Language of the Voiceless: Traces of Taino Language, Food, and Culture in the Americas From 1492 to the Present

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significance because it illustrates that the cazabe was a type of Taino bread made from
a root adopted by the Spanish in their diet. The quote strictly specifies that they filled
three ships with a matalotaje 64 of casaba bread which was the equivalent of a full ship
hold as provisions for their expedition. This seems to indicate an early dietary adoption
of the Taino bread given its long storage life and its possible dietary benefits.
A reaffirmation of this practice as Taino seafaring cultural usage can be traced
back to a document from Oviedo describing its benefits and properties during Taino
island travel:
Este pan de cazabe se sostiene un año y más, y lo llevan de unas partes a otras
muy lejos, sin se corromper ni dañar, y aun también por la mar es buen
mantenimiento, y se navega con él por todas aquellas partes y islas y Tierra
Firme, sin que se dañe si no se moja 65 .
In the quote, Oviedo states that, unless it gets wet, the cazabe could last a year
or more without becoming stale or losing its alimentary properties. The quote also
specifies that it was used in seafaring ventures across the islands and the mainland.
However, in spite this gastronomic implementation of cazabe in the Spanish
diet of the early conquest, it is worth to note that the grammatical use of the word
cazabe as an adjective in Diaz del Castillo’s text represents a linguistic effort from the
writer to structure the sentence using the Spanish word de pan as substantive and
cazabe serving an adjectival function. This syntactical structuration illustrates the
necessity of the writer to specify or convey the need for clarity in the text as if writing for
a group that did not know about cazabe or as if, for him, cazabe was the correct type
64
(Varela Merino, 2009, p. 1575)
65
(Fernandez de Oviedo, Cronistas de Indias, 1950, p. 97)