The Mayan Franciscan Vocabularies: A Preliminary Survey

The Friars Alonso de Solana and Gaspar González de Nájera

Alonso de Solana and Gaspar González de Nájera were contemporaries of Diego de Landa. Some notes on the life of Solana were written up by Fray Bernardo de Lizana in his book Devocionario de Nuestra Señora de Izamal y Conquista espiritual de Yucatán, published in 1633, and some notes about the positions held by Nájera are to be found in Cogolludo's book Historia de la Provincia de Yucathán, published in 1688. It is apparent from these two works that Solana arrived in Yucatan in about 1560 and died in 1600 or 1601. While it is not known when Nájera arrived in Yucatan, it is clear that he was active in the 1580's. It is also known that he made a trip from Yucatan to Spain carrying with him a letter dated January 6, 1580, in which he is mentioned as being the person who was most knowledgeable about matters concerning the Maya. He is last mentioned in Cogolludo as being elected as a "definidor" for the year of 1603.

The frontispiece of the Solana dictionary gives the name of the author as being Fr. Alonso de la Solana, and the date of composition as being 1580. Lizana confirms that Solana was responsible for a "Bocabulario",²⁴  and so despite doubts raised by some researchers, it is not unreasonable to assume that the Solana "Bocabulario" mentioned by Lizana and the Hispanic Society's Solana dictionary are one and the same.

Attention is brought to Fray Gaspar de Nájera because of the following entry on page 58v of the Motul II:

Corromper virgen: çatçah çuhuyil; yet vayte; yax than, yax et vayte. Estos dos vltimos son dos conosidos, según diçe el Padre Nájara.

It is interesting to compare this statement with an entry in the Vienna where only the last two terms are given:

Corromper donçella, bocablo onesto: yax than [.l.] yax et uay [.t.]

It is not clear what role Nájera had in the formation of the Bocabulario of Solana. However, the above serves to reinforce the idea that the Vienna is the vocabulary of Nájera.

Endnotes

24. Escriuió bocabulario excelente en esta lengua maya, muchos sermones y sermonarios con grande propiedad, como si fuera indio mesmo. (Lizana, 1995:229)

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