Arauco?

[Diaz Fernandez]

Dear Mr. Nostler
Dear Mrs Riley

The answer to your question will  be found in the first chapter of my book
El Pueblo Mapuche y su Lengua (The Mapuche People and their Language) which
I have not been able to publish yet. I cannot  find a publisher yet,  the
prologue has been written by a Mapuche linguist, María Catrileo. This work
should be an important contrinution to the general knowledge of this tongue

Now I am answering you.:

Arauco was the name of a small tributary of the Bio Bio river, the people
who lived there were called Araucanians. Later on this ethnomym was applied
to the whole Mapuche nation.
This name was transcribed by Spaniards as Rauco and thus it was regisitered
on an act in Santiago  on 11-08-1541. Later on the conqueror Pedro de
Valdivia wrote it as Arauco and it was Alonso de Ercilla, who made it
wide-world known when he published his poem "La Araucana" in 1569.

Yours sincerely

.

The name Arauco comes from Ragko (according to thedefinition you have
already gotten)
-----Mensaje original-----
De: Nicholas Ostler <nostler at chibcha.demon.co.uk>
Para: kate riley <kriley at together.net>
CC: Linganth postings <linganth at cc.rochester.edu>
Fecha: lunes, 29 de noviembre de 1999 7:29
Asunto: Re: Arauco?

>At 12:51 am +0000 29/11/99, kate riley wrote:
>>Dear List:
>>
>>A question from a writer friend:
>>
>>There is a tree in Chile labeled by a 17th or 18th century
>>priest Araucaria araucana Pehuen.   There is also a town near Concepcion
>>Chile called Arauco.  The Mapuche and other indigenes of Chile have been
>>generally referred to as Araucarians.  Does anyone know (or know
>>someone who might know) the origins of these terms and/or the histories
>>of these namings?
>>
>>Thanks,
>>
>>Kate Riley
>
>My Webster's New World dictionary (ed. Victoria Neufeldt, David B.
>Guralnik; Simon & Schuster 1988: an amazingly useful resource when it comes
>to the etymology of Amerind names) gives as the etymology of Arauco:
>Araucanian: rau "clay" + ko "water"
>My Mapuche/Mapudungun dictionary (Mapuche 6, ed. Esteban Erize, Editorial
>Yepun, Buenos Aires 1990) confirms these glosses
>"rau" por "rag": greda comun (5:151)
>"co": agua (3:59)
>The references in parentheses show that the words were discussed in
>previous volumes of Erize's opus, but I do not have them to check.
>
>I cannot comment on the authenticity or history of this etymology, however.
>And I do not know Mapudungun.  I am copying this to two linguists who do:
>
>Antonio D’az-Fern‡ndez  <chalimin at cybersnet.com.ar>
>and
>Rosendo Huisca-Melinao <rhuisca at entelchile.net>, <rhuisca at uctem.cl>
>
>Best wishes
>
>Nicholas Ostler
>
>----------------------------------------------------------------
>                       Nicholas   Ostler
>                           President
>              Foundation for Endangered Languages
>                  Registered Charity 1070616
>
>             Batheaston Villa,  172 Bailbrook Lane
>             Bath           BA1 7AA        England
>             +44-1225-85-2865 fax +44-1225-85-9258
>                  nostler at chibcha.demon.co.uk
>       http://www.bris.ac.uk/Depts/Philosophy/CTLL/FEL/
>