The Arawack Language of Guiana in its Linguistic and Ethnological Relations Part 5

Opia, the spirit of the dead (Pane, pp. 443, 444). Ar. _aparrun_ to kill, _apparahun_ dead, _lupparrukittoa_ he is dead.

Quisqueia, a native name of Haiti; "vast.i.tas et universus ac totus. Uti Graeci suum Panem," says Pet. Martyr (Decad. p. 279). "Madre de las tierras," Valverde translates it (_Idea del valor de la Isla Espanola_, Introd. p. xviii). The orthography is evidently very false.

Sabana, a plain covered with gra.s.s without trees (terrano llano, Oviedo, Hist. Gen. lib. vi. cap. 8). From this the Sp. _savana_, Eng.

_savannah_. Charlevoix, on the authority of Mariana, says it is an ancient Gothic word (Histoire de l'Isle St. Domingue, i. p. 53). But it is probably from the Ar. _sallaban_, smooth, level.

Semi, the divinities worshipped by the natives ("Lo mismo que nosotros llamamos Diablo," Oviedo, Hist. Gen. lib. v. cap. 1. Not evil spirits only, but all spirits). Ar. _semeti_ sorcerers, diviners, priests.

Siba, a stone. Ar. _siba_, a stone.

Starei, shining, glowing (relucens, Pet. Martyr, Decad. p. 304). Ar.

_teren_ to be hot, glowing, _terehu_ heat.

Tabaco, the pipe used in smoking the cohoba. This word has been applied in all European languages to the plant nicotiana tabac.u.m itself.

Taita, father (Richardo). Ar. _itta_ father, _daitta_ or _datti_ my father.

Taguaguas, ornaments for the ears hammered from native gold (Las Casas, Hist. Apol. cap. 199).

Tuob, gold, probably akin to _hobin_, q. v.

Turey, heaven. Idols were called "cosas de _turey_" (Navarrete, Viages, Tom. i. p. 221). Probably akin to _starei_, q. v.

The following numerals are given by Las Casas (Hist. Apol. cap. 204).

1 hequeti. Ar. _hurketai_, that is one, from _hurkun_ to be single or alone.

2 yamosa. Ar. _biama_, two.

3 canoc.u.m. Ar. _kannikun_, many, a large number, _kannikukade_, he has many things.

4 yamoncobre, evidently formed from yamosa, as Ar. _bibiti_, four, from _biama_, two.

The other numerals Las Casas had unfortunately forgotten, but he says they counted by hands and feet, just as the Arawacks do to this day.

Various compound words and phrases are found in different writers, some of which are readily explained from the Arawack. Thus _tureigua hobin_, which Peter Martyr translates "rex resplendens uti orichalc.u.m,"[23] in Arawack means "shining like something red." Oviedo says that at marriages in Cuba it was customary for the bride to bestow her favors on every man present of equal rank with her husband before the latter's turn came. When all had thus enjoyed her, she ran through the crowd of guests shouting _manicato, manicato_, "lauding herself, meaning that she was strong, and brave, and equal to much."[24] This is evidently the Ar.

_manikade_, from _man_, _manin_, and means I am unhurt, I am unconquered. When the natives of Haiti were angry, says Las Casas,[25]

they would not strike each other, but apply such harmless epithets as _buticaco_, you are blue-eyed (anda para zarco de los ojos), _xeyticaco_, you are black-eyed (anda para negro de los ojos), or _mahite_, you have lost a tooth, as the case might be. The termination _aco_ in the first two of these expressions is clearly the Ar. _acou_, or _akusi_, eyes, and the last mentioned is not unlike the Ar.

_marikata_, you have no teeth (_ma_ negative, _ari_ tooth). The same writer gives for "I do not know," the word _ita_, in Ar. _daitta_.[26]

Some of the words and phrases I have been unable to identify in the Arawack. They are _duiheyniquen_, dives fluvius, _maguacochios_ vest.i.ti homines, both in Peter Martyr, and the following conversation, which he says took place between one of the Haitian chieftians[TN-11] and his wife.

She. Teitoca teitoca. Techeta cynato guamechyna. Guaibba.

He. Cynato machabuca guamechyna.

These words he translated: _teitoca_ be quiet, _techeta_ much, _cynato_ angry, _guamechyna_ the Lord, _guaibba_ go, _machabuca_ what is it to me. But they are either very incorrectly spelled, or are not Arawack.

The proper names of localities in Cuba, Hayti and the Bahamas, furnish additional evidence that their original inhabitants were Arawacks.

