Ruth

Abstract

A pioneer in the identification of archaeological sites in the northeast, the anthropologist Ruth Trindade de Almeida, born in Rio de Janeiro, lived for many years in the region where, in the 1970s, she traveled and mapped the rock art in the Cariris Velhos region, on the border between Paraíba and Pernambuco, in a Volkswagen Beetle. In total, more than one hundred archaeological sites were visited and identified, and the result of her extensive research was published in 1979 in the book “A Arte Rupestre nos Cariris Velhos”, a fundamental work for archaeology and historical research in Brazil.

Itacoatiaras, carved stones, painted stones, engravings, paintings, signs, griffins, lithographs, hieroglyphs, petroglyphs, pictographs, are names that classify the art identified by her. She tells us that if there is a drawing somewhere, someone lived in that place. Many of these drawings were found lost in the backlands, inside caves, in riverbeds. Her studies pointed to a civilization that inhabited the region between 5 and 10 thousand years before Christ.

Now over 90 years old, Ruth, who has lived in Recife for decades, preserves at home, among books, cabinets, and boxes, the original decals of the panels she made during her research. Well preserved, the material holds images that, according to her, may have been erased in the places of origin – some of the sites are under threat of vandalism and destruction. In 2018, shortly after returning with her daughter Oriana from visits to the sites she had researched, we began and recorded an audiovisual conversation with Ruth (at the request of her daughter) about the research, the findings, and the life of a female researcher in the 1970s. The short film Ruth addresses an important and little-known part of our history, linking it to the role of women in science.

Through research, her private collection of photographs and documents was mapped. For the film, current records of Ruth in the midst of her life's work and interviews were made, which made it possible to discuss what it meant to be a woman in science  and  to describe Ruth’s  trajectory between Anthropology and Archaeology.