They search for deer, wild boars, tapirs... Any animal that can be
hunted and gave them that moment of supremacy that they long for so much.

The mountain watches them with distrust.

With its small giant eyes, it follows every step they take.
In the village, another group of men is dedicated to following the paths of alcohol and they wait for the
return of their companions. They have promised to come back when the sun goes down with the prey tied to their
horses. From afar, it will be known who brings the most by the dust cloud they will raise.
The dogs bark and sniff the air.
They have detected some animal. The dogs are running. All in the same direction.
The men, tipsy, follow the steps of the hunting dogs with their shotguns ready.
Suddenly the barking stops.
The men stop in their tracks, they wait.
The dogs begin to howl as if someone is beating them.
The men stand like poles, nailed to the ground. In their drunkenness, they understand that something serious
it is about to happen. The dogs, indeed, return with pitiful whines. They curl up to
the feet of the hunters seeking protection.
One of the men emboldening the others shouts:
It must be a pack of wild pigs. Let's go hunt them.
And the others follow in the footsteps of the one who has become a leader. They run towards the grove of
where the dogs came from.
"Let's surround them," says the leader, and the men spread out forming a semicircle.
They are expert hunters. Many times they have entered the woods and returned with good game.
They have often faced the danger of tigers that appear suddenly, jumping from
the trees and the snakes whose origin is always unknown.
Now they enter the grove closed off by numerous vines and giant ferns.
The forest watches them.

"There they are," says the leader, raising his shotgun to shoot at a huge pig coming at him.
to face the bull. The shot sounds, powerful and dry. It resounds long with a long whistling.
throughout the mountain. The animal falls and begins an agonizing tantrum that the men celebrate with
laughs. The other pigs from the herd flee to a thicker place.
"It's hard for them to surpass me. I am the greatest of the pack," says the leader of the hunters.
Jokes and banter are on the tip of the other’s tongue. Everything is a racket. The hunter peels
From its waist a large knife and looking into the eyes of the animal, it makes a large cut at the height.
from the neck. The jet of blood splashes over his chest and the others celebrate with noisy cheers.
The hunter ties the front legs of the pig with a rope and ties the rope to a tree.
close. "So that the Ka'aguy Póra doesn't take him away," he says wickedly tempting the others. They laugh.
Hunters. All of them. All, except one. The oldest shakes his head in denial and murmurs to himself.
"He has called it" says the old man, but no one listens.
"Let's go look for the others," says one of the hunters.
And the hunt restarts. The pack that was nearby observing the men.
from the thicket, it runs wildly to another place. The men take a detour again.
The hunt has continued and there are several prey they are dragging with ropes. Tacitly, the
the place where the first piece was collected has been designated as the meeting place. Towards
There march the hunters. None have been able to hunt an animal larger than the first and all
they have been talking about the topic.

When they arrive at the site, they do not find the big pig.
"Ka'aguy Póra," says the old man through clenched teeth.

The men, startled, don't know what to say.

"They stole my catch" shouts the one who momentarily became the leader of the group. Bewildered by the
alcohol and blood the man seeks a culprit. “That was you, old man,” the man shouts.
"Ka'aguy Póra" the old man mutters again. "Now I understand, when you disappeared it was
"to steal the piece from me. Where did you put it?" he challenges the man. "We are hunting without need,"
the old man says. "That doesn't give you the right" insists the man threateningly pulling out his knife
for the second time in the day. The old man does not defend himself. A terrible roar is heard in the mountain. The
men are paralyzed, for immediately behind the hunter who threatens the old man a
a five-meter tall giant appears pushing aside the trees. On its enormous head
the dazzling eyes hypnotize the hunters. 'Ka'aguy Póra' says the old man through gritted teeth and it is the
the only thing he will continue to say for the rest of his days.

It shakes its wild mane, the giant, and a kind of pipe made from a skull that it carries in its
Hand. The monster roars furiously and lunges at the men.
They waited in vain in the village for the return of the hunters at sunset. The men
They continued drinking until they fell into a deep sleep.

The next day, worried and sober, the men of the village organize to go out and search.
to the lost hunters. The most optimistic say it is not worth it. That they will return soon. That
They must have stayed in the mountains to collect more pieces. But some are afraid. The mountain is
dangerous.
No one knows that all the preparations will be useless.
A man on foot approaches along the road.
It is the old man.

He is the only survivor.

Delirious and repeating in its wandering: 'Ka'aguy Póra'.

The men of the village surround him asking for explanations about the other hunters. But the
the old man seems to know only two words: 'Ka'aguy Póra'. Over and over the old man responds 'Ka'aguy
Pora. Until finally, the men understand. Knowledgeable of the legend and fearful of
entering the mountain leaves the old man in peace. Ka'aguy Pórale has spared his life but has
removed the judgment.

The legend of Mbaeveraguasu

The Atlantean feels incomplete in his new home. He longs for the golden city where he lived.
youth. One cannot complain about their fate, but it is not the most encouraging either.
One fine day, while talking with Tume Arandu, his brother-in-law, Paraguay confessed his woes.

He needed to engage in something big. He wanted to build a city that resembled that one that
succumbed to the raging waves of the sea. He wanted to create a replica of Atlantis, his hometown.
Tume Arandule talks about the place where Tupã created the first man and the first woman, their
parents. The valley between the hills, the intense green of the vegetation, the blue sky...
The men march towards the hill of Areguá. They are accompanied by the firstborn.
deParagua. Arekaja is your name and you have extraordinary powers for inventions. Young
and strong, a man of great dynamism, Arekaja is the right person to start businesses.
Settled on the hill, the three men observe the majestic spectacle of nature.
valley shines brightly. In front of Areguá a beautiful mountain range. "At the foot of those hills,"
Paraguay the three men begin the journey of the vast valley.
Crystal clear springs fall from the foothills of the hills. The birds multiply in that place.
virgin land. "Here," says Paragua to his son, pointing to a rock that marks the site where
They will raise the new city. 'Here we will raise the new Atlantis.'
Days later, hundreds of villagers from the Paraguase tribe join the work in front of the
Areguá hill. Watching them work from a distance is a marvel for the eyes. Arekaj is in charge.
the works. The woods they bring from the other side of the hills. The polished stones. The ovens
they cook the clay. Strange machines products of the invention of Paraguay its child that
they lighten the work of men. In the midst of the garden, the presence of man.
They didn't take long to finish the work.
The city, new and clean, looked like an apparition when the morning light bounced off
the white walls. The new Atlantis was shining, but Paraguay was still not happy with
the work. He appreciated the effort and collaboration of his people but wanted to give that
city night brightness. I wished it shone as much as when the sun was hitting it fully.
Paraguaordena now, with the help of Arekaja, to start the excavation of a well. He indicates the
place, very close to the house they have chosen as their residence. A few days later the
excavators have drilled the earth several hundred meters. The bottom can no longer be seen.
that well. Now a milky, white, and thick liquid flows from the bowels of the earth. with it
They painted the most imposing buildings of the town, doubling their radiant power. The
Villagers discover that the liquid is tasty and begin to ingest it. After a certain amount
determined, that strange milk of the earth, produces drunkenness and a drowsiness that the
transports to a state of wonderful delight. The milk of the earth, in addition, fattens those who
they ingest it without measure, but it weakens their bones until it causes their death.
Then Arekajadecide decides to continue with the excavation. They search for the yellow liquid that is in Atlantis.
it was used as a generator of artificial light. They search eagerly. The excavation exceeds the
thousand meters. At that moment, from the depths a dry fire erupts which produces a
great alarm among the excavators. Arekaja orders the closure of the well and tells everyone: 'We were going to...
looking for the den of light and we have stumbled upon hell, this is as far as we have come.
Far from being defeated, Arekajay and his father continue, now in solitude, with their experiments.
finally to obtain some form of artificial light. They try devices that are useless a thousand times.
their purposes. Time and again they restart the task, until one good day they manage to piece together a
strange container that, once its mechanisms are activated, produces an intense light. Immediately it
they are delivered to mass production and distributed throughout the city. At night the
Lights emerge now from the windows of all the buildings with unprecedented brightness. So much so
that the villagers named that strange city Mbaeveraguasu, the shining city.
Centuries have passed. Mbaeveraguasues is famous for its lights. The view of it from
the no less famous hill of Areguá is marvelous. Travelers arrive there astonished by
admiration and its inhabitants have preserved the pride with which their creators worked.
The old patriarch Tume Arandu no longer exists on the face of the earth.
The nostalgic Atlantean known here by the name no longer exists on the face of the earth.
from Paraguay.

Arekaja, the dynamic inventor man, no longer exists on the face of the earth.
And now there are no more of their children or grandchildren on the face of the earth.

Now Mbaeveraguas is a sacred city for the Guarani.

The arrival of the karaiete is near. This has been written by Tupã in the destiny of the race.
One summer morning, three loud explosions are heard from the sacred city. What about
Assign them? Who could have produced such noises? Very soon the Guarani
They would find out about the arrival of the karaieteque who entered those lands with blood and fire. They had
made to detonate their powerful cannons and now they were approaching the shining city.
In times long gone, Tume Arandu had implored Tupã for the radiant Guarani city.
the cradle of light and mystery, elmbaeveraguasudesapareciera under the waters before being
profane by the enemy's plants. Tupã received that plea favorably.
The patriarch Guaraní made the waters of Tupã Ykuase become murky and start to bubble day and night.
night.
Very soon the beautiful city and its inhabitants became only a luminous legend. It disappeared.
under the waters like the land that had inspired it. For a long time the Tupã Ykua, then
to cover the city, continued to throw large volumes of water. So much so that they threatened
cover the entire surface of the lands of Rupave. It was then that he arrived at that place.
ungracious benevolent one who blessed the waters, baptized those places and conjured danger, but
that is another story and luckily it has already been told on another occasion in great detail.

The Legend of Perurima

Much is the nostalgia that falls with all its weight on the heart of Paraguay.
At that moment, she was unaware of the grief that her husband had not been able to overcome. It was during a sunset.
in which the umbrella shone more than ever when Paraguale told its
Cuitas. Guarasyá reproached her husband for not telling her before, but then she understood his.
silence and supported him in what he wanted to do now.
Leaving to reunite with Amara is what I want now. Maybe that will calm my...
pains and I ended with my troubles. Paraguayan imagined that he would return to his native land and that
I would no longer see the beautiful city that I had built with Tume AranduyArekaja.
But the poet is in a good mood today and does not want to walk long paths or tell stories of
gigantic crossings like that one, but without going straight to the point. Once
In Amarasoia, Paraguay, his wife was a victim of the jokes of the youngest of his
nephews who at that time was called Toryja.
He started a conversation with the youngest son of Amaraso, one that...
apodabanToryja.Toryja was a great liar, possessed the admired ability to invent
stories of all kinds. It wasn't long before the conversation and Paraguay was completely
tangled with the conversation of that little boy. He told him fantastic stories and invited him to visit
the place where every afternoon a three-headed Ypórade could be seen. Paraguay believed in his
little nephew and let himself be guided, but after wandering for hours he realized that he
it was a joke and he harshly reprimanded the young boy for his
behavior. Paragua threatened to punish Tory if he wasn't taken back.
They were having a discussion when a tiger appeared and pounced on Paragua. Desperate, the man
he asked his nephew to seek help, but the boy stood watching the scene impassively at first
then his uncle abandoned him to his fate and returned to the village.

Upon arriving at the village, Toryjai invented a story in which his uncle had stayed with a few
kind women who took him to their home and whom he had not wanted to return. Guarasyáva then
he promised the boy a good tip if he took him to that house where he had
left umbrella. The boy happily accepted and they immediately set off. Many hours
Afterward, they sat down to rest by the shores of a beautiful lake. They had walked a great
distance. Guarasyávacayó in the account of deceit and began to cry inconsolably. In that
a moment a huge snake appeared before her ready to attack her. Guarasyá fled from
immediate but with such bad luck that he got tangled in the middle of a thornbush. Getting out of there
without getting badly hurt it was impossible. Not even the snake dared to enter,
yGuarasyá was trapped there. Toryjano paid attention to his aunt's screams but was thinking about
any solution. "If with a huge fright he went in there, with another fright he can get out," he said.
for the little one and set fire to the thicket. The branches were burning, popping, and caught in
terror, Guarasyávasalió from that place. I had managed it! It cannot be said that the remedy
worse than the disease but it was close. Guarasyá came out scratched and scorched from
that place so similar to hell, but at least he was able to return to the village.
Tupinambá listened to the story of his sister who was recounting her misadventures in great detail.
details and had to feel ashamed with her. The troubles in which Toryjale had placed were
really funny and, as she had returned safe and sound, her face burned and her body like this
They caused laughter in Tupinamba. How could I have believed that spoiled little boy?
But the biggest surprise for the village was seeing Paragua arrive. Tired, scratched by the claws of the
Tiger and filthy penetrated the village. The first thing he wanted to do was to punish the brat.
that he had been pulling his leg all the time. Tupinambas intervened in Paraguay.
He explained the misadventure of his wife. "She has taken us all for fools," said Paraguay the village.
entera burst into laughter. The very protagonists of the misfortunes could not contain themselves.
the laughter celebrating the boy's ability to set traps, lie, and invent stories.
Tory marched in the procession that his father and Paragua organized in search of Halánte, his city.
birth, lost among the waters of the sea. For many years Tory wandered with her father and her uncle in search
from the lossHalánte, until the two men finally found the city of their nostalgia and
they were collected in it that lay at the bottom of the sea. Toryja, the only survivor of that
The expedition returned to Amarasoia, the land of his father with hundreds of stories to tell.
"Bring something to eat first!" said Toryja sitting on a kind of throne that he
They prepared when he arrived at his mother's village. Tory with his out-of-judgment style asked and
I asked. "Place a hammock and let me rest by swinging. Let me be swung the most.
beautiful maidens of the village. Bring some chicha to drink. I want to be merry to
"This way we can better tell you about the adventures of our expedition."

The Indian women around him laughed at him and mimicked his way of asking. 'Asking and asking, asking'
more is the only thing the indiecito knows...,” they whispered in his ear. “He is so insatiable that from today he
We'll call it Perurima,” said one of them in a loud voice.
For three days he kept asking and asking. When the newly 'baptized' Perurimase felt satisfied,
That's where the story began. Perurima became famous in a short time, and people came from all over.
people who paid him to tell them those fabulous stories. Perurimase became a
expert in storytelling. He mastered those passages in which emotion or comedy was
they made protagonists leading the listeners to burst into tears or to burst out laughing depending on
out of the question.

