NOT Transcribed PDF Text (Image Scans)

Partially Transcribed Fr. Bernhard Havestadt (1714-1778), a German Jesuit, was the author of one of the two 18th century grammars of Mapudungun. A native of Köln, he left the Westphalia monastery of Horst-Maria for the ‘Indies’ in 1746, taking up his post in the region of La Frontera in March of 1748. Here he remained for twenty-two years, leaving a lively record of his evangelisation work and travels. His grammar,though apparently available in a Spanish-language manuscript in the mid-1750’s, was published — in Latin — only in 1777 as Chilidúģu: Sive Tractatus Linguæ Chilensis. This work — part grammar and vocabulary, and part compilation of texts, and travel-log — spans three volumes and nearly one thousand pages.

NOT Transcribed See pages 132-150, on Language. PDF Text (Image Scans)

Transcribed This was the most widely used early work on Mapudungun. So much so that the HMS Beagle, in its famous travels with Captiain Fitz Roy and young Charles Darwin, carried a copy of it in 1831-6. Its author was the Catalan Jesuit Andrés Febrés (1732-1790), who arrived to the Mapuche-speaking territories in 1759 at the age of 27. He appears to have learnt the language and written his grammar less than five years after his arrival in Chile. There is good reason to believe, however, that Febrés came into contact with Havestadt’s Chilidúģu – in Spanish manuscript form – well before reaching the country (see Lenz 1897: XLI-LI, and Havestadt 1777: 189), alongside a copy of Valdivia’s grammar. This would have given him a head start in the learning process. Febrés’ grammar was, nevertheless, published before that of his German brother of the cloth, and is much more condensed. It was therefore used on a wider scale in the training of new missionaries. Another point in which Febrés’s grammar outdoes that of Havestadt is in its care in transcribing the sounds of the language, as is shown by abundant comment on pronunciation matters and exemplification.