Native peoples thumbnail|right|A Payagua chief The homeland of the Guarani people was eastward from the Paraguay River, in the Misiones Province of Argentina and southern Brazil and as far east as the Atlantic coast near Rio de Janeiro. Their pre-Columbian population is estimated at between 300,000 and one million. With the arrival of Europeans, the population rapidly decreased due to epidemics of European diseases. The Guaraní were united only by language and cultural similarities. No political structure existed above the village level. The Guaraní were a semi-sedentary agricultural people.
Native peoples thumbnail|right|A Payagua chief The homeland of the Guarani people was eastward from the Paraguay River, in the Misiones Province of Argentina and southern Brazil and as far east as the Atlantic coast near Rio de Janeiro. Their pre-Columbian population is estimated at between 300,000 and one million. With the arrival of Europeans the population rapidly decreased due to epidemics of European diseases. The Guaraní were united only by language and cultural similarities. No political structure existed above the village level. The Guaraní were a semi-sedentary agricultural people.