than people from the western world attribute to names as well. They believe that names are central to the definition of who a person is and the groups to which he or she belongs; therefore, they pick their names very carefully. Today the Suyá live in a single village of about two hundred inhabitants on the banks of the Suiá-Miçu River. They speak a language belonging the northern branch of the Gê language family. They hunt, fish, gather supplies, and trade with frontier settlements to get their basic needs. They are also protected from frontier violence and the national market economy by a reservation system that intermittently provides health care and material goods and involves them in a new multiethnic social system. Their myths claim that, although the Suyá society always existed, in the beginning the people had no fire, no names, no garden crops, no lip-disc ornaments, and few songs. They acquired fire from the jaguar, garden crops from the mouse, lip discs from enemy Indians, names from a cannibal people living under the ground, and songs from all of these. References External links (eng) "Kisêdjê", Instituto Socioambiental Xingu peoples Indigenous peoples in Brazil Indigenous peoples of the Amazon