1 ANIMATE VERSUS INANIMATE: THE CONFLICT BETWEEN MAYAN AND EUROPEAN - PDF document

1 ANIMATE VERSUS INANIMATE: THE CONFLICT BETWEEN MAYAN AND EUROPEAN ASTRONOMICAL TRADITIONS IN MAYAN COLONIAL DOCUMENTS Alfonso Lacadena Universidad Complutense de Madrid SAA Session on "Celestial References in Mesoamerican Creation Stories" (Org. by Gabrielle Vail and Timothy Knowlton) Vancouver, March 26-30 2008 ABSTRACT In colonial Mayan documents there is a contradiction in how celestial bodies are counted, in some cases using the numeral classifier – tul (for human and supernatural beings) and in others the numeral classifier – p’el (for inanimate beings). In this work it is proposed that such contradiction is only apparent, reflecting the conflict between two great astronomical traditions: the original pre-Columbian Maya, who conceived of celestial bodies as animate beings, and the recently acquired European one, which considered celestial bodies as inert objects. Numeral classifiers and the counting of celestial bodies in Colonial Yucatec As is well known, numeral classifiers are particles that combine with numbers in counting objects, classifying them into certain classes that vary from language to language. In the Yucatecan group—group of languages of the Maya family that exhibits numeral classifiers, as well as the Ch’olan-Tzeltalan group—these classes refer mainly to animacy, shape and size of objects, and the spatial relation that the counted objects have amongst them or in relation to other objects. Numeral classifiers give an extraordinary opportunity to look through the same eyes of the people studied and see how they organized and interpreted the surrounding universe. The numeral classifier which is most commonly used in the count of celestial bodies in Maya alphabetic colonial documents is <ppel> (also written as <pel>, <pel> and <bel>). Thus, for example, is found in the Chilam Balam of Chumayel (Roys 1967: 55, 150) Zuhuy c � uplal u kaba u na uucppel chachac ek ‘The Virgin, as she is called, is the mother of the seven planets’ or in the Chilam Balam of Kaua (Bricker & Mihram 2002): [h]e uuc pel planetazobe ‘As for the seven planets here (…)’ (ibid.: 144)

2 ay 7 planetas he ix vuc pel planetaob lae ‘There are seven planets and these seven planets here (…)’ (ibid.: 153) ti ix chican vuc pel planetas y okol ‘and seven planets appear there overhead’ (ibid.: 153) yt hun pel ek canamail ‘with one guardian star’ (ibid.: 154) ti yx chican hun pel ek luna ‘There appears one star: It is the Moon’ (ibid.: 244). The numeral classifier <ppel> is well attested in Mayan languages of the Yucatecan group for the general count of objects and inanimate beings. Thus, in Colonial Yucatec, we find - ppel ‘cuenta general para todas cuantas cosas hay’ (general count for all exisiting things) (Arzápalo 1995: 661), hunppel ‘uno, y es de cosas inanimadas’ (one, and is for inanimate things) (Arzápalo 1995: 337), - ppel ‘para cuenta en general de quantas cosas hay’ (general count for all exisiting things) (Beltrán 2002: 269); modern Yucatec - p'éel nc. ‘thing’ (Bricker et al . 1998); Lacandon – p’el ‘cosas en general, objetos diversos’ ([for] things in general, diverse objects) (Bruce 1968: 71); Itzaj – p’eel (with variantes – p’ee and - p’e ) nc ‘inanimado. inanimate’ (Hofling & Tesucún 1997: 532-533); and Mopan – p’eel ‘para contar objetos inanimados’ (for counting inanimate objects) (Schumann 1997: 99). In Western Ch’olan Mayan languages this same classifier is attested with the same meaning. Thus, in Acalan Chontal – ppel ‘inanimado’ (inaimate) (Smailus 1975: 165), modern Chontal - p’e ‘used in counting objects of a general or nonspecific shape, that is, objects which are not covered by one of the other shape classifiers’ and ‘used with nouns expressing nontangible concepts’ (Keller 1955: 260); and Ch’ol – p’ejl ‘sufijo numérico para contar cosas en general’ (numerical suffix for counting things in general) (Aulie & Aulie 1978: 98). 1 What interests us here is the use of classifier <ppel> in the count of celestial bodies (stars, planets), and therefore their categorization by colonial Yucatec Maya as inert or inanimate beings. However, interestingly, sometimes Maya scribes used numeral classifier <tul> instead of <ppel> in the counting of celestial bodies, as in the Chilam Balam of Kaua (Bricker & Mihram 2002: 149): vuc tulili planetasob ohelan t u lacal lay kine yt luna maris mercurio jupiter venus saturno ‘Only seven planets are known by everyone: the Sun here, and the Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, Saturn.’ 1 The presence of forms p’éel ~ p’eel in Yucatecan languages and p’el ~ p’e ~ p’ejl in Western Ch’olan ones, points to an earlier shared form *- p’ehl , probably diffused.

