Brazil Central – The Mysterie of the giant indigenous

A panará indigenous. His name is Sôkriti and he was

a one of first to made contact with white men. Photo: 1973.

BRAZIL CENTRAL – 1819, october. The botanist Carl Friedrich von Martius and the zoologist Johan Baptist von Spix and their expedition arrived at Manaus, capital of the Amazonas state. At that time, there was not city of Manaus. In that place there was not even a village.

However, in this place is the location of the confluence of the rivers Negro and Solimões, way to the Jupurá river, area yet little known near the border with Colombia. It's through the river that is possible to reaches Manacapuru, the legendary land of the giants indigenous of the Amazon. Today, the mysterious people no longer exists. Only a few traces of their ethnicity survives in some individuos of the region.

Some say that they belonged to the tribe Mura. The Professor Shirley Gomes, descendant of Muras, recalls: They were very tall. My great grandmother died at 114 years and she never stayed hunchback. Academic sources, however, say that the giant indigenous were of the tribe of Panará.

The descendants of the giants shave their
their heads using a plant: the razor grass.
Parakanãs. Photo: René Fuerst, 1972.

Other tribes have called them by other names like krenacore or krenhacãrore. However, they were even known as the giants indigenous. One of the first to be captured, a man named Mengrire, had 2 feet high, well above the average of Brazilian indigenous peoples. Feared by his enemies, the Panará or the Mura were seen as ruthless warriors.

The ferocity of these indians was legendary. His rivals, like the Tchucarramães, they own made the fame of the giants telling the histories their exploits. Orlando Villas Boas, account: In 1950, at the tribe of the Kayabys the Panará were known like men of great height. Their huge arches and axes, that could be have 1.80 m. They terrorized their opponents. The giants were spooky.

During many years observing the indigenous villages of above, from an airplane, authorities and scholars preferred to avoid contact. In 1961 the British geographer Richard Mason was killed upon entering in the territory of the Panará tribe.

They stood hidden for two hundred years in the heart of the forest in northern Mato Grosso. Only in 1973, when the tribe was shaken by the high mortality caused by diseases of whites, they made the contact with civilization as a last hope to survive as a people. Too late. In 1975, the population of the Panara tribe was only 79 individuals. But this situation has changed through the decades. In 2008, there were 374 of them.

Panarás. Photo: Ailton Costa, 1994

Mysteries

The mistery of these giants amazonian indigenous remains still today. Even the name of the tribe is a puzzle. While some call these natives Panará, others prefer identify them like Parakanãs. In 1971, in a reportage, published in the magazine O Cruzeiro, Fernando Pinto journalist wrote on these legendary indigenous calling them whites giants! In his text, Fernando Pinto states that these giant Indians belong to a tribe called Parakanã, and not Panara.

The expedition of which participated in the journalist was precisely the goal of find these natives, trying to get a connect an unprecedented in history.About the first time in that the expedition made contact, Pinto wrote: Suddenly, we were surprised by a bunch of naked men. They were tall, shaved heads, red skins, painted with annatto, screaming like frightened beasts and exhaling a strong smell of savage (PINTO, 2004).

The Parakanã belong to the linguistic root Tupi-Guarani. They call the civilizados of "turi". If they met a turi, the turi needs to be completely stripped of their belongings and then, the strange have its head shaved... This is if the person has the lucky enough to be considered a "paché" (friend) ... (PINTO, 2004)

Photo: Panara with Orlando Villas Boas, 1965

Three tribes, one myth

The comparative study shows that there is some confusion about the which tribe they belonged, the giant Indians of Brazil. There are at least three tribes, speaking different languages although they have inhabited traditionally areas very close that researchers think to be the origin of the giants.

The Panara were on the border between the states of Mato Grosso and Para states. The Parakanã, were found only at Para state. However, The Panarás are speakers of Jê language group while the Parakanãs are speakers of the tupi-guarani language group.

Adding to the confusion, there is a third tribe, Asurini, speakers of a language Tupi-Guarani, being that they also lived at Pará state. Since the nineteenth century, the indians that ruled the area between the rivers Xingu and Bacajá - peoples today known as Araweté, Arara, Parakanã - were named Asurini (or Asonéri) – a word that for the other tribes means "red", according to ethnographer Curt Nimuendajú* 

(1963c:225 – IN POVOS INDÍGENAS DO BRASIL) . 

The three tribes are also called by the natives of others peoples Kranhacãcore or Krenacore. The word means "big man wiht round head".

* CURT UNCKEL NIMUENDAJÚ 1843-1945. 

German-Brazilian ethnologist, anthropologist and writer

Many scholars have denied vehemently the existence of the indigenous giants at Brazil. They say this based on the current complexion of the descendants of those warriors. 

However, testimonies of the indigenous themselves and reports of researchers of indigenous peoples of the mid-twentieth century confirm that, one day, they existed.

In February 1973, Veja magazine published reportage on the first official contact between the giant Indians and the white men. 

This happened during a expedition of the researchers of indigenous peoples, Orlando Villas Boas (1914-2002) and Claudio Villas Boas (1916-1998), held that year (1973). This adventure turned an historic fact.

The Indians were located on the river Peixoto de Azevedo, in Xingu basin river. Here is an excerpt from the story: They were there. 

They were athletic men painted black from head to toe. They were completely naked, their hair trimmed up to the ear. 

