Saci (pronounced[saˈsi]) is a character inTupi andGuarani folklore. He is a one-leggedblack boy, who smokes apipe and wears a magical red cap that enables him to disappear and reappear wherever he wishes (usually in the middle of adirt devil). Considered an annoyingprankster in most parts of Brazil, and a potentially dangerous and malicious creature in others, he nevertheless grants wishes to anyone who manages to trap him or steal his magic cap. Legend says that a person can trap a Saci inside a bottle when he is in the form of adust devil (see Fig. right where he is portrayed in the center of the whirlwind).
The Saci legend is seen as a combination of native Tupi lore with African-Brazilian and European myth or superstition combined into it. Also, much of the currently told folklore about the Saci is traceable to what writerMonteiro Lobato collected and published in 1917–1918, and the children's book version he created and published in 1921.
According to present-day folklore, this genie can be captured and trapped inside a corked bottle to grant the wishes of its master, or its magic can be acquired by stealing its cap (§ Capturing and subjugating), and the sulfuric smell about the black genie is emphasized, leading to criticism of racism.[a]
The termsaci derives fromTupinambá:çaci meaning "sick eye",[2] or ratherTupinambá:çua ci "evil eye".[3] The suffixed -pererê also derives from Tupinambáperérég meaning "bouncy, jumpy".[3][4][b] The Saci-pererê of myth originally referred to aCuculiformes (cuckoo family) bird, more specifically thestriped cuckoo.[1][5]
German ethnologist Horst H. Figge, who sees extensive influence of AfricanUmbanda religion in Brazilian culture, has argued thatSaci-Cerere can be explained as deriving fromEwe languageasiɖẽɖẽ "one hand", while the formMatimpererê was even more amenable to interpretation as Ewematĩ-[a]fɔɖeɖẽ "without one foot".[6]
Saci-pererê is also known variously assaci-sapererê, -sererê, -saperê, -siriri;saci-triqué;saci-mofera,[1] etc.[7] Eventually the name became fully Portuguesized toMatinta-Pereira [pt],[c] later even earned surnames and calledMatinta-Pereira da Silva or -da Matta.[5][8]
The saci legend as currently known is a composite of folklore and superstition from nativeAmerindian,Black Brazilian, and European myth and superstitio Also appears in Sítio do Picapau Amarelo[9][10] (cf.§ Origin theories)
One informant spoke of three subtypes, theSaci-pererê (pronounced[sɐˈsipeɾeˈɾe]), the stereotypical one-legged black man with red cap and pipe;Saci-trique (pronounced[sɐˈsiˈtɾiki]), bi-racial and a more benign prankster, playing tricks like tying up the tails of animals; andSaci-saçurá (pronounced[sɐˈsisɐsuˈɾa]), with red eyes.[12]
While the Saci often takes the form of the namesake bird (cuckoo, thematiaperê) and remains unspotted.[13][5] He makes whistling noises by day or night, which sounds like "Maty-taperê",[5][15] while others say he sings his melancholy song[13] (cf.§ Trickster on how this deceives people)
He can also appear as a one-legged young boy[d] with red hair (lore ofPará), which has been changed to his wearing a red cap by the influence of civilization.[5] The one-legged boy is always accompanied either by his mother, or an old woman oftapuya or black descent calledtatámanha, dressed in rags (Pará).[5]
Certain details as the smoking the claypipe,[16] and the ability to create whirlwind and to dance and twirl inside it,[17] were part of the folklore solicited in 1917 from the readership ofSão Paulo and its periphery by newspaper contributorMonteiro Lobato, subsequently published in book form in 1918.[18][19]
Saci has a hole in both palms of his hands. A favorite pastime of Saci is passing a lit match through these holes.[20]
Usually an incorrigible prankster, the Saci causes no major harm, but there is no little harm that he won't do. In the barn, he sets farm animals loose,[14] sours the milk,[8] chases horses in the meadow and sucks their blood[22] (in vampiric fashion[13]), torments the chicks, tramples the hens, and spoils the eggs.[23][8] Besides drinking blood, the Saci tangles the horses' manes.[24] This braiding ofelflocks and souring of milk resembles the lore about Germankobolds (cf.schrat), as Monteiro Lobato (1927) had noted.[25]