Days later, Peru decided to go with his aunt to get to know Mbaeveraguasu. There he arrived at
to be very famous. Many inventions were made in Peru during the favorable winds of Mbaeveraguasu.
but what remains of him is mainly the incredible repertoire of jokes and stories full of wit and
vivacity. Narratives that are still recreated by the people today.
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Book Three
The Traditional, Popular, and Religious Legends
The legend of Ykua Bolaños
The name of Fray Luis Bolaños is inscribed in burning letters in Paraguayan history.
Franciscan, in his time, has done an exemplary evangelizing work. But it has endured in
the memory of the people for being an instrument of God in the realization of a miracle whose work is
it has remained with us forever.
March Fray Luis Bolaños at the forefront of a numerous group of indigenous people who have just converted to the faith.
Catholic. It has been several days that they have been advancing through scorched lands. The heat is becoming increasingly more intense.
and more unbearable. Water reserves are depleting and there is no way to replenish them.

Not a wetland, nor a stream, nor a brook, nor a few miserable drops of rain.
No water.
The herbs are silent witnesses of the drought and break with sad sounds at the passage of the
men. Faith is weakening. Since their conversion, the new Catholics have only faced hardships and
They see in it a terrible revenge from their ancient gods.
Fray Bolaños speaks to them, tries to calm them down, asks them for patience. The Franciscan feels a lot of sorrow.
for the situation that these people have to go through but at the same time it shows them a faith
unbreakable that cannot be bent by any drought, no matter how terrible it may be.
He talks to them about the sacrifices that the Son of God had to make to save us from sin.
He speaks and above all he gives himself strength to continue. The road is overwhelming and the strength is already
they faint. It is time to stop and start again with words so that the newcomers
initiates can understand that it is not a punishment from their ancient gods but simply
of a natural phenomenon. While taking a detour to find a better resting place, Brother
Bolaños meets with three of the most important chieftains of the area who come to his
meeting.
The elder arrives with the friar and they talk.
In reality, the chief threatens the friar. If he does not obtain water by invoking his God, he will be pierced.
by the arrows of his tribe. The friar asks for a few moments alone. He walks slowly around the place.
Near some bushes, there is a large stone. The friar asks for help to move the boulder. It
they are removed from their place and as if they had torn the lid off an endless container, the surging
let a stream of crystal clear and fresh water escape in the middle of that dusty area.
The tribes of those three chieftains also converted to Catholicism, and Friar Bolaños continued.
forward with more confidence than ever in your evangelizing campaign.
The Legend of Kurusu Isabel
The diminished column marches towards the
north. Few hopes inhabit the Crosses found in the sanctuary
hearts of the soldiers. Think of the that the population raised to remember
Marshal in his Homeland. He wants to unite his the site of Isabel's death. legend
of Kurusu Isabel.
people, join forces and start the
counterattack. Their desires go beyond
the forces that remain to him. He still refuses to admit defeat. A ruined country is left behind.
The hardworking residents march in the column, and among them marches Isabel as well with her
little daughter in arms.
They cross the wetlands with water almost up to their waists. The insects are having a feast by sinking.
their lancets in the crust of those tired bodies.
Barefoot they march. Now over a field without trees, flat and hostile that extends endlessly before
the cloudy eyes of the troop. the girl cries in Isabel's arms, her sobs drowned by the suffocating
north wind that spreads its warm blanket over the column. No one hears the laments that
they stumble constantly. No one speaks. It is an army of the dead heading to purgatory. Stumbles
Isabel but still manages to get up and continue. The young mother falls behind but the group
Harapiento is not here to attend to those who stay and continues on his way.
Isabel wants to scream but the scream gets stuck in the dryness of her throat. Every ten
Isabel falls and gets back up. With each fall, the battered column drifts a little further away.
more. Isabel trusts to reach them when evening falls and the camp is set up. A couple
The tigers remain alert to Isabel's unsteady steps. The tigers roar from time to time, warning the
defenseless prey, the terrible end that awaits her as if they were sent from the deepest
darkness.
Behind those trees, the column of men and women has disappeared. Isabel can no longer see them.
Hisstrength is waning. How many days has he been walking with his daughter in his arms? A terrible stabbing pain.
on her back she throws it to the ground once more. Whoever saw the desolate landscape now would see no more
What a field. Isabel lies near a tree among the thicket.
The woman has fallen asleep. Her little daughter clinging to her chest. The tigers walk in
narrowing circles around them. Only the yellow backs shine with the sun at surface level.
from the weeds. The inhospitable place has given them an easy bite. They roar fiercely and the sound
it flies to a distant group of trees and hangs between the branches, making the birds flee. It passes
the flock in silence over the stage of death.
The tigers are a step away from the sleeping woman. They smell the flesh that still beats. They listen to the
groans of the creature. They fix their yellow gaze on the woman and her daughter. Are they perhaps driven by the
conservation instinct or are they fed with the flesh of the dead from the war? No one ever
they can answer this question. The tigers crouch down. They scratch the air with their dirty claws.
of mud. They sniff the body of the woman. They delay the final act. The prey does not defend herself.
Isabel dreams in her fainting and in her dream she
I was entering a palace. Two tigers
enormous, subjects with gold chains
The custodian closes the door. She goes up the stairs.
of the main porch held by a girl.
The girl asks about the tigers and the mother replies
calm them down by telling them that they are your
protectors. Indeed, as they pass by, the tigers
They throw and wait. There is nothing to fear, he says.
Isabel in the dream. In a room of mosaics.
Isabel leaves the girl playing with
some beautiful porcelain dolls that
They wear stylish party outfits. She
he starts walking down a painted hallway of
sky. Only the floor he walks on seems
real. The rest is sky. As if it were sliding
on a checkered and straight carpet.
Isabel walks towards the farthest end.
from that celestial hallway. Walk and finish Template where Isabel is venerated.
It is located 15 km from Concepción.
for getting lost in that sky with which now one capital of the department of the same
Isabel feels like she is flying. name, and it is an abandoned site of
the communications.

A very strong light surrounds the woman and her daughter. The tigers recoil as if before the light of
Powerful and they throw themselves close to them.

The girl remains attached to her mother's breast. She is feeding. Her mother, from the state of
inconsistency caresses it with her gaze, calms its moments of fear.
The tigers are vigilant in the daylight.
The tigers are watching under the stars.
Days go by.
The troop is already very far away.

Now, on the horizon a vague cloud of dust rises, approaching. There are two riders that
they advance through the desolate field. They gallop by when they spot something moving in
that stillness. 'Tigers!' they say in unison and spur their horses to hunt the animals,
but the tigers do not move. Standing on the gravel, they watch them advance. They look at them head-on.
like someone watching two old friends approach. Only when they are very close do the tigers run towards a
side and seem to disappear. The surprised men spot the woman and her daughter. They approach.
dismounting from their horses. The girl is alive!
While one cares for the creature, the other digs a grave.
Luckily, the tigers haven't harmed him!
Men work hard to give a dignified burial to the woman who has fed her daughter.
still after her death. The men build her a heavy cross with which they mark that
place. In the end, over the girl's crying, they say a few brief prayers and leave in search of the
nearest village.
No trace of the tigers!
No traces of the cruelty of war!
Years have passed and the people who passed through that place of the cross were nourishing the
legend of the woman who saved her daughter after death. Popular voices have woven for her
infinity of stories to the point of losing that true one that was only witnessed by
the pair of tigers. Today that place is known as Kurusu Isabel. The travelers who
They have arrived at the place, removing splinters from that primal cross until almost making it.
disappear. Splinters that are kept as a good luck charm. A small temple was erected by
the hands of the people and new crosses were placed in that place where today people go
promise makers in search of a miracle.
The legend of the death of Guido Boggiani
I, who was there, see no mystery in it. People insist on making things seem
magical. I don't know where they want to get with that obsessive mania. Things either exist or they don't.
They exist. Why are we going to beat around the bush? At my age, why would I lie to them?
I have told this story whenever I have been asked, but I have already lost hope that
Someone write it just as it is. They always add things that I didn't say.
For many years I kept the story to myself, but as always there is someone who insists, in the end I gave in.
Later, when I realized that everyone was modifying it, I got angry, but I can't.
I deny when it comes to telling what happened to Guido Boggiani.
That time I happened to be a member of their expedition. I did not have that within me.
innate adventurous spirit that the Italian had and surely, I don't remember well, there was no
could have opposed sufficient forces to his insistence. That happened often. Boggiani had a power
of extraordinary persuasion. No one could stop him in his investigations. He was one of those
men restless by nature, you understand me. If he had everything in Italy, relationships with people
influential, notable as a painter, musician, and poet, a beautiful woman, children...
I would have stayed where I was but he didn't, he was possessed by an unrest.
essential that led him to embark on more and more difficult adventures each day. And well, I
I was on that expedition from which he did not return. I was there purely by chance.
We had ventured into the jungle and set up our camp in a sheltered place.
the winds and difficult to access. We got along well with the Indians we encountered.
walking through those places, but there was always the possibility of an assault, so
we took precautions by choosing places that would give us some advantage in case we had to
defend ourselves.
We were accompanied by two Indian guides, which spared us surprises.
One of the things Boggiani liked the most was photographing the Indians in whom he saw the
purest traits. The natives were hesitant, feeling a strange fear before that machine, but
in the end they always ended up accepting the gifts with which Boggiani bribed them, especially
the women who melted at the fabrics that were given to them.
One afternoon, a slender and very graceful young woman arrived at the camp, along with other natives.
Immediately, Boggiani set his scientist's gaze on her and after much back and forth was able to
to convince her to pose for him. Boggiani patiently drew her for just over two
hours. When the work was finished, the girl who was no more than 16 or 17 years old, went out
running with his fabrics and Boggiani smiled satisfied with the work he had done.
That was not the last time that girl visited us at the camp. She came almost
Every day, to the point that one of the guides was already sighing for her. She was truly beautiful.
But she was coming to see Boggiani, that was noticeable. But the interest that Boggiani showed to the
The relationship with indigenous people was merely scientific, and in terms of human interaction with them, it could be
to say that he loved them as he loved all the beings he interacted with.
Boggiani was melancholic and thoughtful during those days. Well, that was his usual character.
only when he was in the middle of a job did he show interest and when he finished it with
success was the moment when he could be seen happy, you know.
The thing is that the young woman kept coming and going to the camp, but Boggiani didn’t seem to notice.
Nothing strange. Everyone knew that she was there for him, except for him.
One night, while everyone seemed to be asleep and Boggiani was smoking away from our hammocks,
the young Indian appeared, stretching out her arms intending to embrace the scientist but he
he held her hands. They talked at length. I did not master the language of that faction because
I could understand very little. I perceived more from the intonations than from the words themselves. But
In the end, the Indian girl ran away and got lost in the jungle.
Boggiani lay down and apparently slept peacefully. I stayed awake, something kept me
it kept me awake and it wasn't simple curiosity but a foreboding. I don't know, the point is that
That night I didn't sleep until very late.
Shortly after the Indian left, being very careful not to wake anyone, and in
The same direction, the Indian guide set off. He was completely infatuated with the girl.
Then sleep overcame me and when I woke up I was alone in the camp. I walked around and
The other guide appeared with a bundle of firewood. The others had gone on an excursion.
I asked about his companion and he told me that he was also on a trip but that at night he
he had found the body of the indigenous girl very close to there. Upon seeing her leave, he followed her - I
the guide narrated – but he couldn't avoid that the knife that Guido had pierced his heart
had given to his father.
What had happened? The young woman felt or believed that her soul had been imprisoned by Boggiani.
since that day he drew her. She had visited Guido that night to get it back.
her soul, but he refused to return the portrait. Then she asked him to please take her
completely in order to be able to return alongside her soul. But Boggiani also refused. Since the girl did not
She was never going to be happier with another man, so she took her own life.

I remember the somber tone that the guide put in his voice when he told me that the relatives of the
young people would take revenge. Upon the warning, I ordered the guide to follow my friend's tracks, I took
with me only the rifle, the water, and a knife. We didn't walk for long. At a bend of a
scattered lay the body of Guido Boggiani face down with a shattered head of a
chop. I approached him and touched his hands on which the warm blood could still be felt. The
the guide pulled me out of that state of disbelief at seeing the dead friend. The instinct of
conservation, in the face of the warning from the Indian prevailed more at that moment. I abandoned the body
by Guido Boggiani. If I hadn't done it, I wouldn't be telling this story.
The legend of the fountain of love
Go the water of the mysterious Soykua Bolaños. Thus, flowing, it has been seen for almost three centuries.
Now it is summer. Paraguay goes through an unfortunate year: nineteen sixty-nine. Year
of war. Year of flight towards the Aquidabán.
The miraculous waters give the place where the stream originates a different aura. Magical if it
wants. Fresh. Suitable for love.
A young man arrives at the deserted place on horseback.
With a leap, he descends to the ground before the horse comes to a stop.

