Tribes
Indigenous peoples of Venezuela and Colombia
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The Luxburg Carolath Foundation works closely with the tribes of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, as well as with the tribes of the Republic of Colombia. The purpose of the foundation is primarily to digitally preserve widely accessible information about their history, traditions and languages.
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Venezuela
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The indigenous peoples of Venezuela, the Amerindians or Venezuelan natives, constitute approximately 2% of the total population of Venezuela, although many Venezuelans share some indigenous ancestry. The indigenous peoples are concentrated in the state of Amazonas, in the southern Amazon rainforest, where they represent almost 50% of the population, and in the Andes of the western state of Zulia. The largest indigenous group, numbering around 200,000, is the Venezuelan part of the Wayuu (or Guajiro) people who live mainly in Zulia state between Lake Maracaibo and the Colombian border. Around 100,000 indigenous people live in the sparsely populated southeastern states of Amazonas, Bolívar and Delta Amacuro. There are at least 26 indigenous groups in Venezuela, including the Ya̧nomamö, Pemon, Warao, Baniwa, Kali'na, Motilone Barí, Ye'kuana and Yaruro peoples.
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According to the most popular and accepted version of the name Venezuela: in 1499, an expedition led by Alonso de Ojeda visited the Venezuelan coast. The stilt houses in the Lake Maracaibo area reminded the Italian navigator Amerigo Vespucci of the city of Venice, Italy, so he called the region Veneziola or “Little Venice”. The Spanish version of Veneziola is Venezuela.
Below are some of the photos of the Anu tribe that still exist today in Maracaibo in the Santa Rosa de Agua region.
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Martín Fernández de Enciso, a member of Vespucci and Ojeda's crew, gave another account. In his work Summa de Geografía, he states that the crew encountered indigenous people who called themselves Veneciuela. Therefore, the name “Venezuela” may have evolved from the native word. Since 1999, the Venezuelan Constitution and new laws drawn up by President Hugo Chávez have allowed indigenous groups unprecedented rights that they did not have for generations.
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Colombia
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The American Indians, or indigenous peoples of the Republic of Colombia, are the ethnic groups that were in Colombia before the Europeans arrived at the beginning of the 16th century. Known as “pueblos indígenas originarios” in Spanish, they make up 4.4% of the country's population and belong to 87 different tribes.
The National Administrative Department of Statistics (Colombia) recognizes the existence of 146 indigenous groups, 87 of which are officially recognized. In addition to this list, there are people who self-identify as indigenous people considered extinct (Calima, Chitarero, Panche and Tairona), of foreign origin (Otavaleño, Maya and others) or who do not identify with any particular tribe.
Approximately 50% of Colombia's indigenous peoples live in the departments of La Guajira Colombiana, Cauca and Nariño. Although Colombia's Amazon region is sparsely populated, it is home to more than 70 different indigenous ethnic groups.
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The following is a list of the 87 indigenous peoples officially recognized in the 2005 census, with their respective population as of 2018 (unrecognized peoples are in italics): Wayuu, Senù, Nasa, Pasto, Emberá Chamí, Emberá, Coyaima, Emberá Katío, Awá, Mokaná, Arhuaco, Coconuco, Arzario, Achagua, Amorúa, Andoke, Bara, Barasana, Barí, Betoye, Bora, Chitarero Calima, Cañamomo, Carapana, Chimila, Chiricoa, Cocama , Coreguaje, Desano, Dujo, Eperara, Siadipara, Guambiano, Guanaca, Guane, Guayabero, Hitnü, Inga, Jupda, Kawiyarí, Kãkwã, Kamëntsa, Kankuamo, Karijona, Kichwa, Kofán, Kogui, Kubeo, Kuaguaje, Kurmaripako, Letua, Makuna, Masiguare, Matapí, Miraña, Maya, Muisca, Nonuya, Nukak, Ocaina, Otavaleño, Panche, Piaroa, Piratapuyo, Pisamira, Puinave, Quimbaya, Sáliba, Sikuani, Siona, Siriano, Tairona, Taiwano, Tanimuka, Tariano, Tatuuka, Tikuna, Totoró, Tsiripu, Tucano, Tule, Tuyuka, Tzase, Uitoto, Umbrá, U'wa, Wanano, Waunan, Yagua, Yanacona, Yaruro, Yauna, Yuko, Yukuna, Yuri & Yurutí
Akawayo
The Akawayo are an indigenous people who live in Roraima (Brazil), Guyana and Venezuela. The Akawayo are an ethnic group who live in Venezuela, Guyana and Brazil, in South America. Akawaio is also a language spoken by 5000 to 6000 people.
