14 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BULL, 44 
the others are secondary. Consult also Orozco y Berra (1:35); Buelna 
(:.); et al: 
Investigation has failed to disclose how or why the name Cahita 
came into use, and why it was so seldom applied until in compara- 
tively recent times. Even Hervas’s work, which was published in 
the year 1800, makes no mention of it. Yet it must have been known 
early in the seventeenth century as the Arte de la Lengua Cahita 
por un Padre de la Compania de Jesus, republished by Buelna in 
1891, and believed to have been written by Juan Bautista de Ve- 
lasco (born 1562, died 1649), mentions it and entitles his ‘‘ Arte”’ 
as that of the ‘Lengua Cahita.”’ In his preface he says, ‘Toda 
esta usa de un mismo idioma, los Hiaquis, los Mayos y los Thehue- 
cos, pero se diferencian en el modo.” Juan Ortiz Zapata (393) uses 
the name (see below). 
The lingustic relation of the Mayo to the tribes on the Sinaloa 
was noticed by the first Spanish explorers of this region, as the fact 
is expressly mentioned in the Segunda Relacién of the journey 
of Nuno de Guzman.' While Ribas constantly joins together 
the Cinaloa, Zuaque, Tehueco, and Ahome of the Rio del Fuerte, 
and speaks of their similarity in customs, no reference to the rela- 
tion of the language of the Cinaloas to the other three tribes has 
been found in his work. Juan Ortiz Zapata (393), speaking of 
the mission or Partido de la Concepcién de Vaca, says it was on 
the banks of the “Carapoa’’ and that its natives spoke the Cahita 
language—‘‘la lengua es caita.’”’ Orozco y Berra (1:332) says that 
this mission (Vaca or Baca) pertained to the Sinaloas, and that 
the ancient villages of Carapoa, Savirijoa, and San José Charay 
corresponded to the ‘Tehuecos.”’ Hrdlitka (1:59) makes Baca- 
bach a Mayo settlement, which is given as a probable synonym 
of Baca (Vaca) in the Handbook of the American Indians, though 
most likely different, as Baca (Vaca) was on the Rio del Fuerte. 
That tribes along the river spoke languages allied to Yaqui and 
Mayo has been shown and is asserted by Ribas (237); this makes 
them dialects of the Yaqui group. But are Cinaloa, Zuaque, and 
Tehueco to be considered synonyms or names of different dialects? 
The earliest original authorities do not make this clear. 
Alegre (11, 10) contends that Zuaque and Tehueco are one and 
the same language—‘‘de ser todos de una misma lengua.” Buelna 
(x) says that Tehueco was the native and current idiom among 
the three indigenous tribes living on the banks of the Rio del 
Fuerte, the most northerly of those actually in the state of Sinaloa; 
the Sinaloa who inhabit the pueblos of Baca, Toro, and Sinaloita, 
on the river above the village of Fuerte; the Tehueco who lived in 
said village, previously called Carapoa, and in the pueblos of 
1 In Colec. Doc. Hist. Mex., 1, 300;see Icazbalceta in the Bibliography. 
