Lope de Vega in lengua mexicana (Nahuatl): Don Bartolomé de Alva Ixtlilxochitl's Translation of La madre de la mejor (1640)

In 1640, Don Bartolomé de Alva Ixtlilxochitl, a descendant of Nahua nobles and Spanish colonizers, translated four Spanish dramatic works from Castilian to Nahuatl (lengua mexicana). By identifying the titles and authors of the three longer Spanish texts and signing his name to the translation, this Mexican priest and scholar became a singular figure in the post-Conquest language encounter that shaped Mexico's hybrid society; specifically, he is the only translator of early-modern Spanish dramas into any Amerindian language whom we can identify by name. In these pages, we contemplate Alva's translation enterprise using La madre de la mejor, a comedia de santos built on the hagiographic accounts of the nativity of the Virgin Mary. We begin with a discussion of the complex, multicultural social context in which the translator and his interlocutors lived and worked. Then we compare the original Lopean drama and the Nahuatl translation. As we do so, we contemplate two key changes wrought in translation. First, the Mexican version of Lope's play erases the picturesque language of characters of humble origins, making all the characters speak like cultivated Nahuas. Second, the decidedly Castilian natural world celebrated in the Spanish drama gives way to a native, Mexican landscape strongly infused with sacred connotations. To close, we consider the implications of changes found in translation as they attest to emerging Mexican identities in the second century after the conquest. (LMB, BDS, ERW)