In the kitchen, he causes soup to burn,[14] or the bean to burn, or drops flies into the soup[23] Ifpopcorn kernels from popping properly, Saci has been interfering.[8]
Given half a chance, he dulls or breaks the tip of theseamstress's needles, makes herthimble roll into a hole, and tangles her sewing threads.[23] He will hides nail scissors[23] and children's toys.[citation needed]
Anything turned upside-down (e.g. nail lying on the ground turned point up.[26]), inside the house or outside on the farmstead, is blamed on the Saci.[8]
Saci can disappear or turn invisible, but all his powers including invisibility is vested in the hat.[27] Also in order to do his deeds unseen, the Saci can transform himself into a bird, thestriped cuckoo (called Matitaperê,Matita Pereira, orsaci in Brazilian Portuguese), whose melancholic song seems to come from nowhere: that is to say, the bird uses high-pitched and low-pitched calls to falsely simulate the closeness/lowness or distance/height of its perch, thus confusing travelers and making them lose the way.[5][28]
He is fond of jugglingembers or other small objects and letting them fall through the holes on his palms.[20] An exceedingly nimble fellow, the lack of his right leg does not prevent him from causing cancer and bareback-riding a horse, and sitting cross-legged while puffing on his pipe (a feat comparable to theHeadless Mule's gushing fire from the nostrils).[citation needed]
However, if offended, Saci is wont to murder the human by tickling or beating.[29]
As aforementioned, the Saci can raise the dust devil (dustywhirlwind) and spin-dance inside it, according to folk belief.[30] It is believed the Saci's whirlwind can be diverted and broken up by casting arosary of whitebeads or a straw cross from Palm Sunday.[30]
The Saci prefers dryness, or is a dessicated being, and dares not cross a waterstream,[13] fearing it will lead to loss of all his powers. Thus one can escape a pursuing Saci by crossing a stream. Another way is to drop ropes full of knots. The Saci is compelled to stop and undo the knots.[citation needed]
One can also try to appease him by leaving behind somecachaça, or sometobacco for his pipe.[20]
One can even capture him by throwing into the dust devil the beads of a rosary seed[31] (or rosary made of grass or sedge[e]), or by pouncing on it using asieve with a cross-shape on it.[20][32] (see Voltolino's painting on right[f]).
The captured Saci can be imprisoned inside a bottle, and be forced to grant wishes in exchange for freedom,[14] just likeAladdin and the Magic Lamp inArabian Nights.[14] But this how the character Pedrinho captures the Saci (lure it inside a dark glass bottle, stoppered by a cork with a cross marked on it) in Monteiro Lobato's children's story (originally published 1921),[34] and the understanding here is that "tales of Saci [which] abound in Brazil and .. traced in more recent history to [Monteiro Lobtato's 1921 children's book]".[14]
If one can steal the Saci's cap, this is another way one will have dominion over him, and make him do your bidding.[27] In the children's story, Pedrinho is instructed to capture and conceal the Saci's hat (endued with all of the Saci's supernatural powers[35]), with which it can regain its power and escape.[36] This is also part of the general present-day folklore, where the magic power transfers to the captor who takes the Saci's cap, but there will be a "lingering odor" on that person for having touched it.[14]
The Saci as it developed in the 19th century[37] and onward, is a composite of Tupi spirit and other layers, partly from African slave culture, and partly from European influence.[9] It has optimistically been characterized as a sort ofmelting pot lore of three races by Alceu Maynard Araújo (1964)[10][g] But different socio-ethnic groups had differing views; the Saci was basically considered to be African or dark-skinned, and certain negative stereotypes about the blacks as held by wealthy landowners and those in power have been reflected into the image of the Saci from those quarters of the population[38] (cf.Monteiro Lobato § Racism in his work and thoughts).