They belonged to the kranhacãrore tribe or the giant Indians. Eight of them, guys very young had between 15 and 18 years and none had less than 1.80 m of height ... (VEJA, 1973)

Other narratives confirm the existence of this mysterious tribe: Caciques (chiefs of the tribe) of Juruna tribe (or tribe of Yurun or Yudjá) say that their grandparents had contacts with the giants. They had over 2 meters and a half of height. Today, they disappeared and became "Mamaés" or nature spirits.

Brazil: giants indigenous: 

Where they came from? 

For where did they go?

In this history mixed with legend the great mysteries are: who were this people? Where they came from? For where did they go?

During the sixteenth century, many Jesuit priests participated in the colonization process of South America. They wrote about these giants in their chronical. 

In "Discovery of the Amazon River", three priests – Alonso de Rojas, Christoval de Acuña, Gaspar de Carvajal – they described: they are giants and have between two to three meters tall. The braves, they live naked and they wear big hoops of gold in their ears and nose (STURARI, 2006).

This mysterious nation always avoided the connect with white men. There are indications that at the time of the arrival of European peoples, portugueses, french, holaneses, the giant Indians lived more to the east. 

Then, they occupied a long strip of land between the states of Mato Grosso, Minas Gerais, north of Sao Paulo, Goias and Para. Today's Tribes, like Assurinis, Panarás, Parakanãs, in past times they were a single culture, a great nãção. The nation of the Kayapos.

The Panará are the last descendants of the Kayapo of south nomadic group who spoke a language of the family Ge, of Central Brazil. 

In the eighteenth century, these indienous had lived at the north of Sao Paulo and at Mato Grosso. They fought hard against the Portugueses. But, with the discovery of gold in Goiás, in their, territory in 1722, the natives were expelled of these regions. With no option, they moved to northern forests.

About this historic period, according the chief cacique Akè Panará, the elders say that in the past, the white men had killed many of the Panarás. They had shotguns, fire-guns. They arrived in our villages and simply killed the persons. The elders told: If the white men reached here, we have to kill them with bordunas (big maces). They are wild (Povos Indígenas do Brasil).

Who were the giants of Brazilian jungle?

Nobody knows if giants indigenous can have existed in Brazil, or at South America, one day. But a thing is sure: the legend exists. And a curious photo of Orlando Villas Boas near an indigenous very much young and tall exists too. (In this page, above).

Into a labyrinth of narratives made of fantasy and reality two hypotheses stand out: 

1. The giants were masters and founders of interplanetary civilizations that had finished their mission in this orb. Then, they gone away nobody knows to where. 

2. The ancient giants were survivers of the Atlante tragedy, when the last lands and kingdoms of the mythic continent were swallowed by the waters of the Oceans. Atlantic and Pacific.

Atlanteans or Extraterrestrials

Extraterrestrials or atlanteans, in a point the legends agree: not all of them left the jungle or this planet. Also there were the descendants. 

The interbreeding surely happened between the people more developed and individuals of the primitive tribes of South American. 

The giants begun to disappear after that the european explorers had arrived at the epoch of Great Navigations, in the XVI century.

Although have fought with the invaders that came of the sea, the giants had no intention to expose to themselves. They understood the power of the war of the foreign. 

The guns of fire. The blood of peoples shed in vain. They chose to disappear! But ... how to do this? How to make to disappear?

The legend has its answers. If they were extraterrestrials, they can have returned to their own planet or simply they went ahead with their travel trough the cosmos. 

But, if the giants were earthlings remnants of the Atlantean Race, perhaps, as some indigenous say and also forest peoples and of the wetland at Brazil Central, only perhaps, the giants could taken to have refuge in the mythical cities and underground tunnels built by their atlanteans ancestors.

FONTES

MESQUITA, Paulo and MOREYRA, Sandra. 

Conheça poções mágicas da floresta e os índios gigantes do Amazonas. 

IN G1/Bom Dia Brasil – published in 05/20/2010

[http://g1.globo.com/bom-dia-brasil/noticia/2010/05/conheca-pocoes-magicas-da-floresta-e-os-indios-gigantes-do-amazonas.html]

PINTO, Fernando. Parakanãs, os índios gigantes. 

IN Memórias de um repórter, chapter 17. 

Brasília: Thesaurus Editora, 2004

SOUSA SANTOS, Boaventura. Capitulação e volta dos índios. 

IN Reconhecer para libertar: os caminhos do cosmopolitismo multicultural – p 88. São Paulo: Record, 2003.

Povos indígenas no Brasil. 

IN [http://pib.socioambiental.org/pt/c/quadro-geral].

REVISTA VEJA, 30 ANOS. Os índios gigantes. 14 de fevereiro de 1973. 

[IN http://veja.abril.com.br/30anos/p_033.html]

STURARI, Marlene. De Pero Vaz de Caminha a Menotti Del Picchia: alguns motivos edênicos na literatura de viagens dos séculos XVI e XVII e no modernismo. 

Dissertação. Universidade de São Paulo, Filosofia e Ciências Humanas: São Paulo, 2006.

Supernatural – A haunted house at Sao Paulo state

The painting of the image of a saint, a rosary and a crucifix

on the wall. Objects that escaped the flames of the haunted house

BRAZIL. SÃO PAULO, hinterland – At Poloni, a little town of São Paulo State, strange phenomenons are happening in a house. While Some say that is a ghost, a damned soul, others blame a poltergeist. 

The residents, a lady of 62 years, her daughter, 32 years and a grandson, a teenager of 14 years old, all of them say that the phenomenons began four months ago. 

