Slip of the Tongue

Several months ago I was embroiled in an online conversation at a local forum I visit from time to time. The topic of discussion had twisted and turned until one of the participants…someone who normally makes it his job in life to rub everyone the wrong way…. made mention that there was no purpose for Latin.
He said, “Latin is a dead language.”

When I read what he had written I stared at my computer screen a little dumbfounded because in my eyes and in the eyes of several others Latin does live on since it is the root language for Italian, French, Spanish and English. It is also very much in use and spoken in the legal field, medical field, in academic circles, the Catholic church uses it for certain papal bulls and mass is often conducted in Latin, AND certain members of the clergy speak it very well, so it isn’t dead as a door nail, is it?

I had a little fun sparring with my online friend as I sought to educate him a little regarding Latin, but you know? There are just some people you can’t teach…..no matter what. I did have fun for several weeks posting comments to everything he wrote by writing my comments in Latin with a little English translation, just so he had an idea regarding what I was saying.

Languages can be extinct. Those are languages that are no longer spoken. There are approximately 82 known languages that can be termed recently extinct languages – like Arwi, Modern Gutnish, and Wappo. Yes, Wappo…..I kid you not.

Languages can also be dead. Those are languages that are no longer spoken by anyone as their main language. Therefore, using that distinction……I have to admit Latin is a dead language since there are no native speakers, but it does live on in so many arenas as I mentioned above. There are also several devotees to the Latin language. So much so they have even created a section of Wikipedia written in Latin with over 40,000 articles to date!

Recently, there was a new discovery regarding an extinct language……a very important discovery right here in what used to be termed the New World.

Archaeologists have been excavating the ruins of the Magdalena de Cao Viejo church at the El Brujo Archaeological Complex, just north of Trujillo, in northern Peru for some time now. El Brujo is actually an ancient monument of the Moche culture and dates back to some point between 1 and 600 A.D. but the church there dates to colonial times. Researchers believe indigenous people were forced to inhabit the area by Spaniards, probably for purposes of conversion to Christianity. At some point the roof of the church collapsed more than likely in the mid-to late 17th century, and papers kept in the library or church office were trapped staying buried until the last couple of years.

In fact, a very important letter was discovered in 2008 but was not divulged to the public until it could be examined. Recently the journal, American Anthropologist, published a piece concerning the letter.

Jeffrey Quilter, an archaeologist at Harvard’s Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology told Reuters, “Our investigations determined that this piece of paper records a number system in a language that has been lost for years…..the language appears to have been influenced by Quechua, an ancient tongue still spoken by millions of people across the Andes….the language in the letter could be the written version of a language colonial-era Spaniards referred to in historical writings as Pescadora, for the fishermen on Peru’s northern coast who spoke it.

Until the letter was found no other evidence of the Pescadora language has been found.

The letter is also important because it gives evidence of numbers being translated which clearly shows the lost language’s numerical system was a ten-based, or decimal system like English. An article at National Geographic advises while the Inca used a ten-based system, many other cultures did not: the Maya, for example, used a base of 20.

Gee, I can’t wait until an online translator for Pescadora is available, so I can have a little fun with my online friends!
IBM has a Virtual Archaeology site for the El Brujo Archaeological Complex here.

13 Facts About the Laws of Burgos, 1512-1513

1. Like many such proclamations and treaties the title…..Laws of Burgos…is based on a location. The document was formerly published in Burgos, Spain in 1512.

2. The laws were the first code of conduct governing how Native Americans should be treated in the Americas by Spanish foreigners in America.

3. At first the laws only included the island of Hispanola, but later Puerto Rico and Jamaica was included.

4. The laws addressed the mistreatment of natives and called for their conversion to Catholicism.

5. The laws were rarely enforced making the Laws of Burgos of little value.

6. The laws called for encomiendas…..a labor system where a Spanish citizen was granted a certain number of natives they became responsible for. Basically in exchange for religious instruction the receiver of the encomienda could exact tribute from the Natives including labor, gold or other products.

7. The laws were written due to the reports of Domingo de Mendoza, the cardinal archbishop of Seville regarding abuse of the American Indians.

