Chono

The Chono were a seafaring people of southern Chile who lived by hunting and gathering and travelled by canoe among the Chiloé, Guaitecas and Chonos archipelagos.

Francisco de Ulloa's expedition reached their lands in 1553. After a Spanish decree in 1608, raiders from Chiloé carried Chono into slavery and servitude. In 1710 a group fleeing internal conflicts reached Calbuco and was settled on Guar Island. In the 1740s Spanish fears of British incursions prompted removals to Chiloé, while other Chono moved south of the Taitao Peninsula.