A Straw Man: The Real Meaning behind the Amazon "Astronaut" Suit

4/18/2012

This week H2 has been running a promotional spot for a rerun of Ancient Aliens (S03E05) in which Giorgio Tsoukalos rhapsodizes about the way an Amazonian cult outfit (below right) looks so much like an "astronaut suit" (below left) that it must be proof that the aliens visited:

“The appearance of Bep-Kororoti has been preserved to this day, in fact it’s a medicine man wearing a straw suit, and that straw suit looks eerily similar to a modern day astronaut suit.”

I don't see it. There is no oxygen pack, for one thing. Among other things this looks is:

1. A beekeeper.

The Beekeepers by Pieter Bruegel the Elder

2. An old-timey scuba-diver.

3. The Venus of Willendorf

Or, you know, anyone who's fat.

This particular straw man (literally, I guess) is the Kayapo tribe's revered and feared shaman Bep Kororot. In The Gold of the Gods (1973), Erich von Daniken made a big (and racist) deal of how the suits worn by the "wild Indians" resembled astronauts' suits even as far back as 1952, "At a time when the clothing and equipment of astronauts was still not familiar to all us Europeans, let along these wild Indians!" (pp.144-146). Von Daniken then quotes the legend of Bep Kororot as told by Joao Americo Peret, who had already expressed sympathy for the ancient astronaut theory before relating the story to von Daniken and therefore had every reason to subtly shade the tale to make it sound as though this were an extraterrestrial being who descended from the sky. This is what Peret said in the 1970s, when talking with von Daniken:

Bep Kororoti walked backwards to the far edge of the Pukato Ti. With his 'kop' he destroyed everything that was near to him. By the time he had reached the very top of the mountain range, trees and bushes had turned to dust. Suddenly there was a tremendous crash that shook the whole region and Bep Kororoti vanished into the air, surrounded by fiery clouds, smoke and thunder. By this earthshaking event the roots of the bushes were torn from the ground and the wild fruits destroyed. Game disappeared so that the tribe began to suffer from hunger. (p. 149)

The funny thing, of course, is that old Von Daniken presented this as though it was his own discovery. But this figure was well known to Claude Levi-Strauss, who reported on him in The Raw and the Cooked (1983), using anthropological reports collected years earlier. In standard anthropological reports, Bep Kororoti is correctly identified not as an ancient astronaut but as a human being, a deceased shaman who exercises spiritual power from beyond the grave. It would be a bit difficult for an alien wearing a spacesuit--one who does not breathe oxygen--to have mated with earth women and produced children, as Bep Kororoti did. Surely even the "wild Indians" would have noticed if one of their number were another species and unable to breathe air.

Most importantly, Bep Kororoti is the protector of bees in Kayapo myth. That's the real reason for the suit. As I mentioned above, it looks like a beekeeper's suit because it is: it represents the beekeeping ancestor spirit.

18 Comments

Brett Allen

2/19/2013 07:51:43 pm

You left out a pertinent fact from your article... Bep-kororoti actually, means "from space." Kind of makes ya wonder, huh?

Jason Colavito link

2/19/2013 10:37:05 pm

That's what Erich von Daniken says, but I have not been able to confirm that in the anthropological literature. I don't trust von Daniken as far as I can throw him. According to Claude Lévi-Strauss, his name refers to the sky only in the sense that he personified storms, which come from the sky.

fin

7/21/2013 12:23:46 pm

YOU SUCK MEN! BIIIGGG TIIMMEEE!!!

Huey

10/28/2019 12:22:12 am

Everyone has an opinion.. but just because the astronaut suit was yet to have been invented does not prove they had (or something similar) not existed else where in the universe..

Australian aboriginal cave paintings are just to compelling.. so to megalithic foundations of many sites around the planet.. very compelling indeed.. and that's before any construction is carried out..

Van D has proved over and over for mine that stone age and pre stone age beings mixed with aliens.. 'Angels descending from heaven and copulating with locals.. Like the great flood that nuked almost everything.. is all in the bible..and as Van D insists.. He's a devout Catholic and believe in god creator and was educated by Jesuits.. but Wat Ezekiel saw ..Enoch and others were not angels.. but Aliens..who.. of course we're worshipped and thought to be god(s) 😊
😊🐬NB.. Van D is not trying to trick anyone.. the 'tricking'..or probably really.. miss-interpritation was done long ago..probably in good faith..!
HB..

Gilgaflesh

11/9/2019 03:14:22 pm

Erich von Daniken was officially diagnosed as a pathological liar by a court psychiatrist. This happened during a trial against him for fraud.

