The Gueguence A Comedy Ballet in the Nahuatl-Spanish Dialect of Nicaragua Part 1

The Gueugence; A Comedy Ballet in the Nahuatl-Spanish Dialect of Nicaragua.

by Daniel G. Brinton.

PREFACE.

The play which is presented in this volume is the only specimen known to me of the native American comedy. It is of comparatively recent origin, and is composed in a mixed dialect, a jargon of low Spanish and corrupt Aztec (Nahuatl); but, both in its history and spirit, it bears so many marks of native composition, and is so characteristic of the sort of humor popular with the tribes from whom it was obtained, that it fairly merits a place in this series of publications.

The text was obtained in Nicaragua, by the late Dr. Carl Hermann Berendt. But no translation of any part of it and no notes upon it were found among his papers. The responsibility for the rendering rests, therefore, with myself. It has presented extreme difficulty, owing to the imperfect condition of the text, the deterioration of the Nahuatl words and forms, the antiquated and provincial senses of the Spanish words, and the obscure local references introduced. I would rather speak of my work as a loose paraphrase, aimed to give the general sense and humorous tone of the original, than as a faithful translation.

The text has been printed precisely as in the ma.n.u.script, even obvious errors in spelling and punctuation having been preserved.

Suggestions with reference to these are made in the notes.

For a.s.sistance in translating the Spanish text, I would acknowledge my indebtedness to Professor Adolfo Pierra, of Philadelphia, and Dr.

F. C. Valentine, of New York, both of whom have pa.s.sed considerable periods in Central America.

_Philadelphia, November, 1883._

INTRODUCTION.

-- 1. _The Nahuas and Mangues of Nicaragua._

Among the outlying colonies of that important people whose chief seat was in the Valley of Mexico, and who are variously known as Aztecs, Mexicans or Nahuas, were several in Central America. "One of these," writes Mr. Squier, "occupied the princ.i.p.al islands in the Lake of Nicaragua, the narrow isthmus which intervenes between that lake and the Pacific, and probably a portion of the country to the southward, as far as the gulf of Nicoya. Their country was less than a hundred miles long, by twenty-five broad; yet here they preserved the same language and inst.i.tutions, and practiced the same religious rites, with the people of the same stock who dwelt more than two thousand miles distant, on the plateau of Anahuac, from whom they were separated by numerous powerful nations, speaking different languages, and having distinct organizations."[1]

This Nahuatl tribe gave the name to the Province, _Nicaragua_, this being, according to some early authorities, the personal appellation of their chief at the epoch of their discovery, in 1522, and, according to others, their national name.[2] For no sufficient reasons, Mr. Squier applied to them the term _Niquirans_, and Dr.

Berendt _Nicaraos_, but it seems better to retain, as distinctive for them, the name _Nicaraguans_, or, more specifically, "the Nahuas of Nicaragua." "Nicaragua" is undoubtedly a Nahuatl word, but, as the letter _r_ is not found in that language, the precise original form is uncertain. Father Francisco Vasquez explained it as a compound of the Nahuatl _nican_, "here," and _anahuacos_, "here dwell those from Anahuac;"[3] or it may be from _nican_ and _nahua_ (plural form of _nahuatl_), "here dwell those speaking the Nahuatl tongue;" or, as a personal name of a chief, it may be _ni calaquiya_, "I entered into, or took possession."

How it happened that this fragment of the Aztec nation had become detached from the main body and resident so far from its central seat, has not been clearly explained. Mr. Squier and some others have maintained the hypothesis that the migration of all the Aztec tribes was from south to north, and that their scattered members in Central America were bands which had stopped on the road.[4] This opinion, however, is refuted by the evidence of language, and also by the unanimous traditions of the Aztecs themselves, both in Nicaragua and in Mexico.

The Nicaraguans had a very positive recollection that their ancestors came from Mexico, driven forth by scarcity of food, and that they wandered along the Pacific sh.o.r.e to the locality in which the Spaniards found them.[5] They remembered the names of their ancient home, or, rather, of their ancient kindred, and gave them as _Ticomega_ and _Maguateca_, locating them toward the west ("hacia donde se pone el sol"). It is easy to recognize in these words the Aztec terminations signifying _gens_ or tribe, _mecatl_ and _tecatl_, which in the plural drop the _tl_. Nor can we be far wrong in identifying _magua_ with the Aztec _maque_, upper, above, and _tico_ with _tiachcauh_, elder brother, and in translating these names, the one as "the upper people," _i. e._, the dwellers on the lofty interior plateau, and "our elder brothers," _i. e._, the senior and ranking clans of their tribe, who remained in Anahuac.[6]

Besides these traditions, the Nicaraguans showed their close relationship to the Aztecs by a substantial ident.i.ty of language, mythology, religious rites, calendars, manners and customs. We have, fortunately, an unusual ma.s.s of information about them, from an examination of their leading men by the chaplain Francisco de Bobadilla, in 1528, who took down their replies with as much accuracy as we could expect, and whose narrative has been preserved by the historian Oviedo. They also had retained a knowledge of the Mexican hieroglyphics, and wrote, in books of paper and parchment, their laws and ritual, their calendars and the boundaries of their lands.[7]