8. The Laws of Burgos consists of 35 laws.

9. One of the laws regarding teaching the Native Americans about Christianity mandated they would be taught the Ten Commandments, the Seven Deadly Sins, and the Articles of Faith, however, the 14th law stated the Natives had the right to perform their sacred dances.

10. The 2nd law is rather interesting…..”The Indians will leave their land voluntarily to come to the ecomiendas so that they shall not suffer from being removed by force.”

11. The 13th law involved gold….”Indians in an ecomienda must search for gold for five months a year and at the end of the five months are allowed to rest for 40 days.

12. The ecomienda system was not new to some of the Natives….the former Incan Empire had a similar system in their culture. Conquistadors and soldiers were not the only ones who maintained ecomiendas. Women and even some notable Native Americans maintained them including Montezuma’s daughters.

13. The sad thing is the Laws of Burgos did nothing to actually help Native Americans. It was just a first in a long series of empty gestures that took place over and over and over.

You can see the actual wording of the Laws of Burgos here.

Other bloggers participate in Thursday 13….you can find them here.

MY St. Augustine

I just returned from St. Augustine, Florida to celebrate my 25th wedding anniversary. It has everything this history teacher loves….lots of history and the beach as well. The picture I’ve posted above was made as we were leaving the beach area and looks over the historic area of St. Augustine. You can just make out the buildings over the trees....

Say “St. Augustine” and you might instantly think of its designation as the oldest continuously occupied European established city and oldest port in the continental United States. However, if you told me that the city was founded by Ponce de Leon on his search for the much ballyhooed Fountain of Youth I’d have to pull out my big red marker and place an X on that lovely forehead of yours.

No, the credit of founding St. Augustine does not go to Ponce de Leon. In fact, the idea that he even landed on the North American continent at St. Augustine is still heavily debated by many history scholars. While some argue St. Augustine was the place others believe he came ashore south of St. Augustine at a place known as Ponce de Leon Inlet or even further south at Melbourne Beach in 1513. Yes, old Poncey was looking for the Fountain of Youth but even that is debated since there is no known connection between Ponce de Leon and the supposed Fountain of Youth. The dots were connected by history writers after his death and the facts are on shaky ground.

The current touristy Fountain of Youth location in St. Augustine is merely a tribute to the story…..a story….a story….no facts, my dear history lover. No facts. It is a good story though. :)
The credit for founding St. Augustine goes to Pedro Menendez de Aviles in 1565. He was a Spanish admiral and pirate hunter.

You might tell me that St. Augustine was attacked by the British in 1702 and again in 1740 by the colony of Georgia’s own James Oglethorpe as he led the British in the Siege of St. Augustine during the War of Jenkin’s Ear. Yes, an ear….men will fight a war of every little thing, won’t they?

You might want to remind me St. Augustine had the first free community of ex-slaves in 1738 or that the city was in the hands of Loyalists during the American Revolution serving as the location where three signers of the Declaration of Independence cooled their heels on the British dime.

You might want me to remember the large number of Greek settlers in the area or the Minorcans whose story resembles that of the Cajuns in Louisiana.

You might want me to remember St. Augustine as the location of the fortress Castillo de San Marcos which was built by the Spanish and later renamed Fort Marion after Francis “Swamp Fox” Marion of American Revolution fame. Over time the fort housed such notables as Osceola, John Horse, and the daughter of Geronimo was born at Fort Marion.

A modern thinking person such as yourself might want me to know St. Augustine became a winter resort of the wealthy due to Henry Flagler and his railroad. You might even want me to know that St. Augustine abounds in little known and untold Black History that has only come to light in recent times such as the fact that the U.S. Signal Corp had a training facility there that trained the Tuskegee Airmen.

Yes, yes, yes….you could tell me all about St. Augustine, but this past weekend all I cared about was my companion for the last twenty-five years, my nice bed and breakfast (which I strongly recommend to all my friends and family…no children allowed though), my nice private pool, and the beach……MY beach…..not Ponce de Leon’s ….not Pedro Menendez de Aviles’….mine, mine, mine, ALL MINE. :)

Special Delivery

This week’s wordless image shows the front and reverse of a Spanish coin minted in Vera Cruz, Mexico at the direction of King Charles III, Bourbon King of Spain in 1783. Polski3 and Anglophile Football Fanatic were the closest in their comments to where I was headed with the images. Alison and Dr. Pezz weren’t too far behind in their reponses. Thanks to everyone who responded.