Hayti, I have already shown has now the same meaning in Arawack which Peter Martyr ascribed to it at the discovery. Cubanacan, a province in the interior of Cuba, is compounded of _kuba_ and _annakan_, in the center;[27] Baracoa, the name of province on the coast, is from Ar.

_bara_ sea, _koan_ to be there, "the sea is there;" in Barajagua the _bara_ again appears; Guaymaya is Ar. _waya_ clay, _mara_ there is none; Marien is from Ar. _maran_ to be small or poor; Guaniguanico, a province on the narrow western extremity of the island, with the sea on either side, is probably Ar. _wuini wuini koa_, water, water is there. The names of tribes such as Siboneyes, Guantaneyes, owe their termination to the island Arawack, _eyeri_ men, in the modern dialect _hiaeru_, captives, slaves. The Siboneyes are said by Las Casas, to have been the original inhabitants of Cuba.[28] The name is evidently from Ar. _siba_, rock, _eyeri_ men, "men of the rocks." The rocky sh.o.r.es of Cuba gave them this appellation. On the other hand the natives of the islets of the Bahamas were called _lukku kairi_, abbreviated to _lukkairi_, and _lucayos_, from _lukku_, man, _kairi_ an island, "men of the islands;"

and the archipelago itself was called by the first explorers "las islas de los Lucayos," "isole delle Lucai."[29] The province in the western angle of Haiti was styled Guacaiarima, which Peter Martyr translates "insulae podex;" dropping the article, _caiarima_ is sufficiently like the Ar. _kairuina_, which signifies _podex_, Sp. _culata_, and is used geographically in the same manner as the latter word.

The word Maya frequently found in the names of places in Cuba and Haiti, as Mayaba, Mayanabo, Mayajigua, Cajimaya, Jaimayabon, is doubtless the Ar. negative _ma_, _man_, _mara_. Some writers have thought it indicative of the extension of the Maya language of Yucatan over the Antilles. Prichard, Squier, Waitz, Bra.s.seur de Bourbourg, Bastian and other ethnologists have felt no hesitation in a.s.signing a large portion of Cuba and Haiti to the Mayas. It is true the first explorers heard in Cuba and Jamaica, vague rumors of the Yucatecan peninsula, and found wax and other products brought from there.[30] This shows that there was some communication between the two races, but all authorities agree that there was but one language over the whole of Cuba. The expressions which would lead to a different opinion are found in Peter Martyr. He relates that in one place on the southern sh.o.r.e of Cuba, the interpreter whom Columbus had with him, a native of San Salvador, was at fault. But the account of the occurrence given by Las Casas, indicates that the native with whom the interpreter tried to converse simply refused to talk at all.[31] Again, in Martyr's account of Grijalva's voyage to Yucatan in 1517, he relates that this captain took with him a native to serve as an interpreter; and to explain how this could be, he adds that this interpreter was one of the Cuban natives "quorum idioma, si non idem, consanguineum tamen," to that of Yucatan. This is a mere fabrication, as the chaplain of Grijalva on this expedition states explicitly in the narrative of it which he wrote, that the interpreter was a native of Yucatan, who had been captured a year before.[32]

Not only is there a very great dissimilarity in sound, words, and structure, between the Arawack and Maya, but the nations were also far asunder in culture. The Mayas were the most civilized on the continent, while the Arawacks possessed little besides the most primitive arts, and precisely that tribe which lived on the extremity of Cuba nearest Yucatan, the Guanataneyes, were the most barbarous on the island.[33]

The natives of the greater Antilles and Bahamas differed little in culture. They cultivated maize, manioc, yams, potatoes, corn, and cotton. The latter they wove into what scanty apparel they required.

Their arms were bows with reed arrows, pointed with fish teeth or stones, stone axes, spears, and a war club armed with sharp stones called a _macana_. They were a simple hearted, peaceful, contented race, "all of one language and all friends," says Columbus; "not given to wandering, naked, and satisfied with little," says Peter Martyr; "a people very poor in all things," says Las Casas.

Yet they had some arts. Statues and masks in wood and stone were found, some of them in the opinion of Bishop Las Casas, "very skilfully carved." They hammered the native gold into ornaments, and their rude sculptures on the face of the rocks are still visible in parts of Cuba and Haiti. Their boats were formed of single trunks of trees often of large size, and they managed them adroitly; their houses were of reeds covered with palm leaves, and usually accommodated a large number of families; and in their holy places, they set up rows of large stones like the ancient cromlechs, one of which is still preserved in Hayti, and is known as _la cercada de los Indios_.