I'm sure he doesn't need to try to trick anyone. I think it goes naturally for him. Ancient aliens aside, the leaps of logic in his books are larger than the distance between the Earth and the nearest inhabitable world.

Eric Shaw link

7/28/2022 03:20:37 pm

You're the one grasping at straws. The suit doesn't look any more like a beekeeper than it looks like an astronaut suit. Most tribes use these as ceremonial costumes not worshipping bees or beehives, they eat them daily in some places without suits. They do these ceremonies to the gods, no ifs ands or buts about it, it's a An'cient astronaut ceremonial suit. Just as the Selk'Nam named after NAM'MA of the Sumerian creation stories of the Anunnaki, An-un-na-ki.

Robert Wulf

6/14/2013 11:59:09 am

I will point to the obvious points you presented in your argument against the indigenous beliefs. A "diving suit," Really? You argue a guy in a diving suit just showed up in the Amazon then went mountain climbing, and that's a realistic rationalization? Regarding the bee keeping. These indigenous people still keep bees, are you arguing they do not know the difference between a bee keeping suit and the constructed ceremonial wear? Really? Almost 20 years of constant research has me taking the oral histories and beliefs of many people more seriously, especially in light of the continuous discoveries that are surfacing. Some Pacific Islanders pray to the Dog Star. It cannot be seen with the naked eye and yet they know where it is every day of the year and can point to it saying the fish men came from there and will return someday. How do they even know about it if it cannot be seen, and this is a very ancient belief. It is good to be careful regarding what we say we know, but it takes no talent to be a skeptic, only ignorance of presentable facts and possibilities, a closed mind, relying on our own ageing dogmas and a belief that oneself has all of the answers.
I do not know what the answer is, but I can definitely say that I do not believe a deep sea hard hat diver showed up in the central Amazon area and kept bees when he wasn't climbing mountains.
Funny, you made no mention of the weapons they say killed animals, destroyed rocks and trees, killed animals without leaving a mark, and nothing about his ability to knock out warriors. He probably just had a good stinger.

6/14/2013 12:22:36 pm

And the Greek remembered the Southern Cross long after it was no longer visible in the Northern Hemisphere. Stars change but memories remain. Which Pacific Islanders claim fish men came from Sirius? I am not aware of this and would like to know specifically which groups.

You apparently didn't get the point that I was trying to say that claiming the suit is a space suit makes no more sense than relating it to any other puffy suit. I was NOT saying it was a diving suit, or the Venus of Willendorf for that matter.

What is there to say of the wonder weapons? They are not different than the wonder weapons of any other set of myths, and are no evidence of the reality of these exaggerations of real weapons.

7/21/2013 12:34:48 pm

BRO! AGEN YOU SUCKED!!! YOUR MIND IS CLOSE!!! YOUR A STUPID IGNORANT PIECE OF SHIT!!! how can you even explained that mayan civilization predict that a star will again show up on the same date again after 26,000 years??? and how can they even relate stars if they doesnt have any spaceships to go the skies?! are you stupid or really just want to have a name? ATT's are yes ambitious because theyre telling us that MAYBE, IF OR WHAT IF aliens really exist way back BC time.. BUT YOU ARE MORE AMBITIOUS DREAMING THAT YOU WILL BECOME A FAMOUS STUPID CRITIC OF ANCIENT ALIENS EPISODES! DUDE! AGEN AND AGEN! YOUU SUUCKKEDD!!!!

choi

8/10/2013 02:23:03 pm

Fin, morons like you are exactly the reason why these fraudsters are making money. But I totally understand. An idiot like you will never know if you have been duped. A 1st grader can even write better than you.

Toon Pimpinz

9/12/2013 10:55:45 pm

lolz look at these idiots parroting stichin and daniken. u got the first grader who thinks you need a spaceship to understand star movement, then u got the wulf guy who makes outrageous claims without any citation. he even completely misunderstands what jason was saying. if you cant comprehend the article you just read, then you obviously didnt comprehend whatever crap made u believe about the dog star. u speak of facts, but present none. and its obvious u confused this dog star myth of the islanders with what daniken and company preach about the african tribe. which was proven to be another made up lie from daniken. get your fake facts straight. there is no culture on this planet that worships the "dog star" (which is like a 1st graders name for it) and you cant prove it

ygor

1/1/2014 03:56:03 am

Dude, do not be stupid! you are forgetting to mention the details of the legend of the Indians Kaiapo, which is well detailed how this creature came to them.

james donaldson link

6/3/2014 08:35:26 pm

These native most likely use ayahuasca, which contains the powerful drug DMT,(Dimethyltryptamine). research done by Rick Strassman in the 1990's shows that most users encounter Alien like beings in their hallucinations, but the visions are so strong strong that is seems as if the user has been transported to a different realm where they can communicate with other beings. Participants said that sometimes these beings had advance technologies to those on earth. thus, the straw man ritual may be related to the pseudo religious ceremony of drinking ayahuasca and the beings they encounter during the mind trip.

