The Yagans: a recent genocide
Danilo Anton

The elimination of one of the most resilient cultures of America due to the Chilean-Argentine conquest and colonization of their territories.

The yagans or yamanes constituted one of the native peoples of America that lived in one of the most hostile environments of the continent where they were able to develop effective strategies that allowed them to effectively adapt.
They lived south of Tierra del Fuego, from the northern bank of the Beagle Channel to Cape Horn and Isla de los Estados.
It is a cold climate zone, with monthly temperatures varying between -2 and 9 degrees on average, with abundant precipitation in the form of rain or snow and frequent strong winds from the west. The water that can be more or less salty depending on the season, remaining cold all year round oscillating between 2 and 8 degrees above zero.

While weather conditions are uncomfortable, the presence of cold, oxygen-rich waters with abundant fish, invertebrates, mammals and seabirds provide an important source of food. In addition, on the protected slopes of the adjacent mountains there are trees of various species also adapted to the cold and windy character of the local climate. These are trees (generally of the genus Nothofagus), with capacity to live in a thin layer of soil, cold temperatures all year and very strong winds.
The yagans used this environment skillfully developing a fishing and harpoon culture that allowed them to feed themselves and obtain other raw materials to manufacture their clothing, tools and other needs for their subsistence. The yagans lived in houses built with structures of tree branches covered by leathers. Their clothes were made with leathers of sea lions or locally, of guanacos. The canoes were constructed with barks of trees and they covered the bottom with a layer of sand and pebbles where they kept a permanent fire.

The canoes were conducted by the women from behind and men did the harpooning (dolphins and whales) from the bow of the boat. When they harpooned a prey women dived into the water to pick them up.
According to the references of the first chroniclers the population of the yagans was originally of about 3,000 to 5,000 individuals.
The Chilean and Argentinean colonization of Yagan territory occurred late in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The impact of the arrival of the advanced creoles was lethal. Newcomers seized land and coastal areas, displacing, enslaving, and even killing those who resisted. 

The Chilean advance was brutal, a colonizing landowner, José Menéndez, created a kind of lordship in the South based on the exploitation of sheep wool and other local products not hesitating to execute the indigenous families as if they were hunting prey. The arrival of the Argentina colonists was similar. The yaganes were quickly eliminated in order to seize their lands, establish estates, and affirm the creole sovereignty of the Buenos Aires authorities. The yagans could not prevent that their places of habitation, fishinng and hunting were occupied by the newcomers. Massacres, diseases and acculturation eliminated without pause the vulnerable Yagan communities.

As it is pointed out, at present there is only one woman Yagan pure survivor. Her name is Cristina Calderón, and she lives in the  Villa Ukika in the vicinity of Puerto Williams (Navarino Island) on the southern shore of the Beagle Channel.
The Chilean-Argentine genocide of one of the most astonishing and resilient cultures in the Americas is almost over. The southern sovereignties of Argentina and Chile are finally consolidated.
There will be the habitual mention to be made of these ancient inhabitants in the tourist circuits and, perhaps, the sale of handicrafts, more or less related to the old cultures, that will be no more than a pale caricature of the intrepid, strenuous and old indomitable Nation of the yaganes at the southern tip of the American continent.
Danilo Antón