Objects that disappear or are thrown against furniture and walls; electronics devices begin to function from nothing, without nobody action.

On Tuesday, December 7 (2010), the house caught fire. All rooms have been affected by flames. But a paint with the image of a saint, a rosary and a crucifix were saved.

Some experts are investigating the case. On one thing everyone agrees: the spiritualists, parapsychologists and also the police. All of them thinks that the incidents are related, in some way, with the adolescent.

Police works with the hypothesis of a joke, a play, but the young H.C.A. denies any involvement and says: I would never do anything that would harm my family. I am following the suffering of my mother and my grandmother. 

A woman, neighbor witnessed one of the paranormal occurrences. Other neighbors, sympathize with the family, are gathering in groups to pray and ask God's help.

Oscar Gonzalez-Quevedo, Jesuit priest born in 1930.

Spanish, he is a Brazilian citizenship since the 1950s.

Parapsychologist, a university professor, writer and lecturer.

For the spanish parapsychologist Óscar González-Quevedo, more known like priest Quevedo, the teenager H.C.A., 14, is responsible for the paranormal phenomena that happen in his family home in Poloni. 

Quevedo said the boy is possessed by a negative energy and, unconsciously has caused these phenomenons. As a priest I belive that these events have no relation with the devil. These phenomena are common in parapsychology, said Quevedo.

But Quevedo contradicts itself: it says that the adolescent is with a psychological disorder like depression, anxiety, irritability or even loss of attention by the family. 

However, the parapsychologist admits, too, that the teenager, though unwittingly, is using a playful spirit. Well, or the mind of the boy i, only, is producing the phenomenons or the whole thing has the participation of a disembodied entity. Meditate...

A doctor and spiritualist leader interviewed the boy and concluded: spirits are trying to avenge the family. The Centro Latino-Americano da Parapsicologia of São Paulo (Latin American Parapsychology Center) will investigate the phenomenons that would be occurring in the house. According to a spokesperson for the center, a professor specializing in paranormal phenomena should visit the house in the next days. 

FONTE: DE PAULA, Janaína. Fenômeno sobrenatural intriga população da cidade de Poloni.IN Sobrenatural, BR – published in 12/09/2010
[http://www.sobrenatural.org/noticia/detalhar/14595/fenomeno_sobrenatural_intriga_populacao_da_cidade_de_poloni/]

Extravagancies of nature: The mangos of the Hells

RONDÔNIA – At Pimenta Bueno city, hinterland of Rondonia state, north region of Brazil, the harvest of mangos in which fruits sprouted with fancy shapes has been calling the atention of the inhabitants.

They appeared at the backyard of a house. Evoking something of evil, the mangos have developed a kind of horn. The most of the fruits has a only one horn but some mangos have two diabolical horns. They are perfect objects to adorn the tables anti-Christmas of the Hells.

SOURCE: Mangas com 'chifres' viram atração em município no interior de Rondônia
IN Globo Amazônia – published in 11/24/2010
[http://www.globoamazonia.com/Amazonia/0,,MUL1631802-16052,00-MANGAS+COM+CHIFRES+VIRAM+ATRACAO+EM+MUNICIPIO+NO+INTERIOR+DE+RONDONIA.html]

The Heart Lake

MANAUS – At the Amazonas state, near the capital – Manaus, the photographer from Reuters News Agency Ivan Canabrava captured the curious vision of a lake that has the shape of a heart, surrounded of the green of forest. The image, published in 27 of october was got in september, 30 (2010).

SOURCE: Lago em 'formato de coração' é fotografado na floresta amazônica
IN G1 – published in 02/11/2010
[http://g1.globo.com/planeta-bizarro/noticia/2010/11/fotografo-flagra-lago-em-formato-de-coracao-na-floresta-amazonica.html]

Cyprian of Antioch, the sorcerer saint

Cyprian of Antioch (of Pisídia) is a historic polemic figure whose biography lost itself in the distance of the centuries that produce the mix between legend and reality.

Paradoxal, during his life he was a powerful sorcerer and, later, a saint christian martyr. He is famous like a Saint but much more famous like a black magician.

The mistery about this sorcerer saint begins with uncertainty with regard to his biography: where he was born, when he born, his family name etc.. Only the arduous research and comparative study can provide some reliable facts.

According the Ortodox Christian Information Center, Cyprian lived at Antioch of Pisídia but was born at Cartago, north of Africa. Cartago may be an unlikely option. 

This information seems to be another result of a confusion among the saints Cyprian, especially with St. Cyprian of Carthage, (Thascius Caecilius Cyprianus) that was born and became a bishop in this city, a Christian martyr who lived in the same period of Cyprian, the sorcerer, century three after Christ.

The key of the birth's place could be in the own name "Cyprian" that can mean someone or something from island of Cyprus, Aegean sea, inner Mediterranean.

In his occultist education, which began in early childhood, since then, encouraged by his parents, that were rich pagans. 

He traveled to many countries and kingdoms studying with the masters of the ancient schools of magic: in temple of Mitra, at Greece, at the mount Olympus in Cyprus, Egpty, India and and schools of Babylon in Mesopotamia, with priests heirs of the ancient Chaldean magi. 

by Lygia Cabus

Cyprian, Christian

At 30 years Cyprian was a famous and powerful sorcerer, well versed in various wonders of magic like astrology, necromancy, the science of filters, oracles, potions, the dominion over the elements of nature. He had the subservience of a legion of demons, protected from the devil himself of whose was a server and a partner.

