cuchivilo - Wikilingue - Encydia
The cuchivilo or cuchivilu (of the dialectal Castilian cuchi: pig and of the mapudungun filu: snake), it is a fantastic aquatic animal of the mythology chilota. There assume to him the ravages that take place in the corrals of fishing (a traditional method of fishing of Chiloé, left in the decade of 1980 for legal dispositions).
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Description
The cuchivilo is a creature of the size of a marine wolf that the merger seemed between a pig and a snake, since the top part, head and forelegs, they are those of a pig of repulsive appearance, and the back is that of a snake or snake marína).
Legend
According to the legend, the cuchivilos would live at the bottom of the sea, in areas slightly deep and near to the shores of the islands of the interior sea of Chiloé. The same way they usually go to swim to estuaries, lagoons or marshes; reason for which it is necessary to be careful than on having bathed in these places, since if someone bathes in the same waters where this being was, to a little time there would be covered the body of grains or of mange. The same way it is dangerous to listen to it, since its croaking similar to that of a pig, he announces that the person who listens to it, will have a short life.
Since the gluttons, this creature him like rolling about in the mud, and one believes that it is always hungry. The seafood and the fish are its favorite food and for this reason the fact is that it gets in the fishing corrals. In addition to eating and destroying the fish caught in the corral, it destroys the construction and roots in the sand in the same way that would make it a normal glutton in the ground. Nevertheless, main problem of the visit of the cuchivilo to the corral is not the damage, but after the attack, the corral remains damned and it will never turn to catch only one fish in him. To remove the curse, it is necessary to realize a magic ceremony known with the name of cheputo or threputo; in that the persons must strike the rims of the corral with laurel branches smoked with "mapucho (tobacco chilote).
See also
- Cuyancúa
References
- Narcissus García Barría. Mythological treasure of the archipelago of Chiloé: interpretive sketch. Andres Bello, 1997
ISBN 9561315165, 9789561315167
