Polynesian skulls found in Mocha Island, Patagonia, Chile

Mocha Island is located 35 km (20 mi) west of the Chilean Patagonian coast roughly 38.5° Lat. South. It is part of the coastal region of the Pacific Ocean in the Arauco area. The island is roughy 13 km long (8 mi) and 5.5 km wide (3.4 mi) and has a surface area of 53 km² (20.4 sq. mi.).

Van Speilberger in Mocha, 1616.. Notice the raft with a llama (lower right) Source

The first traces of permanent population by the Huilliche people of Chile date back to around the year 400 AD, with sporadic presence starting 3,500 years ago. They were known as "Lafkenche", or "people of the sea". The island's name "am ucha" means "soul-resurrect". They navigated back and forth across the channel between the mainland and the island trading with those who lived on the coast. The Spaniards evicted the natives in 1685 to keep them from trading with the Dutch and English ships that sailed through the region. In 1850 people resettled the island.

In 1902 Dr. Luis Vergara Flores was the first to note the similarity between skulls from Mocha Island and Polynesian crania. That year he informed that "I just reported on three skulls from Mocha Island collected by Mr. Carlos Reiche of the National Museum of Santiago. In that study, he concluded that from the western coasts of America westward, the races are Polynesian." The following year, 1903, he published an article about them (1903) in a book about Mocha Island (see Vergara, L. 1903. Tres cráneos de la Isla de La Mocha. In: Isla de la Mocha. Reiche, Carlos (ed.) Santiago: Anales del Museo Nacional de Chile , p.18).

Rocker Jaw, Amerindians and Polynesians

Many years later, Ramírez in 1992 noticed a "rocker jaw" in a skull found on Mocha, pointing out that this is a typically Polynesian feature not found in pre-Columbian Native American crania.

Rocker jaw is indeed a Polynesian feature, a study published in 2021 (Scott GR, Stull KE, Sbei AN, McKinney M, Boling SR, Irish JD. Rocker jaw: Global context for a Polynesian characteristic. Anat Rec. 2021; 304: 1776–1791. https://doi.org/10.1002/ar.24566) points out that "While the rocker jaw is a Polynesian characteristic, the trait is found throughout the world. Within major geographic regions, there are interesting contrasts... Skeletons in South America that exhibit the rocker jaw have been interpreted as Polynesian voyagers who ventured to the west coast of South America. The rarity of rocker jaw in South American natives supports this view." Below is Fig. 2 in this paper, showing a "rocker Jaw" (b) and a non-rocker (a).

Rocker jaws lack the antigonal notch and rock back and forth when placed on a flat surface.

Interestingly one of the jaws found at tje Upper Cave in Zhoukoudian, China "has a rocker jaw comparable to forms found in Polynesia" (roughly 30 ky old), it has not been observed in African hominins (A. afarensis or H. naledi, ergaster, but "it is evident in at least some mandibles, including Atapuerca, La Chapelle aux Saints, and Homo floresiensis... the Old Man from Cro-Magnon, the Mauer jaw, and Old Man 101 from Zhoukoudian."

Rocker jaws appear at a 59% frequency in Polynesia, and is lower in other parts of Oceania: Melanesia, 21%; Micronesia, 5.9%; Australia, 21.7%, and New Guinea, 13.6%. Regarding Africa and the Americas, the values are also very low. America has a north-to-south decreasing cline: Northwest coast, 18.8%; California, 8.7%, Southwestern US, 2.3%; Mesoamerica, 5.7 and South America, 3.1%. North Africa, 17%; Sub-Saharan Africa, 10.2 - 4.8%. Eurasian values are higher East Asia, 26.8%; Jomon, 18.6%; Siberia, 17.1%, Europe, 15.5%.

The paper points out an incongruity with the current notion about how Polynesia was populated: "Given that Southeast Asia was the springboard for the peopling of Polynesia, it is surprising that rocker jaw frequencies from this area provide no harbinger of things to come in remote Oceania. Mainland Southeast Asia has a higher frequency of rocker jaw (0.172) than island Southeast Asia (0.110)... Unexpectedly, Australia and Melanesia have higher frequencies of the trait than Southeast Asia and Micronesia, regions with presumably closer biological ties to Polynesia." Once again a hint at the Melanesian influence on Polynesian genetics and traits.

