ixtlahua/debt

[John F. Schwaller]

Since this discussion began, I have been intending to write.  As it turns
out, one of the folk tales collected by Pablo Gonzalez Casanova , _Cuentos
Indigenas_ (Mexico: UNAM, 1946) focuses on just this word.  It occurs in
the first tale "Cente coatl ihuan tlacatl."  It tells of a debate between a
man and a snake, very much along the lines of Androcles and the Lion.  In
the European version the lion has a thorn in his paw.  The man, Androcles,
removes the thorn.  Later when Androcles (a Christian) is about to be
killed in the Coliseum by a wild lion, it turns out to be the same one he
had assisted years before, and is thus saved.  In the Nahua version the man
saves a snake who had been trapped under a fallen log.  Upon his removal
the snake proposes to eat the man.  The man protests, but the snake utters
the famous line; "Tle tehua qualli tlacatl, amo ticmati que ce qualli ica
ce amo qualli moxtlahua?"  "But you good man, did you not know that a good
[act] with an evil one is repaid?"  The rest of the story goes on to
demonstrate how a good act is repaid with an evil one.  But the key here is
that this act of repayment, or exchange, all revolves around the verb ixtlahua.

My thanks go to Joe Campbell who made me translate this story as one of my
first reading exercises in Nahuatl some 30 years ago.

J. F. Schwaller


John F. Schwaller
Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs and Dean
315 Behmler Hall
University of Minnesota, Morris
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320-589-6015
FAX 320-589-6399
schwallr at mrs.umn.edu