Nagaulsim
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Nagaulsim
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Author : Daniel Brinton
language : en
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
Release Date : 2016-02-26
Nagaulsim written by Daniel Brinton and has been published by Createspace Independent Publishing Platform this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2016-02-26 with categories.
Nagualism was a powerful and mysterious cult which united Mexican and Central American tribes, belonging to different linguistic stocks, into organized opposition against the government and religion of their conquerors. The members of this intertribal organization were bound together by strange faculties and an occult learning which placed them on a par with the famed thaumaturgists and theodidacts of the Old World, and which preserved even into our days the thoughts and forms of a long-suppressed ritual. The terms nagual, nagualism, nagualist are not Nahuatl, but of southern origin. A nagual was a personal guardian spirit. a personal totem, chosen in accordance with fixed rules and by consultation of an elaborate calendar, which was used mainly in astrological divination. The nagualists were powerful enchanters, whom the clergy believed to be in league with the devil and who were thought to be able to transform themselves into beasts. They used in their operations an intoxicant, peyotl, and the seeds of a plant called ololiuhqui. Intoxication was an essential part in many of these severe rites Under the old regime and before the coming of the Spaniards nagualists were especially devoted to the native cult; but it is Dr. Brinton's opinion, which he sustains with great research, that on the appearance of a foreign race and a new religion a new motif was given to this old cult. Those most interested in it turned their sorceries and enchantments with organized, terrific, and often with successful energy against a common enemy. Even the rituals of the Catholic church were travestied in the nagual ceremonies. Dr. Brinton gives a charming account of the exalted position assigned to women in this mysterious society. They were not only admitted to the degrees, but often held most important offices. One of them, Maria Candelaria, was among the Tzentals of Chiapas a native Joan of Arc. The nagualistic rites were highly symbolic, and the symbols had clearly defined meanings. The most important symbol was fire. Of this Father de Leon says: "If any of their old superstitions has remained more deeply rooted than another in the hearts of these Indians, both men and women, it is this about fire and its worship and about making new fire and preserving it for a year in secret places." Another symbol still venerated as a survival of the ancient cult is that of the tree. The species held in special respect is the ceiba (Bombax ceiba). The conventionalized form of this tree strongly resembles a cross, and this came to be the ideogram of "life." The serpent was another revered symbol. In Chiapas one of the highest orders of the initiated was that of the chanes or serpents. . . In reading this learned treatise one is strongly reminded of the studies of Mr. James Mooney, of the Bureau of Ethnology, upon the Ghost dance. There were exhibited at the World's Columbian Exposition four transparencies representing men and women going through the Ghost dance ceremonies, many of them swooning. It were easy to transfer these pictures to the scenes of Dr. Brinton's book. The subject is one of great interest to ethnologists, who have to thank Dr. Brinton for bringing together such a harvest of material from a field in which he is easily the chief gleaner. -American Anthropologist [1894]