Lenca Geography of the 16th and 17th Centuries (original) (raw)

Lenca for Linguists (Sketch of an indigenous language of Honduras)

The main purpose of this sketch, written for language specialists, is to inform about some of the results of two years of intensive study of the Lenca languages of Honduras and Chilanga (El Salvador). Chapter 1 ("What is Lenca?") introduces the Lencas and their language, then Chapters 2 ("Reconstructing Lenca") and 3 ("Dialects, variation and standardization") summarise the process of constructing a modern model of Honduran Lenca language competence. Central chapters focus on what is now known about the Honduran Lenca language (with some passing references to Chilanga Lenca as well) in linguistic terms, starting with a four-page overview followed by separate sketches of the phonology, morphology, syntax and lexicon. Chapter 9 shows a sample of Lenca sentences as they appear in a historical source together with their linguistic analysis, while Chapter 10 presents a snippet of conversation in modern Lenca from a learners' manual. The 44-page sketch concludes with a selected two-way vocabulary list and a bibliography which lists data sources and studies, complete with links to on-line copies of the materials.

Bordering the New Spain Between Aztlán (NM) and Cuzcatlán (SV

Abstract: New Mexico and Central America are united by Pre-Hispanic and Colonial history. While Uto-Nicarao languages expand from Utah to Nicaragua, the Christ of Esquipulas’ pilgrims travel from El Trifinio (Central America Northern Triangle) to Chimayo (NM). “Bordering the New Spain. Between Aztlán (NM) and Cuscatlán (SV)” explores both sides of an ancient Viceroyalty to unveil a Camino Real (Real and Royal Road) whose forgotten signs are recognized only by subjective deposition. Resumen: Nuevo México y Centro América se unen por una historia pre-hispánica y colonial común. Mientras las lenguas yuto-nicaraos se expanden de Utah, EEUU, a Nicaragua, los peregrinos del Cristo de Esquipulas viajan desde El Trifinio (Triángulo Norte de Centro América) a Chimayó (NM). Se exploran ambos bordes de un antiguo Virreinato al revelar su enlace por un Camino Real (entre realeza y realidad), cuyas señales olvidadas sólo las reconoce una deposición testimonial subjetiva

Mapping an Occidental History in Baltasar de Obregón's Historia de los descubrimientos de Nueva España (1584)

Journal of the Southwest, 2011

Stories. .. carry out a labor that constantly transforms places into spaces and spaces into places.-de Certeau, Spatial Stories, 1984 In the mid-sixteenth century, the landscape that lay beyond the evershifting northern frontier of New Spain was still largely an imagined space to European settlers, a mysterious landscape that was mostly a source of legend, lore, gossip, and inauspicious stories of failed conquest and bellicose savages. The dreams of golden cities that had once fueled a desire to explore and conquer the lands to the north had waned significantly after the return of the Coronado expedition from New Spain in 1542, and Spanish explorers, loathe to be saddled with expedition costs or diminished status, largely viewed the banda del norte (edge of the north) as an unwelcoming periphery, a land of indomitable tribes containing little of worth. 1 Furthermore, no maps existed for the area yet, and aside from documents produced by members of a few expeditions, the landscape to the north remained largely unknown, mysterious, and imagined rather than controlled or "pacified." In 1584, however, the first Mexican criollo historian, Baltasar Obregón, sent a text to the Consejo de Indias in Spain, arguing in very practical terms for the establishment of mining settlements in the region and providing valuable itinerary information, including routes passable by horse, water sources, and locations of population centers with cultivated land and "gente de policía." This text attempted