Collection ID: 0002 | Metadata type: TEI | TEI XML | Data

Title

Authors

• Scherzer, Karl, Ritter von, 1821-1903

Other related names

• Berendt, C. Hermann 1817-1878, former owner
• Brinton, Daniel Garrison, 1837-1899, former owner

Call number

Alternate identifiers

• bibid: 9947422203503681
• http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/537194265
• http://hdl.library.upenn.edu/1017/d/medren/4742220

Publisher

Language

Origin

Date

between 1857 and 1878

Summary

C. Hermann Berendt's transcription of 182 vocabulary entries, including numbers, from the list that Karl Scherzer attributed to the Blanco, Valiente, and Talamanca tribes, in his article entitled Sprachen der Indianer Central-Amerika's (Sitzungsberichte der kaiserlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften, philosophisch-historische Classe, 15. Band, Wien, 1855, p. 28-37). The name Viceita, which Berendt substitutes (title and cover), is often associated with the Bribri, and sometimes also with the Cabecar Indians. Scherzer's article comprised a comparative table of languages of Indians of Central America, and he described the above-named tribes as inhabiting the eastern coast of Costa Rica between Rio Zent and Boca del Toro. Scherzer provided the Indian equivalents of German vocabulary arranged in the order of Albert Gallatin's comparative Indian vocabulary. This manuscript is Berendt's revised version of Ms. Coll. 700, Item 158. It comprises vocabulary entries in Spanish followed by the Indian word in the spelling according to Berendt's analytical alphabet (omitting the spelling according to Scherzer, which Berendt had included in the earlier version). In this revised version of the manuscript, Berendt presents the entries in the alphabetical order of the Spanish entries, and places the list of numbers at the end (p. 10). The notes appended to the vocabulary in the earlier version appear here in revised form as a more formal preface (p. iii-vii), although still with corrections, and some passages stricken. As in the earlier version, Berendt makes reference in the preface (p. iii) to the later publication of this same vocabulary in a book that Scherzer co-authored with Moritz Wagner, Die Republik Costa Rica in Central-Amerika (Leipzig, 1857; p. 573-576). He explains that in the latter work Scherzer reported his source to be a certain Indian by the name of Tomas Ottárola of the Blancos tribe, who was born in San José and lived at the time in Orosi; and that at one point in a note (Wagner/Scherzer, p. 563) he refers to the vocabulary as being the language of the Viseitas (Viceitas) and Blancos. The date 1853 that Berendt gives in his title appears to be a reference, also based on the same work, to when Scherzer actually collected the vocabulary during his travels. In further remarks pertaining to the specification of the Indians and the language in question, Berendt provides additional quotations from Wagner/Scherzer (p. v-vi); refers to a communication he had from Philipp J. J. Valentini (p. v, and stricken passage p. vi); and cites (p. vi) an article by Alexander von Frantzius (Die Säugethiere Costaricas, Archiv für Naturgeschichte, Jg. 35, 1869, p. 286). He also sketches in pencil the location of the river Zent, in the vicinity of the rivers Matina and Chirripo (p. vi).

Notes

• Ms. codex.
   
• Title from title page (p. i).
   
• Bound together in the same paper cover with Ms. Coll. 700, Item 158.
   
• This was the thirteenth of 19 manuscripts formerly bound together, probably by Daniel Garrison Brinton, and now disbound (Items 129-136, 143, 145, 146, 151-155, and 157-159). The bound volume had the spine title: Languages of Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica.
   

Extent

Foliation

Support

Binding

Layout

Script

Provenance

• From the collection of C. Hermann Berendt, later acquired by Daniel Garrison Brinton (ex libris stamp on the verso of front free endpaper in the bound volume that once contained the present item).
   

Subjects topical

• Bribri dialect--Glossaries, vocabularies, etc
• Cabecar language--Glossaries, vocabularies, etc
• Indians of Central America--Costa Rica--Languages

Genres

• Glossaries
• Manuscripts, Spanish--19th century
• Manuscripts, Latin American

Licenses

• Text

  These images and the content of Rare Book & Manuscript Library Ms. Coll. 700 Item 159: Vocabulario de la lengua de los indios viceitas y blancos en Costa Rica are free of known copyright restrictions and in the public domain. See the Creative Commons Public Domain Mark page for usage details, http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/.

  URL

  http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/

• Text

  Metadata is ©2019 University of Pennsylvania Libraries and licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License version 4.0 (CC-BY-4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode. For a description of the terms of use see the Creative Commons Deed https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.

  URL

  https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode