Talk:Nahual
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As an example, you mentioned a child's nahual being a bull. I don't belive the Aztecs knew anything about bulls, seeing as those are European animals.
We're talking about the same Nagual. Nagual (spansih spelling for Nagual) is a being whose spirit is both masculine and feminine (balanced Animus and Anima. See also Tibetan Astrology, Mayan Calendar and Theriantropy.
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[edit] Merging, yes
Carlos Castaneda uses both meanings presented here as Nahual and Nagual and spells them both as Nagual. Unless there are other more serious anthropological studies that suggest they have separate origins, I would say the two articles should be combined. It appears to me by reading these articles that both concepts could have derived from a same central belief and the difference is due to distance of peoples separated by natural barriers. That they are spelled differently does not make too much difference, as they would have become a Spanish loan-word from a native language that is pre-literate.
L. Greg 21:19, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
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I myself was looking for nahual ... if that makes any difference what is important is the protectiveness of the therm _ of it's gardianness, and the nahual "sounds" to me as precisely that, it's a peotic twist _ when I hear nagual my rational brain picks up _ when I hear nahual, I'm inspired rather
74.56.220.134 15:29, 15 December 2006 (UTC)Éric
[edit] Confusing terms
This article confuses two terms that of Nahual and that of Tonal. In standard ethnographic terminology of Mesoamerica the Nahual concept is linked to the shaman shapeshifter that can become a specific animal it is distinct from the concept often called tonal which is a animal spirit linked to a person through its birthdate in the ritual calendar. Tonales are guardians and helpers whereas Nahuales is the animal that a shaman/witch can shapeshift into.
[edit] Don't merge
The term nagual seems to be more closely associated with Castaneda, who uses it in his own idiosyncratic New Age way, while nahual seems to be associated with more serious academic study of the remnants of that interesting culture. I think it's useful to keep the two areas separate: wonderful as Castaneda's work is, it's not academic. 81.131.63.74 03:59, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
