Modern Valley Zapotec parents, particularly those who have spent time in the United States, often feel free to give their children names in Spanish, English, or another language, but there are many traditional given names, and you may want to choose one of these names to use yourself while speaking Valley Zapotec. Most traditional names were originally borrowed from Spanish, but these have been used in the language for so long that they are now considered to be completely Zapotec, and in many cases it’s hard to see the relationship to the original Spanish name. There are a few names that have no Spanish source, and may well be names that were in use long before the Spanish conquest.

This guide will introduce you to Valley Zapotec personal (given) names and the titles that are used with them, as well as some terms of address. You may be able to find the equivalent of your English or Spanish name there, a name that sounds like yours, or another name that appeals to you!

§1. Below are lists of ten men’s names and ten women’s names, which we’ll use as examples in this section. (These lists include the names of the characters in the continuing story in this book, Blal xte Tiu Pamyël, which begins in Unida Tyop, as well as other names that will be used in our examples.) The names are given here with both Spanish and English translations (Spanish names are written in English style without accent marks); in the rest of this book, however, we’ll use only the Spanish translations. Each name given below is followed by its pronunciation guide; see Lecsyony Chon and Lecsyony Tap for help in interpreting these.

§2. You’ll notice that the women’s names above are all preceded by the TITLE Lia [Lia]. A title is a word that is used along with a name. Lia means something like English Miss or Ms. or Spanish Señorita, but, unlike these English and Spanish titles, is strictly used by most Valley Zapotec speakers preceding any girl’s or woman’s name, either in direct address

or in reference

(You’ll learn more about sentences like the last one in Lecsyony Gai.) For this reason, we list the names with Lia above.

As you listen to Valley Zapotec speakers, you will hear some contexts in which speakers omit Lia before women’s names. (Some speakers even feel that particular names may sound better without Lia than others do.) It’s always correct to include Lia, however.

(The word lia also can be used on its own to mean “girl”, roughly equivalent to zhyap, which is the word for “girl” that we’ll use in this book.)

§3. Valley Zapotec speakers use other titles along with personal names to show respect. Men’s titles are used before a man’s name, women’s titles go before Lia plus a woman’s name.

A man is addressed or referred to respectfully with the title Tiu [Ti’u] before his name. This title is roughly equivalent to Spanish Señor or Don. (There is no easy equivalent in English, since English respectful address normally would require the use of a surname, not a given name.)

(Notice that when we give examples that use words that have already been introduced, we do not repeat the pronunciation guide.)

A woman is addressed or referred to respectfully with the title Bied [Bi’ed], roughly Señora or Doña, before Lia and her name.

These respectful titles should be used when addressing or referring to any person older than oneself.

(The words tiu and bied also have another meaning: tiu [ti’u] means “uncle” and bied [biied] ([bi’ed] is a combination form, used before another word) means “aunt”. So another translation for Tiu Pamyël is “Uncle Panfilo”, and another translation for Bied Lia Da is “Aunt Soledad”.)

You may also hear speakers using two other titles, Dad [Dad] “Señor” and Nan [Nnan] “Señora”.

These titles, which are generally used only for fairly old people, are somewhat less common than Tiu and Bied, and some speakers may consider them somewhat less polite or respectful.

§4. Often, as you know, we use TERMS OF ADDRESS to address someone or get that person’s attention, rather than that person’s name. A term of address is especially useful, of course, if you don’t know the person’s name, but can also be used even for people you know well. English examples include miss, ma’am, sir, man, buddy, friend, officer, sweetheart, dad, sis, and Your Honor. Words for different classes of people (like friend, officer, and little boy), words for relatives, and even ADJECTIVES (words for qualities) like silly and beautiful can be used as terms of address. Terms of address reveal a lot about the attitude the speaker has toward the person he or she is talking to.

There are a great many terms of address in Valley Zapotec. These can be used for greeting or calling to a person whose name one doesn’t know, just as in English, but Valley Zapotec terms of address are also more frequently used than in English when speaking respectfully to someone whose name is known.

Like every language, Valley Zapotec has both respectful and disrespectful terms of address, as well as special terms for certain relatives and members of certain groups. Below are some useful respectful and neutral terms, given with pronunciation guides and descriptions of when they are used.

The translations of some of these may sound very stiff, formal, or old-fashioned to you, but Valley Zapotec conversation tends to be much more formal and respectful than English or Spanish conversation.

Your teacher can give you more guidance about when these and other Valley Zapotec address terms should be used.

§5. Every speaker of Valley Zapotec has a surname (family name), of course — but these (Spanish) surnames are only used when people are writing or giving their names in Spanish or English. Surnames are not used when speaking Valley Zapotec, and Valley Zapotec titles are not used before surnames. There are Valley Zapotec forms of many Spanish surnames (some of which you saw used as examples in the lessons in this unit), but these are used more to identify families rather than individuals, and we won’t present them here or use them in this course.

§6. Following is a list of Valley Zapotec men’s and women’s names and nicknames. As noted above, most Valley Zapotec names were originally borrowed from Spanish. (Undoubtedly there were other names that were used before the Spanish conquest of Mexico, but most of these have been lost.) Some of the Spanish and English equivalents of the names in the first column are given in the second column, with pronunciation guides in the third column. (Many of these Spanish and English names have other forms or spellings; our lists are not exhaustive.) Zapotec names without Spanish or English equivalents are translated as “(man’s name)” or “(woman’s name)”.

Men’s names

Women’s names