When the first Europeans arrived in Brazil in 1500 it was home to over 10 million Indians. Five centuries of murder, torture, disease and exploitation ravaged this population, and by the 1950s their population had plummeted to an all time low of about 100,000.
Eminent senator and anthropologist Darcy Ribeiro estimated that last century one tribe became extinct every year. He also predicted there would not be a single Indian left by 1980. Almost 1,500 tribes are believed to have become extinct since 1500.
Others are so reduced in size that they number fewer than the 11 people in a football team:
5: Akuntsu tribe (Rondônia state)
4: Juma tribe (Amazonas state)
3: Piripkura tribe (Rondônia state)
2: Indians of the Tapirapé River (Maranhão state). (One may now be dead)
1: ‘The Last of his Tribe’/ ‘The Man in the Hole’ (Rondônia state)
The last survivors of the Akuntsu people. All the other members of the tribe have been wiped out.