Let’s say the UPS guy shows up at your door wearing those cute little shorts and hands you an unexpected delivery. You open the box and find lots of those Styrofoam peanut things hiding whatever lurks underneath. A letters rests on top advising you the box contains something very precious. Not only are you being given the important job of keeping the precious item safe, but you are to make the item bigger and better than it currently is. This scenario always reminds me of my marriage and even the nuturing of my children---both are very precious things that I’m trusted to keep from harm and to cultivate through the years making them better as time goes by.

As an educator I think about my students in the same way. While their stay within the confines of my room is brief I strive to nurture each individual so that they leave my room in a better state than when they walked through the door in August.

You see the UPS man of sorts had delivered to King Charles, almost twenty years before, a gift of nearly one million square miles he would have referred to as New France. You might be more familiar with the gift as the Louisiana Territory.

The gift came to King Charles via the Treaty of Fontainbleu which was signed in 1762 but not made public until 1764. The Spanish would control all of the former French lands west of the Mississippi. Included in the gift of territory was the jewel of the Mississippi---the very important port of New Orleans.

Let’s think about my UPS scenario again…Remember the part of the letter that said I had to make the gift even better than it was when I received it? Well, King Charles had a problem with New Orleans. Its economy was in shambles due to the use of the devalued and often counterfeited French paper currency. Almost immediately the territory became a drain on the resources of Spain due to severe domestic problems back home. There was also a slight problem with French colonists. They did not recognize Spanish rule until 1769 and only did so at the point of 3,000 guns and 22 Spanish warships.

In order to improve the colony’s economy and begin to make a profit for Spain King Charles knew he had to replace the currency being used in his new territory. On October 20, 1783, King Charles sent a ship, El Cazador, to Vera Cruz, to pick up a load of silver coins. By January 11, 1783 El Cazador was fully loaded and set sail for New Orleans with the coin I showed in my wordless image and many, many more like it.

Somewhere between Vera Cruz and New Orleans the ship was lost. Had the ship gone down due to pirates? Was a storm to blame? No one knew, and the ship was declared officially missing at sea by June, 1784.

The loss of the currency was a huge blow to King Charles and to the citizens of New Orleans as well. For the next eleven years Spain continued to hang on to the Lousiana territory, however, in 1800 King Charles agreed to give Napoleon Bonaparte of France control of the Louisiana Territory with the signing of the Treaty of San Ildefonso on October 1, 1800.

Now, fast forward to August 2, 1993. Captain Jerry Murphy is aboard The Mistake, a fishing trawler, along with his crew. As the nets are hauled in everyone is expecting a bounteous gift of fish. Instead there are few fish and a mixture of what appears to be huge clumps of rocks. Upon closer examination Captain Murphy discovers he has been given a precious gift indeed. The rocks are identified as clumps of silver coins with some weighing as much as 35 pounds.

Coins such as these were known as Spanish millled dollars and were important currency in the New World not only in New Spain but in the American colonies as well. Thomas Jefferson recommended to the Continental Congress that Spanish silver coins should be accepted as currency in the colonies. The coins were accepted through 1857.

Captain Murphy and his crew had found the resting place of El Cazador and her silver coins meant to improve the economy of New Orleans had nearly made it to their destination. The wreck lay just a mere 50 miles south of New Orleans.

Now here is the type of question that seperates those that are merely interested in the story and those that have the genetic makeup of a true historian---What if the El Cazador had reached New Orleans and had delivered the influx of silver? Would Spain have been able to take advantage of the promise of New Orleans as a sea port? Would the Louisiana Purchase have taken place when it did? Would America under President Jefferson have become embroiled in a war with Spain over New Orleans since the the port was so important to the American economy?

I’ve already formed my opinion, but what do you think?

You can actually purchase of of the coins from the El Cazador here and here and the shipwreck website can be found here.