attestations of itta, tlachiya vs. pohua

Tue Sep 13 13:36:14 UTC 2011

Piyali Heather,
	I see you haven’t received any responses yet to your mail. I hope you will, but I suspect that they will be few because of the nature of your question, and that’s what I’d like to comment on. Most people that deal with Classical Nahuatl texts, do so exclusively from within what we could call a closed corpus. There’s a finite number of relations you can identify and elaborate on between elements of a closed corpus. However, as you know, Classical Nahuatl can also be looked at as documents registering moments and variants of a language and culture that existed before the 1530s and continues to exist today. You have studied Classical and Modern Nahuatl together, and you have participated in the Tlatlacualtiah ceremony in Tepecxitla, and you have seen first hand how Modern tepahtianih use paper in the process of their communication with deities. And it’s not a pintura, something that is painted, finished and then perhaps, looked over and consulted. It’s paper that lives and embodies deity and has real relationships with human beings. It is invoked rather than consulted. This kind of blows a hole in the closed corpus. Or perhaps it puts the corpus in it’s proper context, and in doing so permits us to look at it in newer and more productive (as in researchers producing knowledge) ways. 
	I don’t have an answer to your question, but it’s a fascinating one. But more important is the methodology and expanded definition of corpus that lies behind the question.
John

John Sullivan, Ph.D.
Professor of Nahua language and culture
Universidad Autónoma de Zacatecas
Zacatecas Institute of Teaching and Research in Ethnology
Tacuba 152, int. 43
Centro Histórico
Zacatecas, Zac. 98000
Mexico
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idiez at me.com

On Sep 11, 2011, at 11:36 AM, Heather Allen wrote:

> Piyali nahuatlatos,
> 
> 
> This question arose while translating a section from the *Anales de
> Tlatelolco* recounting the fall of Tenochtitlan/Tlatelolco. Cortés has
> defeated Tenochtitlan but Tlatelolco still holds out. So he sends a message
> to the tlahtoqueh suggesting that, for the good of the women and children,
> they should surrender. In order to decide how to respond, the tlahtoqueh
> consult a priest. In the Nahuatl, one of the tlahtoqueh asks the priest,
> “quen antlachia quen anquita yn amotlapiello,” which Rafael Tena has
> translated as “¿qué veis, qué aparece en vuestras pinturas?”
> 
> 
> The verbs used here are *tlachi[y]a* and *itta*, which Karttunen has as to
> see something and to see, respectively,while *tlapiello* (*tlapiyalo*) are
> (loosely) things that are cared for or under someone’s stewardship. Tena has
> translated tlapiello as “pinturas,” which certainly makes sense in this
> context. But my question is, are *tlachia* and *itta* the verbs commonly
> used to describe the action of interpreting a *pintura* in 16th and
> 17thcentury Nahuatl documents? Or is
> *pohua* more commonly attested to in reference to *pinturas*?
> 
> 
> I ask because it seems to me that this passage may be describing a ritual
> involving *amatl*, rather than a “reading” of a *pintura*. In other words,
> the priest could be observing or examining amatl in a material sense, rather
> than examining what is inscribed upon the *amatl*. If *pohua* is more often
> used in reference to interpreting a pintura, that would support my hunch,
> especially since *tlapiello* could refer to *pinturas* but also other sacred
> things the priest has in is care.
> 
> 
> Tlazcamati miac for your suggestions!
> 
> 
> 
> Below is the original passage in Nahuatl followed by Tena's translation:
> 
> 
> Nima ye quiualitoa Coyoueuezi tlacuchcalcatl: “Tla quiualnozaca teua”.
> Conilhuia:
> “Tla xiuallauh, quen antlachia quen anquita yn amotlapiello?”. Conitoa teua
> amatlamatqui amatequi: “Nopilçinçiné, ma xicmocaquitica: ‘Tley nel
> tiquitozque? Ca ça nauilhuitl yn titlanapoualtizque. Auh y mach yehuatl yn
> inauatil y Uitzilopochtli cayatle uetzi. Cuix ychtaca aanquimotilizque. Ma
> uc tonacica, ca ça nauilhuitl yn titlanapoualtilizque.’” Auh y ye yuhqui amo
> mouelcaqui, ye no yc peuh y yaoyotl. (116)
> 
> 
> Coyohuehuetzin dijo: “Que se consulte al sacerdote”. Le preguntaron, pues, a
> éste: “¿Qué veis, qué aparece en vuestras pinturas?” Respondió el sacerdote
> encargado de estudiar y recortar los papeles: “Señores, escuchadme: ¿Qué
> podemos decir? Faltan solo cuatro días para que se cumplan 80. Quizá es
> designio de Huitzilopochtli que nada suceda. O quizá en secreto vosotros
> mismos lo veréis. Esperemos, pues sólo faltan cuatro días para los 80”. No
> quedaron contentos [con la respuesta], así que reanudaron la guerra. (117)
> 
> 
> *Anales de Tlatelolco. *Ed. and trans. Rafael Tena. México: Cien de México,
> 2004.* *116-117.
> 
> -- 
> Heather Allen, PhD
> Visiting Assistant Professor
> Department of Spanish & Portuguese
> University of Texas at Austin
> hallen at austin.utexas.edu
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