In his book, Mysteries of Ancient South America, author Harold T. Wilkins writes about the findings of an expedition in the 1920s lead by Colonel P.H. Fawcett into the woods of the Brazilian Amazon where he chanced upon an ancient city and some rock inscriptions, about which Wilkins says, "... those strange writings are something more remarkable... they are of an esoteric Hindu cult." (page 63).
Writing about the inscriptions, he further adds," I have myself discovered some queer links between these strange letters of old Brazil, and characters found in Tibet and Vedic Hindostan". (Page 118).
Brazil which has no apparent link to Vedic India holds many a clue to its Vedic past which lie hidden in its ancient place names such as Ramilandia, and river names such as Parana, Sanskrit for flowing across, or Xinghu, which is just one sound away from the word Sindhu meaning river in Sanskrit.
Brazil was once known as Pindorama and though it is said that 'Pindorama' translates as 'Land of Palms' from the native language Ayamara, Sri Rama was not unknown in this part of the world. RamaRama is also the name of a Tupian language. Also, the Brazilian Amazon is home to several tribes which seem to have a link to the name Rama.
There is an ancient tribe in Brazil by the name 'RamaRama'. The RamaRama were a Tupi speaking group of considerable size, living in the Brazilian Amazonian area in a place called Rondonia who inhabited the banks of the Machadinho and Ahara rivers. The Amazon was itself known as the 'Maranon' in ancient times which appears to be a distortion of the Sanskrit 'jharana' meaning water cascade, stemming form the Sanskrit root word 'jhara'. This word also appears in the native name of the Iguazu Falls on the border of Brazil and Argentina. The Guarani name of the Iguazu falls is Chororõ Yguasu. Chororo is definitely a cognate of jhara, which distorts to sounds like phuhar फुहार in Hindi meaning drizzle. There are other Sanskrit words such as 'tushar' (तुषार) which means 'a spray of water' that explain Guarani words with similar meanings. Other Sanskrit ognates of Maranon such as 'marmahan' (मर्महन्) which is the equivalent of 'striking the vitals', and 'mardana' (मर्दन) which is 'tormenting', seem to describe the temperament of the river Amazon accurately, but it is 'jhara' which is the more versatile of the two words. Various distortions of the word 'jhara' and 'jharana' appear in river names around the world, whether it is the river Jordon of West Asia, or the River Niger of Africa, or the river Parana of Latin America, etc.
Many of the tributaries of the Amazon still bear Sanskrit names. The Jara and the Javary are but a couple of examples that are definitely related to the Sanskrit 'jhara' (झर ) meaning 'waterbody' or 'waterfall, or 'jhari' (झरी) which means 'river.
Then there is the Kaiapo - a powerful and well-known Brazilian tribe who lives in villages along the Xingu River across the Central Brazilian Plateau. The Kaiapo call themselves Mebengokre, meaning 'the men from the water place'. The name Kaiapo was given to them by the neighboring native tribes, which means 'resembling apes' and was probably given because the men used to dance with monkey masks. It is interesting that 'kaipo' is a cognate of the Sanskrit 'kapi' (कपि) which means 'monkey' - in fact the etymological source of the English 'ape' is unknown and is sometimes attributed to the Sanskrit 'kapi'.
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Kaiapo Tribals of Brazil. They wore
masks to look like monkeys -
in tribute to monkey gods. |
Hanuman, in a slightly different form, was also known in South America. The famous Monkey God Sculpture of Copan and the legend of Monkey God worship in the city of Ciudad Blanca in Honduras, is well known. Click here and here for more.
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The Howler Monkey God Sculpture Copan, Honduras |
The etymological source of the name 'Xingu' is largely unknown though it is conjectured that 'Xingu' may derive from the name given to it by a tribe named Asurini who called the river 'Yh Uu' meaning 'Great Water'. The fact remains that the tribe name 'Asurini' itself is Sanskrit. The name 'Xingu' is just one syllable away from the name 'Sindhu'. Sindhu is one of the most important rivers of ancient India, and though Sindhu is a pronoun, it is also a generic word for 'river'. The Asurini 'Yh Uu' is probably a distorted form of 'sindhu'. The Asurini language belongs to the Tupian group of languages and the most widely spoken language of this group, the Tupi-Guarani is close to Sanskrit.
Then there are the 'Paru', 'Para' and 'Purus' rivers. 'Paru' (परु) is 'sun' or 'heaven', 'Para' (पर) is 'greatest' or as a direction it means 'across', and 'Purus' (पुरस्) is the equivalent of 'in front' or 'ahead'.
Other river names include the Uchayali. 'Uchayali' is probably linked to the Sanskrit 'ucchala' (उच्चल), i.e, 'spring forth'. Then there is the Apurimac. 'Apu' (आपू) means 'to flow forward after purification'. 'Apurima' (आपूरिमा) would covert the verb 'Apu' into a noun or pronoun of feminine gender, which aptly describes a river.
Even if the word Apurimac is split into two words 'Apu' (आपू) and 'Ramac' (रमक) as has been done for the Quechua decode, it still makes perfect sense in Sanskrit. 'Apu' (आपू) as mentioned above means 'to flow forward after purification', and 'ramak' (रमक) means 'sporting, dallying, toying amorously' - again an apt description for a flowing river.
Suggested Links:
1. The Indians of Central and South America: An Ethnohistorical Dictionary
2. From Kyper Pass to Gran Quivira