Baniva
The Baniva are a South American indigenous people who speak the Baniva language, which belongs to the Maipurean language family (Arawakan). They live in the Amazon region, in the border area between Brazil, Colombia and Venezuela, and along the Negro River and its tributaries.
Chaima
The Chaimas are an indigenous Venezuelan people who used to live in the area around what is now Cariaco, a municipality in the state of Ribero del Sucre. They lived in the northeast of what is now Venezuela.
Arawak
The Arawak are a group of indigenous peoples of South America and the Caribbean. Specifically, the term “Arawak” has been applied on several occasions to the Lokono of South America and the Taíno, who historically lived in the Greater Antilles and the northern Lesser Antilles in the Caribbean.
Bari
The Motilon, or Bari, are an indigenous people who live in the Catatumbo river basin in the department of Norte de Santander in Colombia in South America. They are descendants of the Tairona culture concentrated in the northeast of Colombia and western Venezuela.
Chibcha
Chibcha is an extinct language of Colombia, spoken by the Muisca, one of the four advanced indigenous civilizations of the Americas. The Muisca inhabited the central highlands (Altiplano Cundiboyacense) of what is now the country of Colombia.
Cuiba
The Cuiba ethnic group is often found in the Casanare region. In Venezuela the language is spoken in the state of Apure, one of the states bordering Colombia, which is located next to the Capanaparo river.
Wayuu
The Wayú or Guajiros (from the Arawak guajiro) are aborigines from the Guajira peninsula on the Caribbean Sea, who mainly inhabit the territories of La Guajira in Colombia and Zulia in Venezuela.
Maquiritare
The Maquiritare are a Caribbean-speaking rainforest tribe that lives in the regions of the Caura and Orinoco rivers in Venezuela, in the states of Bolívar and Amazonas. In Brazil, they inhabit the northeast of the state of Roraima.
Mapoyo
Mapoyo, or Mapoyo – Yavarana, is a Carib language spoken along the Suapure and Parguaza rivers in Venezuela. The ethnic population of Mapoyo proper is approximately 365. The Yabarana dialect may be extinct; in 1977, 20 speakers were known. In 1998, an additional dialect, Pemono, was discovered.
Koguis
They are a people originally from Colombia, who live on the northern slopes of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta in the valleys of the Don Diego, Palomino, San Miguel and Río Ancho rivers. There are about ten thousand people who speak their own language. They are organized into villages, in which the authority is the Mama, a central figure in Kogui culture, who embodies the sacred law. They speak the Kogui language, which belongs to the Arhuaco language group, which in turn belongs to the Tayronas family.
Panare
The Panare people live in the Amazon region of Venezuela. While Western culture has had a moderate influence on other tribes in the region, the Panare have retained much of their culture and tradition, similar to that of North American natives in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Pemon
The Pemón or Pemón (Pemong) are indigenous people who live in the southeast of Venezuela, particularly in Canaima National Park, in the state of Roraima in Brazil and in Guyana. They are also known as Arecuna, Aricuna Jaricuna, Kamarakoto and Taurepang.
uruak
Arutani (ethnonym Uruak) is an almost extinct language spoken by only 17 people in Roraima, Brazil and two others in the area of the Karum River in the state of Bolívar, Venezuela. It is one of the languages with the worst evidence of existence in South America and may be a language isolate.
Tupi
The Tupi people were one of the most numerous indigenous peoples in Brazil before colonization. Scholars believe that although they first settled in the Amazon rainforest some 2,900 years ago, the Tupi began to migrate south and gradually occupied the Atlantic coast of southeastern Brazil.
Piaroa
The Piaroa are an indigenous people from the middle Orinoco basin in present-day Venezuela, who live in an area equivalent to the size of Belgium, roughly bounded by Parguaza (north), Ventuari (southeast), Manapiare (north) east) and the right bank of the Orinoco (west).
YANOMAMI
The Yanomami, also spelled YÄ…nomamö or Yanomama, are a group of approximately 35,000 indigenous people who live in some 200–250 villages in the Amazon rainforest on the border between Venezuela and Brazil.
Yukpa
The Yukpa are an Amerindian ethnic group that inhabit the northeastern part of the department of Cesar in northern Colombia, in the Serranía del Perijá mountains that border Venezuela. Their territory covers the eastern areas of the municipalities of Robles La Paz, Codazzi and Becerril in the Resguardos (indigenous reservations) called Socorpa, Menkue, El Cozo Iroka and some other small areas of Venezuela.
