Daniel G. Brinton

“ Narrative Literature. Of all forms of sustained discourse, we may reasonably suppose that of narration to have been the earliest. The incidents of the hunt were related at the return; the experiences of the past were told as a guide to the present; and the first efforts of the imagination are the depicting of fictitious occurrences, tradition and myth, story and history; these make up most of the entertainment of conversation to simple minds. ”

“ The fate of the prisoner is immediate death and he knows it, but his audacity and bravery do not fail him. He boasts of his warlike exploits, and taunts his captors, like an Iroquois in his death song, and his enemies listen with respect. He even threatens the king, and has to be restrained from attacking him. ”

“ It is a singular error, due wholly to ignorance of the subject, to maintain that the American tongues are cramped in their vocabularies, or that their syntax does not permit them to define the more delicate relationships of ideas. Nor is it less a mistake to assert, as has been done repeatedly, and even by authorities of eminence in our own day, that they are not capable of supplying the expressions of abstract reasonings. ”

“ But, except some orations and poems, hereafter to be mentioned, it is almost all that I can name. Passing southward the harvest becomes richer. When Bishop Landa, in Yucatan, and Bishop Zumarraga, in Mexico, made bonfires, in the public squares of Mani and Tlaltilulco, of the priceless literary treasures of the Mayas and Aztecs, their maps, their parchment rolls, their calendars on wood, their painted paper books, their inscribed histories, it is recorded that the natives bewailed bitterly this obliteration of their sciences and their archives. ”

“ Hence it is, that the notices of the poetry of American nations are so scant and unsatisfactory. While all travelers agree that the tribes have songs and chants, war songs, peace songs, love songs, and others, few satisfactory specimens have been recorded. Those who have examined the subject most accurately have found that many so-called songs are mere repetitions of a few words, or even of simple interjections, over and over again, with an endless iteration, in a chanting voice. ”

“ The modern Maya lends itself very readily both to rhyme and rhythm, and I have in my possession some quite neat specimens of versification in it, from the pen of the Yucatecan historian, Apolinar Garcia y Garcia.
When we reach Peru we find a race not less poetical in temperament than the cultured Mexicans. Nothing but their ignorance of an alphabet, and the indifference or fanatical hatred of the early explorers for the productions of the native intellect, prevented the perpetuation of a Qquichua literature, both extensive and noble. ”

“ Theophilie Gautier used to say, that the most profitable book for a professional writer to read is the dictionary; that is, that a mastery of words is his most valuable acquirement. The extraordinarily rich synonomy of some American tongues, notably the Algonkin, the Aztec, and the Qquichua, attests how sedulously their resources have been cultivated. Father Olmos, in his grammar of the Aztec, gives many examples of twenty and thirty synonymous expressions, all in current use in his day. ”

“ Most of these educated men, however, rather shunned the cultivation of their maternal tongues, and preferred, when they wrote at all, to choose that of their white brethren, the Spanish, Portuguese or English. The extensive theological literature which we possess, printed or in manuscript, in American tongues, and in many it is quite ample, is scarcely ever the result of the efforts of the Christian teachers of indigenous affiliations. ”

“ Of those charming Tupi songs, to which I have already referred, I fear that we have but very few preserved in the original tongue. Not that there is any lack of poems in the lingoa geral, or "common language" of Brazil, as the ordinary and corrupt Tupi there spoken is called. It is a melodious idiom, lending itself easily to rhyme and rhythm, and several Brazilian writers of European blood have gained reputation by their compositions in it. But of genuine aboriginal productions, there are not many. ”

“ Section 1. Introductory. When even a quite intelligent person hears about "Aboriginal American
Literature," he is very excusable for asking: What is meant by the term?
Where is this literature? In fine, Is there any such thing?
To answer such inquiries, I propose to treat, with as much brevity as practicable, of the literary efforts of the aborigines of this continent, a chapter in the general History of Literature hitherto wholly neglected.
Indeed, it will be a surprise to many to learn that any members of these rude tribes have manifested either taste or talent for scholarly productions. ”

“ The partly civilized races of Mexico, Central America and Peru, were much better prepared to receive the lessons of European teachers than the barbarous hunting tribes. Had they had any fair chance, they would have soon equaled their teachers. Father Motolinia, one of the earliest missionaries to Mexico, testifies to the readiness with which the natives acquired both Spanish and Latin, and adds that, in the latter tongue, they became skilled grammarians, and wrote both verse and prose with commendable accuracy. ”

“ In no Oriental city does the teller of strange tales find a more willing audience than in the Indian wigwam. The folk lore of every tribe which has been properly investigated has turned out to be most ample. Tales of talking animals, of mythical warriors, of giants, dwarfs, subtle women, potent magicians, impossible adventures, abound to an extent that defies collection. ”

“ Hence, in this primitive literature which I am describing, the narrative portion is the most abundant. There was a natural aspiration on the part of the natives, as soon as they had learned the art of writing, to preserve in permanent form the records, more or less authentic, of their tribes and ancestors. This desire of preserving the national history is shown by the works of Copway, Jones, Cusick, Ixtlilxochitl, and others, to whom I have already referred, who wrote in European tongues. ”

“ Minor characters are a facetious youth, who is constantly punning and joking; and the dignified figure of the High Priest of the Sun, who endeavors to dissuade the hero from his seemingly hopeless love.
The second drama to which I refer is that of Rabinal Achi, in the Kiche tongue of Guatemala. The text was obtained by the Abbe Brasseur de Bourbourg, and edited with a French translation. The plot is less complete than that of the Ollanta, and the constant repetitions, while they constitute strong evidence of its antiquity and native origin, are tedious to a European reader. ”

