12 entities that constitute them, often species or groups of animals or plants. These “lords” symbolize the totality and somehow represent the potency of the respective species or group. These “lords” cause personality disorders or illnesses, as well as environmental catastrophes or difficult situations. The “shamans” of El Chaco develop ecstasis to communicate with them and attempt to negotiate the therapy or the goodwill of these beings according to the needs of those who resort to them. Shaman, folk doctor, magician or sorcerer may be synonymous in the Gran Chaco. This is so because from a functional standpoint the shaman is a folk doctor, an agent of healthcare, a doctor in charge of helping people maintain balance with life; from a religious standpoint, shamans are brokers with powerful beings who interact with men, and from the perspective of the structure of society, the shaman, whose position is unique and necessary, often leads one of the social orders of the indigenous peoples of the Chaco. The indigenous peoples of the Chaco believe that the compassion for men among those beings makes them allow productive activities in the areas over which they rule, and also grant the means for their subsistence. This manner of thought can be summarized in the axiom “living with nature,” contrary to the one that prevails in our culture, in which the economic good is partly identified with control over nature, summarized in the expression “live off nature”. In the 19th century, when Argentina, Bolivia and Paraguay became independent countries, most of the region of the Chaco, in the midst of the three fledgling States, had not been occupied by white men. After the war of 1870, there was a period of major land speculation, during which the area where the Lengua indigenous people lived became private property, and Paraguay’s leather tanning industry was established there. Regarding the establishment of religious missions, the expert witness noted that religion and teaching of Christian beliefs was present from the outset of conquest to trigger processes of change and assimilation of indigenous peoples to Western culture. Since the late 19th century, the Anglicans began to establish several missions. W.B. Grubb established the Makxlawaya mission among the Lengua indigenous people in the Paraguayan Chaco. However, the processes that most deeply affected the cultures of the Gran Chaco were in connection with participation of the indigenous peoples in the market. Said processes were seasonal or permanent migrations associated with the establishment of sedentary settlements, both giving rise to it and resulting from it, as their natural conclusion. Effective original dispossession caused by the historical institutional act of physical occupation of the territory has hidden the presence of dispossessed legal persons and awareness of the extent and limits of their previous territories. Clearly, due to the nature of occupation and possession of the land by indigenous peoples of the Chaco, these legal persons subject to the law are social groups with sovereig occupation of certain geographical areas. Such is the case of the current Yakye Axa Community, the sedentary expression of one of the bands of the Chanawatsan people. e. Statement by Teresa de Jesús Vargas, witness