Transcribed Prologue, editing and notes by Dr. Rudolf Lenz Full title: “Vida y costumbres de los indígenas araucanos de la segunda mitad del Siglo XIX” Background The text is the autobiography of Chief (Lonco) Pascual Coña, as related to the Capuchin priest Ernst Wilhelm Moesbach. By the time these memories were compiled (mid-1920s), Coña was an older man, in his 70s or 80s, so much of the content relates to the second half of the 19th century. Mösbach gathered the material over the course of four years and many visits to the Chief’s home, near Lake Budi, in the Lafkenche (Coastal) Mapuche territories. Due to its extension and early first-person account of Mapuche life and customs, it is an invaluable part of the people and the language’s heritage.

Preliminary transcription by Benjamin Molineaux. PDF Text (Image Scans) TXT Text (Mapudungun)

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.

Transcribed This set of early seventeenth-century sermons was composed by Fr. Luis de Valdiva (1560–1621) , one of the first Spanish Jesuits assigned to Chile. Valdivia played a cruical role in the development of Spanish Crown’s ‘defensive war’ policy towards the Mapuche, which suspended direct attacks on native groups and emphasised acculturation. The sermons are intended as a programatic introduction to Christian faith, with the express intent of converting the Mapuche and having them renounce their traditional beliefs and religious practices. This was a key part of Valdivia’s strategy for pacifying the region through conversion rather than — thus far unsuccessful — belicose confrontation.