However, seeing that his demonic tricks of witchcraft were unsuccessful against a Christian virgin. 

Perceiving that Devil himself was being defeated by faith in Christ, Cyprian, disappointed with Satan, converted to Christianity. Later, he died like a martyr in the name of his new faith.

Justina, was the name of the girl who faced the devil and his servant, Cyprian using only the name of Jesus and the sign of the cross. 

After the convert Cyprian and Justina became friends-brothers missionaries of the Christianism. In a time of great confusion around religious policies, both Cyprian and Justina were persecuted, arrested, convicted, martyred and killed for being Christians. Historically, a curious fate: centuries later, Cipryan could be tortured and burned alive for being a sorcerer.

Cyprian was martyred along with Justina. First they were beaten with whips wich were gifted with iron nails. The Saints, both stayed impassive. 

The executioner was angry and ordered that both were immersed in a boiler of boiling oil. Once more there was no drama or screamings. Without no more solution, the Emperor Diocleciano, chose to simply behead Cyprian and Justina.

The Book of Saint Cyprian

The sorcerer died like a saint. The saint passed to the history like a sorcerer. Cyprian repented of the practice of black magic, converted to Christianity, died wretchedly in the name of Christ but, despite all that, today, 

Saint Cipriano is famous, very famous, not for his saintity but by the book that has his name on the cover. It is a popular book on witchcraft. 

A prayer book, yes; but they are exotic prayers to satisfy desires that, often, are nothing Christian. The true is that the saint went into history as sorcerer.

The historic search indicates that the Book of Saint Cyprian was not written by Saint Cyprian. There are some reasons for support this idea. Cyprian had destroyed his notes and pagan studies in his act of conversion. He burned all them.

Considering more than 30 years of training and practice in arts or sciences occult, 

Cyprian should be considered an occultist, a scholar of magic and not just mere sorcerer versed in popular sympathies, filters of love and prosperity cause this is the material that constitutes the contents of all of The St. Cyprian Books that were published even today. However, it isn't impossible that some material has escaped of the flames.

The sorcerer Cyprian was also an scholar. He wrote and drew formulas and signs everywhere: as on walls and furniture of the houses where he lived. In addition, prior to conversion, the master sorcerer had disciples who preserved his teachings.

Even so, the authorship of the Books of St. Cyprian is doubtful. He died in 304 AD. The most important historical reference on its existence and his biography is a written confession of the repentant sorcerer. 

This document was rescued by the scholar Marques De Mirville (1802-1873). He found the parchment in the Vatican Library (Rome, Italy).

About the Grimoire whose authorship is attributed to St. Cyprian, it first appeared in a German monastery. The text would have been found by a monk named Jonas Sufurino, who translated the original Hebrew to German. However, the first printed editions appeared only a few centuries later, in 1460, in France.

Soon, the superstitious mindset of the people, the yearning for magic solutions for the problems of the life, turned the Book of Saint Cyprian in a popular literature. 

The profane prayers, printed in pamphlets were circulated throughout Western and Eastern Europe. The book were translated for English, Portuguese, Spanish.

In 1510 the canadense editor Jean Jacques Kean published a edition with the title El Libro de San Cipriano: Tesoro del Hetichero, in spanish. 

At european east countries, the Cipriano scrolls or rolls, printed in Constantinople in 1712, were used as talismans in the modern period [Modern Age]. 

These panflets contained an account of the life of the saint, popular prayers and enchantments for all occasions.

In 1849, appeared the first complete edition in Portuguese of The Book of Saint Cyprian: transcript of the manuscript written by the saint who teaches how to undo all the enchantments of the Moors in the kingdom of Portugal. 

It was in the Iberian Peninsula that the myth of the saint sorcerer remained with greater force. As the new world settlers, the Portuguese and Spaniards brought to Americas the belief in the magical powers of the Cyprian and the first copies of Grimoire or The Famous and truly Great Book of Saint Cyprian.

In the Iberian peninsula, the cultural hybridism produces the association among the saint magician early Christianity to the demonic arts of the Moors, the enchantments of the Arab alchemists, the mysteries of gypsy witches of the East.

Cyprian, like black magician, has transcended the historical condition to establishing itself definitively as a legendary figure and folk, archetypal representative of the image of any powerful wizard, master of the enchantments and magic potions. By L. Cabus – August, 2010

TEXTS CONSULTED

DAVIES, Owen. Ancient and medieval grimories. IN Grimoires: a history of magic books. Oxford University Press, 2009. Google Books.

MISSLER, Peter. Las Hondas raíces del Ciprianillo, 2ª parte: Los Grimórios. IN Culturas Populares Revista Eletrônica, 2006. [http://www.culturaspopulares.org/textos3/articulos/missler.pdf]

SUMMERS, Montague. Witchcraft and Black Magic. Courier Dover Publications, 2000. IN Google Books.

The Lives of Sts. Cyprian and Justina. IN Ortodox Christian Information Center. [http://www.orthodoxinfo.com/death/cyprian_justina.aspx]

Indigenous Rite: The proof of ants

Glove prepared for the tucandeira ritual. 

fonte: Wikimedia Commons

AMAZONAS state – At the region of Andirá river, that borns in the state of Para and empties into the Amazon, north of Brazil, are situated the lands of the indigenous tribes of the Sateré-Mawé people. 

There are 38 villages recognized by FUNAI (National Foundation of Indigenous) along the River Andirá.

