Macro Je

The Macro Je group, the Jê peoples and their wider Macro-Jê relatives, held the highlands and savanna of the Brazilian interior while Tupi–Guarani peoples occupied the coast. Northern Jê peoples include the Timbira and the Mebêngôkre, or Kayapó; the central Jê include the Xavante and Xerente, and the southern Jê include the Kaingang and Xokleng.

When the Portuguese founded São Paulo in 1554 the hinterland still belonged to them. In the eighteenth century bandeirantes hunting gold and slaves drove the Kayapó west, the Xavante were enslaved and then withdrew into Mato Grosso from the 1830s, and the Kariri rose in the war of 1683–1713.