And upon touching the green ground of a tender grass, in a demonstration of skill that only
He enjoys taking off his hat and gently throwing it, making it perform a graceful flip.
after which he is left hanging by the tip of a dry branch. The man sits at the foot of a
tree humming a little song softly.
Wait for someone or simply enjoy the surroundings.
No one who comes to elykuacon with that unmistakable joy can simply be on a stroll.
The boy seems to be waiting for his beloved. He is anxious. A good amount of time has passed and the lad has
I am dozing off. His chin is now falling onto his chest. Is he asleep?
A young girl arrives at the clearing from the mountain. She approaches the cross that commemorates the miracle. In
silence kneels and prays. He lights a fire to two candles. He surrounds them with stones and leaves them there.
Did he/she make any promises?
Now the girl crosses the small stone bridge stretched over the stream and heads
towards the place where the man slumbers. With the lace of her veil, she brushes the face of the
boy. He immediately wakes up and apologizes to the woman. "Oh, thank God you are
Here! Since you took a while, I dozed off, but the worst part wasn't that, I was dreaming that
I had to leave without being able to see you. What joy!” He takes her in his arms and they merge, surrendered to
love.
She knows it is the end.
He seems not to know it. Either his innocence is truly great or he knows how to hide it very well.
feelings. About to march with the troops towards the Aquidabán, he appears optimistic with
Regarding the war. Surely he doesn't want to upset his beloved.
The bells of a distant church drop their tired sounds over the waters of the stream. They
I would say that those sounds come to die in elykua. The birds are arriving from all the
cardinal points to stay in the trees that surround the stream. With gentle nudges, the
night separates from the sun and takes its place as queen of the shadows. Before settling down for the
rest, life shows its immense power.
I am thirsty,
The man hands him the ornate gold guampa that he has tied to his waist and accompanies him until the
slope. The woman carries the water and drinks. "I will be back soon, you'll see. And then we will be together
"Forever," says the man. "Forever," she says, returning the horn from where
He would drink. There is still a little water inside it. The man looks at the container. The mark of the
lips of his beloved. He brings the object to his mouth. He rests his lips on the marked spot and drinks.
the water that remains inside. A kiss upon another kiss.
At last they say goodbye tenderly. The woman disappears into the hills and the man sets out on the
the path of war on his horse. He no longer has doubts. He will return to the woman he loves. And
this time it is neither innocence nor pity. It is a strange force. It could be said to come from the water and from
fire. Of those candles that burned slowly in front of the cross and of the water that he drank from it
glass with his beloved.

The man was one of the few survivors of the war.

He managed to outsmart death and enemy prisons to arrive safe and sound next to his beloved.
Since then, elykuaBolaños has accumulated miracle after miracle as the belief began that if two
In love, they drink from the same glass of water, nothing will be able to separate them.

The Legend of the Chingolo

Golden and bright, the bird descends upon the tower and walks, pecking here and there at some grain.
that the wind has brought to the heights of the building. Despite its size, relatively
small, the bird maintains its balance facing the strong wind of the heights. It is
about a mossy tower that has endured the passage of the centuries without flinching. Its walls have
I've lived through more than a hundred storms without a whimper! Men have surrounded her, they have besieged her and have
surrounded by war, but the arrows and bullets have not affected her. Unfazed, the
the tower remains proud, soaring towards the blue, a symbol of man's quest for the infinite.
has always pursued.
There goes the golden bird with its elegant stride and the unheard brightness of its plumage.

Suddenly her voice rises in the afternoon air in a lovestruck chirp.

In the presence of a female companion - the females were at that time silver in color without
similarly - the chingolo boasts of grace and liveliness. It circles around the tower brushing against the
bells and making them tremble so that they emit a barely audible metallic brushing for them.
Turn around and touch the ground with the golden chest. The little bird watches him attentively, enjoying with the
a demonstration that has no other goal than to impress her.
The chingolo takes another turn and stands firmly on the weathervane that adorns the tower.
So look at the little bird that is further down and says: "If I wanted to, I would knock down this tower of
a single kick.
The little bird smiles mischievously at the exaggerated claim of its suitor.
A black cloud suddenly appears near the tower and quickly advances towards the weather vane.
The little bird looks horrified at the phenomenon and cannot help but think of a punishment. The chingolo
he faces it, but the strength of the storm pulls him in its whirlpools. There is nothing he can do. His
A show of strength and power makes no sense now. Divine punishment for arrogance has arrived.
less than a rooster crows.
The chingolo rolls on the ground injured and its golden feathers turn into a mixture of
ash and earth. All its beauty has disappeared. Its beautiful chirping does not appear in its throat and already
cannot gracefully support itself on its fine legs. Since then, the chingolo moves with
those ridiculous little jumps and he gets confused with the ground. The presumptuous, the arrogant and the proud
they always have a sad ending.
The Legend of Karai October
This man who now braids his whip hidden in the broad wings of his tattered
straw hat lives alone on the mountain. No one sees it except once a year. It appears to
ensure that the tradition of always is fulfilled on the first day of October. Come prepared, with
with the whip ready to punish those who dare to challenge the custom.
He is very interested in the cooking of each house. He goes to where the pots are boiling without
It matters nothing to him. He has done it for centuries. Who could question his attitude?
Grumpy and a man of few patience, ElKaraise walks through the towns making his sound
whip to announce his arrival. Most women give way to him and let him spy on
the pots. But those who have not followed the tradition seek to drive it away, fearful. Those
they do not escape punishment.

They call him KaraiOctober. The man is somewhat short and his wide hat flattens him even more.
He is wearing shabby clothes and, as we already said, he cracks his whip before entering.
spying in the kitchens and in the pots.
October is poverty, misery, hardship.
It is only driven away with a pot full of food.
If he doesn't find enough, he stays with that family for the whole year and, besides the
rebencazos, misery will accompany them throughout the year, with its disastrous consequences.
That is why in every household, on the first of October, a well-served stew is never missing.
the awareness of the whole family will remain at peace for the rest of the year. On the other hand, those
Those who resist and hoard the food of that day will have to live with hunger for the rest.
of the year. This tradition teaches the farmer to foresee food for his family during the months
of 'lean cows', a period that begins in October and covers the last months of the year.
The prize is for the prudent.
The punishment, for the lazy.
The Legend of Bad Vision
They had been living together in marriage for more than three years. They had been happy in the early days.
times, but the monster of jealousy had taken away their laughter. The woman with her suspicions
she was pushing her husband towards infidelity and he, tired of the reproaches he received in his
house, chose to seek comfort in other arms. The fact of being jealous without reason ended up producing
What was feared. The man, despite his infidelity, continued living with his wife.
But the woman no longer lived to build a family but to destroy the marriage.
Every step he took always had a destructive purpose.
He spent his life thinking about how to trap his husband in the traps he often set for him.
tended. Her thoughts fell into madness until one day the terrible idea burned in
her sick mind. 'And if someone asks me about him, I'll tell them he left with someone else,' she said to herself.
woman in the throes of her macabre ideas.
They had no children, so that spared him any inconvenience.
There would be no witnesses.

One night the woman patiently waited for her husband. In the spot on the bed where she was supposed to be
lying down, she arranged some old blankets that formed a lump resembling her body and with a
A heavy garrote sat waiting for her husband. She waited like bloodhounds wait for
They have surrounded their prey: calmly, without haste.
When the man arrived, the woman had no issues with his plan. She greeted him with a terrible
garrote to the head. The bones cracked and the man said goodbye to life. The woman, due to the
doubts, he charged with his primitive weapon and struck a few more blows fueled by strength
from the hatred that I had nourished for so long.
He dragged the man's body to a cart, loaded it, and in the midst of the darkness of the
night took him to a cave far from his house. There, at the bottom of the cave, he poured out the body
without life and covering it with dry branches, he set it on fire.

She still took the effort, the woman, to erase the traces of the wheelbarrow. She did all this with great
patience and no one saw it. The crime had been perfect. His face now looked relaxed,
almost happy. When, in the following days, her neighbors asked about the husband, she would answer
cheerfully: "That scoundrel ended up leaving, with some crazy person around."
The woman did not expect what was going to happen.

A week after the husband burned in the cave, the night turned stormy. Black the
clouds could be seen every time the lightning illuminated the scene. The woman, humming
a song, preparing dinner. She had always had the habit of singing while she was making the
work. A violent and sudden gust of wind came to disturb his peace. The glass of the
window. The woman turned around scared and saw her husband's body suspended in the air,
sparking, covered in embers. A chilling howl was heard throughout the region. The
woman died of fright on the spot.
The restless soul of the deceased husband had returned home.
A large fire broke out later in that house and no one knew what had happened. Only
they found the lifeless body of the woman. But the soul of that man, who also had his
guilt still roams the roads and when it sees lonely or unsuspecting travelers, it tends to unleash its
howls. If anyone responds to their screams, then they appear and with their terrifying image,
sparking, drives crazy or kills.
The Legend of Kurusu Bartolo
It is the year 1816. Father Bartolo runs towards the church. It is time for mass. The sacristan has already ...
call to the parishioners ringing the bell and the few men and women that populate
the old banks are eager to fulfill the Christian obligation of the holy mass.
Father Bartolo comes from the cultivated fields. He has been talking to the farmers but before
visited two families who are dedicated to weaving.
Now he is at the altar, sweaty but happy to have arrived on time to fulfill his
Obligation. The readings are done by the sacristan and Father Bartolo reserves the sermon. Father Bartolo speaks.
the little interest that the word of God awakens in the population. It holds responsible for this to
government of the Supreme that spreads materialism and forgets the soul of the people. Speak
with passion and devotion. He speaks convinced that his words convey the truth.
That’s right, Father Bartolo, a passionate man.

A man who walks the paths of life infecting people with his enthusiasm.
This is Villarrica del Espíritu Santo and here Pai Bartolo is like family. To all the families.
who live, dream, and work in this city. It is that Father Bartolo goes house to house with the
hope of getting to join the scarce congregation that attends and collaborates with the church. No
These are good times for the church in Paraguay. For that reason, we must work twice as hard, says Pai.
Bartolo.
The priest is a bit hyperactive, that must be said. Sometimes he asks people for things that people
It cannot give. No, nothing material, it is regarding the activities of the church. The things
spiritual. The commitment. Those things.
But that's the least that can be asked of a Catholic, says Pai Bartolo.
In these times it is different, they sometimes reply. God is not only in his church, Father,
others say. God is more in our fields than in that church of theirs, they say. Why should I leave,
So they can say that I'm a teacher's pet of the priest. The things that Father Bartolo hears.
They are usually terrible for a man of faith, but nevertheless he keeps going.
Some peasants recognize that Pai Bartolo's enthusiasm is capable of making things sprout.
seedlings more quickly. Plants grow faster when crossing through the fifths Pai
Bartolo with his restless step. The fabrics seem to progress twice as fast when he talks to those who
the looms operate.
Of course, that restlessness, that dynamism, that acceleration has a price. More than once it has...
seeing the sacristan suffocated and drowned in his worries, but Father Bartolo rejects any
type of help. No more than a glass of water that sometimes was insufficient to get out of the trance in
that his own nerves were trapping him.
It is not known exactly when, but one day Father Bartolo forgot the way to the church and a farmer
he had to bring it closer with good will. Another day he was found wandering in the field. Father
Bartolo started talking to himself in the streets. At first, people thought it was a result of his
natural way of being, but when he started to pass by his acquaintances without addressing them
They realized that he was suffering from a serious illness.
The relatives of Father Bartolo then decided to speak with the sacristan who confirmed their...
fears. They then decided to take him to their farm and ensure that he does not go out because all things
they became dangerous due to the behavior that Pai Bartolo demonstrated because of his illness.
Father Bartolo did not accept this situation at first, and one stormy night he managed to escape.
to the care of her family and went out to walk in the nearby fields. On the way, she tried
to cross a stream but fell into it and drowned. The locals buried him next to that
stream and marked the site with a cross.
The cross was gaining fame for its miracles and it seems that it particularly listened to the pleas of the
farmers who came to ask him to send them the rain. Some time later, the cross was removed and
taken to a chapel that Don Hilario Meaurio had built for the purpose of worship in his
home. Even today it is worshiped nearby and every May 3rd, Day of the Cross, it is customary to
to make the tasty Chipa Kurusu. When the farmers come to it eager for rain for their
sown is infallible. On the ninth day of the novena, they say, the rain always arrives. It
It is curious that every afternoon, amidst chants and drum sounds, they usually carry the cross in procession.
to give him a bath in that creek where Pai Bartolo would meet his death.
The Legend of Saint Thomas
I remember that on a rainy day when we were traveling through the Guairá region, we had to stay at
spending the night in a small village by the roadside. We were returning to the capital after
visit some relatives in the countryside and we stayed in a kind of general store. There they served
to eat and they also offered us, for little money, a little place to sleep. The night was cold and
Since we didn't want to take any risks, we stopped and stayed.
We ate a delicious soup that the hostess had prepared for hours. And then
After dinner, almost everyone who had stopped there remained at the table chatting.
largely about the legends of our land.
Then arose the famous legend of Saint Thomas, the saint of farmers.
Some suggested that the legend was very ancient and that it actually did not belong to Saint Thomas but
of the firstborn of Rupave and Sypave, the patriarch Tume Arandu, whose feats transcend the
Over time, the name changed, and stories of Paí Tume, Pai Zume, or Chume are known.
Some call it karai Zume or its variants. These people said that the evangelizers who arrived
They took advantage of the phonetic similarity and then made the Indians believe that it was about
of Saint Thomas, although others argue that it is Saint Bartholomew. The phonetic similarity
The names were what made it possible to appropriate a history with indigenous roots for purposes
evangelizers. This coincides with the fact that apparently, Pai Tume (I prefer to call him by his name
Tume Arandu was the one who taught the Guarani the cultivation of cassava and its preparations.
In other places, they say that what he actually taught was the cultivation of corn, and in others that it was he
Who taught the properties and uses of yerba mate? Let's give all possibilities a chance.
The confusion takes on the aspects of a riddle when we come across the hundreds of texts that
they refer to the topic in various ways. Even the famous Pai Tume or whatever it is called
turns into a character serial starring the famous "cases" that abound in literature
oral of our country. Thus, the discussion was long and relaxed. Everyone seemed to have
the reason and everyone seemed to not have it. How to find a point of agreement more or less
sensible when it comes to a topic of legendary, mythical, fantastic, and spiritual origin?
Some say that Pai Tume was actually the Saint who would have arrived in America by paths.
various according to the sources. The history places the saint in the time before Christ. The
historical conditions then come into play and by elimination, one arrives at the conclusion that the
Saint could not have arrived by sea but on foot across the Bering Strait. This theory
"Reasonable" collapses when local precedents are sought. Almost everyone agrees that
the saint is said to have arrived from Brazil and they have even shown the path he took through the
jungles.
Some say that all those discussions among folklorists and literati make no sense and
they are a real mess. But there are those who claim that all known stories have
a part of the truth. But how to assemble that gigantic puzzle?
Unlikely and almost impossible task.
Through Rosicrán, one of the most knowledgeable Paraguayan folklorists of this century, we know
for your Ñande Ypy kuéra that Tume Arandu, towards the end of his life took refuge in a cave where
he joined for the first and only time to a woman and where shortly after he died.
In the end, that night we dedicated it to, let's call him that, the Creole Saint Thomas.

