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Protásio Frikel

German-Brazilian anthropologist (1912–1974) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Protásio Frikel
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Günther Protásio Frikel (24 March 1912 – 27 September 1974), better known as Protásio Frikel, was a German-Brazilian anthropologist and missionary. Frikel conducted extensive field research amongst the Indigenous peoples of North Brazil, especially the Tiriyó people of whom he visited extensively over 20 years. Frikel's research led to the creation of the Parque Indígena Tumucumaque  [pt], an indigenous territory for the Tiriyó.

Quick facts Günther Protásio Frikel, Born ...
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Biography

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Early life and education

Frikel was born in Breslau (modern-day Wrocław, Poland) on 24 March 1912.[1] His father was a watchmaker.[2][3] Frikel studied science in Gymnasium at the Bardel Franciscan Monastery [de] in modern-day Lower Saxony after completing his primary and secondary schooling in Breslau.[1] In 1931, Frikel traveled to Recife, Brazil to become a priest and Franciscan missionary in the Amazon. Frikel studied in Olinda, Pernambuco from 1931 to 1933, then continued his studies in Salvador, Bahia where he was ordained in 1937. Frikel studied theology, philosophy, sociology, psychology, and history. During his studies, Frikel developed an interest in anthropology, Brazilian ethnology, and Afro-Brazilian religions, particularly Candomblé as practiced in Bahia.[4][1] His first publication Die Seelenleehre der Gege und Nagô (The soul doctrine of the Gege and Nagô) published in 1941 in the Revista dos Franciscanos was about anthropology.[2][3]

Missionary work

In 1938, Frikel was assigned to the Territorial Prelature of Santarém, where he served in several parishes until 1957, including Santarém, which administered the mission stations of Alenquer, Óbidos, Faro, Oriximiná, and Juruti.[4] Frikel established a relationship with the Anthropology Department at the Museu Paraense Emílio Goeldi (MPEG) in Belém do Pará.[5][1] As a missionary, Frikel traveled throughout northern Pará and conducted masses, baptisms, weddings, and funerals for the people and communities that he encountered.[3] Frikel conducted missionary work amongst the Munduruku people in the Alto Tapajós region.[2] He also established Missão Tiriyó, a mission in the Amapa-Para border region.[6]

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Frikel, as a Franciscan missionary, playing with a baby at a zoo run by the Goeldi Museum.

While serving as a missionary, Frikel pursued his anthropological interests by collecting material and noting observations about the people he served.[5][3] He encountered and documented several archeological sites, such as sambaquis and terra preta mounds, and indigenous communities along the banks of the many tributaries of the Amazon river.[7] Beginning in 1944, Frikel shifted his focus from missionary work to ethnographic fieldwork. During his first expedition conducted from November to December in 1944, Frikel met the Kaxuyana people [pt] along the Cachorro River.[1][7] Frikel attempted to make contact with other indigenous groups in the region, such as the Kahyana and Parukoto people. In 1949, Frikel met members of the Tiriyó people for the first time and developed an intense interest in their culture. In 1950, Frikel visited the Tiriyó for the first time.[8]

Frikel visited many communities and was noted by Lucia Hussak van Velthem, a colleague at the MPEG, to have "visited virtually all of the remote and difficult-to-access indigenous villages in northern Pará". Frikel is known to have made contact with the Kaxuyana [pt], Parukotó, Wayana, Aparaí, and Tiriyó people.[3] In a 1957 publication, Frikel mentions that he's encountered over 30 distinct indigenous communities such as the Aramayana, the Maraxó, and the Okómoyana who are broadly lumped together as the Tiriyó people.[8] Frikel also studied the Mocambeiros, the descendants of enslaved Africans who escaped slavery and sought refuge as maroons along the Trombetas, Curuá, and Cuminá rivers in Pará.[9][3]

Shift to anthropological research

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Frikel with his wife, Marlene, on a boat near the indigenous village of Catté, Pará, in 1963.

In 1963, Frikel became a Brazilian citizen and joined the MPEG.[a] That same year, Frikel left the Franciscan order to focus on his anthropological research.[10][3] Frikel later became an alternate director of the Anthropology Department at the MPEG.[3][11] He later married Marlene, who accompanied him on numerous field trips to Indigenous communities to conduct anthropological research.[3]

German anthropologist Hans Becher notes that Frikel's most notable work was on the culture and traditions of the Tiriyó.[3] From 1940 to 1974, Frikel made 13 trips to different Tiriyó communities to study their language and culture.[8] Over his many visits to their communities, Frikel documented how the Tiriyó way of life changed through contact with outsiders.[12] Despite initially being a Franciscan priest, Frikel was critical of evangelization missions to indigenous Brazilians and believed that "no mission has the right to detach the Indian [sic] from his traditions".[3] His research contributed to the creation of the Parque Indígena Tumucumaque  [pt], an indigenous territory for the Tiriyó, in 1968 or 1969.[3][11]

Frikel collected newly made items created by indigenous people for trade and sale for museums in Austria, Germany, Denmark, and Sweden.[3]

Death and legacy

Frikel passed away on 27 September 1974 in Belém do Pará.[13] His widow Marlene da Silva Frikel sold Frikel's anthropological findings to his former colleagues to financially support herself.[14] As of 2017, the majority of Frikel's legacy can be found at MPEG, the Landesmuseum Hannover (NLMH) in Hannover, Germany, and the Museum of Archeology and Ethnology of the University of São Paulo. As of 2017, objects gathered by Frikel can be found at MPEG, the Museu do Ipiranga in São Paulo, Brazil, the Museum am Rothenbaum in Hamburg, Germany, and NLMH. The MPEG collection consisted of over 2,600 objects from over 15 different indigenous groups.[15]

As of 2021, the MPEG had boxes with around 50,000 archaeological items collected by Frikel throughout Pará and Amazonas. In 2006, Brazilian researchers found that over 90% of the items had not yet been analyzed.[3]

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Academic legacy

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Frikel was a member of nine academic associations: the Associação Brasileira de Antropologia [pt], Current Anthropology, the New York Academy of Sciences, the Swiss Society of Americanists [de], the American Anthropological Association, the Instituto de Antropologia e Etnología do Para, the Instituto Brasileiro de Educação, Ciência e Cultura [pt], Ethnologische Gesellschaft Hannover, the Institute for Encyclopedia of Human Ideas on Ultimate Reality and Meaning.[13]

Publications

Selected works include:[16]

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Notes

  1. [a]
    One source says he joined as a scientist in the anthropological department,[10][11] whereas another says his joined as an anthropologist.[3]

References

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