While this Aztec band thus acknowledged themselves to be intruders, such appears not to have been the case with their immediate neighbors to the northeast and southwest. These were of one blood and language, and called themselves _mankeme_, rulers, masters, which the Spaniards corrupted into _Mangues_.[8] The invading Aztecs appear to have split this ancient tribe into two fractions, the one driven toward the south, about the Gulf of Nicoya, the other northward, on and near Lake Managua, and beyond it on Fonseca Bay.[9] Probably in memory of this victory, the Nicaraguans applied to them the opprobrious name _Chololteca_, "those driven out," from the Nahuatl verb _choloa_, and the suffix _tecatl_, which was corrupted by the Spanish to _Chorotecas_.[10]

The name does not by any means intimate that the Mangues came from Cholula in Mexico, as some ancient, and some modern, writers have hastily supposed;[11] nor is it a proof that they spoke an Aztec dialect, as Ternaux Compans has a.s.serted.[12] So far is this from being the case, the Mangue has no sort of affinity with the Nahuatl, and must stand wholly asunder from it in the cla.s.sification of American tongues. It has, indeed, a relative to the north, and a close one, the Chapanec or Chiapenec,[13] spoken by the inhabitants of three small villages in Chiapas, the largest of which has given its name to the province. These Chapanecs, by their traditions, still clearly remembered at the time of the Conquest, and preserved by the historian Remesal, migrated from Nicaragua to their more northern home. As they had no connection with the Aztecs, so, also, they were wholly without affinities with the great Maya stock, which extended far and wide over Central America, although the contrary has been recently stated.[14] In fact, among the five different languages which were spoken in the present province of Nicaragua at the time of the discovery, not one belonged to any branch of the Maya group.[15]

My present theme does not extend to a discussion of these various tongues, nor take me further into the ethnology of their locality.

It has to do solely with these two nations, the Nicaraguans and the Mangues. The culture-level of the former was nearly as high as that found in the Valley of Mexico. They had a settled government, constructed edifices of stone, sculptured idols, utensils and ornaments out of the same material, were skilled in ceramics, deft in weaving cotton cloth and reed or gra.s.s mats, able in war, and thoughtful enough to puzzle their first European visitors with questions as to the stars and the earth, the beginning and the end of things.[16] Careful archaeologists in our own day have searched the territory they inhabited, and many museums contain specimens of what they accomplished in the direction of the arts, and testify to a respectable degree of intellectual advancement.[17]

We know less about the Mangues. They are mentioned as differing in religious rites from the Nicaraguans, and the impression is conveyed that they were in a more primitive condition, but yet with fair claims to be ranked among the cultivated nations of the new world.

Among them, in fact, Dr. Berendt located one of the "centres of ancient American civilization," and considered the definite solution of their affiliations as one of the problems of the first order in the ethnology of America.[18] The Spanish historians relate that they had hieroglyphic books, like the Mexicans; that they were rather light in color, careful in dress, setting much store by their long hair, which they sedulously combed, and had an autocratic military government. Their country was thickly peopled, especially that portion of it between the lakes. The district of Managua was almost like a continuous town, so closely were the native houses placed together for nearly ten miles. In fact, it was called one city by the earliest explorers, and Oviedo, who takes pains to criticise these for their tendency to exaggeration, estimated the population of this limited district, at the time of the Conquest, at forty thousand souls.[19]

At present, scarcely any pure-blood remnants of either of these nations can be found, and both languages are practically extinct.

When Mr. Squier visited Nicaragua, in 1850, he obtained, with great difficulty, a short vocabulary of the Nahuatl dialect, spoken on the island of Ometepec, in Lake Nicaragua; and, in 1874, Dr. Berendt, only at the cost of repeated efforts, succeeded in securing from a few survivors of advanced ages a moderately full collection of Mangue words and sentences.[20]

[Ill.u.s.tration: MAP OF THE LOCATION OF THE NAHUAS OF NICARAGUA AND THEIR NEIGHBORS.]

To ill.u.s.trate the practical ident.i.ty of the Nahuatl of Nicaragua with that of Anahuac, and the Mangue of Nicaragua with that of Chiapas, I will insert two short lists of common words with their equivalents in those four dialects. The first is from Mr. Squier's works above referred to, the second from the ma.n.u.scripts of Dr.

Berendt now in my possession.

_Comparison of the Nahuatl of Nicaragua and of Mexico._

ENGLISH. NAHUATL OF NICARAGUA. NAHUATL OF ANAHUAC.

G.o.d, teot. teotl.

Man, tlacat. tlacatl.

Woman, ciuat. ciuatl.

Head, tzonteco. totzontecon.

Foot, hixt. ycxitl.

Dog, izcuindi. itzcuintli.

Deer, mazat. mazatl.

Rabbit, toste. tochtli.

Fire, tlet. tletl.

Water, at. atl.

House, calli. calli.

Maize, centl. centli.

Rain, quiavit quiahuitl.

Flower, sochit. xochitl.

Wind, hecat. ehecatl.

Snake, coat. coatl.

Eagle, oate. quauhtli.

Flint, topecat. tecpatl.

Mountain, tepec. tepec.

One, ce. ce.

Two, ome. ome.

Three, ye. yei.

Four, nau naui.

Five, macuil. macuilli.

_Comparison of the Mangue with the Chapanec._

ENGLISH. MANGUE OF NICARAGUA. MANGUE OF CHIAPAS.

Man (h.o.m.o), ndijpu. dipaju.

Man (vir), nyu'a. n[)o]jue, naha.

Woman, najui. najui.

Father, gooha. youa, poua.

Mother, ngumu. goma.

Head, gu t[chi]ima t[chi]ima.

Eye, nahte. nate.

Ear, nyujui. noj[)u]a.