Nagualism: A Study in Native American Folk-lore and History. Daniel G. (Daniel Garrison) Brinton

even than these are those who wander about as physicians or healers; who are none such, but magicians, enchanters, and sorcerers, who, while pretending to cure, kill whom they will. They apply their medicines by blowing on the patient, and by the use of infernal words; learned by heart by those who cannot read or write; and received in writing from their masters by those acquainted with letters. The Master never imparts this instruction to a single disciple, but always to three at a time, so that in the practice of the art it may be difficult to decide which one exerts the magical power. They blow on feathers, or sticks, or plants, and place them in the paths where they may be stepped on by those they wish to injure, thus causing chills, fevers, ugly pustules and other diseases; or they introduce into the body by such arts toads, frogs, snakes, centipedes, etc, causing great torments. And by these same breathings and magic words they can burn down houses, destroy the growing crops and induce sickness. No one of the three disciples is permitted to practice any of these arts without previously informing the other two, and also the Master, by whom the three have been taught.

      “We have learned by the confession of certain guilty parties how the Master begins to instruct his disciple. First he tells him to abjure God, the saints and the Virgin, not to invoke their names, and to have no fear of them. He then conducts him to the wood, glen, cave or field where the pact with the Devil is concluded, which they call ‘the agreement’ or ‘the word given’ (in Tzental quiz). In some provinces the disciple is laid on an ant-hill, and the Master standing above him calls forth a snake, colored with black, white and red, which is known as ‘the ant-mother’ (in Tzental zmezquiz).40 This comes accompanied by the ants and other small snakes of the same kind, which enter at the joints of the fingers, beginning with the left hand, and coming out at the joints of the right hand, and also by the ears and the nose; while the great snake enters the body with a leap and emerges at its posterior vent. Afterwards the disciple meets a dragon vomiting fire, which swallows him entire and ejects him posteriorly. Then the Master declares he may be admitted, and asks him to select the herbs with which he will conjure, the disciple names them, the Master gathers them and delivers them to him, and then teaches him the sacred words.

      “These words and ceremonies are substantially the same in all the provinces. The healer enters the house of the invalid, asks about the sickness, lays his hand on the suffering part, and then leaves, promising to return on the day following. At the next visit he brings with him some herbs which he chews or mashes with a little water and applies to the part. Then he repeats the Pater Noster, the Ave, the Credo and the Salve and blows upon the seat of disease, afterwards pronouncing the magical words taught him by his master. He continues blowing in this manner, inhaling and exhaling, repeating under his breath these magical expressions, which are powerful to kill or to cure as he chooses, through the compact he has made with the Devil. Finally, so as to deceive the bystanders, he ends with saying in a loud voice: ‘God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost. Amen.’

      1

      These words occur a number of times in the English translation, published at London in 1822, of Dr. Paul Felix Cabrera’s Teatro Critico Americano. The form nagual instead of nahual, or naual, or nawal has been generally adopted and should be preferred.

      2

      For instance, in “The

1

These words occur a number of times in the English translation, published at London in 1822, of Dr. Paul Felix Cabrera’s Teatro Critico Americano. The form nagual instead of nahual, or naual, or nawal has been generally adopted and should be preferred.

2

For instance, in “The Names of the Gods in the Kiche Myths,” pp. 21, 22, in Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, 1881; Annals of the Cakchiquels, Introduction, p. 46; Essays of an Americanist, p. 170, etc.

3

Historia de las Indias Occidentales, Dec. iv, Lib. viii, cap. 4.

4

More especially it is the territory of the Chorti dialect, spoken to this day in the vicinity of the famous ancient city of Copan, Honduras. Cerquin lies in the mountains nearly due east of this celebrated site. On the Chorti, see Stoll, Zur Ethnographie der Republik Guatemala, pp. 106-9.

5

Bernardino de Sahagun, Historia de la Nueva España, Lib. x, cap. 9.

6

Derived from teciuhtlaza, to conjure against hail, itself from teciuh, hail. Alonso de Molina, Vocabulario Mexicano, sub voce.

7

Bautista, Advertencias para los Confesores, fol. 112 (Mexico, 1600).

8

Nicolas de Leon, Camino del Cielo, fol. 111 (Mexico, 1611).

9

Paso y Troncoso, in Anales del Museo Nacionàl de Mexico, Tom. iii, p. 180.

10

Sahagun, Historia de Nueva España, Lib. x, cap. 29, and Lib. xi, cap. 7. Hernandez has the following on the mysterious properties of this plant: “Illud ferunt de hac radice mirabile (si modo fides sit vulgatissimæ inter eos rei habendæ), devorantes illam quodlibet prsæsagire prædicereque; velut an sequenti die hostes sint impetum in eos facturi? Anne illos felicia maneant tempora? Quis supellectilem, aut aliud quidpiam furto subripruerit? Et ad hunc modum alia, quibus Chichimecæ hujusmodi medicamine cognoscendis.” Franciscus Hernandus, Historia Plantarum Novæ Hispaniæ, Tom. iii, p. 71 (Ed., Madrid, 1790).

11

Diccionario Universal, Appendice, Tom. i, p. 360 (Mexico, 1856).

12

Confessionario Mayor y Menor en lengua Mexicana, fol. 8, verso (Mexico, 1634).

13

Vetancurt, Teatro Mexicano, Trat. iii, cap. 9.

14

Hernandez, Historia Plantarum Novæ Hispaniæ, Tom. iii, p. 32.

15

Dr. Jacinto de la Serna, Manual de Min stros de Indios para el Conocimiento de sus Idolatrias y Extirpacion de Ellas, p. 163. This interesting work was composed about the middle of the seventeenth century by a Rector of the University of Mexico, but was first printed at Madrid, in 1892, from the MS. furnished by Dr. N. Leon, under the editorship of the Marquis de la Fuensanta del Valle.

16

MSS. of the Licentiate Zetina, and Informe of Father Baeza in Registro Yucateco, Tom. i.

17

Acosta, De la Historia Moral de Indias, Lib. v, cap. 26.

18

Of

40

In his Tzental Vocabulary, Father Lara does not give this exact form; but in the neighboring dialect of the Cakchiquel Father Ximenes has quikeho, to agree together, to enter into an arrangement; the prefix zme is the Tzental word for “mother.”