Details

Other Title:

Ulua

Subjects:

Ulva dialect -- Glossaries, vocabularies, etc.
Indians of Central America -- Nicaragua -- Languages.
Indians of Central America.
Language and languages.
Ulva dialect.
Nicaragua -- Languages.
Nicaragua.

Form/Genre:

Glossaries.
Manuscripts, Spanish.
Manuscripts, Latin American.
Glossaries, vocabularies, etc.
Controlled vocabularies.

Language:

Spanish and Ulva, with the English equivalent occasionally noted in parentheses.

Biography/History:

French engineer.

Summary:

Vocabulary list of 63 words and the numbers 1 to 10, in Spanish and Ulva (Ulua), transcribed by C. Hermann Berendt from a work by Pablo (Paul) Lévy published in Spanish translation under the title Notas geográficas y económicas sobre la República de Nicaragua (Paris: E. Denne Schmitz, 1873). Berendt draws from a vocabulary list given by Lévy (p. 298) and the preceding discussion (p. 295-297), but arranges the entries in a different order. In a preface (Advertencia), Berendt notes that in his book Lévy referred to the people among whom he collected the vocabulary only as Caribs, without further specifying what group or language was meant, but that in a passage elsewhere in the book (p. 254-255), Lévy gives geographic locations of different groups of Caribs (or Smoos), and refers to those living around the upper basin of the river Mico as divided into Carca, Siquia, and Ulua. Berendt explains that the words noted in red ink (to the right of the Ulva) represent comparisons to the Ulva vocabulary collected by Julius Fröbel in 1851 and published by E. G. Squier in Nicaragua, its people, scenery, monuments, and the proposed interoceanic canal (New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1852, vol. 2, p. 324-325); and that words in blue ink (far right column), represent comparisons to the Tawahka (Toaca, Twaka) vocabulary collected by Mr. Haly and communicated to Berendt by the Rev. Alexander Henderson. For Berendt's transcription of Fröbel's vocabulary, see Ms. Coll. 700, Item 146, which also includes another version of Lévy's vocabulary, with Berendt's notes, dated March 1872. For Berendt's transcription of Haly's vocabulary, see Ms. Coll. 700, Item 133. Berendt notes that Lévy appears to have been familiar with Fröbel's vocabulary. According to Daniel Garrison Brinton, the present manuscript includes additions and corrections communicated to Berendt by Lévy during a meeting between them in Granada, Nicaragua, in 1874; there is no evidence in the manuscript itself to support that assertion. Brinton also says that the words are in Berendt's analytical alphabet, but the forms are identical to those in Lévy's book.

Notes:

Ms. codex.
Title from title page (p. 1).
This was the tenth of 19 manuscripts formerly bound together, probably by Daniel Garrison Brinton, and now disbound (Items 129-136, 143, 145, 146, 151-155, and 157-159). The bound volume had the spine title: Languages of Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica.
Pagination: Paper, ii + 5 + i leaves; [1-5], 6-9, [10 (blank)]; contemporary pagination in ink, upper outer corners.
Layout: Written in 20 lines. Vocabulary arranged in 3 or 4 columns, with Spanish on the far left and Ulva in the next column to the right, and the 1 or 2 columns to the right of the Ulva reserved for comparisons, consistently with a column for Ulva vocabulary by Julius Fröbel, and in most instances an additional column on the far right for the Twaka vocabulary of Mr. Haly.
Script: Written in the hand of C. Hermann Berendt.
Binding: Contemporary paper covers; sewn.
Origin: Probably written in Granada, Nicaragua, in 1874 (Brinton).

Penn Provenance:

From the collection of C. Hermann Berendt, later acquired by Daniel Garrison Brinton (ex libris stamp on the verso of front free endpaper in the bound volume that once contained the present item).

Cited in:

Described in Brinton, Daniel Garrison. Catalogue of the Berendt Linguistic Collection (Department of Archaeology and Paleontology, University of Pennsylvania, 1900), p. 28 (no. 145).
Described in Weeks, John M. "Karl Hermann Berendt: Colección de manuscritos lingüistícos de Centroamérica y Mesoamérica," Mesoamérica 36 (Dec. 1998), p. 662 (no. 106).
Described in Weeks, John M. The Library of Daniel Garrison Brinton (University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, 2002), p. 68-70 (no. 388, document 10).

Cited as:

UPenn Ms. Coll. 700, Item 145

Contributor:

Berendt, C. Hermann (Carl Hermann), 1817-1878, former owner.
Brinton, Daniel G. (Daniel Garrison), 1837-1899, former owner.

OCLC:

63636017