Sinais de variação linguística no tupi em um dicionário missionário do século XVIII

Abstract

This paper aims to present the first results of the analysis of linguistic variation in an anonymous 18th century Portuguese-Tupi dictionary belonging to the British Library (King's 223). The date of the dictionary is unknown, but the manuscript is found together with documents from the period 1740-1757, which suggests that it was composed in the first half of the 18th century.The codex belonged to the Jesuit farm of Gilboé (Rio Tocantins). The work was transcribed and edited by Ferreira França (1859) and Plínio Airosa (1951). In this research we will use both versions. For example, the dictionary mentions for the entry "poder": "eycatüí; e não [poder] deycatüi, como no catecismo foi porém não se pratica tal palavra e costumam dizer aicuab [. ...] eu posso aecatu segundo a arte pág.l59" (França 1859:106) This kind of information is absent in the other colonial Tupi dictionaries. The procedures to be followed in the analysis are: a) identification of the Tupi grammar and catechism consulted by the author from the pages cited in the dictionary. The works to be consulted are three catechisms (Araújo[I618] 1952, Araújo 1686 and Bettendorff 1687) and two grammars (Anchieta[1595]1946/Figueira 1687); b)survey which parts of the grammar and catechism were the most consulted by the missionary in the elaboration of the entries; c) comparison of the information about the frequency of usage of the Tupi expressions ("não se usa" or "[se usa] vulgarmente") contained in the entries with the comments of the Jesuit João Daniel in his chronicle "Tesouro Descoberto no Rio Amazonas" (1976) about the changes occurred in the Tupi language in the 18th century. The first results of the British Library dictionary analysis confirm Father Daniel's information that the Tupi catechism and grammar printed by the Jesuits in the 16th and 17th century employed a variety of Tupi already out of use in the Amazon in the 18th century.