We discussed and had a lot of fun with the different versions of a footprint.
the inscription on the rock of a hill still exists. We laugh because some authors say that it is a
kick of fury given by Tau to announce his revenge on the Guarani, others say that the famous
the footprint is of the pombéro and the boldest is the footprint of Pai Tume.
There is no way to construct a definitive narrative on this topic.
The truth is that the image of a different man who left his teachings to the Guarani has
survived for centuries in the collective unconscious. Has taught to plant and use the
cassava, has taught to plant and use corn, or has conjured the mate herb by taking out the
poison that Aña had loaded into her, Pai Tume, Pai Sume, Karai Chume or Zume or Tume Arandu,
Saint Thomas and Saint Bartholomew are always linked to the rural man, to his work.
and the development of tasks that help cultivate the spirit.
The legend of Karai Vos
Almost without answering, the old man puts the bread that they just finished at that ranch into his old and tattered bag.
Give it to him. Sir Vosã walks the streets constantly.
No one knows what they carry in their burlap bag, but they put everything they find in there.
Surely a mix of things. He has been seen putting the food that is given to him in the houses,
the old cans that you find around and pick up who knows for what, screws and nails in
disuse, some abandoned puppy has also ended up in the old man's bag.
They say he is crazy because he talks to himself.

It is said that he has no house or place to sleep because he is always seen wandering the streets.
He is said to be disgusting because he hardly ever bathes and wears one set of clothes over another.

It is said that he feeds on his dogs that he has around him through spells.
It is said that when he finds a child alone during naps, he puts them in a bag and takes them away, to
Then kill it and eat it. The Karai Vosã, the man of the bag or the lord of the bag is a
an unfailing character in all towns. Children fear him and flee from his presence.
Mentioning the karai Vosã, mothers manage to keep their disobedient children at home.
heavy summer naps. The time that Karai Vosã likes the most. The time when it comes out
especially to hunt children. If it finds you alone on the street, you are lost. You have to be careful.
be careful because with his sly look he can paralyze you. Don't look at him too much if you run into him.
he over there.

The legend of the French Girl

It is Sunday. At the Trinity church, people are gathered at the exit of the Mass.
A tall boy with an elegant bearing strides confidently toward the grove in the background of the
Church. Through the other gallery, a girl has come out of the church and with small steps she is also heading towards.
there. They are going to meet in secret.
They are in love and if we had to refer to the beginnings of this love, we would say that everything
It started when the boy picked up the handkerchief that the girl dropped at the exit of mass.
Sunday, a few months ago. The passion has been secretly nourished and love was
growing. Now young people talk about the possibility of committing. The boy does not
encourages to confront the girl's tutor without her speaking to him first explaining her feelings
feelings. Nothing more and nothing less than the Supreme! Don José Gaspar Rodríguez de Francia,
At the height of his rule, he remains inaccessible even to the girl. Although he often visits her, he is
park. He seems to have lost the gift of eloquence that led him to lead the first cry of
American independence.
The girl promises to speak with her tutor as soon as possible.

The young man promises to see her again through the gate of her house and to bring her wildflowers.
In the brief minutes they are together, they experience the youthful joy of healthy and sincere love.
glances, their brief caresses and a furtive and delicate kiss adorn the encounter.
Days later, the Supreme visits the girl's house, inquires about her health, and talks.
with the maids who have the mission of taking care of her. Watch over her, jealous, because nothing should be lacking in that house.
The girl must be raised with her needs met.
The girl asks to speak with him.

They both sit in wicker chairs. The girl, shyly yet determined,
she has a suitor and the young man wants to speak with her. How dare he! she thinks
Don Gaspar. But his expression remains serious while listening to the girl. He asks with interest.
the name of the boy is faked. José Antonio Rojas de Aranda, the girl responds. Ask in
where they meet. After mass, on Sundays in Trinidad, the girl replies. She asks if he is there.
sure of your love. And the girl smiles, blushing. She no longer asks: You can leave, she says now and
the embarrassed but happy girl for having confessed her love walks towards her rooms.
The Supreme calls the maidservants and sentences in a grave and loud voice, as if to be heard by the
girl. Nymph, the girl will not leave this house again. Masses are strictly forbidden.
Sunday and any other activity. That said, Don Gaspar goes out to the patio, unties his horse, and
she settles into the chair and sets off towards her estate in Yvyrai.
The girl, who has heard the tutor's words, breaks down crying bitterly.
The conversation with the Supreme came to his mind. He had not explained himself well. He had not insisted.
He had not shown enough passion. He blamed himself for this and many other things. The hours
they were extinguishing the cries and igniting new hopes. The night was closing in on the
orange grove that surrounded the house and with the night the beloved would arrive. He always had a
exit for the most difficult situations.
There goes the Supreme. Preceded at a good distance by the guards who are announcing its passage. The
windows of the few houses that stand along the road draw the curtains, close the
blinds. They turn off the lights.

The slow trot of his horse leads him to get lost in his thoughts. The animal walks alone. Already
He knows the way by heart. That horse is a faithful companion. The Supreme remembers his youthful years.
His romantic adventures. Those Rojas de Aranda had within themselves the power of seduction.
One of them had intervened in the love that José Gaspar professed for a young woman and had
humiliated conquering the one he loved so much.
Loneliness had turned the Supreme bitter. Power had isolated him from the people.
Now another Rojas de Aranda on his way wanting to take away the only affection of his life. But this
It was he who could prevent the realization of love. Fate had taken a complete turn.
I would never allow one of those to interfere in my life. Never!
Ten at night. A rider arrives at the orange grove and dismounts from his horse. He hides it among the
trees and heads towards the house. The guard dog, Sultan, comes out to greet him with celebrations. It could be said
he is the owner of the house but does not head towards the doorway. He takes a detour and approaches one of the
barred windows. There the girl awaits him. He tilts his hat back, crosses his arm between
the bars and takes his love's garment by the waist. Impatient to know the news of the
the interviewer asks the girl: "What happened to our request?" The girl recounts the interview with
the Supreme. "They will bring another guard dog," says the girl. "Don't worry, I will befriend him, already
"You see, it hasn't been very difficult for me with Sultan," says the young man, petting the dog's head that
is by your side.
The words of love from José Antonio erase the bitter traces left by his words.
Supreme. 'Everything will be resolved very soon,' says the boy before leaving.
He was never heard from again.

Was he kidnapped by the Supreme guards?

Was he perhaps sent to other lands?
Was he murdered?
The truth is that the young man disappeared as if by magic. He never visited again.
the girl and the girl never left that house again. The days that passed by her life were
everyone the same. The girl did not look at anyone. She barely tasted any of the food that
the maids of France served them. They never spoke to anyone. They did not answer the questions that
They were done to him. But at night, he would press against his window's grill and gaze at the moon yearning for
his beloved. Suddenly it seemed to him that the slender figure was appearing among the orange trees, but everything was
reduced to her imagination. The man of her dreams would not appear again. Sultan no longer did
parties to nobody. He barked, that is, during many nights inconsolably. He barked insistently one
Cloudy night in which the stars were hiding in the dark nests of the clouds. The Supreme
he was there. It had been a long time since that fateful night when he uttered his
sentence. Now he was coming back. What strange designs brought him back to the house? No one will know.
never.
Your father wants to see you,
The girl, driven mad by the fury contained for so long, responded with loud screams.
understandable. "He is not my father. He is a monster. He took away my love. I don't want to see him," the girl was shouting.
girl while the mulatto servants dragged her before the presence of the Supreme. The girl did
I stood in front of him with all the arrogance of youth: "I hate you. I will hate you for my entire life. You do not
"You are my father," she said, looking him in the eyes. The girl spat on the ground: "You disgust me," she said and
Then he started a terrible laugh in which madness could already be glimpsed. The Supreme gave
he turned around and left. He would never return to that house again.

Upon the dictator's death, his will contained no mention of the girl. No one
knew her true name except for him, so the girl was left nameless for eternity. At the
death of Ninfa, the caretaker, the mulatas took charge of the girl. They moved to a house of the
center and there continued his eternal confinement.

The mulattos took turns for housework and also for outings, in which
They sold products door to door. People eager to learn the girl's secrets.
they asked about her, but the mulattas always refrained from talking. They sold their products,
they kindly answered what they could and fell silent when asked indiscreet questions.
The girl Francia died, perhaps from sadness, perhaps from the madness of love, one sunny morning... Never
He was able to walk freely through the streets. Four soldiers carry his coffin and the faithful mulatto women
they accompany as the only entourage.

The Legend of Ka’a Iary

Pour the frothy and hot mate into the circle formed by the men around the fire.
They are miners and replenish their strength after a day of hard work. The harvest of the herb.
mate is the activity of the miners. Some are particularly skilled, but all know that
They must move respectfully in the plantations, harvesting only those leaves that are already well.
Seasoned. Nobody destroys the tree that feeds them, is the saying among them.
Now it is story time in the circle formed by the men. In the reddish darkness, the miners
they transform into voices that alternate in the narrative. Stories of ghosts, of fairies, of
headless horsemen, ghosts, fantastic stories that drive the adrenaline of the miners.
In the darkest corner, Julio and Taní listen in silence. They are newcomers. Just three days.
they carry in the harvest with the rags on their backs. It is not much that Julio and Taní have been able to
to harvest but at least they have a house and food.

Julio and Taní are young and have ambitions.

Julio and Taní wonder to themselves whether the legend that the miners repeat so often is true.
about the Ka’a Iary and both fall asleep that night with the idea of verifying it.
The roosters haven't crowed yet and Tani exits the shed where the miners sleep. She walks out quietly, without
to wake anyone. A uneven concert of snoring accompanies him. Taní goes out and heads towards the
church. He wants to be back without anyone noticing. He wants to make a promise now that
Holy Week is here. Now is the right time to see if that fairy of the mountain
it exists or it doesn't. Taní knows the formula. She has heard it many times. She enters the church and vows to live
always in the mountains, befriending Ka’a Iary and having no dealings with another woman.
Now Taní is leaving.

A shadow slips behind your steps.

Taní runs towards the mountain.
The shadow enters the church and swears to always live in the mountains, to be a friend of Ka’a Iary and to have no
I deal with a woman.
Julio leaves the church and marches toward the mountain. The oath has given him new strength. He carries a
a paper on which he has written his name and a date. He squeezes it in his right hand. He is
excited. He looks for a patch of grass to leave his message. Finally, he finds one that he
It seems appropriate and conceals the paper among its pages. He will return on Sunday. This is how he has put it.
paper. He will return to meet the beautiful Ka'a Iary. He knows that he must first go through other
tests, but knows that he will then be protected by the forest, covering his dream with the greens
fairy wings.
Julio and Taní, confused with the other miners, work hard that week. At the end of the day, their
the front is marked by the tattered headband they wear over their shoulders. Now they are taking them
the hand to the harvest and the weight of what has been collected increases day by day.

Julio waits calmly for Sunday, the day of the meeting.

Tani is agitated by the possibility of discovering the truth... does the famous Ka’a Iary exist?
Taní does not know about Julio's promise.
Julio senses that Taní has also made the promise to the forest fairy.
It's cold at this hour of the morning. Tani is searching for the place where she left her message. She
stops in front of the patch of grass. He looks around in every direction. The abyssal silence of the night
He gathers her in his arms. The moon looks at him sideways as it leans on its own crescent.
sinking in the west of the mountain behind the trees that stare intently at the young man like guardians
very high and invincible. A talkative wind runs joyfully bringing the conversations of the most
there.
Suddenly, two small yellow lights appear with a fierce roar among the plants. Lit
the gaze of a huge tiger confronts Taní, who is stuck to the floor. The tiger looks at him and advances.
towards him. Taní knows that this is the acid test. He must stay calm but cannot help the
fear and the trembling of his knees. When the tiger is ready to leap on the young man a
enormous snake jumps over the tiger and with the light of its scaly body begins to wrap around it.
The tiger struggles with all its might. The dark breath of the fight clings to its feet.
from Taní, who observes everything with deep fear. An army of giant scorpions is forming.
present in that same place illuminated by the unusual ruckus. The scorpions jump over the
animals in battle and they stab their poisonous stingers to then fight to the death among themselves. One
a troop of howler monkeys falls from the trees stomping on each other and joining the
infernal fight. The monkeys throw Taní to the ground. The scorpions climb onto his body. The tiger
tries to reach the young man with its claws. The wild pigs are running over. Around the fight
a cloud of luminous dust. Large macaws swoop in low flight pecking at the
monkeys that scream even louder. It is no longer known who is attacking whom and Taní is mixed in
that horde that oozes blood and hatred.
A blue cold freezes the image and before Taní's eyes appears a sweet young girl of gold.
hair. The animals have disappeared. The young woman looks at him tenderly. Taní gets up and wants to go.
towards her but the fairy gently stops him with her voice:
Don't come closer. You have passed the test. Your honesty has brought me here and here I am to
to protect you. I celebrate that you are with me and from now on I will be by your side. There is only one condition.
"What you must fulfill, and surely you already know what it is," Ka'a Iary finally said.

If you mean that from today onwards I must be faithful to you, I am already warned,
The Forest Fairy only responded with a smile and disappeared instantly.
Taní returned to the spot where the tea miners were, but he did not find his friend Julio.
who wanted to invite to attend the Sunday mass. Taní went alone to mass, renewed his
promise and thanked God for allowing him to meet Ka’a Iary.
Taní returned to the booth shortly after noon and came across a terrible sight. In
In the middle of the ranch lay on a cot the lifeless body of his friend Julio. According to the miners who
they found him in the mountain, he had been attacked by wild beasts. His torn body spoke for
yes only. Taní thought about the fight of the beasts beside him. In the tremendous scuffle that had occurred
what happened with him as the center and cried for his friend. Tani who guessed Julio's desire to
to discover whether Ka’a Iary existed or not knew what had happened to his friend. The little faith had
the fact that the beasts, instead of tearing each other apart, attacked him and that is how it ended. Taní
he thanked God again and made the sign of the cross in front of the lifeless body of his friend.

Since then, Taní had the help of Ka’a Iary in her harvest. She ventured into the mountains and
he reappeared with the tattered bag full of the best herbs. And when he was preparing to weigh his
Ka’a Iary harvest, was raised on the scale, invisible to others, increasing the weight of the harvest.
of Taní.
The young man was faithful to the fairy for the rest of his days, but there were other miners who, due to lack of faith, did not
they passed the test of the beasts that Ka’a Iary subjected them to at that time. Many others
they swore allegiance to the fairy, overcame the test, but at some point temptation caught up with them and
they broke their oath of loyalty. Ka’a Iary then ended their lives by leading them astray in the
mountain and leaving them at the mercy of the beasts.

