Staden, Hans b. (?) 1525; Homberg, Hesse d.(?)
Author of a popular travel narrative of sixteenth-century Brazil published under the title of Warhafftig historia und beschreibung einer landschafft der wilden, nacketen, grim- migen menschenfresser leuthen in der Newen Welt America gelegen...
(True History and Description of a Territory of the Wild, Naked, Fierce Cannibal People Located in the New World of America, 1557). Staden may have participated in the War of the Schmalkaldic League (1546—1547) before traveling to Lisbon in 1547. After a journey to Pernambuco on a commercial vessel in 1548, tales of rich Indian kingdoms in Spanish America lured Staden back to the New World two years later. Due to unforeseen circumstances, he was back in Portuguese Brazil by 1552 and became commander of a remote military outpost on the island of Santo Amaro. In late 1553 or early 1554 he was captured by cannibalistic Tupinamba Indians and, after a lengthy ordeal, was freed a year later by the captain of a French privateer. Following his return to Europe, Staden became a citizen of Wolfhagen (Hesse) in 1556, learned the making of gunpowder, and published a book on his experiences in the university town of Marburg. His whereabouts after 1557 are unknown.Staden’s book, which was dedicated to the landgrave Philip of Hesse and illustrated with over fifty woodcuts in the first edition, is divided into a narrative part, detailing his adventures among the Tupinamba, and an ethnographic part. Cannibalism forms a leitmotif, especially in the first section: Staden is constantly threatened by death, repeatedly witnesses
anthropophagous practices, and narrowly escapes being killed and eaten himself on several occasions. Courage, practical intelligence, and his faith in divine Providence sustain him through his captivity.
Staden’s sensational account was one of the best-selling travel narratives of the sixteenth century.
No less than four printings have been identified for 1557, the year of its first publication, and the Antwerp publisher Christophe Plantin brought out a Dutch translation in 1558. Further Dutch editions appeared in Antwerp in 1563 and Amsterdam in 1592, and a Latin version came out in 1592 and was reprinted in 1605. Altogether, over eighty editions appeared in eight languages. A Brazilian feature film, Hans Staden, coproduced, written, and directed by Luiz Alberto Pereira, was released in 1999.In recent years the authenticity of the narrative—for which no corroborating evidence exists, as Staden is never mentioned in Portuguese or French sources— has been the subject of debate. Careful analysis has revealed that Staden incorporated episodes and structural elements from earlier travel narratives and skillfully crafted his work to satisfy a readership that expected books on America to feature graphic instances of cannibalism. In addition, the half-learned Hessian soldier’s tale was apparently coauthored (and may have been ghostwritten) by the Marburg anatomy professor Johannes Dryander (1500—1560), the author of a number of medical and cosmographical works, whose influence appears particularly evident in Staden’s accounts of illnesses and cures. Defenders of the book’s veracity, on the other hand, have dismissed these findings and pointed to ethnographic evidence from contemporary Brazil to sus-
Staden 's Zwei Reisen nach Brasilien. (Hans Staden,
The True History of His Captivity, 1557)
tain their claim that it authentically describes a personal encounter with cannibalistic Indians.
Mark Hdberlein
See also Conquista; Indian Captivity;, Schmidel, Ulrich (Schmidl, Schmidt
References and Further Reading
Arens, William. The Man Eating Myth: Anthropology and Anthropophagy. New York: Oxford University, 1979.
Menninger, Annerose. Die Macht der Augenzeugen: Neue Welt und Kannibalen- Mythos, 1492—1600. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner, 1995.
Whitehead, Neil L. “Hans Staden and the Cultural Politics of Cannibalism.” Hispanic American Historical Review 80 (2000): 721—751; cf. the exchange between Mark Haberlein, Michaela Schmolz-Haberlein, and Neil L. Whitehead in Hispanic American Historical Review 81 (2001): 745-756.