Kawésqar

The English and other Europeans initially adopted the name that the Yahgan (also known as Yámana), a competing Indigenous tribe whom they met first in central and southern Tierra del Fuego, used for these people: "Alacaluf" or "Halakwulup" (meaning "mussel eater" in the Yahgan language). Their own name for themselves (autonym) is Kawésqar. == Economy ==

Like the Yahgan in southern Chile and Argentina, the Kawésqar used to be a nomadic seafaring people, called canoe-people by some anthropologists. They made canoes that were eight to nine meters long and one meter wide, which would hold a family and its dog. They continued this fishing, nomadic practice until the twentieth century, when they were moved into settlements on land. Because of their maritime culture, the Kawésqar have never farmed the land. == Population ==

The total population of the Kawésqar was estimated not to exceed 5,000. They ranged from the area between the Gulf of Penas (Golfo de Penas) to the north and the Brecknock Peninsula (Península de Brecknock) to the south. The Little Ice Age, lasting from the 17th to the 19th centuries, may also have had a negative impact on the Kawésqar population. Through the late 19th and early 20th centuries, numerous missionaries and anthropologists moved among the Indigenous peoples to record, study and, in the case of the missionaries, proselytise them. ==Kawésqar in human zoos==

, dressed in huanaco skins" () In 1881, European anthropologists took eleven Kawésqar people from Patagonia to be exhibited in the Bois de Boulogne in Paris, and in the Berlin Zoological Garden. Only four survived to return to Chile. Early in 2010, the remains of five of the seven who died in Europe were repatriated from the University of Zurich, Switzerland, where they had been held for studies. Upon the return of the remains, Chilean president Michelle Bachelet formally apologized for the state having allowed these Indigenous people to be taken out of the country to be exhibited and treated like animals. ==See also==