Many were the miners who, unbelieving of its existence, tore off the leaves that were not yet
They were seasoned and destroyed the forest, they also paid with loss and death. The
protective spirit of the mountain, Ka’a Iary does not forgive offenses. Taní always knew this and lived every
one of its days framed in respect and fidelity. Ka’a Iary always protected him.
The legend of the Ypoa bell
Proud of their work among the indigenous people, the superior of the Jesuits of the Missions strolls.
bordering the community farms. The priest thinks of some material work that would serve for
bring God's signals closer to the men of these lands. It doesn't take long for them to appear in his mind.
sounds of a bell echoing in their mind since their earliest childhood. A bell that
At this point in his life – the priest is already 63 years old – he does not quite know if he really heard it or,
Simply, in their dreams. A unique bell. The sound resonates clear and serene, strong and soft.
It's a different sound. The Jesuit returns to his chambers and fervently writes a letter.
directs some famous Italian founders whose professional talents were highly praised by a
your friend who returned to Europe many years ago.
Some time later, she receives the response.

The technicians are willing to travel to this remote place on earth.

Ready and eager to cast that unique bell.
The priest sends expeditions to search for the precious metals requested by the Italians.
They must be back before they arrive at the Missions. Seven months later the
materials and the technicians are already in the town. Everything is ready for the casting. The
molds have been prepared with the utmost care. The inscriptions of the bell
they will leave faith in the fact for eternity. The priest imagines the sounds set free in the
beautiful regions where the towns of the Missions are located and smiles to herself. With the
calm conscience withdraws from the workshops where the work is being done to complete the
wonderful bell.
The Italian technicians, with the help of the indigenous people, who were trained in the trade during
a good time, they prepare for the smelting. The precious metals boil. The alloy is the
most important step in the whole process but at the peak moment the technicians realize
account that something has failed. They stop the task. They must analyze each step taken.
They honestly communicate to the Superior their failure and propose to replace the lost materials.
Now the work transforms into a matter of dignity. The money to be collected loses interest.
for the project directors. But something breaks inside the priest. With fury
he blames the specialists. He throws their curriculum in their faces, insults them. He knows he shouldn't.
to do what he is doing but cannot help it. Something greater than his strength dominates him
spirit. The homage to the Lord loses strength and becomes a whim of a mortal.
He places the workers. He gives them only one last chance.
Indalecio is the Christian name of one of the indigenous people who work there. Indalecio has been
chief of his tribe and is ashamed of the failure. When he arrives home for rest
Nocturno comments on what happened, recounts the anger of the Superior, says 'I would be angry too.' His
daughter, whom everyone calls Ysapy, for the brightness of her eyes, listens attentively. Fifteen or
The young, slender, and beautiful girl will be sixteen years old. That night, Ysapy cannot rest in peace.
Think about his father. About the threats from the superior. About the punishment that awaits him if they return to.
to fail. In the shame of his father.
The sun has not yet risen, but Ysapy is already up. She has gathered all her jewels and is ready to leave.
to the house of a wise man who lives in isolation, much further beyond the hills. He wants to ask him how
The alloy work must be done so that it does not fail. He wants to save his father.
The man is European but masters the language of the indigenous people. His advanced age forces him to use
thick crystals in front of her eyes. In complete silence, she listens to what the young Indian woman
comes to ask him and the plea for an answer in exchange for the jewelry he brings.
he consults his alchemist books, reads and rereads them. Ysapy waits. Finally, he gives his answer. The only one.
the way to unite those metals in complete harmony is to combine them with a woman's blood
virgin. The answer is pure magic. Ysapy returns happy to the Missions. She already has the secret.
that will enable her father's work to succeed, but she will soon realize that
Among virgin women, none are willing to be sacrificed.
The technicians have already analyzed the work step by step and have not found any faults in it.
procedures. There is something we did wrong in the practice, they conclude. Willing to give a second
battle, they prepare all the materials and restart the process. People watch the
works. The metals boil, change colors. Among the crowd, Ysapy witnesses the works.
Intimately, he has already made the decision, he waits for the moment when everything is ready for the
alloy, then jumps. No one can stop the young girl who has thrown herself into the huge
containers leaving a brief howl of pain in the air. Indalecio wants to throw himself after his
daughter but the powerful arms of her coworkers hold him back. The Indian dies of pain
right there. The alloy has been achieved. It is a success. The silence is complete. No one dares to be
happy. The death of the young woman could not prevent the death of her father. Both travel towards another
space, much more serene. A celestial space that from this day forward will be filled with the
sounds of this fabulous bell. The only one smiling is the priest who finally sees his dream come true.
whim
The bell, as planned, is hoisted and placed in a tower in the center of the town.
From there, for a good while, he let many tunes free that came to life and got lost in
the blue of the Paraguayan sky. But one fine day, other whims, this time political, produce the
flight of the Jesuits. Threatened, they must leave everything behind and withdraw from the Missions.
The priest, now very old, entrusts the bell to a trusted group of indigenous people. He asks them to
hide it in a safe place until the bad times pass.
The Indians carry the bell to the shores of Lake Ypoa. They plan to cross the lake and keep it in
a secret place. They lift her into a large canoe and begin their journey of no return. The waters are
quiet. Some other island shifts location changing the landscape. The indigenous people
They are disoriented. They no longer know which way to go. Where to row. The canoe collides with a log and they fall.
to the water its crew and with them the heavenly bell. So much ringing up there and now it must
to rest in the depths of the lake, among the mud and the creatures. Will it sound with the same clarity in
those depths? Whom will it grant its miraculous voice? The visitors of the lake and the
travelers passing by its banks that at night, from the nearby fields one can
to hear the ding-dong of a bell. Mysterious sound that adds to the mysteries of Lake Ypoa.
Mysterious and magical are the sounds that invite the unsuspecting to come closer and sink forever.
in the dark waters.
The legend of the Christ of Piribebuy
Wood and grass the caravan brings. They climb the last slope. The road has not been easy but now
They arrive at the post and you can already see the expectation in the men. The movements of the wagons.
seem to speed up at the sight of the place. Numerous wagons rest filled with goods that
they are heading towards Asunción. A large and illuminated ranch is the center of that pilgrimage where the
men talk loudly and some get drunk with rum.
Don Taní leads the caravan. Now the laborers detach the oxen, and they take them to graze.
a zone of weeds that they have seen upon arrival. Don Taní counts the cattle. "One mule is missing!" he says.
loud voice. 'Ramón!', calls Don Taní and instantly Ramón, a twenty-year-old boy, is there next to
To the foreman. There's a mule missing, go find it, orders Don Taní, it must be in the lower area. Depart.
Ramón is in a hurry. He wants to return soon and join the fun. The darkness of the night does not
intimidates Ramón. He is young and strong, what could happen to him?

Shortly after, he hears the deep bray, he orients himself and, aided by the light of the moon, finds
the lost mule. It tries to take her along the shortest path, but the mule resists. The mule takes
the path she wants. She must have smelled water, thinks Ramón. He lets her go. There is a need to
be patient. The night is long. Halfway, Ramón believes he sees a lump lying next to a
tree, but it is not this that catches Ramón's attention, but rather some sobs that he hears like
coming from that bundle. Pitiful and drowned are the sobs. Ramón escapes from the place
pulling the mule as best as he can, he arrives agitated next to his foreman. Don Taní, says Ramón, you
Maybe you don't believe me but I've seen something, a lump, near a tree over there in the low area and the lump
I was sobbing all the time. I didn't want to get close alone. The truth is it scared me a little.
But, how messed up, the foreman responds cheekily. Go with José and Ricardo and bring that bundle.
Look if someone has abandoned a creature. That usually happens. The three pawns return to the place and
they effectively find a third of leather that they are initially hesitant to approach due to
the lamenting sobs they hear. In the end, Ricardo, the bravest, advances closely followed.
for the other two and open the bag.
!A Christ! exclaims Ricardo. !A Christ! the other two repeat in chorus and disbelief.
Indeed, inside the leather bag, they find a large wooden crucifix.
dimensions. Upon opening the bag, the cries have ceased. He was calling us, says Ramón. And you didn't.
You were getting excited, he replies sarcastically, Ricardo. The men return carrying Christ on a litter.
inside the leather bag. They call their foreman and show him what they found.
Well, well, says Don Taní looking at the image, if God wanted us to find it, then we
We will take him with us to Piraju. There I am going to build a chapel. Who knows who left
There is Christ? The hand of God...
The traveling patrons who stopped at the inn quickly discovered the finding and wanted to
see the image. Finally, Don Taní gave in and the image was seen by everyone. They looked amazed at that
enormous Christ carved in wood with articulated arms. As expected, there were those who
they agreed that Don Taní should take the image and others believed that it should
stay there to protect the travelers. If it had appeared there, it had to stay there, they said.
Despite the insistence of the latter, Don Taní stood firm and the next day, when
The dawn was breaking, he loaded the bag with the Christ onto a mule and prepared to leave.
Strangely, the entire caravan started to move, but the mule carrying Christ stubbornly refused to budge.
did not want to move forward. They changed the mule Christ and she also did not want to start. So
they were there all day. Don Taní, pressured by the owner of the ranch, didn't know what to do. For a
on one side he wanted that Christ, but on the other it seemed miraculous that the mules did not want
they would only march when they were carrying the image.

In the end, he stuck to his guns. I will take him myself to Piraju, said Don Taní. He gave a day of
resting his pawns and decided to spend the night right there.

That night Don Taní began to feel unwell. A strong upset stomach was taking over him. He felt
horrible pains in the belly and there was nothing that could calm her. They prepared infusions that
they yielded no results. The pain continued and Don Taní suffered enormously. The situation worsened when
night falls. Don Taní cursed the food. But in reality, the family that owned the inn was the
that attended to him with greater care. They gave him the best bed in the house. They put wet cloths on him.
cold in the head... Because Don Taní was flying with fever. Strange ailment, this one that afflicts Don Taní,
There is no way to stop it, said Filomeno, the owner of the ranch, shaking his head negatively.
The next day and after having suffered unbearable pain, Don Taní, to everyone's surprise,
he died. They buried him nearby with deep sadness, for he was a regular at that place. They sent
a messenger to Piraju to inform his family that the caravan he was leading set off.
slowly carrying their goods now with deep sorrow.
Everyone interpreted that Christ should stay there.
They saw a clear sign in the death of Don Taní, Christ wants to stay, it was the voice of the
majority of travelers. There's no turning back...
Since then, the Christ stayed at the inn's ranch.
Years later, with the help of the travelers, a chapel was built next to the ranch.
Around these two constructions, houses began to multiply. People settled down.
there to obtain the protection of Ñandejára Guasu, as they began to call Christ. The
The hamlet quickly formed a town that was called Capilla Guasu, a population that gave rise to.
to the picturesque Piribebuy, where the image of that Christ of strange rests in its church
provenance.

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Book Four

The Mythological Museum of Capiatá

Capiatá, km 19.
Like every morning for the past twenty years, early in the morning, the Mythological Museum 'Ramón Elías'
opens its doors on Route No. 2, right at km 19, where – it can be said
thus – Capiatá begins. A brilliant introduction for the city, this museum that today carries
the name of its creator, the tireless professor Ramón Elías.
Many years of work, sacrifices, and travels throughout the country was the cost that Don Elías paid.
to collect, recover, and restore invaluable pieces of Jesuit and Franciscan art;
documents, photographs and weapons from the Great War and the Chaco War.
In his adventures through the interior, always supported by his wife,
Elsa Céspedes, now in charge of the Museum, Mr. Ramón had the
opportunity to talk with people who conveyed to him
your knowledge about the myths and legends of Paraguay. Your
innate curiosity did the rest. She kept researching and inquiring until
to form in their rich imagination the image of the "monsters" (as
he would call them) of those stories. Since they lacked an image he
it was proposed to build them one.

This is how he began to carve in the wood of our land.

images that faithfully depicted the fantastic tales that
It was heard in the different corners of the country. One by one they were
I appeared to you, oh oh, the moonlight, the pombéro, the jaguar.
poor vision, like so many others.
Don Ramón was not only a teacher and researcher of our past,
but was also deeply rooted in social life
and cultural of their people.
In the sporting aspect, he was a basketball player in the national team.
Capiatá, football player in the first division, president of a club, organizer of the parades
Asuncenos with beautiful floats that displayed their inexhaustible
creativity...
Muleteer supports his neighbors and anyone who needs his help.
Friend of the brilliant anthropologist León Cadogan who encouraged him to
to move forward, Mr. Ramón Elías did not relent in his efforts to
recover the memory of Paraguay, the historical one and that which
shapes our collective unconscious.
He never received official help for his task, nor did he seek it.
He was doing his job with pure awareness.
When the gathered pieces were so many that he could no longer keep them.
At home, he thought about creating a suitable place for its conservation.
a place where not only he could appreciate them but they would also be useful to
society. Although no one knew it, he had already formed a
clear idea of what the place where I would locate the sculptures would be like
own and those historical pieces.
I wanted a traditional house but I didn't want to build it with
current materials. Their idea was different. This is how it all started.
to tour the demolitions of colonial houses throughout the
country. It recovered the tiles, the posts, the beams from there,
tiles, the large bricks, the openings, the grills. It was a tough
a task of accumulation and an enormous and costly investment. A
as time went by, the task became simpler for him,
since his interest was known in vast places, when
there were those types of demolitions they called it and the people
approached to offer him materials. His effort was to build a
traditional house with materials from other houses
traditional ones that unfortunately were disappearing.
Doña Elsa proudly comments that the museum and the house where
Today, the lives were completely raised with materials.
ancient, original. There is nothing today except the hand of
work.
This house is a re-
construction. In this house
several houses coexist from the colonial era. It took a long time
a don Ramón Elias build it. Gather each element
of those he had imagined and attach others that are to it
they were presented by the road. The works were directed
by himself and the house is raised based on his own design.
Recently en 1979 was the Museum inaugurated as it is today
you can see it.

