acatl (Mdz13r)
This element has been carved from the compound sign for the place name, Acapolco. It is one or more reed (acatl) plants that have been damaged (which was a look that was intentional on the part of the painter, who wanted to express the verb, poloa). The pieces are painted a turquoise blue.
Stephanie Wood
c. 1541, but by 1553 at the latest
plants, plantas, reeds, cañas, carrizo
aca(tl), reed, cane, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/acatl
reeds
la caña
Stephanie Wood
Codex Mendoza, folio 13 recto, https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/objects/2fea788e-2aa2-4f08-b6d9-648c00..., image 36 of 188.
The Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford, hold the original manuscript, the MS. Arch. Selden. A. 1. This image is published here under the UK Creative Commons, “Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 License” (CC-BY-NC-SA 3.0).