1S92.] OD [Brinton. 



This Xelhua was a mighty man — one of the " Giants," — and was 

 surnamed the Builder, for he it was who constructed the famous 

 Pyramid of Cholula. He is also referred to as chief of the Olmeca, 

 an unknown, ancient people. 



We need attach little importance to these old stories, and will 

 find it more profitable to turn to the language of the Mazatecas to 

 discover their affiliations. 



In investigating its possible analogies with other idioms, I have 

 been somewhat surprised at the relationships which it certainly dis- 

 closes. These are not with the Zapotec-Mixtec stock, as I have 

 (erroneously) stated in my work, T/ie American Race,'^ but with 

 two quite remote and independent stocks. 



The one of these is the Chapanec^which was spoken in the present 

 State of Chiapas, and also at the time of the conquest by many 

 thousand natives, who occupied the shores of Lake Managua and 

 Fonseca Bay, in Nicaragua, where they were known as Mangues 

 and Orotinans. The dialects of this stock are closely akin to each 

 other. 



The second list of affinities point to a still more remote and 

 unexpected relationship. The Mangues had as neighbors beyond 

 the Cordilleras, in Costa Rica, a group of related tribes — the Tala- 

 mancas, Borucas, Bribris, Vizeitas, etc., whom I shall call, col- 

 lectively, " Costa Rican." These have been satisfactorily shown 

 by Dr. Max Uhle, Dr. A. Ernst and other students to be not dis- 

 tantly connected with the important Chibcha stem of New Granada, 

 which, at the conquest, was widely extended over that Province, 

 and is the only linguistic stock of South America whose presence in 

 North America has been proved. f 



After presenting the vocabulary furnished me by Mr. Pinart and 

 the texts offered by Pimentel I shall pursue the comparisons of the 

 stock of terms thus supplied. 



English-Mazatecan Vocabulary. 



Arm, chale. Black, twna. 



Bad, minda. Blue, iso. 



Banana, nacJia'. Boy, indidi (see "Son"). 



Beans, nahma'. Bread, chu hi. 



Beard, tza' a. Breast (chest), animale. 



*T!te Amencan Race: A Linguistic Classification and Ethnographic Description of the 

 Native Tribes of North and South America, p. 142 (New York, 1891). 

 t See The American Race, pp. 181-186. 



PKOC. AMEB. PHILOS. SOC. XXX. 137. E. PRINTED MARCH 5, 1892. 



