Alonzo de Bárcena (also called de Barzana) was a Spanish

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missionary and linguist who is being designated by the

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as a candidate for sainthood.

Biography

He was of native of

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Andalusia Andalusia (, ; es, Andalucía ) is the southernmost autonomous community in Peninsular Spain. It is the most populous and the second-largest autonomous community in the country. It is officially recognised as a "historical nationality". The ...

, southern Spain, born in 1528; died at Cuzco, Peru on 15 January 1598. He became a

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in 1565, and went to Paris in 1569. He was first destined for the missions of Heartier, whence he was ordered (1577) to Juli, on the shores of

Lake Titicaca Lake Titicaca (; es, Lago Titicaca ; qu, Titiqaqa Qucha) is a large freshwater lake in the Andes mountains on the border of Bolivia and Peru. It is often called the highest navigable lake in the world. By volume of water and by surface area, i ...

in Southern Peru. He became one of the founders of this important mission. Barcena remained in Central

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for eleven years, when the Provincial Juan de Atienza sent him to Tucuman in

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest ...

. His work among the various tribes of that region and of

Paraguay Paraguay (; ), officially the Republic of Paraguay ( es, República del Paraguay, links=no; gn, Tavakuairetã Paraguái, links=si), is a landlocked country in South America. It is bordered by Argentina to the south and southwest, Brazil to t ...

continued until 1593, when he was made

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of the

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in those provinces. Exhausted physically by his long and arduous labors, Barcena died at

Cuzco Cusco, often spelled Cuzco (; qu, Qusqu ()), is a city in Southeastern Peru near the Urubamba Valley of the Andes mountain range. It is the capital of the Cusco Region and of the Cusco Province. The city is the seventh most populous in Peru; ...

in Peru.

Writings

He is credited with having had a practical knowledge of eleven Indian languages and with having written grammars, vocabularies, catechisms in most of them. These manuscripts are possibly still in the archives of Lima. Only one of his writings is known to have been published: a letter full of important ethnographic and linguistic detail, on the Indians of Tucuman, on the Calchaquis and others. The letter published in 1885 is dated 8 September 1594, at Asunción in Paraguay, and is addressed to the Provincial John Sebastian. Bárcena made an extensive record of the mysterious, now-extinct Cacan language, but as the manuscript is lost, very few identifiable words remain, and the language is unclassifiable at present.

Beatification

In March 2016, the

Roman Catholic Diocese of Cusco The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Cusco ( la, Cuschen(sis)) is a Latin Metropolitan archdiocese with see in the city and old Inca imperial capital of Cusco, in Peru.Pope Francis Pope Francis ( la, Franciscus; it, Francesco; es, link=, Francisco; born Jorge Mario Bergoglio, 17 December 1936) is the head of the Catholic Church. He has been the bishop of Rome and sovereign of the Vatican City State since 13 March 2013. ...

to be

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on the account of his holy life.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Barcena, Alonzo de 1528 births 1598 deaths People from Baeza 16th-century Spanish Jesuits Spanish Servants of God 16th-century venerated Christians Jesuit missionaries in Peru Spanish Roman Catholic missionaries Jesuit missionaries in Paraguay Jesuit missionaries in Bolivia