The authors attribute this high frequency among Polynesians toa comgination of "founder effect and genetic drift... in sum, is the outcome produced by an unusual combination of chance and functional factors." Yet, it does not explain the lack of this trait in South America, among the lowest in the world.

The Mocha skulls revisited

A paper published in 2010 (Matisoo-Smith, E. and Ramírez, J. M. (2009) “Human Skeletal Evidence of Polynesian Presence in South America? Metric Analyses of Six Crania from Mocha Island, Chile”, Journal of Pacific Archaeology, 1(1), pp. 76–88. doi: 10.70460/jpa.v1i1.11.)

analyzed crania from remains found on Mocha. They noticed that some of them were not similar to Patagonian skulls, and instead looked Polynesian:

"Three of the six crania, however, provided results that were geographically inconsistent with their Mocha Island location in at least one or more of the analyses... rhe possibility of admixture of the Mocha Island samples is particularly interesting and we suggest that admixture between indigenous Mapuche populations and Polynesian voyagers is worthy of consideration... Interestingly, the cranium that shows the strongest affiliations with Pacific populations is the one from box 10, which corresponds to El Vergel period (1000–1500 AD)".

In 2011, at Tunquén, Chile, close to the port city of Valparaiso, a press release from the University of Playa Ancha reported: "A dozen skeletons dating back a thousand years were found in very good condition. They exhibited the same morphological features as the archaeological remains discovered in 1990 and subsequent years on Mocha Island, south of Concepción. Some of the bodies presented all or some of the three morphological features that characterize the Polynesian phenotype: a rocker jaw, a pentagonal skull, and the oval shape of the femoral head socket that connects the ligaments to the hip." José Miguel Ramírez (yes, the same researcher mentioned further up) was commissioned to investigate them. Although he did not publish any paper on this remarkable finding, he did say thta: "What's interesting is that we were able to conduct mitochondrial DNA analysis, which would reaffirm the idea of interbreeding, and that the contact wasn't occasional, but rather that there were descendants. The only explanation is that there was a relationship between peoples who spoke different languages, which would also explain the dozen or so Polynesian words in Mapudungun.”."

Transpacific Routes

Some scholars have studied the potential routes across the Pacific, and have used computer simulations to do so, starting with Irwin G, Bickler S, Quirke P. (1990), Voyaging by canoe and computer: experiments in the settlement of the Pacific Ocean. Antiquity, 64(242):34-50. doi:10.1017/S0003598X00077280. 🔒, Finney, Ben, (1994), Putting Voyaging Back into Polynesian Prehistory, Voyage of Rediscovery: A Cultural Odyssey through Polynesia (Oakland, CA, 1994; online edn, California Scholarship Online, 24 May 2012), https://doi.org/10.1525/california/9780520080027.003.0008 🔒 and Wyatt, S., (2004), Ancient transpacific voyaging to the new world via Pleistocene South Pacific Islands. Geoarchaeology, 19: 511-529. https://doi.org/10.1002/gea.20008 🔒.

The map below, from José Miguel Ramírez Aliaga and Elisabeth Matisoo-Smith (2008) is captioned: " Figure 1. Routes between Polynesia and South America (according to Finney 1994 and Green 1998, 2000). A: Direct route between the Marquesas Islands and Peru (Buck 1938); B: Recommended route for sailing from the Marquesas Islands to Valparaíso; C: Route from Rapa Nui eastward, taking advantage of westerly winds; D: Westerly winds in winter, from Rapa Nui northward; and E: Area of possible return from South America, according to Irwin (1992)."

Possible routes between Polynesia and America. Source

Apparently travel from Polynesia to America was possible and during the ENSO (El Niño-Southern Oscillation)events it would be much faster because it weakens easterlies and increases westerlies, pushing sailing boats towards America. Canoes sailing from Rapa Nui (Easter Island) would end up in the Arauco region of Chile.

There have been El Niño events during the Late Pleistocene and the Holocene, some weak, others strong: "The period of greatest activity was during the Early Holocene when at least six such events took place during a period of ca. 3600 years, beginning near the end of the Younger Dryas ca. 12 000 years ago... No severe events took place during the Middle Holocene between ca. 8400 and 5300 years ago, when a wide variety of other paleoclimate proxy records indicate that the El Niño–Southern Oscillation regime was particularly weak. Since ca. 5300 years ago, four of these severe events have taken place. The Late Pleistocene sequence is constrained by only two dates, which indicate that at least ten severe events took place between ca. 38 200 and 12 900 years ago." (Source)

For a brief but clear explanation of the El Niño event and its causes, and consequences, visit this external site: What is the El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) in a nutshell? (the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration).