The Sateré-Mawé, like many peoples of all the cultures of the world, including the post-modern culture, they have a iniciation ritual by wich all the young have to pass when they reach a certain age. In the case of indigenous Sateré-Mawé this ritual is the tucaneiras ants proof.

The tucandeiras ants (Paraponera clavata), that are also named cabo-verde ants in portuguese, Bullet-ants in english, "Hormiga Bala" or, still, "Hormiga 24 horas" in spanish (ants 24-hours), this specie is famous for their extremely painful bite. The Spanish name refers to the duration of the pain caused by the bite of this insect.

The initiation ritual of Sateré-Mawé consists in suffer the extreme pain of the bites of many of these ants. 

For the occasion, ants are stored in a cylinder of bamboo. The insects can not leave because the cylinder is sealed with leaves of white-cashew. 

The ants hate it. In the preparation of the ceremony, the ants are introduced, one by one, inside a sleeve made of straw-caranã.

The heads of the animals remain at the side out of the gloves, the stingers, inside the glove. The whole process irritates the ants. 

When the gloves are ready, beginners should wear these gloves and keep them for 15 minutes while the hands are being bites by these ants, hostiles. While the boys are suffering from pain, the tribe sings and dances.

The ceremony of the Tucandeira is a religious rite. Besides being a test of courage is an act of bravery and a protection for the body. 

The indigenous Sateré-mawé believe the sting of ant-tucandeira has medicinal properties, like a kind of vaccine.

 

The people says that if someone that is with a fever wears the tucandeiras gloves, the fever goes away.

The ritual must be repeated twenty times in twenty different days. If it miss a single day, the protection of the rite is broken, and the curse falls on the defaulter.

For the afraid youngs, who desire avoid the proof, the Tucandeira's curse is a thing to consider. He will be tormented by the Tucandeira. 

The elders say that the tucandeira is a woman. She appears in the dream of the men as a beautiful woman and offers a food that is not of this world. Who eats of this food becomes very ill. 

A native who made his twentieth ritual this month (August 2010) says, relieved: If I had not finished, I would die, I become ill and paunchy, because she "impregnates" (the person). You stay like a pregnant but, in true, begin to grow tucandeiras within the man.

FONTES:

Ritual leva meninos a colocarem mão em luva com formigas.

IN Portal MS – published in 16/08/2010

[http://www.portalms.com.br/noticias/detalhe.asp?cod=959587514]

Tribo Sateré-Mawé. IN Missão Novas Tribos do Brasil MNTB

[http://www.mntb.org.br/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=128&Itemid=242]

Poisoned water

AMAZÔNIA – At Rolim Moura city, in the rivers Bambu and São Pedro, the waters stand empoisoned. Since early July (2010) thousands of fish have been found dead. And the fishes are not the only victims. Other animals are suffering of the mysterious evil. Capivaras (or capybara, Hydrochoerus hydrochaeris), jacarés (Alligatoridae), oxes and other species have been also found dead.

Environmental authorities believe that this is a case of pollution by pesticides. Analyses will be made to determine the cause of the disaster. The population was warned not to use the waters of those rivers. Even baths and other hygienic practices can be dangerous to health.

According to technicians from IBAMA (Instituto Brasileiro do Meio Ambiente e Recursos Naturais) the mere contact with the water of these rivers can cause skin changes. Many fish were found still alive but the bodies structures stood necrosed. The poison acts slowly decomposing body mass of animals.

SOURCE: Mortandade ainda é mistério.
IN DIARIO DA AMAZÔNIA published in 07/30/2010
[http://www.diariodaamazonia.com.br/diariodaamazonia/index2.php?sec=News&id=4522]

The Mistery of Crater of the Macaws

MATO GROSSO DO SUL – At the region of the town Rio Bonito, in a locality named Alegria Farm (Fazenda Alegria) there is a huge crater. It has 512 meters of diameter and its depth is unknown. It's the Macaw's Hole (Buraco das Araras), a place of difficult access (look the photo). The explorers that managed arrive there confirmed that the crater is indeed an enigma.

The vertical walls of the abyss have terraces, tunnels and caves that hide amazing scenarios. All things there is very strange, macabre and unexplained. The tunnels seem to be work of human hands or other intelligent agent.

In the 1970s the Brazilian Army sent an expedition to the site. Technicians reached only 90 meters deep. They found a collection of the strangest objects: many human bones and carcasses of cars destroyed. No one knows how the cars were stopping there. It's as if they had fallen from the sky.

Other explorers, using techniques of rappelling, down more there are 124 meters deep (the equivalent of a 41-story building) found a lake of green waters, dark and dense. There was not observed any form of animal life except a strange reptile, like a kind of crocodile. Also in the vicinity of the lake were found human bones and more one car destroyed.

Some scientists believe that the crater can be result of the fallen of a meteorite at a very ancient geologic epoch. However, there are many legends that recur the fantastic and the supernatural as an explanation for the mysteries of the crater. At the place, would have fallen a UFO.

Others say the that the abyss leads to a shelter of extraterrestrial or maybe that the crater could to be a kind of laystall where cars and people abductees are buried in secret, in this strange cemetery, the crater of Araras. And still, others, think that the crater is one of the entrances to an underground world inhabited by a race of intelligent beings unknowns of the mankind.

by L. Cabus

Fossils of prehistoric reptiles found in the state of Santa Catarina

SANTA CATARINA – At the Alto Vale do Itajaí [Itajaí Valley], the Museu Paleoarqueológico e Histórico [Paleo-Archeological and Historic Museum], in the city of Taió, received some rarities. The newest findings are fossils that may be older than the dinosaurs.