11/15/2014 07:02:53 am

I feel ambiguous about this story. I don't consider myself a die-hard sceptic or believer, and unfortunately there are no Kayapo Indians for me to question. All I got are titbits of information, translated and interpreted by multiple sources, from a tribe which doesn't possess written records.

I do feel I need to point out, that among many Indian tribes it is socially accepted for spouses to have extramarital intercourse. In case of impregnation the husband will by default be considered the father. The biological progenitor is irrelevant. I'm not acquainted enough with the Kayapo Indians to know if they shared this custom, but if they did, Bep Kororoti, whoever he was, did not have to have intercourse in order to become a father.

The bee-keeper angle is interesting. I did not realize Amazonian Indians may have constructed protective clothing to deal with bee's. Either as a keeper or as a honey collector. Of course it doesn't fit all elements of the myth, but myths are hardly renowned for logic. It is more than worth considering.

Of course I can't help agreeing that this story is awkwardly scifi-ish. A heavenly visitor in a shining suit wielding a thunder weapon that destroys rock, all pretty impressive. The way he purportedly left, by being catapulted into the sky by a bent tree, less so.

If only I knew some Kayapo indians.

jasmine

5/20/2016 06:02:03 am

you forgot to mention that the legend also tells of how Bep Kororoti was distraught when one of his devices went missing, he was quite angry and became withdrawn ...apparently the device was important to him for returniing to his people in the 'sky'/'space' ....there are many more details of this special being that you did not mention but selectively and in a cursory manner avoid, perhaps in order to favor your attempt to debunk the alternate hypothesis of a space visitor ( i dont know maybe interdimensional etc ).....but why such a close mind? ....your arguement still does not sway me from considering the real possiblity of an interaction between an alien ? species and natives of the amazonian jungle. What about the kachinas....you know our old testament and Ezekiel is fascinating and what about the pillar of cloud by day and pillar of light by night shadowing the jews when they were wandering in the wilderness?....would it bother you if we demote Jehovah to an alien intelligence toying with humans as their pet project ?
lol

5/20/2016 12:32:47 pm

Well can you give a link for the complete story? I didn't find any source that mentions Beb had "devices". Seems strange that indians whom don't even have devices would have a word for "device".

In my experience the obscure websites about ufo's and conspiracies tend to fantasize additional details that simply don't occur in the original tales or scientific literature. Take Puma Punka for instance. Every UFO website out there claims that the city is made from rock which was too hard to be worked by low-tech humans. But in actual fact, the city was made almost entirely from sandstone and clay.

And if that pillar of light & smoke even occurred it was likely a vulcano. Since they tend to blast out light and smoke. Not that I understand why a few thousand year old book is considered fact enough for anyone to bother interpreting. There are myths equally old that I doubt you'd believe at all. So why this one? Because you can twist it into aliens?

Instead of wondering why skeptics are closed-minded I think the real questions should be: why do believers have tunnel-vision? Why don't they check more reliable sources before making up their mind? What is it about comic sans pink-on-black websites written by an anonymous internetter that they consider more reliable than a scientific publication?

5/20/2016 12:37:19 pm

*That should ofcourse be Puma punku.

Cristiano Gomes

6/28/2020 09:22:49 am

EN

Thanks to the author of this article! I am Brazilian, and I was researching this subject (Bep Kororoti), indignant that there is so little information in my own country about it. In addition to being a conscious source, I believe that your hypothesis that this "space being" was a creation, albeit indirect, of the author of the book about ancient astronauts is the one that best explains this mystery. Congratulations!

PT-BR:

Obrigado ao autor desse artigo! Eu sou brasileiro, e estava pesquisando esse assunto (Bep Kororoti), indignado por haver tão pouca informação no meu próprio país sobre isso. Além de ser uma fonte consciente, acredito que sua hipótese de que esse "ser do espaço" foi uma criação, ainda que indireta, do autor do livro sobre astronautas antigos seja a que melhor explica esse mistério. Parabéns!