Menghin, Osvaldo F (1967) in Relaciones transpacíficas de América Precolombina. Runa X: 83-97. Buenos Aires (Trans-Pacific relations in the Pre-Columbian America), argues that we should not limit ourselves to Polynesians only; there were Mesolithic cultures in Melanesia that could have crossed the ocean as early as 5,000 years ago. He pointed out that:

"First, it was doubted that the peoples of pre-Columbian times, especially the Neolithic ones, already possessed boats and the necessary nautical knowledge to be able to cross the ocean. However, this objection has no basis whatsoever. Ocean currents and winds considerably favor navigation in the Pacific. The equatorial current, which flows eastward, reaches the American coast precisely at the point where biogeographical conditions were very favorable for the acclimatization and diffusion of cultures that came from the tropical zone of Asia (Sauer). We are referring to the present-day republics of Panama and Colombia. One can also consider the route used by the Spanish in their voyages between the Philippine Islands and America, from the 16th century onwards. Taking advantage of the predominantly westerly winds north of Hawaii, they sailed towards California and then along the coast south; On their return journeys, they took a more southerly route, favored by the trade winds. Furthermore, we must not underestimate the navigational skills of primitive peoples, even Neolithic ones, and certainly not those who came later. It is well known that the Polynesians built larger and better ships than those Columbus had at his disposal. The Polynesians' nautical knowledge was also highly developed. It's true that around 2000 BC, the Polynesians didn't yet exist as an ethnic group, and the eastern Pacific was generally unpopulated at that time. But the island world of western Oceania is home to very ancient cultures, some even pre-Neolithic. It must be accepted that the inhabitants of this area were excellent mariners as early as the third millennium BC. Otherwise, they could not have made the voyages to Polynesia, whose settlement—despite Heyerdahl's mistaken ideas—did not occur from America, but from the west. They also knew how to return from America. The pre-Columbian spread of the sweet potato from America to Oceania is perhaps an indication in favor of this supposition."

Cultural similarities and differences

Menghini also noted that some opponents of this idea have said that contact from mainland Asia would have introduced rice or eurasian cereals, and of course the wheel and carts, plus domestic animals. However Menghin does not see this as relevant arguing that the wheel and carts, known in Mesopotamia since c.4,000 BC only reache Egypt around 1,600 BC. Carrying domestic animals across the Pacific into America would have been an improbable feat, yet Amerindians knew the art of domestication, doing so with the llama in Peru, Bolivia, and Chile (where it was known as chilihueque). Dogs could have arrived in their boats. Finally, regarding cereals chia, amaranth, maize, beans, potatoes, tomatoes, peanuts, peppers, offered a better alternative for cultivation in American soil.

I agree, the wheel or the cart is useless in the dense Papuan jungle and the rocky and sandy Polynesian islands, the Melanesians didn't use them, and they did not cultivate rice. They thrived on the produce of their own ecosystem, farming sweet potatoes, bananas, sago, yams, taro). The Melanesians could have carried their agricultural skills with them across the Pacific. Interestingly, this would avoid the need of having to reinvent agriculture in America, starting with a band of hunter-gatherers that trekked across Beringia who then discovered agriculture in America and domesticated corn, and other plants there, after coming from a 100% pre-agricultural society.

In a previous post, we have mentioned the similarity between the Polynesian ceremonial adzes and the "toki" of Mapuches, the article by Ramírez Aliaga and Matisoo-Smith (2008) noted this similarity and others. The authors suggest they were caused by cultural contact, and that they are not convergent discoveries (same cultural traits in different parts of the world, that arise by chance).

And also, the Polynesian chicken bones found very close to Mocha Island, in the Arauco peninsula in Patagonia. These bones have been dated to 1364 ± 43 AD, 140 to 180 years before the arrival of the Spaniards.