The samples were found by the small farmer Mr. Rafael Cichoki, in Santa Terezinha, hinterland of Taió. According Mr. Cichoki, his son was walking cycling at the neighborhoods when began to pay attention in certain rocks. The boy noticed that the stones had marks: remains of petrified animals. He collected some of these stones.

For the geologist Mr. Douglas Fernando Silva, fossils can be of mesossauros, prehistoric marine reptiles. The findings support the hypothesis that the region, one day in the remote past, was a sea. The material will be sent to Rio Grande do Sul for analysis.

SOURCE: Fósseis que podem ser de répteis marinhos pré-históricos são encontrados no Alto Vale do Itajaí.
IN CLIRBS – published in 06/30/2010.
[http://www.clicrbs.com.br/especial/sc/jsc/19,0,2956275,Fosseis-que-podem-ser-de-repteis-marinhos-pre-historicos-sao-encontrados-no-Alto-Vale-do-Itajai.html]

Areias City – The ghosts of the Road of the Tropeiros

Areias (Sands) is a small city located at the of São Paulo state, in a region called Vale do Paraíba (Paraiba Valley). There, exists a sinuous track, a haunted road, the SP-68, the Tropeiros highway. When the night falls, ghosts trucks appear on this road with their lights on, scaring the drivers who are surprised by these sudden visions.

The elders tell that the trucks are transporting spectra of spectra. Spectra of the trucks that meandered on that road at the epoch of the Revolution of 1932. They experience an eternal loop of death, transporting to nowhere the spirits of the soldiery confused who died during the conflict. The elders tell that the trucks are spectra of spectra. Spectra of the trucks that meandered on that road at the epoch of the Revolution of 1932. They experience an eternal loop of death, transporting forever the wandering spirits of the soldiery who died during the conflict. They travel starting from nothing to go to nowhere.

There is also the ghost of a prosperous farmer. He had promised Our Lady Aparecida a pilgrimage to the shrin, by foot, in gratitude for a grace achieved. Always deferring the fulfillment of promessa, he died. Even today he is on that road. He doesn't want to reach the shrine on foot. Lazy, the ghost wants a ride and it gets on the road, waiting a car or a truck hoping to stop anyone. He needs the permission of the driver to enter in the vehicle. This phantom should ask a ride for the truck of the ghosts soldiers. Let's meditate...

SOURCE: Um Farol na Estrada
IN Mistérios do Vale – June, 2010
[http://misteriosdovale.blogspot.com/]

Mystery: Brackish water of a pit reaches 60 degree centigrade without explanation

CEARÁ – At Missão Velha city, dwellers of the siege Riacho Seco are scared with a phenomenon still not explained by geologists. The water of a pit located in the backyard of the agriculturist Mr. Marcelo Barros Santana, suddenly, became hot to a temperature above 60 degrees centigrade. The suction pump of water was burnt but according to the technician Mr. José Rodrigues, who examined the machine, was not the defect that caused the warming water.

The geologist Mr. Raimundo de Oliveira Romcy, who visited the site, believes the phenomenon has a geothermal cause, like a wave of steam that has could pass through earthly fissures in the crust or even some chemical reaction among minerals salts. The geologist, then, recommended emptying the well but water, renewed, continued hot. The water from that well was brackish and, because this, the water was only used for certain domestic services.

The case can only be clarified after the examine water in laboratory. The fact that intrigued the geologist is that the heating only occurred in one of the pits of the region that receive water of the same underground source.

SOURCE: VICELMO, Antonio. Cacimba com água quente intriga populares.
IN Diario do Nordeste – published em 06/18/2010
[http://diariodonordeste.globo.com/materia.asp?codigo=801325]

Ghostly paranormality at Itatira city

Andréia Alves Marcolino, 16, has already experienced

the phenomenon more than five times. She is very afraid.

MORE: The Curse of the Magaia ghosts

BRAZIL. CEARA state. ITATIRA CITY. At the city of Itatira, hinterlands of Ceará state, a 220 km da capital, Fortaleza, northeaster of Brazil, students from a rural school (School of Elementary Teaching Eduardo Barbosa at Cachoeira district) are suffering a strange phenomenon. With Aged between 12 and 19 years, from different classes, youths  fall in trance.

During the trance, the students enter in a strong agitated state. Some crises are much intense reaching to cause faints in the victims. 

When they regain consciousness, all tell the same thing: they saw the ghost of a former student who died seven years ago.

One girl, Beatriz da Silva Nascimento, describes the ghost: He is swarthy, tall, and wears blue pants. He speaks to us. Gives a very strong headache, then we see our colleagues in falling, we feel heavy and the fainting comes. The episodes became frequent.

Since June 2, 32 students were affected by the strange disorder. As in cases of demonic possession medieval the evil affects almost exclusively the feminine sex. Were 32 girls and one boy... 

In just one day, 25 students were received at Emergency of the local Hospital. The doctor Pedro Thiago Fleet commented: The students arrived shouting, presenting a picture of hysteria with a certain degree of aggressiveness.

The persons talk of a number of other symptoms: muscle aches, headache, breathlessness, weight on the chest, pallor, chills, difficulty walking, nausea, muscle paralysis, increased heartbeat, high blood pressure, fainting, anxiety and fear of dying.

