Rig Veda Americanus

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Title: Rig Veda Americanus
Sacred Songs Of The Ancient Mexicans, With A Gloss In Nahuatl
Author: Various
Release Date: February 9, 2005 [EBook #14993]
Language: English and Nahuatl
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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LIBRARY?OF?ABORIGINAL AMERICAN?LITERATURE.
No. VIII.
EDITED BY?D.G. BRINTON
[Illustration: XIPPE TOTEC, GOD OF SILVERSMITHS, IN FULL COSTUME. HYMN XV.]
BRINTON'S LIBRARY OF?ABORIGINAL AMERICAN LITERATURE.?NUMBER VIII.
RIG VEDA AMERICANUS.
SACRED SONGS OF THE ANCIENT MEXICANS,?WITH A GLOSS IN NAHUATL.
EDITED, WITH A PARAPHRASE, NOTES AND?VOCABULARY,
BY?DANIEL G. BRINTON
1890
PREFACE.
In accordance with the general object of this series of volumes--which is to furnish materials for study rather than to offer completed studies--I have prepared for this number the text of the most ancient authentic record of American religious lore. From its antiquity and character, I have ventured to call this little collection the RIG VEDA AMERICANUS, after the similar cyclus of sacred hymns, which are the most venerable product of the Aryan mind.
As for my attempted translation of these mystic chants I offer it with the utmost reserve. It would be the height of temerity in me to pretend to have overcome difficulties which one so familiar with the ancient Nahuatl as Father Sahagun intimated were beyond his powers. All that I hope to have achieved is, by the aid of the Gloss--and not always in conformity to its suggestions--to give a general idea of the sense and purport of the originals.
The desirability of preserving and publishing these texts seems to me to be manifest. They reveal to us the undoubtedly authentic spirit of the ancient religion; they show us the language in its most archaic form; they preserve references to various mythical cycli of importance to the historian; and they illustrate the alterations in the spoken tongue adopted in the esoteric dialect of the priesthood. Such considerations will, I trust, attract the attention of scholars to these fragments of a lost literature.
In the appended Vocabulary I have inserted only those words and expressions for which I can suggest correct--or, at least,?probable--renderings. Others will have to be left to future investigators.
CONTENTS.
Preface
Introduction
I. Hymn of Huitzilopochtli
II. War Song of the Huitznahuac
III. Hymn of Tlaloc
IV. Hymn to the All-Mother
V. Hymn to the Virgin Mother
VI. Hymn to the God of Fire
VII. Hymn of Mixcoatl
VIII. Hymn to the God of Flowers
IX. Hymn to the Goddess of Artists
X. Hymn to the God of Fishing
XI. Hymn of the Otomi Leader
XII. Hymn to the Goddess of Childbirth
XIII. Hymn to the Mother of Mortals
XIV. Hymn Sung at a Fast every Eight Years
XV. Hymn to a Night God
XVI. Hymn to the Goddess of Food
XVII. Hymn to the Gods of Wine
XVIII. Hymn to the Master of Waters
XIX. Hymn to the God of Flowers
XX. Hymn to the God of Merchants
Glossary
Index
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
Xippe Totec, God of Silversmiths, in Full Costume, Frontispiece
Priest of Xippe Totec, Drinking and Playing on a Drum, Hymn XV
Chicomecoatl, Goddess of Food and Drink, Hymn XVI
Totochtin, the Rabbits, Gods of the Drunkards, Hymn XVII
Atlaua, Singing and Dancing, Hymn XVIII
INTRODUCTION.
As in a previous number of the Library of Aboriginal American Literature I have discussed in detail the character of the ancient Mexican poetry, I shall confine myself at present to the history of the present collection. We owe its preservation to the untiring industry of Father Bernardino de Sahagun, one of the earliest missionaries to Mexico, and the author of by far the most important work on the religion, manners and customs of the ancient Mexicans.
By long residence and close application Sahagun acquired a complete mastery of the Nahuatl tongue. He composed his celebrated _Historia de las Cosas de la Nueva Espa?a_ primarily in the native language, and from this original wrote out a Spanish translation, in some parts considerably abbreviated. This incomplete reproduction is that which was published in Spanish by Lord Kingsborough and Bustamente, and in a French rendering with useful notes by Dr. Jourdanet and M. R��mi Simeon.
So far as I know, the only complete copy of the Nahuatl original now in existence is that preserved in the Bibliotheca Laurentio-Mediceana in Florence, where I examined it in April, 1889. It is a most elaborate and beautiful MS., in three large volumes, containing thirteen hundred and seventy-eight illustrations, carefully drawn by hand, mostly colored, illustrative of the native mythology, history, arts and usages, besides many elaborate head and tail pieces to the chapters.
There is another Nahuatl MS. of Sahagun's history in the private library of the King of Spain at Madrid, which I examined in May, 1888, and of which I