Vasitri

Vasitri Illustration of the vasitri by Philippe Coudray in Guide des Animaux Cachés (2009). Category Wildman Proposed scientific names Other names Achi, vasuri Country reported Venezuela First reported 1825 Prominent investigators

The vasitri (Maipuran: "big devil") was a wildman reported from Venezuela's Upper Orinoco region, famous for being discussed by naturalist Alexander von Humboldt.

Description

The vasitri was described as a "hairy man of the woods", and was reputed to build huts, carry off human women, and devour human flesh. It was dreaded by both natives and foreign missionaries, who believed in its reality.

Sightings

Undated

A Father Gili told Alexander von Humboldt that a woman of San Carlos in Venezuela's Llanos region was once abducted by a vasitri, eventually giving birth to children which were "a little hairy also". She and the vasitri lived in domestic harmony, and the afterwards praised its "gentle character and attentions," only consenting to be rescued by some hunters because she was "weary of living far from the church and the sacraments". The hunters did not see the vasitri.

Theories

Humboldt suggested that the vasitri could be a spectacled bear (Tremarctos ornatus), but this theory has been criticised.

Humboldt regarded the vasitri as likely to be a new species of bear, as their footprints resemble those of men and they are alleged to attack women, but his theory is widely criticised as George Eberhart points out, the only known South American bear, the spectacled bear (Tremarctos ornatus), is found in the montane forests on the opposite side of the continent. Philip Henry Gosse also criticised this theory, commenting that a Venezuelan bear with the features of the vasitri would be no less unusual than a genuine wildman. Eberhart suggests that stories of the vasitri could refer to any one of a number of aggressive, cannibalistic Indian tribes of the Amazon, who used to abduct women of neighbouring tribes. Regardless of his own thoughts, Humboldt encouraged travellers who might visit the Orinoco region to investigate the vasitri, and discover whether it was an unknown bear or "some very rare monkey".

Philippe Coudray, on the other hand, suggests that the vasitri could be a descendant of putative New World neanderthals, which would have been pushed down to South America when the larger, stronger Bigfoot-type giant hominids arrived afterwards. Gosse also supported the idea that it could be an unknown anthropoid ape, as its more unusual reputed characteristics (building huts and abducting women) were also believed of the gorilla by African natives.