|
Vasitri
Alternatively known as
Salvaje, Achi, and Aigypan.
Allegedly,
another mysterious primate
from South America, this time from the Venezuelan jungles and
the Colombian Andes.
The Vasitri are described as wild men-like hairy creatures that,
according to the local Amerindians, construct primitive huts and crude weapons.
These beings are said to be extremely dangerous, ill-tempered and carnivorous, eating men but
carrying off women for breeding purposes.
At the banks of the
Upper Orinoco, at the
valley of Upar near the lake of
Maracaybo, at the mountains of Santa Martha and of Merida, at the provinces of
Quixos, and at the banks of the Amazon near
Tomependa, belief in these creatures
is prevalent, particularly among the native peoples. In all these places, so
distant one from the other, it is asserted that the Salvaje is easily recognized
by the traces of its feet, the toes of which are turned backward. But if there
really exists a hominid, monkey or ape of large size in the New Continent, how
has it happened that for three centuries no man worthy of belief has been able
to procure the skin or the carcass of one? A mystery indeed.
The earliest mention of these creatures was
made in 1800 by
Baron Alexander von Humboldt, the famous Prussian
naturalist who mapped over 1,700 miles of the Orinoco River:
"On the Orinoco, it is rumored the
existence of a hairy man of the woods called Salvaje, that carries off
women, constructs huts, and sometimes eats human flesh. The Tamanacs call
him Achi, and the Maypures named him Vasitri or "great devil." The natives
and the missionaries have no doubt of the existence of this man-shaped
monkey, of which they entertain a singular dread. Father Gili gravely
relates the history of a lady in the town of San Carlos, in the Llanos of
Venezuela, who much praised the gentle character and attentions of the man
of the woods. She is stated to have lived several years with one in great
domestic harmony, and only requested some hunters to take her back, "because
she and her children (a little hairy also) were weary of living far from the
church and the sacraments."
von Humboldt,
notwithstanding his credulity, acknowledges that he never knew an Indian who
asserted positively that he had seen the Salvaje with his own eyes.
Central and South American legends describing
hairy, manlike beings as abductors of women also find Old World parallels. In
the pictorial art and fiction of medieval Europe, wild men are often depicted
carrying off ladies, presumably to share an amorous life in the greenwood, and
the African folk belief that gorillas abduct human females is also widely known.
See Agogwe,
Abominable
Snowman, Almas, Sasquatch,
Yowie, Chemosit,
Chuchunaa,
Curupira, Higabon,
Kaki Besar, Maricoxi,
Bigfoot,
Mapinguary, Yeti,
Meh-teh, Nguoi Rung, 'X', Windigo,
Orang Pendek and Wildman of China.
Sources: (1)
Anderson, Ivan T.,
Abominable Snowmen: Legend
Come to Life,
Adventures Unlimited Press;
(2) Kirtley, Bacil F., Unknown
Hominids and New World Legends, Western
Folklore, Vol. XXIII April 1964, No. 2; (3) von Humboldt,
Baron Alexander and Bonpland, Aime (Translated
and Edited by Ross, Thomasina), Personal
Narrative of Travels to the Equinoctial Regions of America During the Years
1799-1804, Vol. 2., The MacMillan Co.
|
|
|