Just two years later, in a unlucky accident

automotive, died on creator.
Leaving behind a work and a life story
incomparables. The figures about some of the myths by him
carved would transform in the 'official' image, so to speak
somehow, of those monsters. Artisans of
the entire country adopted the features created by Mr. Ramón Elías
and they multiplied their work. Monsters like elao ao, elkurupi,
the fireman, the shining moon, hello elm boy tuiy
they found him I am figure definitive y self han
multiplied by the way that Don Elías would give them.
The museum is an invaluable legacy.
In addition to the own sizes, numerous images made by the
Franciscans and Jesuits, perfectly dated, can be found.
there for the admiration and delight of visitors. Photographs and
weapons of the Chaco War. Elements of everyday life of
the colonial era. Documents of the War of the Triple Alliance.
Everything in that special house that the professor would leave for the
posterity.
Nowadays, Mrs. Elsa Céspedes directs the Museum with the same
love with which the teacher did it. The affection of his grandsons and granddaughters
surrounding the mansion at km 19: gateway to a thriving city.
The museum continues to provide satisfaction to its owners although to
sometimes maintenance can be difficult, especially considering
It is said that no one is charged an entrance fee here.
A private venture away from the selfishness that sometimes seems to flow through all of us.
areas. An entrepreneurship that, without grudges, with twenty years of life and another twenty of
previous work, it is the only one of its kind in the whole country.

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Fifth Book
Chronicle of the real geographical sites where the actions of the myths take place
legends of Paraguay.
Introduction
First of all, we want to highlight some heartfelt words of gratitude to the people who support us.
helped in the company to visit the real geographical sites related to myths and legends
from our country. Almost anonymous, as in these pages you will find some of their names and/or
testimonials, these people made their best goodwill to help us in our
searches and trips.
This chapter does not intend to conclude a research that can still be extended, but rather to mark a
path in this direction. A path that somehow Narciso R. Colmán left open with
those little paragraphs in which I mentioned names of people and places where the mystery was
it was manifesting itself in various ways.
We have walked many kilometers on this journey. We have done it in every way.
bus, by car, by motorcycle, by bike, on foot... We have greeted each person with whom
We have crossed paths. We always got answers that helped us move forward. No one gave
turning a blind eye to our demands, which clearly speaks of the deep sense of the
the hospitality of our people.
You will excuse the quality of our photographs, but they are taken by amateurs and have
above all, a documentary value more than artistic.
Every word of these chronicles is the simple reality we have lived. We do not include in these
lines not a bit of fantasy with the purpose of you, the readers, being able to know the
places we walked through with complete objectivity.
There are indeed inexplicable things like the footprints on the stone, for example, but they are verifiable.
through the eyes of whoever wants to come closer to see. Sincerity has been our principle in crafting
The chronicles. Let's go to them.

Yaguarón
THE CURRENT CITY
The city of Yaguarón, located on, or rather intersected by Route No. 1, is found
between the towns of Itá and Paraguarí, and is marked by legends. The Church of San
Buenaventura, the Yaguarón Hill, the “Dr. Francia” Museum, and a little further the Mbáe Sa Company
Guasu, they mark places that, in those stories that have stayed in the memory of the people,
they appear as settings for memorable adventures.
The city of Yaguarón is our first destination in these 'chronicles' that aim to testify to the
real places that imagination, or perhaps some mysterious facts, have linked to
always with the myths and legends of our land.
THE MUSEUM, A MUST-VISIT PLACE.
First, we headed to the "Dr. Francia" Museum, located just two blocks away from the
the most important reference of the city: the Church of San Buenaventura. There we talked
We spoke with the person in charge and we were able to see the very few pieces of the museum: "It's just that this
The house was recovered empty and the pieces we can show today come from donations.
volunteers. Here lived the father of Dr. Francia, Mr. José Engracia García Rodríguez, who resided
at the time when the Spanish Crown appointed him Administrator of Tobacco in Yaguarón,
our host.
Four mannequins that display the supposed features of Dr. José Gaspar Rodríguez de Francia in
different ages, dressed in period attire, are found in one of the rooms.
Photographs of Dr. Francia's daughter (the France Girl?) are also highlighted in the place.
legend?) and the granddaughter, the latter related to the Peña family who were owners of the famous
Quinta de Yvyrai, residence of 'El Supremo', in the Trinidad neighborhood of Asunción, of the
which we will discuss in a separate chapter as it relates to the Legend of the French Girl.
HEADING TO THE MYSTERIOUS YAGUARON HILL
We now walk towards Cerro Yaguarón. We are accompanied by Rubén Darío Oviedo, a 19-year-old young man.
who has spent childhood traveling through the places we are now trying to document.
We walked along Route No. 1 until we reached the curve leading into the city – we are
making the reverse journey of our arrival, as if we were heading towards Asunción -
where we venture to the left. We cross the Cemetery and continue walking for a few
how many more blocks in zigzag, first to the right and then to the left, to the right and to the
left until you reach the foot of the hill. "There are three paths to go up and down the hill - he explains to us.
our guide - one of them is moving to the right, it's like a street and it's the most
accessible, the other is this one that is here in front of us. It is the path of the Stations of the Cross, the crosses
that are occasionally on the hillside of the hill mark the last stations. This Stations of the Cross
starts at the church and ends at the top of the hill. And the third path is a staircase that
it has been built into the very rock and is at that point, to the left. To know the three
Paths are our proposal.
Here we go. We decided to climb first via the Way of the Cross. The hardest one according to our
guide. It is steep and you have to step on protruding rocks because loose stones can be found anywhere.
moment can cause slipping. Once up, we head towards the end that
it points to the city. From there we can barely distinguish the roof of the church due to the great
number of trees that grow around them, a fraction of the route, the cemetery and some
small streets.
Most of the village is under the trees.
Towards the horizon, the mountain range. The gentle slopes that outline a hollow like
trimmed with scissors. Those heights look hazy due to the effect of distance.
THE TEARS OF KERANA
Just 50 meters from the place where we reached the summit, there is a small ykua.
Just a thread of water, almost imperceptible, springs from a rock in the shape of a small pot.
Surely the water has shaped it with its incessant flow. Here Kerana cried in sorrow. She cried until
death. "This, during Holy Week it was all marked. I don't know why they would have taken out the
"posters," says Rubén Dario. The local inhabitants do not associate the ykua with the place where.
Because they will cry until there are no tears left, until death. But they also don't know how to give it a name.
this small spring at the top of the hill. Although after reading Narciso R. Colmán in
Our Ancestors, I can't help but imagine Kerana at that moment. Destroyed by
everything that had happened to her in her short life. Her beauty extinguished. Torn to shreds by weeping,
dying in this place that must have been much more inhospitable back then.
THE FOOTPRINTS IN THE STONE
In front of the ykua, just ten steps away, are the 'footprints on the rock'. These are two
footprints corresponding to a human step. Contrary to what we have read in some
books, the footprints are of a normal size, in other words, traces of a human being. Some
authors have mentioned that they were large footprints. Others attribute them, given that
characteristic, the pombéro and in Yaguarón the inhabitants say they are the footprints of Santo
Thomas (in some versions it is mentioned that from a rock Saint Thomas rose towards the
heavens leaving their feet marked on the stone). For his part, Rosicrán mentions in the Genesis of
the Guaraní Race which is about a 'rage' kick delivered by Tau, cursing Tume Arandu
and swearing revenge for the death of their children. The truth is that the footprints on the rock do not cease to
to be mysterious. It escapes our understanding to consider the possible causes that left
those footprints recorded in that place. What strange combination of reality and the supernatural.
Could that document have been left to us? From what historical period would it date? Mysteries that only the
specialists could clarify.
HEADING TO THE CAVE
From the place where the footprints are located, going down and towards the village, we
we found a very narrow path on the steep slope of the mountain. Along this path
we take a tour that remains risky despite some quite deteriorated railings.
It's the path to the cave or grotto. After some efforts, we managed to reach that place.
An inscription names it as the Cave of Santo Tomás. On the other hand, returning to the work - unique in
his genre - Ñande Ypykuéra, we can read that in that cave was where Tume Arandu and his tribe
They destroyed the seven phenomenal sons of Tau and Kerana, that is, Teju Jagua (who was the one
he inhabited that place without being able to abandon it due to its deformity), Moñái, Jasy Jatere, Kurupi, Luisõ,
Mboi Tui and Ao Ao, who died alongside the immolated Porãsy, daughter of Marangatu.
The cave is not really a cave, as it is not an excavation in the rock but rather the stones
that fell, the result - I dare to affirm - of some geological origin explosion, formed
a kind of "house", quite narrow.
In some of the different versions that exist of the Legend of Saint Thomas, it is said that the
Saint lived his early days in these lands in a cave. Perhaps that's why the inhabitants of
They call it Yaguarón.
It is worth clarifying that what we can find in Rosicrán as Moñái Kuare, the same
Residents claim that it is another site, outside the boundaries of the Yaguarón hill but not
very far away, but we have not found anyone to guide us there. The place seems lost in the
curls of oblivion.
THE HILL HAS ITS TWISTS
Once we have visited the previously described places, and photographed them, we
we decided to go down by the path that was previously on our left ('the staircase')
according to our guide) and now we have on our right, while we observe the village of
Yaguarón. The descent was not as 'sweet' as we thought. A path as long or longer than
the one we climbed. Filled with difficulties in the first part and with some steps of
rather high stones a little lower. The fatigue did not help us to make this descent
something more relaxed. Our strength was exhausting. Climbing hills like this and descending them is not
As easy as it may seem at first glance. In any case, the experience is worth it.
We wanted to learn about the third way: the easiest according to our guide. So we went there,
from one end to the other, always walking at the foot of the hill. In front of us a kind of street
enripiada ascends once again towards the summit of the hill.
We took a break before tackling the difficult task. Once we recovered, we started the second
ascent. It was certainly much quieter than the first. This path leads to the second
half of the summit. Vegetation reigns here. This half is located on the opposite side of the
the town of Yaguarón and is not visible from there. A palm grove imposes its presence and among the
palm trees (mbokaja) there are plots that are cultivated by some farmers who claim that
it is about private property.
For better description, we will say that our hill has a truncated summit, as if someone had...
I would have cut the tip. In this way, the 'summit' is a fairly wide extension of the
land, more or less irregular but generally flat, through which one can move as if
it was on a vast terrace covering several hectares. On one side, pure stone,
on the other side pure vegetation.

Is another legend being born at the summit of the hill?

