Shawãdawa

Four blends, four added ingredients

The table shows the ingredients named on the supplier’s page for each blend, whether that page calls the blend a tobacco product, and the pack sizes.

“Not stated” means that the supplier’s page for the blend does not mention tobacco; it does not mean that the blend is tobacco-free.

Tsunu ash and catinga-de-mulata

The supplier uses tsunu as a name for a group of related trees of one genus that grow across the Amazon basin, not for a single species, and makes the ash by burning the bark. Its page for the Kapayuba blend spells the ash sunu. It gives no botanical name for tsunu, kapayuba, rawaputu or rupusuti, so none is given here.

Catinga-de-mulata is the one plant the supplier identifies: Tanacetum vulgare, known in English as tansy, a species of the daisy family (Asteraceae). It is native from Europe to temperate Asia and has been introduced in Brazil.

The Shawãdawa, as described by the supplier

The supplier writes that the name Shawãdawa means “family of the macaw” (shawã: macaw, dawa: family) and that the people were also called Arara, a name given to them in the 19th century. It places them along the upper Juruá in the Brazilian state of Acre, in four demarcated Indigenous lands, and notes that their language shares a Pano root with those of neighbouring peoples such as the Yawanawa. The supplier names a Shawãdawa partner as the maker of the Kapayuba and Rupusuti blends. Mycotrop relays this information and has not verified it independently.

Related categories

Blends named after the Katukina and the Yawanawa have their own categories. The full range, including tobacco-free blends, applicators and ashes, is in the main Rapé category.

Rapé: what is known

Rapé (also spelled hapé or rapeh) is the name for Amazonian snuffs, most often made of finely ground tobacco, usually Nicotiana rustica, mixed with bark ash or other plants. In Portuguese, rapé simply means snuff; the word comes from the French “râpé”, grated. There is no single recipe: the blend changes with the people, the region and the purpose, and tobacco-free rapés also exist.

Among several peoples of Acre, including the Huni Kuin, the Yawanawá and the Noke Koî (Katukina), rapé has a ritual role. It is blown into the nostrils with a tepi, a long pipe handled by another person, or with a kuripe, a V-shaped applicator used on one’s own.

Storing rapé

Keep rapé in a tightly closed container, dry, away from light and heat: the powder takes up moisture and clumps quickly.

Discreet delivery

Orders are packed on working days and leave in plain outer packaging that does not describe the contents. Once your order has shipped, we email you the tracking link when one is available. Estimated delivery times, right of withdrawal and exceptions: Delivery, tracking and returns.

Sources: Stanfill et al. 2015, Food Chem Toxicol 82; Faria 2016, Federal University of Santa Catarina; Instituto Socioambiental, Povos Indígenas no Brasil; IARC Monographs vol. 100E; supplier information. Updated 5 October 2026 by the Mycotrop team.

Frequently asked questions