Michel Launey - An Introduction to Classical Nahuatl

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An Introduction to Classical Nahuatl

Now available to an English-speaking audience, this book is a comprehensive grammar of classical Nahuatl, the literary language of the Aztecs. It offers students of Nahuatl a complete and clear treatment of the language's structure, grammar and vocabulary. It is divided into thirty-six lessons, beginning with basic syntax and progressing gradually to more complex structures. Each grammatical concept is illustrated clearly with examples, exercises and passages for translation. A key is provided to allow students to check their answers. By far the most approachable textbook of Nahuatl available, this book will be an excellent teaching tool both for classroom use and for readers pursuing independent study of the language. It will be an invaluable resource to anthropologists, ethnographers, historians, archaeologists and linguists alike.

Michel Launey, now retired, was a professor at the Universit Denis Diderot, Paris, and the Institut de Recherches pour le Dveloppement, Cayenne. He was a visiting professor at the Universidad de Guadalajara, Universidad Nacional Autnoma de Mxico and Yale University, among others. His other books include Introduction la langue et la littrature aztques (the French edition of this book, published in 1979), Une grammaire omniprdicative (1994) and Awna Parikwaki: Introduction la langue palikur de Guyane et de lAmapa (2003).

An Introduction to Classical Nahuatl

Michel Launey

Universit Denis Diderot, Paris

Translated and Adapted by

Christopher Mackay

University of Alberta

CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS

Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, So Paulo, Delhi, Tokyo, Mexico City

Cambridge University Press

32 Avenue of the Americas, New York , NY 10013-2473, USA

www.cambridge.org

Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780521732291

Michel Launey and Christopher Mackay 2011

This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press.

First published as Introduction la langue et la littrature aztques by LHartmattan, 1979

First published as Introductin a la lenguay a la literatura Nhuatl by UNAM, Mxico, 1992

First published in English 2011

Printed in the United States of America

A catalog record for this publication is available from the British Library.

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication data

Launey, Michel.

[Introduction la langue et la littrature aztques. English]

An introduction to classical Nahuatl / Michel Launey; translated and adapted by Christopher Mackay.

p. cm.

Translation from French to English.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-0-521-51840-6 (hardback) ISBN 978-0-521-73229-1 (pbk)

1. Nahuatl language. 2. Nahuatl literature. I. Mackay, Christopher S., 1962 II. Title.

PM4061.L3813 2010

497.45282421dc22 2010015176

ISBN 978-0-521-51840-6 Hardback

ISBN 978-0-521-73229-1 Paperback

Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party Internet Web sites referred to in this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such Web sites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.

Contents

Preface

The people generally known as the Aztecs called themselves Mexica ( mxc ). Aztec means from Aztln, the mythical starting point of the Mexica's migration to the south. Their language was called nhuatl or nhuatltlli clear speech or even mxcatltlli Mexica speech.

The century that followed the Spanish conquest saw the death of a great part of the native population, the dismantling of their social system and the irrevocable alteration of their culture. This historic catastrophe one of the greatest in human history was partially attenuated thanks to the efforts of some enlightened friars and certain native notabilities, who gathered or composed all sorts of texts in Nahuatl: legends, discourses, historical chronicles, compilations of traditional knowledge.

This textbook is an introduction to this language. It aims to satisfy the interest in Nahuatl that has arisen in recent years. In various universities and institutions, historians, ethnographers and linguists have offered students and investigators of very diverse origins courses and seminars relating to the Aztec sphere. I hope that this work will be of some utility to them and that it will receive a favorable welcome.

I imagine that it will be of equal interest to linguists, who may not particularly deepen the study of indigenous Mexican history and culture, but who seek to expand the field of available linguistic data and so are looking for reliable descriptions of as many languages as possible.

Let us specify again that the language described here is Classical Nahuatl, the literary language of the century following the Conquest. Nearly five centuries on, there is clearly no region in which this variety of Nahuatl is still spoken. It is thus a dead language, or rather, a dead variant of the language, in the same way as the English of, say, Christopher Marlowe is a dead form of the English language. No one nowadays speaks exactly like that, but many hundreds of thousands of people speak present-day variants of Nahuatl, some of them fairly close to the classical one, so that travelers to Mexico today may be pleasantly surprised when recognizing words and expressions, thereby gaining more inside knowledge of the country and its people.

The original version of this book was published in 1979 in French, and a Spanish translation by Cristina Kraft appeared in 1992. Several English-speaking friends and colleagues suggested that an English version be made available to scholars and students. So when Christopher Mackay volunteered to take on the task of translation, I readily and thankfully accepted. It quickly appeared that the original version needed some modifications, both in view of a few grammatical points which did not seem totally clear to me thirty years ago and of the specific referential background of English-speaking potential readers. After many e-mail exchanges and a personal encounter at the University of Alberta, which gave rise to intensive discussions and fruitful adjustments, the final result is indeed impressive. Christopher Mackay did a painstaking, marvellous job of it, and I am deeply indebted to him.

My gratitude also extends to all the colleagues and friends, nahuatlatos and/or linguists, who helped me enlarge my field of knowledge and deepen my interest in this wonderful language and culture. A special mention is due to the organizers of Nahuatl or Uto-Aztecan sessions: Fernando Leal and Jos-Luis Iturrioz in Guadalajara, Jonathan Amith at Yale and most of all to Una Canger and Karen Dakin, who kindly took a last decisive look at the final version.

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