We cross the forest in front of us and emerge back onto the rocky part.
The sun presses on our heads. The closest path to go down, after walking through
mount and go out again to the rocky point that overlooks the town, it is the "staircase." But before
We discerned something that had escaped our notice. In this flat summit, there are two elevations.
of the land. Like small little mountains. We assume that for a climber that, the highest one, must be
to be the true summit. Summit on the summit.
We asked our guide if there is a trail to climb to that place that at the
the distance looks very tangled, filled with seemingly thorny trees and now grayish due to
the prolonged drought. "There is a path but we cannot go there," he tells us and in the face of the new
questions say: “It has been a long time since anyone dares to go there.” A warm silence jumps, gives
three loops in the air and falls over the group, then the guide explains: 'There, they say, they tell, that
A man committed suicide. He was very evil it seems. He hanged himself at that peak. A long time ago.
years. The chicken mostly roams around noon, which is the time when it was killed. A girl climbed up without
knowing it not long ago and too big scared him the ghost of that gentleman.” We looked at our
watches. The hands point to twelve o'clock. The guide did not want to accompany us. We
we prefer to remain in doubt. Perhaps a new legend is being born at the summit of
Yaguarón Hill.
THE SAN BUENAVENTURA TEMPLE
We have left this visit to the Church of San Buenaventura for last. A jewel of the baroque style that
It predominated in the Franciscan constructions of the 18th century. Its foundation dates back to 1755.
approximately. We sought in the temple, in addition to observing the beauty of its main altar,
the altarpieces, the pulpit, and the sacristy, which we knew from reference; a bas-relief that, according to
mention Concepción Leyes de Chávez, in his book 'Río Lunado', page 102, there would exist in the
church, showing the struggle between an indigenous person (it would be the Guarán from the legend titled Yaguarú) and the
monster of the Guarani mythology called Jaguaru. The only similar thing is a circular bas-relief.
that is attached to the front wall of the temple, beside the door and that,
according to data from the person who guides visitors there, it would have been at the top of the
front, above the main door. In this bas-relief, a warrior can be seen fighting
with a spear against an animal. According to references from the same person, in ancient times
I could see clearly that it was a Roman warrior fighting with a lion and that there would exist
photographs that prove it. Unfortunately, none of those photographs are found in the
temple. This bas-relief is the only thing that resembles what is mentioned in that book. Given the
we will have to conclude that the imagination of Concepción Leyes de Chávez transformed the
Roman warrior in an indigenous person and the lion in Jaguaru, placing the bas-relief on the wall.
behind the temple and not in the front as we verified on-site.
THE VALLEY OF SA GUASU
We say goodbye to the temple of San Buenaventura with its exquisite carvings covered in gold leaf.
and we headed to the Sa Guasu valley leaving Yaguarón behind. A legend that is inscribed in this
the same book names this place. We travel in a bus that goes through the nearby companies.
to Yaguarón. Today it is called Compañía Mbáe Sa Guasu and is located on the road
that goes from Yaguarón to Pirayú, before reaching the mountain range. We found nothing particular.
in this company. Working peasants, distanced from the legend of the man-eating monster.
Only a few locals know it, very few. And no one fears walking the paths these days.
formerly ravaged by the cyclops of our mythology.
Atyrá
Atyrá is another reference city when we talk about mythology and legends of our land. Its
a past full of stories and its present full of community achievements caught our attention
attention and moved the interest to be the second city on our long list of trips and
Visits. Atyrá can be reached from Altos and from Tobatí by dirt roads and partially
paved, and from Route No. 2 (at the height of Caacupé) via a detour today completely
paving of 15 km.
THE MEETING PLACE OF THE AVARE AND THE PEOPLE
It is said that in the place where the building of the Municipality of Atyrá stands today, in the past
there were seven yvapovõ, under whose shadows the avare and the people gathered to deliberate
was approaching to participate in the Assemblies. In fact, the name of the city: Atyrá comes from the
the word Atyha means a meeting place. There are no more traces of the yvapovõ if there are any.
they once existed.
From this site, today the center of Atyrá, Tumé Arandu spoke to the people asking for harmony and love in
the moment when the seven phenomena – the children of Tau and Kerana – sowed hatred and
they unleashed the fury of the various village. There the wise one cautiously communicated the plans to
to destroy the monsters that ravaged the tribes. There countless times the tribes gathered
from the region to resolve their matters.
I see them now under the shade of the trees discussing in small groups. I see some of them.
natural leaders ask for the floor and make their speeches. I see the greedy responding to the
Questions. I see them enter a large hut to deliberate. I see the hills just as they are today,
giving shape to these meetings and feeding on the words that reach them rolling
about the grass. I see those words blossoming on the hills and brightening their millennial existence...
THE PRESENT OF ATYRA
Now Atyrá is known for its dedication to hygiene. It is rightly called the city most
clean of the country. They say that their "ecological" work is also commendable. Their streets are calm and in
All of them we encounter signs that reproduce phrases from famous thinkers. Phrases
that help to live in harmonious coexistence and promote individual growth
community. The church, the small pedestrian street where the leather artisans have their shops,
sundial, the cemetery that, contrary to what is usual, claims life's joyful colors
eternal, and the former mayor's house museum (the one who initiated the renewal of Atyrá), are
city references. It is also the waterfall that they call "el chorro" here although it is
located a few kilometers past the community of Monte Alto. And the companies that surround
Atyrá: Monte Alto, Mbururú, Candia Loma, Candia, Caacupemí... The people of have worked hard
Atyrá to make its city a livable city, a city that serves as a mirror for them, a
attractive city for tourism that, although it does not receive a large number, is constant. All the
Days visitors arrive at the small town.
THE HILL KAVAJU
Mount Kavaju may not be among the mandatory references of the inhabitants of
Stop, but everyone knows him. They are aware of his existence and many have visited him. In fact, a
16-year-old boy, Nicanor Vera, accompanies us as a guide on our excursion to the hill.
Although it could be said that it is an incursion.
The morning is calm and open. The blue of the sky seems to want to dye the somewhat dry fields.
in this winter season. The blue of the Paraguayan sky! Dusty and reddish roads have led us
brought to the foot of Cerro Kavaju. Contained expectations begin to release as if
they were kites and are getting trapped among the branches of the dense vegetation that covers
the hill. We went up. The path is extremely complicated. In comparison, the Yaguarón hill is child's play
of children. The Kavaju, named so for the shape of the summit that draws a kind of chair
to assemble, appreciable especially from the road that goes from Caacupé to Tobatí, is difficult to climb.
The slope facing the Mbururú company appears almost at a right angle, from the summit to
the ground. Exotic plants cling to the rocks and drop long arms from above.
Enormous and eroded stones lie, who knows since what centuries, some embedded in others.
whitish color of the rocks appears filtered by darkness that forms whimsical shapes
that the water and the wind have been carving them on the surface. We climb, we climb, we climb... No
we can stop comparing this hill with Yaguarón hill. This one is higher, more
impressive...
We do not know exactly what we will encounter. We are looking for the cave in which, according to the
Legend, Moñái hid his thefts. We made the ascent by climbing one of the less steep sides.
we climbed steeply until we reached the highest summit and found no traces of the damned cave.
Will it exist in reality or is it just another invention of the writers' lush imagination?
They have dedicated themselves to narrating the legends? Our guide assures that it exists, but it's on the other side.
Near the summit, we discovered a series of 'faults' that form narrow rooms.
Could one of these be the cave where Moñái was hiding? We explore them all. We slide through.
under the stones to reach them. We climb. We jump. We are not convinced by what we see.
From this summit we can see an evangelical camp, a pottery workshop, the hills, which to
along the entire horizon we are enclosed in a misty circle, some hamlets, some
visible paths by sections due to the abundant vegetation.
After a short break, we began the descent on the 'other side'. This place is more dangerous.
“Ahí está la cueva”, dice nuestro guía al que tanto acosáramos con nuestras preguntas. Ahora sí.
Looking at each other we surprise gestures of satisfaction. This is what we were looking for. In a
inaccessible place on the stone that falls at a right angle and among the vegetation, a mouth
darkness opens its jaws and remains motionless for eternity. From the path where we
we found it, we observed it above. We documented. We photographed. There rises the shadow of Moñái,
with its horns of light, creeping among the trees. Only he can reach there. There he ascends the
graceful figure of Porãsy. A chorus of butterflies lights the way for the beautiful young woman not to
Tropiece. The butterflies and their stardust. The footsteps of Porãsy on that luminous avenue.
that from our path is barely perceptible. I estimate that Moñái is sleeping the 'mona' of his
misdeeds. I see the beautiful woman get lost in that sinister mouth. It is the beginning of the end. It is
the beginning to the end.

Tobatí / Caacupé
TWO PEOPLES UNITED BY A LEGEND
We have seen in the legend that the Indian José, pursued by warriors from another tribe, saved his life.
after invoking the Virgin promising her that he would carve an image with the wood from the tree
what he hid from the savages.
In the journey through the real sites of those legendary events, we guide our steps towards
the mountainous towns of Tobati and Caacupé, cities where we can observe both
images that the Indian José made of the Virgin.
THE SMALLEST IMAGE
Caacupé has been synonymous with spirituality since ancient times. Every year, it converges there.
devotion of hundreds of thousands of Paraguayans and foreigners who worship the Virgin and who give themselves
Every December 8th to venerate her. But the sanctuary is an attraction for Catholic faithful.
throughout the year. In the large esplanade in front of the Basilica that houses the image of the Virgin,
countless candles burn day and night. We arrived in Caacupé via Route No. 2, beautiful
road surrounded by beautiful landscapes where the hills, full of vegetation, provide a backdrop
imposing. To elaborate on the description of this land, of the basilica, and of the miracles of the Virgin
From Caacupé it would be an unjustifiable task. Poems and songs demonstrate faith.
unbreakable of a deeply devoted people. It is hard to find a Paraguayan who does not
has not stepped into the temple of Caacupé. Has not knelt before the image of the Virgin,
that I haven’t asked for a favor, that I haven’t lit a candle...
The image, now protected inside a glass case that has a vaulted top,
looks at all visitors with the same kindness. His devotees feel that he looks at each one of them with
infinite tenderness and with a gentle smile, characteristic of holiness. Her blue and gold mantle is known and
recognized everywhere.
The image, which does not reach a meter in height, small in size, is grand in expression and
it awakens tears in more than one visitor... People say that this image is the one that the
Indio José carved with infinite love for his particular devotion. It is the image he made for his.
home
THE VIRGIN OF TOBATI
We then wanted to meet the other Virgin, the one that brings shine to the church of Tobatí, and we headed there.
we drive. As we head towards that city, the road becomes rougher than in other places of
Cordillera department. The hills appear with their bare rocks as if sliding curiously.
up to the side of the road. These are ancient orographic systems that show us the
action of the winds and water on its ancient stones. As if the artisans of Tobatí, who
they work with mastery in wood, they would have joined in a harmonious army of workers to
carve the stone. Numerous ceramic factories and potteries let the smoke from their kilns flow in
the highest peaks of the mountain range. In the square, in front of the church of this town.
workers, there is a fountain that lets the water drop from two pitchers, work completed
during the Village Contest, in which Tobatí stood out for its projects and
achievements obtaining first place.
The church is locked when we arrive at it. On the main facade, above, a stained glass window.
in a circular shape, it represents the Indian José carving the wood. Fortunately, we found the
Mrs. Justina Kulzle de Gill ("Nena"), who keeps the key to the temple at times when
The father is busy giving classes at the school.
In this way we managed to access the church which, like so many others in the department, us
show an altar made by the indigenous people under the direction of the Franciscans, founders of
towns back in the 18th century. The altar is beautiful. At one time, it was kept part by part in houses.
from different families of the village and it recently regained a central place when the
building of the current church. In some parts, pieces are missing. Unfortunately, the theft has been
a constant in these temples and the precious images have sometimes ended up in the hands of
private collectors, distorting their function. Mrs. Justina tells us
that the restoration work will begin very soon. It leads us to the sacristy where
a replica of the Virgin rests. "The one that is on the altar is no longer taken out when there are processions.
We prefer to keep it safe as it is an invaluable relic.” While this replica is made with
love for the craftsmen of the village, upon seeing the original image that presides over the altar of the church
We noticed a big difference. This figure that looks at us with tenderness is almost two meters tall.
from its seat. Hands together. The blue mantle. The gaze...
We imagine that artisan whom we now call Indian José. We see him under the shade of a
ancient tree with its rustic tools, outlining the features of the Virgin on the wood.
We envision the sensations of their hands as they lift a chip, as they polish, once finished the
size who knows with what stones, the wood already transformed. We imagine the man and in his
hands, to the image. The gold leaf applied now in a stone room, closed and
illuminated by numerous candles. We imagine the delicacy of the movements while coloring the
cheeks, the hands that turn over containers full of pigments. We imagine the moment in
that the mantle falls over the wood and finally the crown rests with utmost delicacy on
the holy head. We imagine that long and delicate process...
Now we are on the way back, the hills again impose their majesty upon us.
stone and the valleys their tangled greenery.
ITAESPEJO
Near Tobatí, about 5 kilometers away, along the road that passes by the
Huyguaty Company, there is a hill that the locals call Ita Espejo. The mountain
it is completely within the property of Monte Alpino (mineral water subdivision). The
the part that faces the road, which ends at the company's gate, has stones
cut at ninety degrees, smooth and enormous. On the other side, a spring that rises from the hill
feeds a stream that has already been turned into a spa by the inhabitants of this place. The
Strange shapes that the stones take in the place are the key to understanding their name.
Smooth stones arranged in terraces and smooth stones at ninety degrees, all with a height
mica component, a mineral that produces continuous glimmers when the sunlight hits it
full. This is the spring where Tume Arandu used to bathe when he received the far from holy visit
from Tau. Repelled by the wise, it is said that the wicked cast his breath upon the stone that Tume
Arandu used it as a mirror, cursing it forever. One more place in this department.
Mountain range sown with mysteries.
Caazapá
EL YKUA BOLAÑOS, SOURCE OF LOVE.
Yvyturusu Mountain Range. From Villarrica, the capital of the Guairá department, we move
towards Caazapá, the capital of the department of the same name. This is the only road in good condition.
to access the city of Ykua Bolaños. Isolated in the center of the Eastern Region, Caazapá suffers
this abandonment, but despite everything, its inhabitants work to move forward, and they do so with the
the same faith with which Brother Luis Bolaños made that stone roll so that water would flow. They say
that already have universities and are proud to welcome students from other towns in those classrooms.
The only paved streets in Caazapá lead to perhaps the only place that travelers visit.
from this city: the Ykua Bolaños, fountain of love, miraculous spring...
We walked the path by foot, greeting the neighbors along the way, a custom that is common in the countryside.
from our country, and especially in towns like Caazapá, fortunately it has not been lost. The
Signage indicates that the path leads us to the ykua and to the city sports center.
Indeed, upon arriving at the site, the first thing that appears before our eyes is a large
construction: the sports center.
It's Sunday and there are party preparations here.
In the large hall, which we peek into to greet the few people who are there, the
Tables are located and prepared with tablecloths and cutlery. We ask about the exact site.
of the ykua location and a young man indicates to us to go down the path.
A hundred meters away from the hall is the famous Ykua Bolaños, now before our eyes.
Sure, we have seen it in photographs, but it's not the same. Being before the miraculous spring is another
What. The vegetation surrounding the place is exuberant. A high relief frames the spring.
reminding us of the image of the friar.
On the short journey we met a kind person, it is Mrs. Ofelia.
Núñez de González (60) resident of the San Miguel company. She explains to us that this
the community is located on the road from Caazapá to Iturbe. It tells us about its farm, the animals,
the garden, the cane, and the corn that her husband plants... She tells us that today's celebration in the
The sports center is to celebrate the ordination of a certain Sánchez, a man from Caazapá, as a deacon...
He tells us about his childhood. How it was before: "When I was a girl, the spring used to throw more
amount of water and here it formed like a natural pool of stones. Now they have fixed it and
adorned. All of this was not like this. There was a quite dense weed patch. And down there, a ...
the biggest stream where we used to wash clothes during the dry season. You should have seen it during Holy Week.
Santa, the number of people who arrived here. They come with pocket knives and take away little pieces.
from the cross. That little cross you see there was enormous during Holy Week. Now only pieces remain.
People take the pieces of wood to make amulets or crucifixes because they say that this is going to
to make sure that your beloved never abandons you, especially if you travel a lot. Also
They come to drink from the same glass because it is said that if they do this, they will never separate.

