"[8] Many archeological remains point to the presence of the Guaraní peoples in a wide swath of South America dating long before colonial powers arrived.

Some archeologists estimate that, between 3,000 and 5,000 years ago, proto-Guaraní collectives, perhaps motivated by a population spike, migrated from the Amazon basin to the south, occupying territories already home to other groups.

They lived in family groups of varying sizes and obtained everything they needed from their environment, including through collecting medicinal plants, constructing traps for hunting, and crafting pottery.

[9] Another thesis posits that none of these groups had submitted to the missionary process, choosing to preserve their independence despite frequent displacement from territory that is now part of Paraguay, Brazil, Uruguay and Argentina.

There are no estimates of how many Guaranís, fighters and civilians alike, died in the war, because they were lumped in with all other "peasants" and "soldiers" in contemporary Paraguayan government records as part of an "ethnic denial" policy that was very typical of the period.

In the Argentine region of Misiones, Mbyá coexist, in the same familial communities, with members of the Xiripá Guaraní and Pai Tavytera groups.

Two large communities in Misiones near Iguazu Falls, Fortin Mborore and Yriapú, are home to more than 600 people, many of them coming from Paraguay or Brazil.

These villages are known as tekoa, and they're ideally in places where the traditional Mbyá way of life, referred to as ñande reko, can be reproduced.

The Mbyá hunt, fish, and gather food, as well as plant crops in their fields, principally maize (avatí), cassava (mandió), potatoes, peanuts (manduí), beans (kumandá), squash (mindain), and watermelon (janjau).

[14][15] Today, the spaces occupied by Mbyá communities are less and less able to provide them with the resources they need, making it necessary for them to consume industrial products.

They also live in the Argentine province of Misiones and parts of southern and southeastern Brazil and some areas in Uruguay, reaching the Brazilian coast.

However, national borders, restrictions on entering private property, and governments' designations of tribal reserves make this characteristic cultural practice difficult to continue.

The Mbyá speak a different dialect of Guaraní than that spoken in Paraguay, with distinct phonetics, morphology, syntax, and vocabulary.

Knowledge is transmitted through conversation around the fire, accompanied by drinking maté and smoking a pipe known as a petyngua, as well as through rituals in the opy house of worship.

The concept of family and parentage among the Mbyá is directly related to their geographic mobility, a noteworthy characteristic of the group's culture.

They circulate among the various villages and encampments of their people: visiting relatives, spreading news, participating in rituals and activities that require collective work (such as constructing buildings), seeking spouses, trading objects, and so on.

Death, disease, a lack of resources, and internal political conflicts are also reasons that Mbyá individuals and families migrate.

[15] Traditionally, healing treatment through medicinal plants is provided by shamans called karaí, also known as opy'guá or "lord of the opy," who also perform rituals meant to influence the weather, prevent future events, and ensure fruitful hunts and harvests.

On the other hand, in Argentina, some communities that are confined in tribal reserves rely on lunch distributed by bilingual schools as their only real source of food.

The familial groups who travel outside the villages and indigenous territories in Argentina and Brazil usually make their living by selling handicrafts, products that reference Mbyá material culture and cosmology, and by providing agricultural labor for private landowners.

These performers also aim to spread awareness of the indigenous cause in Brazil and inform Brazilians of the Mbyá culture and way of life.