1886.] 65d [Brinton. 



in the imperative and optative moods ; again, a higher synthetic 

 construction may be employed in the sentence, by which the 

 idea expressed is emphasized, a device in constant use in their 

 poetry, and especially the strength of emotion is indicated by 

 suffixing a series of terminations expressing contempt, reverence 

 or love. The latter are wonderfully characteristic of Nahuatl 

 speech. They are not confined to verbs and nouns, but may be 

 added to adjectives, pronouns, participles, and even to adverbs 

 and postpositions. Thus every word in the sentence is made to 

 carry its burden of affection to the ear of the beloved object! 



Add to these facilities the remarkable power of the Nahuatl 

 to impart tropical and figurative senses to words by the employ- 

 ment of rhetorical resources, and to present them as one idea by 

 means of the peculiarities of its construction, and we shall not 

 consider as overdrawn the expression of Professor De la Rosa 

 when he writes : " There can be no question but that in the mani- 

 festation in words of the various emotions, the Nahuatl finds no 

 rival, not only among the languages of modern Europe, but in 

 the Greek itself."* 



The Nahuatl word for friendship is icniuhtli. This is a com- 

 pound of the preposition ic, with; the noun-ending tli ; and the 

 adverbial yuh, or noyuh, which means " of the same kind." The 

 word, therefore, has the same fundamental conception as the 

 Latin amicus and the Cree inawema, but it was not developed 

 into a verbal to express the suffering of the passion itself.f 



777. The Maya. 



The whole peninsula of Yucatan was inhabited by the Ma3'as, 

 and tribes speaking related dialects of their tongue lived in 

 Guatemala, Chiapas, and on the Gulf Shore north of Vera Cruz. 

 All these depended chiefly on agriculture for subsistence, were 

 builders of stone houses and made use of a system of written 

 records. Their tongue, therefore, deserves special consideration 

 as that of a nation with strong natural tendencies to develop- 

 ment. 



In turning to the word for love in the Maya vocabulary we are 



* Ettudio de la Filosofia y Riqueza de la Lengua Mexicana. Par Agostin de la 

 Rosa, p. 78 (Guadalajara, 1877). 



t There is another word in Nahuatl of similar derivation. It is pohui, to make 

 much of a person, to^like one. The root ispo, which carries with it the idea of 

 sameness, similarity or equality; as itelpocapo, a boy like himself. (Paredes, 

 Promptuario Manual Mexicano, p. 140.) 