A butterfly of iridescent and glowing blue arrives at the spring and stops over the
water as if it were a flower. Liba of the waters. Perhaps she is in love...
Carapeguá
THE FIRST DOMAINS OF THE POMBERO RACE
Land of the Akahendy, Carapeguá greets us with its vast plains stripped of great
trees. Shrubs everywhere on the way to the "lowlands." How many times has Route No. 1 been
seen the traffic interrupted by the rains in this locality! We ourselves...
We have spent some days waiting for the waters to recede so we can cross.
Some adventurers have launched themselves with their vehicle and have been dragged with varying luck.
We can imagine those beings "carape", ragged and camouflaged in those bushes that
before our eyes they multiply to the horizon. Their lewd games with innocent young people to
those who, once kidnapped through spells, were subjected in the desire to improve their race.
We imagine the fury of that father who set fire to the fields and believed he had exterminated the
pombéro. We imagine that same father watching his beloved daughter die in his arms. He
we imagine dying of grief. Gray lands, these of Carapeguá. Lands of which little is known
It can be said. So little! Lands that, even in that adversity, their current inhabitants have known how to
to work to make their lives something worthy of respect.
Villarrica
KURUSUBARTOLO, THE CROSS OF THE RAIN.
The data that the books have provided us to reach the exact location where it rests.
Father Bartolo's cross is certainly confusing. We are confident that we will be able to get there with the
help from the locals, we set off on the adventure. Pasope, Puente Liberal, the road to
Rosado and other landmarks are our guide.
We arrived at Villarrica del Espíritu Santo on a cold morning with a clear sky.
It seems that it rained during the night.
On the horizon, the Yvyturusu Mountain Range.
Back and forth in the conversations with the gua'i. We couldn't pinpoint exactly where.
we must head. Finally, with the collaboration of the taxi drivers at the bus terminal, we arrived
to a more or less coherent point among so many convolutions. Some of the bookish data
What we bring is wrong. Others point to where they say we must find the Kurusu Bartolo.
Path to Rosado.
We march towards Itapé, where according to what we are told, there is a highly venerated image of the Virgin.
We move towards the shores of Villarrica. We take the main road through Loma Hovy. We crossed
the bridge over the Guarapó stream. We have only walked a kilometer and we entered - with the
help from the neighbors of the area – on the road that goes to Compañía Espinillo. We are now looking for
to the Portillo family who, according to some, guards the Cross. The path, previously gravelled,
now it appears clayey. We often slip. The mountain range is still there, in front of
our steps, omnipresent in our journey. We have walked nearly two kilometers.
when we stop in front of a ranch-style building. Typical peasant house:
open gallery in the center and rooms at the ends. We crossed the courtyard and greeted
the family. A young couple and an elderly lady welcome us. She is Damiana Maidana de Portillo
and invites us to go in to see the cross. We have found it!
We entered the bedroom. Two small beds, a wardrobe, and the altar where the cross is erected: Kurusu Bartolo.
At the foot burn the candles. Images of saints next to the symbol of Christianity. The simplicity of
Peasants accompany the days of the cross in these places far from worldly noise. The chat
about the miraculous cross is pleasant and entertaining. Mrs. Damiana tells us about the times of
before, when the cross was taken in procession to give it a bath in the stream, nearby, right here
two kilometers more or less. The Bartolo stream, where that hardworking father of the century died.
past. The lady tells us about the existence of another cross. This one is the smallest - it will be two
meters high - the other is larger. Both were made with the wood from the original cross. In the
The closing of the years loses the history for which two crosses were made from one.
The second cross is at the house of José Barúa, the people of Espinillo tell us.
We go back out to the road that leads to Itapé, we move forward. We pass the turnoff to Rosado a few
five hundred meters more or less and after a left turn we stop at the house
by José Barúa. There, in the entrance gallery, is the other cross. It must be almost three meters long.
height, and also a small altar welcomes it. There are no candles here. Don José is not present in
house. We are kindly attended by her daughter. We take photographs of the place and return.
We will continue searching for the places of our legends. We will keep moving forward on this path.
Itacurubí de la Cordillera
LAGUNA SIRENA, VARIOUS MYSTERIES.
Twice we had to travel to Itacurubí de la Cordillera to go see with our
the famous Sirena Lagoon with my own eyes. The challenge to overcome was to obtain the permission to
enter private property. At the first opportunity, we reached the place: Loma Company
Medina, on a Sunday. A grave mistake. All the people from Estancia Buenaventura were at the
hurdles. Who should we ask for permission to cross the gates? We decided, then, to go
we also go to the races and meet the locals. Talk, if there is an opportunity, about
the Sirena Lagoon and listen to what is said about it. Andrés Emilce Medina (34) a resident of the
the community says that the lagoon is very, very deep. It also says that when something is thrown in
lined towards the very center, a product of the depth, falls again at the feet of the one who
fishing. He recounts that when throwing a stone with a sling, the stone stops its path and falls in the center
the product of some strange attraction. He says that the waters arrive quickly. "My uncle -he says-
It was once with a friend and the waters rose so quickly that he had to spend the night holding on to
the height of a tacuaral until they rescued him." Magical things told during the cuadreras.
As evening falls, with no possibility of visiting the strange place, we promise to return and set off.
way back.
Days later we return to the gravel road that leads to the gate of the Estate
Buenaventura, known in Itacurubí as 'Estancia Maggi'. The boss is not here but we
They are opening the entrance. We have to wait for him to return from Coronel Oviedo. We will do it.
patiently. The laborers and foremen gather in a circle and talk about "the Siren." The póra,
the moñái, the pombéro appear in their stories. They say that there were mermaids there before. The lagoon is
entirely in the property of the estate. It's about two kilometers from here, they say. No one
dare to swim in those waters. Some time ago there was a canoe that some laborers had
taken there but is no longer there. Who knows what has become of her?
Don Carlos Santos Maggi Rolón, great-grandson of the former owner Don Buenaventura Rolón is
now with us. he personally takes us to the lagoon. He asks about our work.
It is interesting. Few trees on the path. A field full of weeds. The footprints faded by
the grass. We spotted a little hill. There is the lagoon. The prolonged drought makes the unimaginable
presence of water around here. The grass and the semi-dry weeds do not indicate water. We descended from the
vehicle in which Don Carlos will transport us there. We entered the little grove and there, in the
medium... the Sirena lagoon! A relatively small body of water. Don Carlos steps forward
and dogs, right on the edge of the lagoon, a very long stick. There is no bottom, he says. It is said that
Here they threw tons of gold in another time and from there all the mysteries come.
Vegetation is tangled around the water mirror. The water is murky. The wind barely ripples.
the pond. My great-grandfather even initiated some work to drain the lagoon. Mission
impossible. It is too deep. They abandoned the task, but a trench remained, let's see,
says Don Carlos. We circled the forest and entered through another path. The creek is nearby.
Yhaguy. We enter the small forest and after several scratches from branches and vines
we found the trench that was dug so many years ago to drain the lagoon. The trench us
guide to the stream. It is closer than we imagined. When there is a rise, the stream and
the lagoon joins. The water comes up to here, says a laborer, pointing to a height above his
head. We looked at him incredulous but the others affirm the same. We arrived at the stream, Runs like
if it were not happening close to the mystery, or maybe it runs for that very reason. As if nothing connected it.
to so many scary stories, sometimes it passes unperturbed and other times it flees wildly. One hectare to the
it is the surface of the lagoon, maybe a little more. Here you can fish for everything, they even catch up to
catfish. Tarariras are the most abundant, the workers say they seem to be more eager to leave than
to stay.
We return. We leave the forest. We retrace the path already taken, occasionally losing the
handprints. We shook hands and promised to come back for a visit at any time.
Asunción
THE HOUSE OF DR. FRANCIA IS NOT THE ORIGINAL
Trinidad neighborhood: about two blocks after the central building of the IPS on Sacramento street
(Social Security Institute) we are looking for the house that belonged to Dr. Francia. The famous Quinta de
Yvyraí, so mentioned in the pages of Yo El Supremo, the historical novel by our renowned Augusto
Roa Bastos. "The house remained inside the Whaldreen factory," a neighbor tells us. We
we headed towards the Whaldreen factory, very close to there. At the gate, a small booth and in it
a security guard. It seems that mail is received there and it is enabled or not.
vehicle entrance. We asked the guard about the house. He confirms that yes, the house of the Dr.
France is there, behind a huge shed (the factory). Can we see it?, we inquired. 'You must
request authorization at the store, on the avenue.” The store is the well-known Cemento Shopping.
We enter. After several phone consultations, the response is 'You must submit a note.' No
we became discouraged. We decided to consult Dr. Pussineri, director of the House of the
Independence. He/She kindly attends to us in his/her office. Our questions are directed towards
The house that is inside the Cemento Shopping. "That is not the original house of Dr. Francia.
I have seen the property title, dated 1842, and Dr. Francia had already passed away. The place is indeed.
there. There was the original house and it seems that the remaining house is a copy or at least is
very similar to the one that inhabited the same place as The Supreme.” The mystery is unveiled. The house
it is not the original. Anyway, our curiosity drives us to present the note and try
Good luck. We want a photo of the house. We want to see it, even if it's just from the outside, but until
now it has not been possible for us.

Conception
THE VENERABLE KURUSU ISABEL
The farthest point of our previously planned journey is Concepción. We start from
Coronel Oviedo boarding a bus that will take us through Route No. 3 to Yby Yaú and
Then along Route No. 5 to Concepción. We arrived in the northern city at two in the morning.
The cold night shows us a quiet, silent city... There is not a soul in its streets.
luck, a lodging has put guards who are waiting for the passengers at this hour. After a
brief rest –we get up at six– we prepare to face the day working for
getting to Kurusu Isabel. We're in luck! Víctor González, the night watchman of the El Lodging
Cyclone originates from the area where Kurusu Isabel is located. He knows the place well and us
join us on our walk to the Concepción market in search of transportation for
get there. The legend is already written. We have done it with the help of the bibliography
existing, but now we learn that Rosa Isabel Sanabria (or Rosa Ysabel Sanauria) died of
He/she said. We know that he/she had no daughter. We also know from the information we gather that he/she died.
during the return of the Residents and not during the trip to Cerro Corá. The data we have
used to construct the literary version of the legend do not match those we started with.
pick up in Concepción. It seems that the authors of the books we have consulted have not been
in this place corroborating the data. Who knows how long they have been citing a book about
Another so that the error seems today more real than reality itself?
On the go, we decided to leave our legend as it is, but to record the actual data.
In these chronicles, the reader will then be able to compare the two 'realities'.
We say goodbye to Víctor González – he also needs to rest – and at eight o'clock sharp we
We start looking for the way to Kurusu Isabel. We need to walk down the Pdte. street.
Franco to the road, there continue for a kilometer and take the detour that begins next to the Equestrian Club.
that is in front of the Acaverá Regiment. They haven't told us, but to get to the route, from the
There are about ten blocks to the market. Already on the road we leave the cemetery behind and then it appears.
regiment, all to our right, a little beyond the main door of the regiment, and to the
to the left appears the Hippodrome and there is a Y-shaped detour. The street is gravelled and along it
mainly motorcycles, bicycles, and carts. A large number of carts pulled by
oxen. They are the farmers who take their products to the city market. Round trip of
carts. In the first part of the road, we encountered a great abundance of parrots. For
We joked about naming the road Tape Gua'a, but moving forward a
Soon we encountered a large number of crows. Then, for us, it transforms
in Tape Cuervo. A little more and we reach the Santa Rosa Company. The vast majority of the houses
they are located, who knows why some strange whim, on the left sidewalk. The settlement extends
for several kilometers, it seems to end when we arrive at the school but continues on a bit
beyond, on the right sidewalk, in an arrival a small temple with a roof appears before us
with a gable roof and walls painted yellow. A small iron cross on the ridge
The front notifies us that we have arrived.
The doors are open.
We entered the room full of expectations.
A row of simple wooden benches tells us that people gather there to pray. It works.
like oratory the temple. Faded paper garlands that once
They must have been blue and red, hanging from one end to the other of the venue. In front of the benches, a
a high wooden table and behind it a double leaf barred door closed with
lock. Behind the bars, there is an altar dressed with a white lace tablecloth and on it
vases, crucifixes, and candlesticks. In the corner of this closed segment that is illuminated by
two windows, there are more than a dozen crosses of different sizes all
"dressed" in white. Upon leaving again, we realized that next to the entrance door of a
On one side, there is a small table, and on the other, three jugs covered with tin plates, and on top of them,
pitchers to drink. We uncapped them and found that the jugs were empty and the pitchers.
full of dust. It has been a long time since anyone has left water for the thirsty travelers who, like Rosa
Isabel Sanabria, they pass through this place. Desolate fields in that traveled north. Dry land.
in this Tropic of Capricorn where we stand. Surly mountains advance with the gaze
oblique about the walkers and a ruthless sun that, even with the low winter temperature of
this journey forces us to walk almost in our skin.
Rosa Isabel Sanabria. The young quinceañera who couldn't withstand the walk of the Residentas and died.
But he didn't know that his name and his cross would become legend. The neighbors have not known or
they have not wanted to answer our questions. Perhaps there are some other mysteries that
discover in Kurusu Isabel... We could not unravel them.
Areguá
THE PLACE OF CREATION
The hill where the main church of Areguá stands today is the same one where they supported the
Tupã and Arasy plants. From there they created all the things in the world. When the lake was not yet
lake. With his land, Tupã shaped the matter of what would be the first man and the first woman.
With their land, the artisans of Aregüe prepare the clay for their pitchers and ceramic figures.
rustic. In its land, strawberry plants grow with unmatched strength. A chosen land from the very beginning.
Destined for the gods and men. From their heights, travelers glimpsed the splendid
Great eagle.
The church bells ring and the people climb the hill to hear the word of God.
From Asunción we can reach this town by three roads, the one that goes from Luque, the one that
access the hill directly via a detour from Route No. 2 a few kilometers before Itauguá and
the one that passes through Ypacaraí and Patiño.

The church bells are ringing and their call sinks into the depths of the waters of
lake attracting fish and enriching fishing. The bells ring and the mud coagulates more
strong under the protection of divine music. Areguá is magical. She is the gateway to the myths of
our land, from our ancestors... From its streets, but above all from its hill everything
it presents itself more naturally for those interested in knowing the fantastic tales of the
race.
Areguá, gateway.
She knows that in the bed of that young lake lies the most beautiful city that has ever existed.
built in these lands. It was built by an Atlantean and they called it Mbaeveraguasu.
Areguá holds the secrets of the music that shone brightly.
Areguá saw and experienced the wild overflow of the Tupãykua.
The trees of Areguá witnessed the beauty of Porãsy, the strength of Tupinamba, the wisdom of
Tume Arandu, the kindness of Marangatu.
The grass of the hill served as the bed for the first romantic encounter of Rupave and Sypave, the parents.
first. There Japeusa and Guarasyáva were conceived, who would have such different destinies. The
one tragic, the other glorious.
Areguá is the cradle, why say more.
Lake Ypacarai
Known worldwide for the famous song that names it, Lake Ypacaraí is, to this
height, symbol of Paraguay. That enormous mirror of water situated between Areguá, San Bernardino and
Ypacaraí has a very unique history. It is said that its fierce waters were 'tamed.'
by the blessing of Brother Luis Bolaños. Before that, the springs overflowed greatly.
force increasing the volume of its waters constantly with the danger of making it disappear
the surrounding populations. The legend says that the lake was formed by the will of Tupã who
I would not allow the karaiete to know the beautiful city called Mbaeveraguasu.
rose in that valley.
Nowadays the lake is not as blue as the song says, its waters are contaminated. Numerous
Spa resorts and private beaches give life and take it away in a single act. They give life with their
movements, their colors, their constructions. They get rid of it by throwing their waste into the
waters.
Boat rides are, despite everything, something wonderful. The feeling of being in a small
sea, the view of the coasts. To have the opportunity to enjoy the fresh breeze that flows through the
surface of the waters twisting its fingers in the small waves.

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