Tehuelche people

The Tehuelche people is the generic name given to a group of Amerindian tribes indigenous to Patagonia and the southern pampas regions of Argentina and Chile. Tehuelche is a Mapudungun word meaning "Fierce People". They were also called Patagons (“big feet”) by Spanish explorers, who found large footprints made by the tribes on the Patagonian beaches. These large footprints were actually made by the guanaco leather boots that the Tehuelche used to cover their feet. It is possible that the stories of the early European explorers about the Patagones, a race of giants in South America, are based on the Tehuelche, because the Tehuelche were typically tall, taller than the average European of the time. According to the , 4,300 Tehuelche lived in the provinces of Chubut and Santa Cruz, and an additional 1,637 in other parts of Argentina. There are now no Tehuelche tribes living in Chile, though some Tehuelche were assimilated into Mapuche groups over the years.