Charía

Charía is the recurring adversary of the divine twins in the Guaraní twin-cycle set down for the Apapocúva by Curt Nimuendajú. In the celebrated fishing episode the twins mock him as he angles at a river; when the younger brother dives at the baited hook Charía hooks him, clubs him dead and carries him home to be cooked as a fish, whereupon the elder brother gathers the bones and brings him back to life. Comparative scholarship identifies him with the celestial or 'blue' jaguar whose pursuit of the luminaries the Guaraní see in eclipses, and whose ultimate unleashing belongs to their expectation of the destruction of the earth; until then he is held in check by the great father Ñanderuvuçú. Nimuendajú and later commentators note that the Apapocúva also read this primordial enemy as the prototype of the alien outsider, a mythic template later mapped onto the encroaching non-Indigenous world.

Domains

• cosmic antagonism
• eclipses

Powers

• to attack the sun and the moon
• to threaten mankind until the world's end unless restrained

Epithets

• Jaguar ovýEgon Schaden, Aspectos fundamentais da cultura guaraní, 3rd ed. (São Paulo: EPU/EDUSP, 1974; 1st ed. 1962). (secondary)

Relations

• slayer of: JasyAt the river Charía hooks and clubs the younger twin (the Moon), taking him home to be cooked as if he were a fish; the elder twin recovers the bones and restores his brother to life.Alfred Métraux, 'Twin Heroes in South American Mythology,' Journal of American Folklore 59, no. 232 (1946): 114-123. (secondary)
• subordinate to: ÑamandúThe malevolent jaguar-adversary is contained at the edge of the world by the great father Ñanderuvuçú, whose restraint keeps him from devouring humanity before the appointed destruction.Curt Nimuendajú, Die Sagen von der Erschaffung und Vernichtung der Welt als Grundlagen der Religion der Apapocúva-Guaraní, Zeitschrift für Ethnologie 46 (1914), 284-403 (Port. trans. ed. Egon Schaden, São Paulo: Hucitec/EDUSP, 1987). (secondary)

Sources

• Charía is the eternal adversary of the culture-hero twins in the Apapocúva-Guaraní world-cycle, the fishing enemy who kills the younger twin and, as the celestial jaguar, threatens the sun, the moon and the world's end.: Curt Nimuendajú, Die Sagen von der Erschaffung und Vernichtung der Welt als Grundlagen der Religion der Apapocúva-Guaraní, Zeitschrift für Ethnologie 46 (1914), 284-403 (Port. trans. ed. Egon Schaden, São Paulo: Hucitec/EDUSP, 1987). (secondary); Egon Schaden, Aspectos fundamentais da cultura guaraní, 3rd ed. (São Paulo: EPU/EDUSP, 1974; 1st ed. 1962). (secondary); Alfred Métraux, 'Twin Heroes in South American Mythology,' Journal of American Folklore 59, no. 232 (1946): 114-123. (secondary)