I-Juca-Pirama

I-Juca-Pirama is a short epic poem written by Brazilian author Gonçalves Dias. Published in 1851, it is written under decasyllabic and alexandrine verses, and divided in ten cantos. It is one of the most famous Indianist poems of the Brazilian Romanticism. I-Juca-Pirama means, in Tupi, "He who must die and that is worthy to be killed". The poem tells the story of a Tupi warrior who is arrested by an enemy, cannibal tribe — the Timbiras. As he is about to get killed for sacrificial endings, he begs for mercy, in order to be freed and return to the woods, where his old, sick and blind father awaits. The Timbiras then allow the Tupi warrior to go.