Naming the Trinity: From Ideologies of Translation to Dialectics of Reception in Colonial Nahua Texts, 1547-1771

Tavárez, David

doi:10.1080/713657406

Cited by 28 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 6 publications

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“…35-36) found that if teotl was used, it was always paired with dios and the phrase "the one" (ce nelli) as qualifications to the Nahua concept. Tavárez (2000) also shows that across Christian doctrines and confession manuals, the loanword dios was preferred over a Nahuatl translation or epithet. Dios explicitly differentiated commonalities and universal associations between Nahua deities and the Christian god.…”

Section: Book 1: the Idolatrymentioning

confidence: 99%

Exclusive Monotheism and Sahagún’s Mission: The Problem of Universals in the First Book of the Florentine Codex

Sánchez-Perry

2021

Religions

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This article outlines the missionary methods of the Franciscan Bernardino de Sahagún, his interaction with Nahua communities in central Mexico, and the production of a text called the Florentine Codex. This article argues that the philosophical problem of universals, whether “common natures” existed and whether they existed across all cultures, influenced iconoclastic arguments about Nahua gods and idolatry. Focusing on the Florentine Codex Book 1 and its Appendix, containing a description of Nahua gods and their refutation, the article establishes how Sahagún and his team contended with the concept of universals as shaped by Nahua history and religion. This article presents the Florentine Codex Book 1 as a case study that points to larger patterns in the Christian religion, its need for mission, and its construal of true and false religion.

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Section: Book 1: the Idolatrymentioning

confidence: 99%

Exclusive Monotheism and Sahagún’s Mission: The Problem of Universals in the First Book of the Florentine Codex

Sánchez-Perry

2021

Religions

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“…By now, we have seen the Nahua concept of tonalli standing for the Christian “soul” in two early Colonial dictionaries. Although after this initial period of coining the “doctrinal Nahuatl” (see Tavárez 2000), the term tetonal did not proliferate in written sources. Another term, yollotl , “heart,” found its way to Christian discourse.…”

Section: What the Sources Really Tell Us About “Teyolia”mentioning

confidence: 99%

An Animating Principle in Confrontation With Christianity? De(re)constructing the Nahua “Soul”

Olko

Madajczak

2018

Ancient Mesoam

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Abstract-Yolia is one of the principal indigenous terms present in Christian Nahua terminology in the first decades of European contact. It is employed for “soul” or “spirit” and often forms a doublet with ánima in Nahuatl texts of an ecclesiastical, devotional, or secular nature. The term -yolia/teyolia has also lived a rich and fascinating life in scholarly literature. Its etymology (“the means for one's living”) is strikingly similar to that of the Spanish word ánima, or “soul.” Taking into account the possibility that attestations of the seemingly pre-Hispanic -yolia can be identified in some of the written sources, we have reviewed historical, linguistic, and anthropological evidence concerning this term in order to revisit the Nahua concept of the “soul.” We also scrutinize the very origin of -yolia in academic discourse. This analysis, based on broader historical and linguistic evidence referring to both pre-Conquest beliefs and Christianization in sixteenth-century central Mexico, is the point of departure for proposing and substantiating an alternative hypothesis about the origin of -yolia. Our precise focus has been to trace and pinpoint a pervasive Christian influence, manifest both in indigenous Colonial texts and conceptual frameworks of modern scholars interpreting them. We conclude that -yolia is a neologism created in the early Colonial period.

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“…In terms of language, they engaged both precontact resources of Nahuatl and innovations brought by the Spanish language and culture (including the friars’ deliberate translations of Christian terms) in a creative process of response to historical circumstances. Anderson et al (1976), Burkhart (1989, 2001), Cline and León-Portilla (1984), Karttunen and Lockhart (1976), Lockhart (1992), Schwaller (2006), Sigal (2011) and Tavárez (2000), to name only a handful of publications, demonstrate how Spanish terms were adapted by Nahuatl, which, concurrently, modified its original vocabulary to describe the Colonial reality.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Life-Giver: The Pre-Hispanic Nahua Concept of “Father” Through Colonial Written Sources

Madajczak

2017

Ancient Mesoam

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This paper explores the ancient Nahua concept of “father,” employing early Colonial sources written in both Nahuatl and Spanish. A careful contextual analysis of the occurrences of various Nahuatl terms for “father” or “parent” leads to the conclusion that the principal criterion for creating their metaphorical extensions differed considerably from parallel Spanish criterion. While the latter referred to the power relationship (“father” is the one who governs), the former was based on the concept of exchange (“father” is the one who gives). This principle has implications for studying many aspects of Nahua culture in which the terms for “father” appear: gender and social roles, political hierarchy, pre-Hispanic religion, or evangelization. The difference in the construction of such basic concepts in Nahuatl and Spanish leads to methodological considerations about studying sources that have arisen from the context of cultural contact.

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Naming the Trinity: From Ideologies of Translation to Dialectics of Reception in Colonial Nahua Texts, 1547-1771

Cited by 28 publications

References 6 publications

Exclusive Monotheism and Sahagún’s Mission: The Problem of Universals in the First Book of the Florentine Codex

Exclusive Monotheism and Sahagún’s Mission: The Problem of Universals in the First Book of the Florentine Codex

An Animating Principle in Confrontation With Christianity? De(re)constructing the Nahua “Soul”

Life-Giver: The Pre-Hispanic Nahua Concept of “Father” Through Colonial Written Sources

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