Other cultural similarities (and they are many!) are the communal work ("minga" in Mapuche language, and "umanga" in Rapa Nui), the pit ovens (a hole dug in the ground, that uses hot stones to cook food. It is called "curanto" by the Mapuche, who still use them, and one has been dated at 6,000 years of age, in Puente Quilo. Polynesians also use them ("Umu" in Tonga and Samoa, Imu in Hawaii, and Hangi in New Zealand). Interestingly, the Polynesians didn't exist six thousand years ago! Finally they mention the "dalca", a canoe made from three planks sewn together, and caulked, used by the Chono people in Western insular Patagonia, and the Veliche of Chiloé Island, is found among the Polynesians and the Chumash natives of California. We will explore the sewn-plank canoes in a future post.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2025 by Austin Whittall © 

The navigating skills of the Southern Tehuelches (Aonikenk)

The Tehuelche people were the original inhabitants of Patagonia, and they lived in the steppe, east of the Andean mountain range (to the west were the Chonos, Mapuches, and Huilliches in what is now Chile). They were the descendants of the ancient Patagonian Paleo-Indians. There are two versions about the origin of the name Tehuelche: one is that it comes from their words tehuel = “south” and chu = “land”, this suffix was later distorted by the Mapuche into che = “people”. The other is that the Mapuche called them chewuel = “surly”, “unsociable” and che = “people”, hence the “unfriendly people.”

We divide the Tehuelche people into two distinct groups, each with cultural and linguistic differences: the Northern Tehuelche (Günnuna Kenna or Gennakenk – which, in their language, meant “people”) and the Southern Tehuelche. The region located between the Senguer, Chubut, and Chico rivers was a flexible border between both groups.

Today's post will focus on the southermost of the Tehuelches and their navigation skills.

Southern Tehuelches and Selk'nam

The Southern Tehuelche were divided into two separate sub-groups, very similar except for their language: The northernmost were the Teushen (Boreal Southern Tehuelche), who lived in the north of central Patagonia, between the Santa Cruz and Chubut rivers. To the south were the Aonikenk or Aonek’enk (Austral Southern Tehuelche), which meant “People of the South.” They lived in the southern area, between the Santa Cruz River and the Strait of Magellan.

On the northern side of Tierra del Fuego Island were the Selk’nam (or Ona), who were “foot Indians” who never adopted an equestrian way of life because horses never reached their island before the arrival of the first white settlers. The Selk’nam were very closely related to the Tehuelche in culture and language; they had become separated from them when the sea level rose and flooded the Strait of Magellan, isolating them on Tierra del Fuego at the end of the last Ice Age.

The watercraft of the Aonikenk

Father Thomas Falkner (1707-1784) was an English Jesuit priest who lived in what is now Argentina in several Jesuit missions where he was in close contact with natives of different Patagonian tribes from 1730 until 1767, when the Spanish crown expelled the Jesuit order from South America. Upon returning to Britain in 1774, he wrote his book, Description of Patagonia, detailing his first-hand knowledge of the region. In it, he described how the natives crossed the Strait of Magellan:

"Tamu, the Yacana-cunnec Cacique, told me that they used a kind of float, with which they sometimes passed the Straits, and had communication with those of his nation". (p.92)

Falkner applied the name Yacanacunnec to what we now call the Aonikenk Tehuelche people. Perhaps "those of his nation" were the Fuegian Selk'nam natives, who were also part of the Chon native peoples, isolated on the Isla Grande, the main Tierra del Fuego Island after the last ice age.

Falkner added on p. 111 some more information:

"The last of the Tehuel nations are the Yacana-cunnees, which signifies foot-people ; for they always travel on foot, having no horses in their country. To the north, they border on the Sehuau-cunnees; to the west, on the Key-yus or Key-yuhues, from whom they are divided by a ridge ot mountains: to the east, they are bounded by the ocean; and to the south, by the islands of Tierra del Fuego or the South Sea. These Indians live near the sea, on both sides of the straits, and oftentimes make war with one another. They make use of light floats, like those of Chiloe to pass the straits."

Chiloe floats

Toribio Medina (Los aborijenes de Chile, 1882, p.188) describes the canoes and balsas of the Araucanians, which they used in rivers, lakes, and to cross between the mainland and Mocha Island (28 km - 17 mi.) They used rushes, reeds, puya, or straw, and tied them into bundles as floats (Read more about these vessels). They hollowed out canoes. Further north in the Peruvian and Chilean Atacama region the natives made floats using sealed sea wolf hides filled with air. But these were not hollow, you had to mount them.