Facing these facts, local authorities are seeking a solution. Priest and parapsychologist are being consulted. 

A Mass was celebrated at the school but the phenomenon was repeated during the ceremony: one girl had a trance and spoke with a strange voice. 

While science bet on the old theory of mass hysteria even without finding motivation, the evangelical pastor José Carlos reveals:  

It can be a spiritual force acting within the school. Because at that school three young people died in accidents. In this case, according to the pastor, if the phenomena are produced by wandering spirits, the solution are on the prayer. 

SOURCE: 

ALVES, Antonio Carlos. Paranormalidade em Itatira.
IN Diário do Nordeste – published in 06/09/2010
[http://diariodonordeste.globo.com/materia.asp?codigo=797396]

Criminal law and Paranormality

About one month ago, in Brasília, the police chief Martha Vargas appealed to telepath Maria Jaques to cooperate in investigating the murder of retired minister of the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE), Jose Guilherme Villela, 73, his wife, Maria Mendes Carvalho Villela, 69, and the couple's housekeeper, Francisca Nascimento da Silva, 58. The triple murder occurred on August 28 last year at apartment of SQS 113, where everyone lived. The case did not please the authorities. She was removed from case.

It is a polemic question: could the psychic, the paranormal be considered able to contribute with criminal investigations? In Brazil and in other countries of the world, examples are rare but eventually the clairvoyants were important in the elucidation of some crimes and for the definition of veredict of the judge too.

The Brazilian expert on relations between law and parapsychology, Valter Borges da Rosa, recalls some cases in wich paranormal phenomena were registered in court proceedings at Brasil. In 1944, there was a legal dispute over the copyright of Humberto de Campos (1886-1934), journalist, writer and brazilian politician.

The widow of the writer, Catarina Vergolino Campos, went in the Justice against the Brazilian Spiritist Federation demanding payment of authoral rights on psychographed works by the medium Francisco Cândido Xavier. The question was that the books had been a creation by the spirit of the deceased. The lawsuit was dismissed. The judge not considered nor the exploiting the name of the writer under ground that the Judiciary is not an organ of consultation to decide on the intellectual activity of a dead man.

In two other cases, judical sentences were established with the help of dead people letters. Texts psychographed by Francisco Cândido Xavier, called Chico Xavier, the most famous spirit medium of Brazil.

They were all crimes of murder. The first happened in the city of Campinas de Giânia, Goiás state, in 8 of may of 1976. It was practiced by Mr. José Divino Gomes against Mr. Maurício Gargês Henrique. The accused was acquitted based in a message of victim, dead victim, that, revealing the facts, exempted the defendant from guilt.

The second crime occured at the city of Campo Grande, Mato Grosso state. The tragedy happened in first of march of 1980. The victim, Mrs. Cleide maria, ex-miss, left her post mortem and appeared at the court through the same medium spiritualist. The ghost declared that her husband realy killed her, but the episode has been an accident.

SOURCE: Valter da Rosa Borges - Polêmica do além
IN Brasília Em Dia — published em 20/05/2010
[http://www.brasiliaemdia.com.br/2010/5/28/Pagina7528.htm]

Earthquakes in Brazil?!

Image: Arte/G1

CEARÁ — 22 of may day, 2010In the city of Sobral, hinterland of Ceará state and also at Fortaleza, capital of the same state earthquakes, that attained among 3,9 to 4,3 in Ritcher Scale happened and have scacre the population. The tremors began some years ago. While the seismologists say that there is no reason to worry, nothing to fear the fact is that the frequency of the phenomenon only increases.

In 2008, in the month of may, the tremors reached even four degrees on Richter Scale. The fact occupied the headlines of the channels of communication in Brazil. More of thirteen cities of Ceará were hit At the state, this phenomenon became an ordinary thing. In april of 2009, occured tremors at the region. The seismic movements are became more and more frequent. Residents of the region between the city of Sobral and Fortaleza, capital of the state, are forced to leave their homes because of damage to infrastructure. The walls are cracking.The largest earthquake in the northeast region, which reached 5.2 degrees on the Richter scale, occurred in November 1980 on the east coast of Ceará.

ACRE — 24 of may day, 2010. In the begin of the afternoon (3:18 a.m., — GMT, schedule of Brasília),an earthquake with magnitude of 6,5 degrees in Ritcher Scale hit the state of Acre and the lands around that area of the Amazon region. The phenomenon was detected by the Geological Service of the United States of North America and confirmed by the Observatório Sismológico of the Universidade de Brasília (Seismological Observatory of the University of Brasilia, UnB).

Acre is a one of the 26 brazilian states of the federation that presents great seismic activities. The cause of this is the proximity in relation to Andes Cordillera. There, the impact among the plates of the underground rocks, the tectonic movements that occur along the Pacific ocean shore of the Latin America, mainly in the country of Chile. The tremors at amazonic region are echos provoked by the movements further west.

