Mythologies of the Querandí Tribe

The Querandí were one of the Het peoples, indigenous South Americans who lived in the Pampas area of Argentina; specifically, they were the eastern Didiuhet. The name Querandí was given by the Guaraní people, as they would consume animal fat in their daily diet. Thus, Querandí means "men with fat". Prior to the 19th century, they were also known as the Pampas. Mapuche (or araucanos) called them Puelche. This is today the present Argentine provinces of La Pampa, most of the province of Buenos Aires, the center and the south of the province of Santa Fe (especially to the south of the Tercero-Carcaraña River), a great part of the province of Cordoba (adapted ecologically to the temperate Pampasia, their northern limits were in the region of the Gran Chaco - around 31° lat. South) and the peneplains of the present provinces of San Luis and Mendoza, although these zones were more difficult to inhabit due to its extreme climate and lack of surface water. Physically, the Querandí people had a well-proportioned body. They were tall and extremely warlike. They wore leather clothes, similar to a fur blanket; women would also wear a skirt that covered their bodies down to their knees. With a semi sedentary lifestyle, they grouped their leather tents by their water supply in the winter, and they would go on their raids inland in the summer. At the time of the arrival of the Europeans, they stood out as great runners, hunting, or rather capturing, by running down Pampan deer, ñandúes, and even guanacos, although to facilitate their activity they had invented two devices (one that would become a classic in Argentina): the bolas, and the more primitive one consisting of a stone tied to a cord made with leather or sinews called by the Spaniards a stone-lost boleadora. They would also hunt tinamous, deer, quail and ñandúes with the help of their bows and arrows and their bolas. They also made pottery. They believed in a great god whom they called Soychu, who had a contender or evil spirit: Gualichu. According to the 2010 census, there are 3,658 self-identified Querandí in Argentina.

Querandíes, name used by Spanish colonists to refer to the people who attacked and impeded the first settlement of Buenos Aires. Little is known about the origins of the Querandíes or their subsequent history. Some scholars suggest that the Querandíes disappeared perhaps because of a combination of disease, intertribal warfare, and migrations north up the Paraná River. The more common interpretation, however, is that the Querandíes were part of the larger Pampas linguistic group (Gunun a kena) who originally inhabited the region between the Río Carcarañá in the north and the Río Salado in the south and who later migrated south, away from the littoral, to escape disease and intertribal warfare.

Querandí, South American Indians who inhabited the Argentine Pampas between Cabo Blanco on the Atlantic coast and the Córdoba Mountains on the western shores of the Río de la Plata. After the arrival of Spanish settlers, they are believed to have been absorbed into a larger group under the general name Pampas by which the indigenous peoples of the region are still known.

Little is known of the Querandí, but they are thought to have shared cultural characteristics with the surrounding plains peoples. They were hunters and gatherers, catching game with bolas and fish with nets. They violently resisted Spanish settlement and attempts to subjugate them during the 16th century. The adoption of the horse transformed Querandí life, as it did that of other plains Indians. They formed large nomadic bands and made war against other Indians and against the Spaniards. Scholars believe that disease and warfare took a great toll on the Querandí and other peoples of that region and may have prompted a southward migration.

Five hundred years ago when the Spanish entered South America, Native American tribes often fought back against the invaders. One way tribes could put pressure on the Spanish was to surround their settlements. This is what happened in the early 1500's when Maldonado, a Spanish girl, was 15 years old. Native Americans of the Querandí tribe had encircled the Spanish settlement where Maldonado lived. Before long, the food supply of the Spanish settlers was depleted. The people faced starvation. They begged their captain to allow them to take their chances and leave the settlement in search of food - but this the captain would not allow. Famished, Maldonado escaped the settlement and fled into the jungle. As night fell, she heard with alarm the calls of wild animals. Where could she safely sleep for the night? But one call that drew her closer. It was a cry of pain. She followed the sound to a cave where she found a puma that had just given birth. Maldonado helped the mother puma clean the cubs. Later, she watched the babies while the mother went out to hunt. And so days went by. One day while Maldonado was gathering food and the mother puma was inside the cave with her cubs, the girl was surprised by Querandí warriors. They captured her and brought her to their village. Fearing the worst, Maldonado braced herself for the death she felt certain was to come. But the Querandís were kind to the girl. They taught her tasks to help in their village, and she gladly took part. One day, a band of Spaniards attacked the Querandí village. Recognizing a Spanish girl, they grabbed Maldonado and forced her to return home. The Spanish captain was furious that she had disobeyed him by escaping to the jungle. To make an example of her, the cruel commander ordered that she be tied to a tree and left there for wild animals to devour. After several days, the sad villagers ventured where Maldonado had been tied to the tree, fearing the worst. Much to their surprise they found her still tied to the tree and very much alive. Much more surprised were they to learn that it was a mother puma who had fed and protected the girl all that time.

Querandíes is the name given to an ethnic group from the northeast of the Pampas region of present-day Argentina at the time of the arrival of the first European colonizers in the 16th century. Currently this denomination also applies to people who claim to be their mixed-race descendants. According to Samuel Lafone Quevedo, the word querandí comes from the Guarani "quirã" (tallow or lard) and "ndi" (copulative suffix: "con"), so it would mean that he is fat or that he is rich in fat or oil, in a possible allusion to the fact that in their daily diet consumed animal fat. For Manuel Ricardo Trelles it would come from the Guaraní word carandaí (palm or palm tree). Other authors, such as Eduardo Madero and Vicente Fidel López, assign Quechua origin to it. The Querandíes appear in the historical chronicles in 1528 and are mentioned until the depopulation of the first Buenos Aires in 1540. They appear again in the chronicles from 1580 when Buenos Aires was refounded and Juan de Garay carried out the distribution of indigenous people, until 1586 when Rodrigo Ortiz de Zárate defeated them militarily. Since then there are no direct testimonies of their existence, with the exception of the census of parcels of the jurisdiction of Buenos Aires and Santa Fe in 1672, which mentions them as Querandíes in Santa Fe and Tubichaminíes in Buenos Aires. The Querandí are a source of controversy among researchers and historians as to whether they were a single distinct ethnic group or belonged to a larger entity, and also as to why they disappeared from historical sources, whether they were exterminated, assimilated or changed their ethnic denomination.

The primitive settlers of the area today included in the Buenos Aires scope were the Querandí people. The name Querandí was given by the Guaraní people, as they would consume animal fat in their daily diet. Thus, Querandí means “men or people with fat".
Physically, the Querandí Indians would present a beautiful, well-proportioned body. They were tall and extremely warlike. They would wear leather clothes, similar to a fur blanket; women would also wear a skirt that covered their bodies up to their knees. With a semi sedentary lifestyle, they would group their leather tents by the water supply in the winter, and they would go on their their raids inland in the summer. They were good runners. They would hunt partridges, deer, quails and ñandúes with the help of their bows and arrows and their boleadoras. Pottery was their industry. They would believe in a great god whom they called Soychu, who would have a contender or evil spirit: Gualichu. With the Spaniards, they adopted the horse, thus generating a new lifestyle. Even if they continued being nomads, they could make contact with other native peoples. In 1516, the Spaniard Juan de Solís landed on the shores of the River Plate (Río de la Plata), but the natives resisted his attempt of conquest and the expedition failed.