“ Brinton gives us the clue to the religious thought of the aboriginal Races. ... It is a learned and careful book, clearly written, popular in style though scientific in method, and must be a good deal fresher than a novel to most readers."—The American (Philadelphia) .
"This volume is the first attempt at what is entitled to be regarded as a critically accurate presentation of the fundamental conceptions found in the native beliefs of the tribes of America."—The New England Bibliopolist. ”

“ In fact, so many tribes were of a gay and frolicsome disposition, so much given to joking, to playing on words, and to noticing the humorous aspect of occurrences, that they have not unfrequently been charged by the whites best acquainted with them, the missionaries, with levity and a frivolous temperament. ”

“ One branch of the Maya race, the Tzendals, inhabited a portion of the province of Chiapas. One of their hero-gods bore the name of Votan, a word from a Maya root, signifying the breast or heart, but from its faint resemblance to "Odin," and its still fainter similarity to "Buddha," their myth about him has given rise to many whimsical speculations. This myth was written down in the native tongue by a Christianized native, in the seventeenth century. ”

“ Yet to him we probably owe the preservation of the writings of Ixtlilxochitl, Tezozomoc, and others who wrote in Spanish, and whose volumes have since seen the light in the collections of Bustamente, Lord Kingsborough, Ternaux-Compans, and elsewhere.
The Nahuatl MSS. have remained unedited. Few took an interest in their contents, fewer still in the language. The science of linguistics is very modern, and that even so perfect an idiom as the Nahuatl could command the attention of scholars for its own sake, had not dawned on the minds of patrons of learning. ”

“ Among the many losses which American ethnology has suffered, that of the text of the native dramas is one of the most regretable. Is is, however, not total. Two have been published which claim to be, and I think are, faithful renditions of the ancient texts as they were transmitted verbally, from one to another, in pre-Columbian times.
The most celebrated of these is the drama of Ollanta, [86] in the Qquichua language of Peru. No less than eight editions of this have been published, the last and best of which is that by the meritorious scholar, Senor Gavino Pacheco Zegarra. ”

“ Les chefs des vieillards m'avoient souvent parle de leurs ancetres, des courses qu'ils avoient faites, et des combats qu'ils avoient eu a soutenir, avant que la nation put se fixer ou elle est aujourd'hui. ”

“ Horatio Hale, who has done so much to elucidate the whole subject of Indian ethnography and migrations, with the argument derived from language in connection with established tradition; and especially to disentangle Iroquois history from its complications with the legends of their mythology."—Auburn Daily Advertiser, July 21, 1883.
"The book is one of great ethnological value, in the light it casts on the political and social life, as well as the character and capacity, of the people with whom it originated."—Popular Science Monthly, November 1883. ”

“ This is well, for all these things teach us what manner of men made up the indigenous race, what were their powers, their aspirations, their mental grasp. But closer to very self, to thought and being, are the connected expressions of men in their own tongues. ”

“ Very few strictly scholastic works seem to have been produced by the natives. Nearly all those which I have seen for use in the Mission schools appear to be the productions of the white instructors, generally, of course, aided by some intelligent native. I have in my possession an Ortografia en Lengua Kekchi, picked up by Dr. Berendt in Vera Paz, which was the work of Domingo Coy, an Indian of Coban (MS. pp. 32) . But on examination it proves to be merely an adaptation of a Manual de Ortografia Castellana, in use in the schools, and not an original effort. ”

“ Some old men acquire great reputation as story tellers, and are invited to houses, and feasted, by those who are desirous of listening to them. Good story tellers often originate tales, and do not disclaim the authorship. When people of different tribes meet they often exchange tales with one another. An old Indian will occupy several hours in telling a tale, with much elegant and minute description."—Ethnography and Philology of the Hidatsa Indians, pp. ”

“ The language numbered about sixteen dialects, none very remote from the parent stem, which linguists identify as the Maya proper of the Yucatecan peninsula. While there are a number of verbal similarities between Maya and Nahuatl, the radicals of the two idioms and their grammatical structure are widely asunder. The Nahuatl is an excessively pliable, polysyllabic and highly synthetic tongue; the Maya is rigid, its words short, of one or two syllables generally, and is scarcely more synthetic than French. ”

“ We may as well omit from consideration, in this connection, the merely pictographic signs of the hunting tribes, although they were used for mnemonic purposes. Let us rather proceed, at once, to the highest specimens of the graphic art in ancient America, and inquire their scope. In Mexico, in Yucatan, in Nicaragua, and in one or two districts of South America, the early explorers found systems of writing which seemed to resemble that to which they were accustomed. ”

“ An account of Tezcuco and its rulers, after the Conquest until 1564, was the work of a native, Juan de San Antonio; while Don Gabriel de Ayala, a native noble of that city, composed a history of the Tezcucan and Mexican events, extending from 1243 to 1562. [23]
Of the anonymous MSS. in Boturini's list, I shall mention only one, as it alone, of all his Nahuatl records, has succeeded in reaching publication. He called it a History of the Kingdoms of Culhuacan and Mexico. ”

“ Washington Matthews says of one of the Sioux tribes is, in substance, true of all on the Continent:—
"Long winter evenings are often passed in reciting and listening to stories of various kinds. Some of these are simply the accounts given by the men, of their own deeds of valor, their hunts and journeys; some are narrations of the wonderful adventures of departed heroes; while many are fictions, full of impossible incidents, of witchcraft and magic. ”