The Sun.—"Cur holy and pockifled Uncle" (referring to the myth of Nanahuatl, who was syphilitic, and leaping into the flames of a fire rose as the sun).
Tobacco.—"The nine (or seven) times beaten" (because for sacred purposes it was rubbed up this number of times); "the enchanted gray one" (from its color and use in conjuring).
Water.—"The
Green Woman" (from the greenness which follows moisture); "our
Mother, whose robe is of precious stones" (from the green or vegetable
life resembling the turquoise, emerald, jade, etc.).
36. It might be asked how the dark arts and secret ceremonies of the Nagualists escaped the prying eyes of the officers of the Holy Inquisition, which was established in Mexico in 1571. The answer is, that the inquisitors were instructed by Cardinal Diego de Espinosa, who at that time was Inquisitor General and President of the Council of the Indies, "to abstain from proceedings against Indians, because of their stupidity and incapacity, as well as scant instruction in the Holy Catholic faith, for the crimes of heresy, apostasy, heretical blasphemy, sorcery, incantations, superstitions," etc.
Energetic
inquisitors, however, conceded very grudgingly this exemption. In the
imposing auto de fé celebrated in the city of Mexico, in 1659,
a half-breed, Bernardo del Carpio by name,
son of a full-blood Indian mother, accused of blasphemy, etc., endeavored
to escape the Holy Office by pleading his Indian blood; but his appeal
was disallowed, and the precedent established that any admixture whatever
of European blood brought the accused within the jurisdiction of the
Inquisition.[130] Even this seems to have been a concession,
for we find the record of an auto de fé held in 1609, in the
province of Tehuantepec, in which eight full-blood natives were punished
for worshiping the goddess Pinopiaa.[131]
Mr. David Ferguson, however, who has studied
extensively the records of the inquisition in Mexico, informs me that
in none of the trials read by him has he observed any charges of Nagualism,
although many white persons were accused; and some tried, for consulting
Indian sorcerers.
37. It will be seen from what I have said, that the rites of Nagualism extended as widely as did the term over Mexico and Central America. It becomes, therefore, of importance to discover from what linguistic stock this term and its associated words are derived. From that source it is reasonable to suppose the rites of this superstition also had their origin.
The opinions on this subject have been diverse and positive. Most writers have assumed that it is a Nahuatl, or pure Mexican, word; while an eminent authority, Dr. Stoll, is not less certain that it is from a radical belonging to the neighboring great stock of the Mayan dialects, and especially the Quiche, of Guatemala.[132] Perhaps both these positions are erroneous, and we must look elsewhere for the true etymology of these expressions. Unquestionably they had become domesticated in both Maya and Nahuatl; but there is some reason to think they were loan-words, belonging to another, and perhaps more venerable, civilization than either of these nations could claim.
To illustrate this I shall subjoin several series of words derived from the same radical which is at the basis of the word nagual, the series, three in number, being taken from the three radically diverse, though geographically contiguous, linguistic stocks, the Maya, the Zapotec and the Nahuatl.
[130] See the Relacion del Auto celebrado en Mexico, año de 1659 (Mexico, En la Imprenta del Santo Officio, 1659).
[131] J. B. Carriedo, Estudios Historicos del Estado Oaxaqueno, Tom. i, pp 8, 9 (Oaxaca, 1849). About 1610 a number of Indians in the province of Acapulco were put to death for having buried enchanted ashes beneath the floor of a chapel! (Serna, Manual de Ministros, p. 52.)
[132] "Nagual ist in seiner correcten Form naoal ein echtes Quiché-Wort, ein Substantivum instrumentale, Yom Stamme naó wissen, erkennen. Naoal ist dasjeuige, womit oder woran etwas, in diesem Falle das Schicksal des Kindes, erkannt wird, und hut mit dem mexikanischen nahualli (Hexer, mit dem man es vielleicht in Verbiudung bringen möchte, nichts zu schaffen." Guatemala, p. 238.
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