Berendt, C. Hermann (Carl Hermann), 1817-1878. Miscellanea centro-americana.
Title:
Miscellanea centro-americana. [ca. 1862-1876]
Scrapbook, assembled by Daniel Garrison Brinton, of notes, manuscripts, clippings, line drawings and hand-drawn maps of C. Hermann Berendt, on a variety of topics pertaining to Central America. Also included is an unfinished draft letter from Berendt to an unidentified addressee, reporting on his ethnological and linguistic research on the Indians of Nicaragua (1874?; f. 21r); and a letter from George Williamson, then Minister Resident of the United States in Guatemala, to Berendt, dated 15 November 1874 (f. 24r). The volume has a table of contents listing 18 headings (f. i recto). The following handwritten materials of Berendt are included: Bibliography to Central America (f. 1r); a description of the land, industry, fauna and flora, and population of Verapaz department, Guatemala (Descripcion de Vera Paz; f. 4); notes on a conversation, entitled Isthmus Tehuantepec (second folio numbered 15); texts on Indian dance and drama, or festival (f. 36r), including the Mangue or Chorotega Indians of Nicaragua (Representaciones escenicas; Festspiele im Chorotega Gebiet; Bailes de Masaya), the Kekchi Indians of Cobán, and the Quiché Indians (Sakikoxol ò baile de Cortes), of Guatemala. Other sets of notes are headed: Archäologische Funde in Yucatan (f. 17r); Antiquities of Nicaragua: an Indian flute (f. 21v-22r); List of Nicaraguan antiquities (f. 23r); and Native words from Oviedo, with vocabularies labeled as Nicaragua (compared with Nahuatl), Cueva and Chorotega languages (f. 37r). Numerous maps, plans, and drawings pertain to various ruins in Mexico and Guatemala (see Note on decoration); objects depicted in drawings are sometimes noted to be from the collection of Berendt himself (f. 25r), or of Earl Flint (f. 25v, 26r), or Schiffmann (f. 26v, 27r). The following Spanish-language clippings are also included: an anecdote involving the Tzotzil Indians of Chamula, in Chiapas, Mexico, dated 1869 (f. 16r); a description of the locale and ruins of Palenque, Chiapas, dated 1872 (f. 34v-35r); and pages from La Sociedad económica, Guatemala, 1873 (f. 38r), with an article about the Guatemala National Museum and its ethnographic department, as well as a series of articles on the Lacandon Indians (El pais de los lacandones), and the Popol vuh (El libro sagrado), holy book of the Quiche Indians, as well as a serialized version of Pedro de Alvarado's account of the conquest of Guatemala (Informacion hecha por orden de Hernan Cortés).
ArchivalResource:
41 leaves : paper ; 391-394 x 255-258 mm. bound to 402 x 286 mm.
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