Just assaci is also the name of a bird, the "striped cuckoo", Saci was probably originally an avian myth, asLuís da Câmara Cascudo (1976) has argued.[39] A bird will often perch on just one standing leg, and this can easily lead to the legend that the Saci in human form was one-legged.[40] There is also a myth which castsJaci [pt] the Moon and Saci thecurassow (Portuguese:mutum) bird as former siblings inincestuous love before their transformations, which would explain such names as Jaci-Taperê ("taperadaLua", "ruin or abandoned house of the moon").[41]
However, a more anthropomorphic type of Saci (dubbed "Saci-moleque" or "Saci-imp" by Queiroz), nocturnal and shy, was introduced to Southern Brazil in the late 18th century, from further down south from the Tupi-Gurani population inParaguay, and the Saci underwent further modification in the 19th century. The original ParaguayanYací-Yateré has been described by Cascudo as a redduende about the size of a 7 year-old child, who stole camp fire, having no knowledge how to strike fire.[42] In the name Yací-Yateré,yací ([jaˈsi]) indeed means "Moon" inOld Tupi.
Couto de Magalhães (1876) also held the view that although he knew Saci Cerêrê to be a red capped, small-sizedtapuio like figure, lame in one foot bearing wound marks on each knee, he thought the lore was too contaminated with Christian superstition to know the genuine indigenous lore at the heart of it. Thus the exact role of the Saci Cerêrê in the stewardship of plants was unclear to him, though it must have been assigned one, being a subservient spirit toJaci [pt] who was the supreme mother of all vegetation as well as being a lunar goddess.[43][44]
There have been various origin theories emphasizing the influenced of various ethnic groups, as collated in the studies by Renato da Silva Queiroz (1995a, 1995b). A different picture from Cascudo's on the origins of Saci contended that it was based on the Brazilian-African (Bantu) myth ofDudu Calunga, a one-legged, one-eyed black boy or man, proposed by Antônio Joaquim de Souza Carneiro (1937).[45] But Europe also spoke of the race of the one-leggedSciapod or Monopod goes which might have been a source, since this legend goes back to Classical times, later to be prominently illustrated in printed books.[46]
His red cap is a trait shared by thetrasgo or "goblin", and (while the red cap is common inhousehold spirits all over Europe), thetrasgo in Portuguese lore has all its supernatural powers concentrated in the cap.[36][35][47]
The Saci-Pererê concept shows somesyncretism withChristian elements: he bolts away when faced with crosses, leaving behind a sulphurous smell – classical attributes of thedevil in Christian folklore. It has been argued by Queiroz that Saci's sulfur smell, devilishness, thievery, sorcery, etc., are things that the "rural dominant class" among thePaulistas had ascribed black laboring population, while the common rural folk were free of such bigotry.[24]Monteiro Lobato was not the inventor of the sulfur legend, having only collected it from readers.[48] But Monteiro Lobato's children's book (1921) made Saci familiar to the urban populace, as a heroic figure black color, nevertheless retained the negative stigma of the sulfuric smell and capturability, resulting the modern media subsequently censuring and downplaying those aspects (thus "taming" the Saci from the wild) .[24]
A similar creature of lore isRomãozinho, a mythic black boy who hit his mother and was condemned to roam the fields and forests.[8]
State of São Paulo in 2004 designated that October 31 be celebrated not asHalloween (aka "Dia das Bruxas") but as Saci Day. The nation of Brazil followed suit and made this official in 2010.[49]
A novel species ofdinosauromorph, discovered in 2001 atAgudo (southern Brazil), was namedSacisaurus because thefossilskeleton was missing one leg.[56]
The names of the BraziliansatellitesSACI-1 andSACI-2 werebackronyms on the character's name, as well as fourretrotransposons in theDNA of theflukeSchistosoma mansoni were named Saci-1, Saci-2, Saci-3, and Perere, for their ability to jump around in the parasite'sgenome.[57]
Since the Saci's one-legged physique reminds us of people with aphysical disability, asocial network named SACI (an acronym ofSolidariedade, Apoio, Comunicação e Informação, meaning "Solidarity, Support,Communication, and Information") was created at theUniversity of São Paulo with the purpose of stimulating these four efforts towards the social and medicalrehabilitation of physically disabled people.[58]
Sport Club Internacional (andSocial Futebol Clube) has the figure of Saci as its mascot, owing to the club's popular roots, the red color of his clothing and the fans' hope that the team could pull tricks on their opponents. WhenWason Rentería played for the club, in the 2005 and 2006 seasons, he would often celebrate his goals by doing animpersonation of Saci.
