Boitatá

The Boitatá is a fiery serpent of Brazilian folklore, a glowing snake of flame whose name comes from Tupi words for "snake" and "fire," seen at night over fields, rivers, and marshes.

The Name

The name Boitatá comes from Tupi, the language spoken along much of the Brazilian coast when the Portuguese arrived. Mboî means snake and tatá means fire, so the Boitatá is the "fire snake." Spellings vary widely, and in Guaraní-speaking regions of Paraguay, Argentina, and Uruguay a similar being is called Mboi Tata.

The Earliest Record

The Boitatá is one of the first Brazilian supernatural beings written down by a European. In 1560 the Jesuit missionary José de Anchieta, writing from São Vicente on the coast of São Paulo, described beings the Indigenous people called baetatá, which he explained meant "thing of fire." Nothing could be seen of them, he wrote, but a flashing fire darting here and there, especially along the seashore and rivers, and they were said to attack and kill people. Anchieta listed them alongside the forest spirit Curupira as beings the Indigenous people feared.

The Story

Over the following centuries the Boitatá became part of Brazilian rural folklore, and its story grew. A well-known version from Rio Grande do Sul, retold by the writer João Simões Lopes Neto in Lendas do Sul (1913), tells of a long night and a great flood that killed many animals. A huge serpent survived by eating only the eyes of the dead animals, and the light from all those eyes filled its body until it glowed. It grew thin and died, but its shining ghost still wanders the fields at night.

In other regions the Boitatá is a guardian of fields and forests that punishes people who set fires carelessly, or a fiery snake that chases travelers. The folklorist Luís da Câmara Cascudo, the great collector of Brazilian folk belief, recorded many regional forms and noted its kinship with fiery apparitions in European folklore.

Appearance and Powers

The Boitatá is almost always a serpent made of fire or light, sometimes with huge glowing eyes. It glides over open fields, marshes, and riverbanks at night. Many writers have linked these sightings to the will-o'-the-wisp, the pale lights caused by marsh gas that also inspired ghost stories in Europe.

Legacy

The Boitatá is a regular figure in Brazilian children's books, school lessons on folklore, and television. It is celebrated on Brazil's Folklore Day, August 22, alongside the Saci and the Curupira.

Related

• Amaru: The Amaru is a great mythical serpent of Andean and Inca tradition, a creature of the underground waters, sometimes two-headed or winged, whose emergence was linked to floods, landslides, and the upheaval of the world.
• Xiuhcóatl: Xiuhcóatl is the fire serpent of Aztec religion, a turquoise-scaled serpent with an upturned snout that served as the weapon of the war god Huitzilopochtli and as an emblem of the fire god Xiuhtecuhtli.
• Gaasyendietha: Gaasyendietha is the fire-dragon of Seneca tradition, a powerful serpent-like being identified with the meteor, which lives in deep lakes and rivers and flies between them trailing flames.
• Dragons Across Cultures
• Dragon Legends

Sources and Further Reading

• José de Anchieta, Cartas, informações, fragmentos históricos e sermões (Academia Brasileira de Letras, 1933)
• Luís da Câmara Cascudo, Dicionário do Folclore Brasileiro (Instituto Nacional do Livro, 1954)
• João Simões Lopes Neto, Lendas do Sul (1913)

Cite this entry: “Boitatá,” Draconika Encyclopedia of Dragons, https://www.draconika.com/dragons/boitata.