However, I found a Source that mentions a native in Chiloe called Agustín Yapa who "crossed the channels to transport sheep in leather balsas" (Benjamín Vicuña, Catálogo de la biblioteca i manuscritos, 1886. p.44).

"Pelotas" or coracles

Tomás Harrington disagreed with Falkner. Harrington was an Argentine school teacher and ethnologist (1887-1967) who lived and worked in Patagonia, where he interviewed dozens of Tehuelche natives and compiled an extensive native vocabulary and listed many place names. In his Contribución al estudio del Indio Gününa Küne, Revista del Museo de La Plata, Vol.2 No.14 (new series), 1946, p.259) he noted that the name Yacana-cunes can be interpreted as "pedestrian people", and that the Keyus were the people who crossed the Strait. He added that it is impossible to define the racial origin of either group.

However, we have an eyewitness Antonio de Viedma (1742-1797), a Spanish naval officer who explored the coast of Patagonia and trekked inland discovering the lake that bears his name. In his diary (Diario de un viaje a la costa de la Patagonia, para reconocer los puntos en donde establecer poblaciones con una descripción de la naturaleza de los terrenos, de sus producciones y habitantes; desde el puerto de Santa Elena hasta la boca del Estrecho de Magallanes) he recounts his exploration from San Juliá to Lake Videma during which he had to cross the Chico River close to Corpen (map). On the way back the river was flooded:

"Day 27
At 8 a.m. we set off, and at 12 p.m. we reached the banks of the Rio Chico de Santa Cruz. Since the river was very high, the indian Ocopán decided not to ford it; so we stopped at a place they call Chonqueyr.
Day 28
At 5:30 in the morning, the indian Ocopán and Don León de Rosas, who had attempted to cross the river, succeeded and informed me. I intended to cross as they had, but upon reaching a channel, the stable hand couldn't restrain the horses, which bolted. So I ordered the pilot to cross and tell Julián to send me some swimming Indians so as not to risk my life or leave without gathering all the horses. He did so and found Julián at a place they call Quilion, from where he sent me three swimming Indians, equipped with hides and sticks to form a ball [in the original "pelota"] They arrived where I was at sunset and brought guanaco meat for us to eat.
Day 29
At 8:00 a.m., having prepared to cross the river, and feeling that the "pelota" that the indians were mkaking wasn't right, I ordered them to leave it, and that once they were on the other side of the river, I would try to cross with my horse. This was done, and we all crossed without the slightest incident; and continuing our journey, we arrived at Oenna at midday, where I found the pilot returning to join me, and some tents belonging to Chief Julián, whom I had sent for the same purpose; and here we spent the night."

Viedma ratifies the use of floats mentioned by Falkner.

Fifty-one years later Captain FitzRoy and Charles Darwin (the scientist who proposed the theory of evolution through natural selection) left the HMS Beagle to explore the Santa Cruz River from its mouth. They almost reached Lake Argentino before turning back due to lack of supplies. In his description of their journey (where the boat had to be hoisted by the sailors against the river's stron current), FitzRoy mentions the natives and their floats (FitzRoy, R. 1839. Narrative of the surveying voyages of His Majesty's Ships Adventure and Beagle between the years 1826 and 1836, describing their examination of the southern shores of South America, and the Beagle's circumnavigation of the globe. Proceedings of the second expedition, 1831-36, under the command of Captain Robert Fitz-Roy, R.N. London: Henry Colburn. See p. 344)

"...we arrived at the spot whence the smoke had issued, but saw no human beings: though marks of very recent fire, and numerous tracks of feet upon a soft muddy place at the side of the river, showed that a party of Indians had lately crossed over, and a smoke rising at some distance on the southern shore, pointed out where they were gone. At this spot there was about an acre of good pasture land, by the water side: and the breadth of the river itself was something less than usual, reasons which had induced the natives to select it as a crossing place*. To pass a river running at the rate of six or seven miles an hour, and about two hundred yards in width, can be no easy task to women and children. But as we saw many prints of very small feet on the muddy bank, both women and children must have crossed at this place with the men. How did they get over? there is no wood, neither are there rushes with which they might make balsas†. Perhaps some of the women and children were put into rough, coracle-like boats, made of hides‡, and towed across by the horses, holding by whose tails the men swam and perhaps many of the women. This method of holding by the tail, while swimming, is said to be better than resting a hand upon the horse's neck and holding by the mane. None of the Indians sit upon their horses while swimming."
* Marked 'Indian Pass' on the plan.
† Floats or rafts.
‡ "Me envió tres indios nadadores, provisto de cueros y palos para formar una pelota." (Diario de Viedma, p. 58.)