Physically they were undersized, less muscular than the Spaniards, light in color, with thick hair and scanty beards. Their foreheads were naturally low and retreating, and they artificially flattened the skull by pressure on the forehead or the occiput.[34]

Three social grades seem to have prevailed, the common herd, the petty chiefs who ruled villages, and the independent chiefs who governed provinces. Of the latter there were in Cuba twenty-nine; in Haiti five, as near as can be now ascertained.[35] Some of those in Cuba had shortly before the arrival of the Spaniards moved there from Haiti, and at the conquest one of the princ.i.p.al chiefs of Haiti was a native of the Lucayos.[36]

The fate of these Indians is something terrible to contemplate. At the discovery there were probably 150,000 on Cuba, Haiti, and the Bahamas.[37] Those on the latter were carried as slaves to Haiti to work in the mines, and all of the Lucayos exterminated in three or four years (1508-1512).[38] The sufferings of the Haitians have been told in a graphic manner by Las Casas in an oft-quoted work.[39] His statements have frequently been condemned as grossly exaggerated, but the official doc.u.ments of the early history of Cuba prove but too conclusively that the worthy missionary reports correctly what terrible cruelties the Spaniards committed. Cuba was conquered in 1514, and was then quite densely populated. Fourteen years afterwards we find the Governor, Gonzalo de Guzman, complaining that while troops of hunters were formerly traversing the island constantly, asking no other pay than the right of keeping as slaves the natives whom they captured, he now has to pay patrolmen, as the Indians are so scarce.[40] The next year (1529) the treasurer, Lope de Hurtado, writes that the Indians are in such despair that they are hanging themselves twenty and thirty at a time.[41] In 1530 the king is pet.i.tioned to relinquish his royalty on the produce of the mines, because nearly all the Indians on the island are dead.[42] And in 1532 the licentiate, Vadillo, estimates the total number of Indians on the island, including the large percentage brought from the mainland by the slavers, at only 4,500.[43]

As a specimen of what the treatment of the Indians was, we have an accusation in 1522 against Vasco Porcallo, afterwards one of the companions of Hernando de Soto. He captured several Indians, cut off their genitals, and forced them to eat them, cramming them down their throats when they could not swallow. When asked for his defence, Porcallo replied that he did it to prevent his own Indians from committing suicide, as he had already lost two-thirds of his slaves in that way. The defence was apparently deemed valid, for he was released![44]

The myths and traditions of the Haitians have fortunately been preserved, though not in so perfect a form as might be wished. When Bartholomew Columbus left Rome for the Indies, he took with him a lay brother of the order of the Hermits of St. Jerome, Ramon Pane by name, a Catalan by birth, a worthy but credulous and ignorant man.[45] On reaching Haiti brother Pane was first sent among the natives of the small province called Macorix de abajo, which had a language peculiar to itself, but he was subsequently transferred to the province of Guarinoex on the southeastern part of the island where the _lengua universal_ prevailed. He remained there two years, and at the request of Columbus collected and wrote down the legends and beliefs of the natives.

He is not a model authority. In the first place, being a Catalan he did not write Spanish correctly; he was very imperfectly acquainted with the native tongue; he wrote hastily, and had not enough paper to write in full; he is not sure that he commences their legends at the right end.

Moreover his ma.n.u.script is lost, and the only means we have of knowing anything about it is by a very incorrectly printed Italian version, printed in 1571, and two early synopses, one in Latin in the Decades of Peter Martyr, the other in Italian, by Messer Zuane de Strozi of Ferrara, which has been quite recently published for the first time.[46]

By comparing these we can arrive at the meaning of Brother Pane with considerable accuracy.

His work contains fragments of two distinct cycles of legends, the one describing the history of the G.o.ds, the other the history of the human race.

Earliest of creatures was the woman, Atabeira or Ataves, who also bore the other names Mamona, Guacarapita, Iiella, and Guimazoa. Her son was the supreme ruler of all things, and chiefest of divinities. His names were Yocauna, Guamaonocon, and Yocahu-vaguaniao-vocoti. He had a brother called Guaca, and a son Iaiael. The latter rebelled against his father, and was exiled for four mouths and then killed. The legend goes on to relate that his bones were placed in a calabash and hung up in his father's house. Here they changed into fishes, and the calabash filled with water. One day four brothers pa.s.sed that way, who had all been born at one time, and whose mother, Itaba tahuana, had died in bringing them into the world. Seeing the calabash filled with fish the oldest of the four, Caracaracol, the Scabby, lifted it down, and all commenced to eat.

While thus occupied, Yocauna suddenly made his appearance, which so terrified the brothers that they dropped the gourd and broke it into pieces. From it ran all the waters of the world, and formed the oceans, lakes, and rivers as they now are.

