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

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cousin, ‘head’. Nevertheless, it is the prefix ca of cacique that places the chief as the
position of the highest power of Taino society and gives us a singular view of Taino
cosmovision. This is argued because when we find the morpheme K’ in Taino and
Arawak related languages, the term is often related to light cucuyo > ‘firefligh’, cuaba
> ‘fire starter wood’, k’ue > ‘sacred’, ‘enlighten’, ‘friendly’, ‘holly’. Additionally, if we take
Breton’s definition of the prefix K’ as a possessive pronoun 113 as reference, it can be
observed that in his analysis of Carib lexicology he defines this prefix as the equivalent
of ‘mine’, ‘my’ and ‘ours’ which could possibly transliterate cacique as k’a > ‘my
enlighten’ + ix > ‘similar to’ + ike > ‘head’ or ‘leader’ = ‘my sacred, enlighten head’. Yet,
what is truly remarkable about the position of the cacique as the highest authority of
Taino social structure is the fact that the word behique, which is the term for the
shaman who communed with the spiritual world, does not have any phonemes related
to the sacred or holy. Instead, it is defined by the prefix ebe’ > ‘medicine’ 114 , which
according to Breton (1665) is related to the Carib ebénnetou > ‘sorcerer’. In turn,
cacique shares some of its morphology with the Carib cáchi > ‘the sun’ 115 .
Furthermore, it is also relevant to mention that this prefix k’ is often found defining
other Taino words such as: caona > ‘gold’, ca-za-be > ‘my good breads’, caicu >
‘northern reef’ which gave birth to Caicos and possibly to Lucayos and yucayu from
which corruption we got the English word cay or keys > ‘sand bank’.
However, in the insular Carib, this term, with its possible variants kå, kâ and ca
became associated with ‘top’, ‘northernmost’, ‘uppermost’ and island kaya (ka >
113
(Breton, 1665, p. 322)
114
(del Castillo Matheu, 1977)
115
(Breton, 1665)