3 and Chilam Balam of Na (Gubler & Bolles 2000: 94, 95): Mahanceni uuctulili planetasob lae ohelan ix tumen tulacal: lay Kine, Ue, Mars, Mercurio, Júpiter, Venus, Saturno. Lay ix u nucul. Lay ix u chuchma lae. ‘It is clear that there are seven planets which are known by all: they are the Sun, Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, Saturn. This is their meaning. This is their burden.’ Although numeral classifiers can alternate in some cases (for example, <ppel>, as a general classifier for inanimate beings can alternate with classifiers referring to shape or size of objects), the strange and interesting thing in this case is that <ppel> and <tul> are classifiers used in categorizing elements that belong to radically opposite classes: as we have seen, <ppel> is the classifier used for inanimate beings, while <tul> is the classifier used for animate beings, like human and animals: Precisely, in modern Yucatecan languages, – túul ~ - tuul ~ - tul is the classifier of animate beings. Thus, in modern Yucatec – túul nc. animate [person, animal] (Bricker et al . 1998); Lacandon – tul ‘seres vivos (dioses, hombres, animales)’ (living beings, gods, human, animals) (Bruce 1968: 71); Itzaj – tuul (with variants – tuu and – tu ) ncl. ‘ser vivo. animate class’ (Hofling & Tesucún 1997: 613); and Mopan – tuul ‘para contar objetos animados’ (for counting animate beings) (Schumann 1997: 99, 281); - tuul ‘clasificador de números de cosas vivas’ (numeral classifier for living things) (Ulrich y Ulrich 1976: 208). This modern meaning of – túul ~ - tuul ~ - tul , that is, a numeral classifier used for counting animate beings, whether human or animals, is often extended to explain the usage of Colonial Yucatec <tul>. However, I would like to point out that the meaning of Colonial Yucatec <tul> is not exactly the same as the modern one, but seems to have been more restricted in the past. If we analyze the use that <tul> has in Mayan alphabetic colonial texts we notice that it is restricted to the class of human and supernatural beings, being the inclusion of animals a late development at the end of colonial times. 2 For example, in the Chilam Balam of Chumayel, <tul> is attested with mehen ‘son (of man)’, al ‘son (of woman)’, casadosob ‘married people’, ahkin ‘priest’, ch’uplal ‘women’, noh xib ‘nobles, elder men’, yxahau ‘queen’, yxma na ‘orfan’, yxnuc ‘elder women’, personaob ‘persons’, uinicob , ‘men, people’, batab ‘governor’, and supernaturals like bacab , chac ‘the chac s’, ahcanan col ‘the guardian of the milpa’, but not with animals. The same happens in the Chilam Balam of Tizimín, where <tul> is used, for example, with ixahau ‘queen’, nacom ‘war captain’, and other human beings, like the seven warriors from Mayapan who destroyed Chichen Itza who are said lai ukaba uinicil uuctul ob , as well as with gods and supernaturals, as chac uayab sodz , bacab or ku 3 but, again, not with animals. In fact, it is highly interesting to notice that colonial lexical sources do not include animals as beings belonging to the class represented by <tul>: for example, the Dictionary of San Francisco has – tul ‘cuenta para personas’ (count for persons) (Barrera 1980: 818); the Dictionary of Ticul has - tul ‘cuenta para ángeles, almas y hombres’ (count for angels, souls and people) (ibid.); Beltrán de Santa Rosa, in his list of classifiers, includes – tul ‘para hombres, mugeres, ángeles y almas’ (for men, women, angels and souls) (Beltrán 2002: 270). The meaning of <tul> as a general classifier for 2 As can be noticed in some Indian colonial wills, where – tul begins to be used in the counting of cattle, instead of – cot and – pok . 3 See Bricker 1990a, 1990b.