At this time there were men but no women, and the men did not dare to venture into the sunlight. Once, as they were out in the rain, they perceived four creatures, swift as eagles and slippery as eels. The men called to their aid Caracaracol and his brothers, who caught these creatures and transformed them into women. In time, these became the mothers of mankind.

The earliest natives of Haiti came under the leadership of the hero-G.o.d, Vaguoniona, a name applied by Las Casas to Yocahu, from an island to the south called in the legend Matinino, which all the authors identify, I know not why, with Martinique. They landed first on the banks of the river Bahoboni in the western part of Haiti, and there erected the first house, called Camoteia. This was ever after preserved and regarded with respectful veneration.

Such, in brief, were their national myths. Conspicuously marked in them we note the sacred number four, the four brothers typifying the cardinal points, whose mother, the Dawn, dies in giving them birth, just as in the Algonkin myths. These brothers aid the men in their struggles for life, and bring to them the four women, the rain-bringing winds. Here, too, the first of existences is the woman, whose son is at once highest of divinities and the guide and instructor of their nation. These peculiarities I have elsewhere shown to be general throughout the religions of America.[47]

The myth of the thunder storm also appears among them in its triplicate nature so common to the American mind. G.o.d of the storm was Guabancex, whose statue was made of stones. When angry he sent before him as messenger, Guatauva, to gather the winds, and accompanied by Coatrischie, who collected the rain-clouds in the valleys of the mountains, he swept down upon the plain, surrounded by the awful paraphernalia of the thunder storm.[48]

Let us place side by side with these ancient myths the national legend of the Arawacks.[49] They tell of a supreme spiritual being Yauwahu or Yauhahu. Pain and sickness are the invisible shafts he shoots at men, _yauhahu simaira_ the arrows of Yauhahu, and he it is whom the priests invoke in their incantations. Once upon a time, men lived without any means to propitiate this unseen divinity; they knew not how to ward off his anger or conciliate him. At that time the Arawacks did not live in Guiana, but in an island to the north. One day a man named Arawanili walked by the waters grieving over the ignorance and suffering of his nation. Suddenly the spirit of the waters, the woman Orehu, rose from the waves and addressed him. She taught him the mysteries of _semeci_, the sorcery which pleases and controls Yauhahu, and presented him with the _maraka_, the holy calabash containing white pebbles which they rattle during their exorcisms, and the sound of which summons the beings of the unseen world. Arawanili faithfully instructed his people in all that Orehu had said, and thus rescued them from their wretchedness. When after a life of wisdom and good deeds the hour of his departure came, he "did not die, but went up."

Orehu accompanied the Arawacks when they moved to the main, and still dwells in a treeless, desolate spot, on the banks of the Pomeroon. The negroes of the colony have learned of her, and call her in their broken English, the "watra-mamma," the water-mother.

The proper names which occur in these myths, date back to the earliest existence of the Arawacks as an independent tribe, and are not readily a.n.a.lyzed by the language as it now exists. The Haitian Yocauna seems indeed identical with the modern Yauhahu. Atabes or Atabeira is probably from _itabo_, lake, lagoon, and _era_, water, (the latter only in composition, as _hurruru_, mountain, _era_, water, mountain-water, a spring, a source), and in some of her actions corresponds with Orehu.

Caracaracol is translated by Brother Pane, as "the Scabby" or the one having ulcers, and in this respect the myth presents a curious a.n.a.logy with many others in America. In modern Arawack _karrikala_ is a form, in the third person singular, from _karrin_, to be sick, to be pregnant.

Arawanili, which one might be tempted to suppose gave the name Arawack to the tribe, did not all writers derive this differently, may be a form of _awawa_, father. In the old language, the termination _el_, is said to have meant son.

Of the two remaining languages said to have been spoken in the small provinces of Macorix de arriba and Macorix de abajo, in Hayti, we have no certain knowledge.[50] Las Casas gives one word from the former. It is _bazca_, no, not. I cannot identify it. There is reason, however, to suppose one of them was the Tupi or "lengua geral," of Brazil. Pane gives at least two words which are pure Tupi, and not Arawack. They are the names of two hideous idols supposed to be inimical to men. The one was Bugi, in Tupi, _ugly_, the other Aiba, in Tupi, _bad_. It is noteworthy, also, that Pigafetta, who accompanied Magellan on his voyage around the world, gives a number of words, ostensibly in the language of the natives of Rio Janeiro, where the Tupi was spoken, which are identical with those of Haiti, as _cacich_, chief, _boi_, house, _hamac_, bed, _canoe_, boat. But Pigafetta acknowledges that he obtained these words not from the natives themselves, but from the pilot Juan Carvalhos, who had been for years sailing over the West Indian seas, and had no doubt learned these words in the Antilles.[51]