Vegetalismo is a term used to refer to a practice of mestizo shamanism in the Peruvian Amazon in which the shamans—known as vegetalistas—are said to gain their knowledge and power to cure from the vegetales, or plants of the region.
[1] The term is used by followers of Brazilian new religious movements to refer to both indigenous and mestizo ayahuasca shamanism in contrast to their practices.
The vegetalismo practice combines deep Catholic elements with the animistic religious beliefs common to indigenous tribes throughout the region.
Though many vegetalistas declare themselves to be Catholics, they receive their knowledge and power to heal from their special relationship with the spirits of the Amazon rainforest.
[1] One becomes a vegetalista out of personal choice or vocation, and their shamanic powers become recognized gradually as they build up their reputation in the community in which they live.
[1] The word "icaro" may come from the Quechua verb ikaray, blow smoke for healing, or it may come from the Shipibo term ikarra, shaman song.
[1] Poet César Calvo describes a virote as a "very small poisoned dart, capable of abandoning and resuming its material shape in order to transverse any distance; any time; any wall, shield, or protection; to nail itself in enemy flesh and to reach the target selected by the sorcerer who gave it form and then animated that form, endowing it with destiny and transcendence".
[4] Depending on the culture and various circumstances, these pathogenic projectiles can be materialized as a number of different things, including the thorns of spiny palm trees, insects, tiny stones, stingray stings, snake fangs, scorpions, toads, monkey hair, among other menacing things.
[1] In urban settings a shaman will usually hold one of these sessions several times a week, and they usually draw crowds of about twenty people or more, many of whom don't know each other.
[1] Generally in the urban setting the shaman will meet and speak briefly to everyone in attendance for the ceremony, gathering information on their illnesses and what it is their seeking to find from ingesting ayahuasca.