acolli (Mdz3v)

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description: 

This element, acolli (shoulder, or bend/curve, as in a body of water), has been carved from the compound sign for the place name, Acolman.

Description, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis: 

The presence of the bone may intend to call attention to the shoulder (acolli) site of this arm. This arm is not adorned the way some other signs for acolli appear in this collection. Gordon Whittaker calls "acol" a pseudo-logogram, for in place names it is not literally about a shoulder but provides the phonetics for "a" (water) and "col" (bend, or curve), referring to "the curve of the lakeshore." [See Whittaker, Deciphering Aztec Hieroglyphs, 2021, 180.]

Added Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Source Manuscript: 
Date of Manuscript: 

c. 1541, but by 1553 at the latest

Creator's Location (and place coverage): 

Mexico City

Syntax: 
Cultural Content & Iconography: 
Cultural Content, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Shapes and Perspectives: 
Keywords: 

arms, hands, fingers, shoulders, bones

Glyph or Iconographic Image: 
Additional Scholars' Interpretations: 

shoulder

Glyph/Icon Name, Spanish Translation: 

el hombro

Spanish Translation, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Image Source: 
Image Source, Rights: 

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).

See Also: