Atlauhpolco (Osu35r)

Atlauhpolco (Osu35r)
Compound Hieroglyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description:

This painted compound Nahuatl hieroglyph represents the place name Atlauhpolco (perhaps, "At the Large Ravine"). It shows a mountain or hill (tepetl), a landscape feature that does not literally figure into the name, but this mountain or hill has an indentation at the top suggestive of a ravine (atlauhtli). This ravine has water in it. The water is painted a turquoise blue with three horizontal lines, flat not wavy, so probably still water. A single little stream comes up into the air above the water, and this has a droplet or bead at the tip, a classic part of the iconography for water. The red and yellow horizontal lines at the base of this hill or mountain point to the location where a natural spring could emerge as attested in a number of hieroglyphs in this collection. Also, the mountain and spring together could stand for altepetl (town, socio-political unit, or ethnic state).

Description, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis:

A modern version of this place name is Atlapulco. The way this ravine is drawn is similar to the hieroglyph for Atl Itlalacyan (below) in this same manuscript, which may suggest--in that case--that the place where water seeped into the ground was a ravine, too.

Added Analysis, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Gloss or Text Image:

Gloss/Text Diplomatic Transcription:

Atlauhpolco

Gloss/Text Analysis, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Source Manuscript:

Osuna, Codex (Osu)

Date of Manuscript:

1551–1565

Creator's Location (and place coverage):

Mexico City

Semantic Categories:

place name

Syntax:

noun(s)

Writing Features:

compound fully logographic

Cultural Content & Iconography:

Landscape Features

Names (places)

Water

Cultural Content, Credit:

Jeff Haskett-Wood

Colors:

Shapes and Perspectives:

circle(s) (small, often concentric)

frontal view

Parts (compounds or simplex + notation):

Reading Order (Compounds or Simplex + Notation):

inherent/internal/merged

Keywords:

barrancos, quebrada, quebradas, agua, nombres de lugares, topónimos, place names

Glyph or Iconographic Image:

Relevant Nahuatl Dictionary Word(s):

a(tl), water, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/atl
atlauh(tli), ravine, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/atlauhtli
-pol-, large, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/pol

Glyph/Icon Name, Spanish Translation:

posiblemente, En el Barranco Grande

Spanish Translation, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Image Source:

Library of Congress Online Catalog and the World Digital Library, Osuna Codex, or Painting of the Governor, Mayors, and Rulers of Mexico, https://www.loc.gov/resource/gdcwdl.wdl_07324/. The original is located in the Biblioteca Nacional de España.

Image Source, Rights:

"The Library of Congress is unaware of any copyright or other restrictions in the World Digital Library Collection. Absent any such restrictions, these materials are free to use and reuse." But please cite the Biblioteca Nacional de España and this Visual Lexicon of Aztec Hieroglyphs if you use any of these images here or refer to the content on this page, providing the URL

Historical Contextualizing Image: