draft manuscript - Linguistics - University of California, Berkeley

9.2.3 Practical Language Learning and Reliance on Translators
As indicated in the previous section, Maynas Jesuits made use of descriptive linguistic materials
when available, but there were no doubt many cases in which materials were not available. In either
case, the commitment to learning lenguas particulares appears to have been significant. Uriarte, for
example, identifies practical language learning as his most important task upon taking up his post
at San Joaquín de Omaguas:
Dejada por Dios la sosegada vida, que tenía entre mis sanregis, hube de mudar rumbo
y aplicarme a las diversas ocupaciones que incumbían a este pueblo y oficio, de cuidar
de otros nuestros, pues fuera de la primera obligación de doctrinar y aplicarme
a diversas lenguas, aunque predominaba la omagua (mas para adultos era precisa
noticia de mayoruna, masamaes), era preciso atender al abasto de toda la Misión baja
y de Napo...
(Uriarte [1776]1986:225, emphasis ours) 349
The degree to which individual Jesuits became gained fluency in lenguas particulares appears
to have varied significantly, and some, like the Italian Jesuit Ignacio Maria Franciscis, who worked
briefly in San Joaquín de Omaguas, were singled out for their language learning ability. Franciscis 350
(b. 1705 Palermo – d. 1777 Palermo) 351 spent four months with Uriarte in San Joaquín de Omaguas
in order to oversee the mission annex of San Fernando de Mayorunas, 352 and both Juan de Velasco
(b. 1727 Riobamba – d. 1792 Faenza), an Ecuadorean Jesuit, and Uriarte commented on Franciscis’
talent for language learning. De Velasco ([1789]1981:517-518, emphasis ours) comments:
I am still in Quito slaving over learning these diverse native languages, which are entirely foreign
to a European missionary. A priest as experienced as Father Johannes Baptist Julian, from Upper
Germany, wrote to us that upon arriving at his mission settlement he hadn’t been able to speak even
one word with the Indians, let alone understand them.
349 Translation (ours):
God having abandoned the peaceful life that I had led among my sanregis [i.e., the residents of San
Regis], I was compelled to change course and apply myself to the various affairs that are incumbent
upon this community [San Joaquín] and office, watching over our other concerns, since apart from
the first obligation to proselytize and apply myself to the various languages, even though
Omagua predominated (save for the adults for whom the gospel was also needed in Mayoruna and
Masamae [a Yameo dialect]), it was necessary to attend to the supply of the entire lower Mission and
that of the Napo...
350 Franciscis’ work in the New World began when he arrived in the Darién region of the Reino de Tierra Firme
(modern-day Panama) in 1741 (Pacheco (1959:300), cited in Gallup-Díaz (2001:549)), where he wrote a grammar,
vocabulary and catechism in lengua dariela (Hervás y Panduro 1800:280), a Chocoan language (Constenla Umaña
2004). He subsequently worked in Guayaquil and Quito before coming to Maynas in 1748 (Uriarte ([1776]1986:288),
de Velasco ([1789]1981:513)). He was made missionary at Pebas and then later transferred to San José de Pinches
(a mission on the Pastaza founded in 1698 by Nicolás Lanzamani (de Velasco [1789]1981:510)), where he seems
to have spent several years (Uriarte [1776]1986:289). Following his four-month stay in San Joaquín (see above),
he was ordered back to Pinches, and then to Guayaquil, where he resided at the time of the expulsion (Uriarte
[1776]1986:290).
351 See footnote 150.
352 San Fernando de Mayorunas, a Panoan settlement on the opposite bank of the Amazon river from San Joaquín de
Omaguas, was officially christened in January 1757 (Uriarte [1776]1986:249), but had been extant at least since
1754 (Uriarte [1754]1942:76).
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