This Volume 3 in the Acta Ethnica series of the “Centro Interdipartimentale di Studi e Ricerche sull’Etnobiofarmacia” (CISTRE) is dedicated to the Saraguro indigenous people that live confined in a few villages on the Southern Andean region of Ecuador.
Though at first menaced by the process of colonization and nowadays by the Western acculturation, the Saraguros, that are among the oldest indigenous communities of South America, are striving to maintain their traditions, costumes, knowledge, religious and medicinal practices. With the publication of this book, which has been made possible thanks to a fruitful collaboration between the University of Pavia and the Universidad Técnica Particular of Loja (UTPL), a rich documentation is illustrated about the traditional uses of native plants by Saraguros.
In fact, surrounded by a rich biodiversity, the Saraguros use plants for different purposes, such as magical-religious ceremonies, cures for “supernatural” and organic ailments, divination practices, and practical needs of daily life, such as the dyeing of personal clothes and textiles.