Zoological Basis of Casta Terminology

To the reader: please do not take offense at the terminology below. This terminology is clearly racist, and should be insulting to many, many people. This terminology is here as it is a record of how people were viewed.

Non-Christian and Mixed Races were often viewed as monsters based on the Old Testament book of Leviticus (which in modern times would be classified as racist, sexist and homophobic: a view shared by Judaeo-Christian and Moslems). Because of these racist views, these 'monstrous' people were often given names that referred to animals.1 Examples follow.

Animal Terminology Kind of person Region
Fantasmagoric monster Al Borayque Anti converso and anti-Jewish
Muslim or Morisco propaganda 2 		Iberian world and Muslim world
Goat Bôde Elderly black man with white beard 3 Brazil
Cow Boviander Anyone with non-white blood Dutch Guyana (Surinam)
Coyote Coyote Anyone with AmerIndian blood Nueva España
Baby animal Cria Children containing non-white blood 4 Brazil
Livestock Criollo Slave or livestock Nueva España
Hen Hen Negro Female Negro slave English-speaking New World
Griffin Griffin Half-blood slave 5 Famagusta, Cyprus (1299-1301)
Wolf Lobo Anyone with negro (black) blood Nueva España
Mixed animal species Mestizo Mixed with (Spanish) non-white blood 6 New World Spanish colonies
Mongrel Mongroo Anyone with non-white blood Dutch Guyana (Surinam)
Mule Mulato Mixed with non-white blood 7 New World Spanish colonies
Pig Marrano Jew (or converso) Iberia
Vulture Urúbu Anyone with non-white blood Brazil

1   "Medieval representations of peasants, for example, rendered them as a lower order of humanity and associated them with animals, dirt, excrement. The beastialization of the peasantry could reach such extremes that a historian of slavery has suggested that it was an important precursor to the early modern racialization of Jews and blacks." See María Elena Martínez, "Genealogical Fictions: Limpieza de Sangre, Religion, and Gender in Colonial Mexico", Stanford Univ. Press, 2008, pp. 9-10.
.
2   The Al Borayque was used as propaganda to depict Jews, especially conversos or "New Christians" as fantasmagoric monsters. Another way to justify the view of Jews as being monsters, was to do as Alonso de Espina did, and "[relate] the lineage of Jews to the offspring of, first, Adam with animals and second, Adam with the demon Lilith." See David Nirenberg, "Was there race before modernity? The example of 'Jewish' blood in late medieval Spain," in Ben Isaac, Yossi Ziegler, and Miriam Eliav-Feldon, Eds., The Origins of Racism in the West, Cambridge University Press, 2009, p. 256. Note that all the other examples in the table on this page refer to castas, but the Al Borayque refers to raza.
.
3   A Bôde's white beard reminds one of the name "goatee".
.
4   Often "cria" referred to the non-white children of slave's masters; see Portuguese language dictionary.
.
5   Charles Verlinden, "The Beginnings of Modern Colonization: Eleven Essays" (Yvonne Ferccero, Trans.), Cornell University Press, Ithaca, 1970, p. 89. Used in Famagusta, Cyprus 1299-1301, to refer to the offspring of Slavic (white) slaves who were employed at sugar plantations at Genoese and Venetian colonies. The use of this term suggests the beginnings of a caste system based on status (slave or free man), pre-dating the use of caste in the New World, to indicate race (color). To date, no terms have been found to describe "quarter-slave", "one-eighth-slave", etc., equivalent to quadroon, octaroon, etc.
.
6   María Elena Martínez, "Genealogical Fictions: Limpieza de Sangre, Religion, and Gender in Colonial Mexico", Stanford University Press, 2008, p. 164.
.
7   The term mulatto, reminds one of "alboraico" and "alboraique", pejorative for converso (roots similar to alcohol, algebra, arroba, etc.) "Alboraico" and "alboraique" originally referred to Muhammad's fabled animal, neither horse nor mule (New Christians, or converso: neither Jews nor Christians). María Elena Martínez, "Genealogical Fictions: Limpieza de Sangre, Religion, and Gender in Colonial Mexico", Stanford U. P., 2008, p. 164. Also, see Magnus Mörner, "Race Mixture in the History of Latin America", Little, Brown and Company, Boston, p. 58, footnote 20.

Click to Close