PERNAMBUCO — At this other state of northeast region of Brazil, the tectonic movements, although with less intensity are very frequent. At March 3, only in the city of Alagoinha, occured more than 60 tremors that reached 3.2 degrees on Richter Scale. In this city, the aftershocks of land have became routine and they are not so insignificant how someone may think. With the high frequency of occurrences, the structures of the buildings aren't supporting more vibration constants: the cracks are already appearing. But the most frightening is that many people reported hearing, on the occasions of the tremors, a sound similar to the thunder that echoing from the deep of the earth.The phenomenon has been accompanied by the department of seismology at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte (UFRN), which has adequate equipment for monitoring earthquakes spreaded in several cities in the interior of Pernambuco

SÃO PAULO — The tremors have been also registered the southeast and south regions of Brazil. At the states of São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Paraná e Santa Catarina the people stayed surprised with the occurences of the phenomenon. In april of 2008 the earth trembled with an intensity of 5,2 degrees in Ritcher scale. At the four states, the quakes were felt. According the Observatório Sismológico da Universidade de Brasília (Seismologic Observatory of Brasília University - UnB). The epicenter was located in the Atlantic Ocean, 270 km far from São Paulo.

At the years of 1970, the text books of Geography and the teachers taught that Brazil, being consisting of very ancient lands, not suffered from earthquakes. Now suffers. Because everything changes, everything at the Universe is moving. The planet also. The Earth, after all, is not a dead body drifting in space. In contrast, the Earth and is moving in itself, indifferent to the discomfort it can cause human kind.

SOURCES

ARAUJO, Glauco. Tremor de terra é registrado no interior do Ceará. IN G1 — published in em 04/17/2009
[http://g1.globo.com/Noticias/Brasil/0,,MUL1089081-5598,00-TREMOR+DE+TERRA+E+REGISTRADO+NO+INTERIOR+DO+CEARA.html].

CALHEIROS, Celso. Município de Pernambuco registra seis tremores de terra.
In Terra Notícias — published in 05/19/2010
[http://noticias.terra.com.br/brasil/noticias/0,,OI4390298-EI8139,00.html]

COSTA, Thiago André. Tremor de terra atinge São Paulo, Paraná, Rio de Janeiro e Santa Catarina. IN Gazeta do Povo — published in 04/22/2008. [http://www.gazetadopovo.com.br/vidaecidadania/conteudo.phtml?id=759295]

GOZZI, Ricardo. TERREMOTO NA AMAZÔNIA: Americanos registram tremor de 6,5 graus no Acre. IN Ariquenmes Online from R7 and G7 —published in 24/05/2010[http://www.ariquemesonline.com.br/textos.asp?codigo=13887]

HARTMAN, Anderson e RIBEIRO, Marcelle. Terremoto de 6,5 de magnitude atinge o Acre.
IN O Globo Cidades, Reuters — published in 05/24/2010
[http://oglobo.globo.com/cidades/mat/2010/05/24/terremoto-de-6-5-de-magnitude-atinge-acre-916670302.asp]

MARTIN, Isabela. Tremores de terra no Ceará pôde ser percebido até no Piauí.
In O Globo — published in 02/29/2008
[http://oglobo.globo.com/pais/mat/2008/02/29/tremores_de_terra_no_ceara_pode_ser_percebido_ate_no_piaui-426020018.asp]

Video - The first victim of an earthquake at Brazil

MINAS GERAIS — Caraíbas city will slowly turning into a ghost town. Residents try to rescue what was left after the destruction. Mr. Sebastiao da Silva, local resident says: Caraíbas is over, the city was devastated. 

One girl died and six people were injured. The more than 300 homeless by the earthquake are in this nursery (shown on video). Mr. José Ferreira de Paula, mayor of Itacarambi asked for help from state and federal governments to buy land and rebuild homes. 

At Vargem Grande, 6 km from Cararaíbas, the earth also shook and some houses suffered cracks.

SOURCE

PEIXOTO, Paulo

Depois do tremor, Caraíbas vira um vilarejo-fantasma

https://www1.folha.uol.com.br/fsp/cotidian/ff1112200707.htm

UPDATED: December 23, 2023

The Curse of the Magaia ghosts

MOÇAMBIQUE, Angola Press — At Maputo, capital of the country, in the Secondary School Quisse Mavota is happening a strange phenomenon: an epidemic of fainting of students. All the victims are girls. Only in a week were more than twenty faintings. Rumors speak of ghosts. The school was built upon cemetery for a family aristocratic of a clan of the region.

They were the Magaia. But a ritual asking permission to the dead was not performed. The school was built in 2006. Just at this epoch, there was an outbreak of faintings during the months of June and July. Now, the incident is happening again. Nobody knows exactly what is waking the spirits.

Julieta Bata, 17 years old, one of the girls that fainted tells what happened to her: she was in the classroom when she heard a noise, like someone screaming and saying things. Then, she felt herself a little sick and left the classroom. First, felt shortness of breath and after it was like someone was pulling her legs. She lost consciousness and she does not remember anything else.

Psychologists and psychiatrists think that the explanation for the faintings is a collective hysteria the sociologists don't found no reason that could have triggered such a phenomenon of this nature. However, the Association of Traditional Doctors of Mozambique has no doubt that the problem is a curse. The spokesman of that institution said that all that is happening is due to a "claim of the spirits" and the blame is of the authorities who that ignore the traditions: "We must respect the places where we know there were bones. We are Africans, we have other logical".

To cancel the curse, a traditional doctor will have to make the purification of the school: For now they are just suffering faints, but the girls may start to die.

SOURCE
Onda de desmaios ameaça alunas de uma escola nos arredores de Maputo
IN Angola Press — published in 05/10/2010
[http://www.portalangop.co.ao/motix/pt_pt/noticias/africa/2010/4/20/Onda-desmaios-ameaca-alunas-uma-escola-nos-arredores-Maputo,e97d2cde-88e3-4f37-8d94-b53064b9c9df.html]