We know tht FitzRoy had read Falkner, and since he also quotes Videma, he probably imagined the coracles based on this information.

Argentine explorer and scientist Francisco Moreno (1852-1919) during his own exploration of the Santa Cruz River, in 1876-77, which reached Lake Argentino, cited FitzRoy's comments and added his own rmarks (See Viaje a la Patagonia Austral. Vol. 1, 1879. See p.256.):

"There is no doubt about the accuracy of these words; the place lends itself easily to crossing, for even though at this point the river is narrower than in other parts and runs at a speed of seven miles per hour, the undulation formed by its course and the disposition of the terrain make it preferable to other points. The Indians also confirm the assertion of the English admiral and have told me that before Pavon Island was populated they crossed the river at this point and at other places located further inland where, although the river is always too deep, as happens at the point I am concerned with, to allow passage on firm foot, they always find more or less ease in crossing it.
They carried it out, and even today they sometimes do, on rafts made of branches and tree trunks that the river carries in its upper course, and when trunks are lacking, as happens here in Chickerook Aiken, they built such rafts, although smaller, with the poles of their tents. On them they placed the small children and the few belongings; the women and men held onto the ends of the poles submerged in the water and swam alongside the raft. This was pulled by a horse, to whose tail it was tied, but before they had horses, the strongest swimmers of the Indians were in charge of steering it. This means of crossing the rivers is not without dangers, and it is frequent that one or more of the indigenous people drown; however, I have sometimes used it with excellent results in my exploration of the Limay and Negro Rivers. Our companion Isidoro assures me that he also knows that this point has been a crossing point for Indians. [a ford]"

This ford was located at Chickerook-Aiken (see approx. location in Google maps).

Allen Francis Gardiner (1794–1851) was a British Royal Navy officer and missionary, who starved to death in Tierra del Fuego, after an unsuccessful attempt to set up a mission among the Yaghans or Yamana. In 1842, he left us a description of a now unknown tribe, the Tachwell (see my post on them) who lived in the Southwestern Andes and frequented the Strait of Magellan. In 1842 Gardiner wrote (Accounts and Papers. COLONIES. Session 2 February 24 August 1843. 33. Vol XXXIII. House of Commons papers, Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons. HMSO, 1843) about them, and one part of his description mentions the use of hide-covered canoes to cross the Patagonian rivers:

"The district by the Tatchwell is wet and rainy and heavily timbered with trees of great size, their tents, dress, and stature is similar to that of the other Patagonian tribes; they have, however, canoes, but these are only employed for crossing rivers, and are merely a light frame covered with guanaco skins. They use no paddles but are towed across by their horses swimming before with a lasso attached to their tails."

Benjamin Bourne in "The Captive in Patagonia" (p.133) describes "boats" used by the Aonikenk to cross rivers. He had been sailing from Connecticut to California in 1849 during the Gold Rush and while stopping for supplies on the northern shores of the Strait of Magellan was taken captive by the Aonikenk and held prisoner. After three months he managed to escape when he saw a boat with a party of white people. They took him to the island on the Santa Cruz River, rescuing him.

Below is his description of native navigation and a plate from his book:

"We moved the next day in a northerly direction, and struck the river Santa Cruz, encamping about an eighth of a mile from its marshy banks...
Three or four days were passed in suspense, which was at last terminated by taking our line of march down the river. We halted at noon, at a point where the banks sloped gently to the water's edge, on either side of the deep and narrow channel. Active preparations were here commenced for crossing. Part of the horses were driven across the river, whilst a portion of the tribe were occupied in building boats to ferry their families and goods across. Their boats are constructed after a simple fashion. A quantity of bushes are cut and dragged down to the margin of the water. They take four tent-stakes, and lay them so as to enclose an area eight feet square, lashing them firmly together at the four corners. Four Indians then raise the stakes from the ground, while others place the skin covering of the tent over the frame, allowing it to sag down three or four feet. The edges of the skin are brought over the stakes, and fastened on the inside. The bushes, made ready for the purpose, are placed within, tops downward, round the entire circumference, and secured to the stakes, till the boat is completely timbered up. The bushes keep the skin distended, and give to the vessel an oval shape, so that, though square at the top, it bears a striking resemblance to a large iron pot. Its length and its breadth of beam are of course equal. When completed, it is firmly lashed from stem to sternpost, and from side to side, with a lariat, or green hide rope, forty feet long, to keep it from spreading or racking. I had no hand in modelling this witch of the wave, but, like an apprentice, did as I was ordered in forwarding the structure, and, when nothing else was required, "held on to the slack." It was at last completed, like the temple of Solomon, without the sound of axe or hammer; neither bolts, trenails nor caulking-iron, were required. We carried the barge down, and launched her in the stream. Two paddles were made by lashing two bladebones of the guanaco to sticks. Squaws, pappooses and baggage, were stowed away, till the boat was laden to the water's edge. I was directed to take passage with the family and household effects of the chief, and seated myself in the centre of the closely-packed craft. One end of a lariat was fastened to the boat, and the other tied to the tail of a horse. A savage mounted, with one rein attached to the wooden bit on the up-stream side. Two others took the oars, one on each side, and a squaw was stationed on the top-gallant forecastle for the purpose of singing, to insure good luck. All is ready. The old horse wades till the depth of water compels him to swim, and the boat is pushed off. The rider floats on the horse's back, kicking the water with his feet, holding the rein in one hand, and grasping the mane with the other. "Chew! chew!" he shouts, at the top of his voice. The black swan in the forecastle opens her capacious mouth and sings, "Yek yah, youri miti! yek yah, youri miti!" The two oarsmen dig away with might and main, while the younger fry swell the chorus with a "Yah! yah! yah!" The boat brings some heavy lurches to the windward, then yaws off to leeward; all owing to those lubberly oarsmen not meeting her with the helm in season. At length, after innumerable shiftings, we reached the opposite shore, and waded up on dry land. Several boats were constructed after the same unique model, and succeeded in crossing safely."

Ferrying the Santa Cruz. Bourne

So, all of these people confirm the use of guanaco hide-covered floats.

Across the Strait of Magellan

An interesting paper (Franklin, W.L. (2022) Guanaco colonisation of Tierra del Fuego Island from mainland Patagonia: Walked, swam, or by canoe? Geo: Geography and Environment, 9, e00110. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1002/geo2.110) explores why does Tierra del Fuego only have one large mammal, the Guanaco, and no rhea or pumas. The answer according to Franklin is that a large eruption by Hudson Volcano some 7,750 years ago wiped out the natives and large terrestrial fauna in the southern tip of Patagnoia, and that "Neither terrestrial vertebrates nor man were replenished from the adjacent mainland for 1000 years because the Strait of Magellan was a complete biogeographical barrier. Guanacos on Tierra del Fuego have lower genetic diversity compared with the mainland, suggesting it is a younger population. Empirical evidence and pivotal events of Patagonia's prehistory support one of three hypotheses: guanacos were introduced to Tierra del Fuego by early Holocene, guanaco-dependent, indigenous peoples from the mainland who repopulated Tierra del Fuego utilising the newly invented, skilfully crafted, seaworthy bark canoe."

Below is an image from Franklin's paper depicting the natives carrying guanaco across the Strait of Magellan.

Franklin therefore suggests " Guanacos and Fuegian dogs to Tierra del Fuego... by bark canoe. I propose that canoeists when they recolonised Tierra del Fuego in the Middle Holocene selectively introduced two ‘utility species’ of mammals to Tierra del Fuego that were of direct survival value for the existence of a terrestrial hunter-gatherer culture on the island: the guanaco because of its importance as a familiar and sustained source of food and skins (clothing and shelters), and the domestic Fuegian dog in a mutualistic relationship for its companionship, protection and hunting abilities..."

The bark canoe is what the Yamana or Yaghan people used until their demise in the late 1800s. However, the Selk'nam Fuegians were not known for owning boats or bark canoes. Their territory was the open grasslands and tundra, bogs and the fringe of the Fuegian Forests, on the north side of Tierra del Fuego. They seldom ventured into the woods of the Southern Andean ridges. They were pedestrian, land people, not sailors or canoe people like the Yamanas or their neighbors, the Alakaluf of the Western and Northwestern Tierra del Fuego canals and fjords. The Alakaluf used dugout canoes made from logs.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2025 by Austin Whittall ©