Cacahuaxochitl (MH885v)

Cacahuaxochitl (MH885v)
Compound Glyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description: 

This black-line drawing of the simplex glyph for the personal name Cacahuaxochitl (“Cacao Flower”) is attested here as a woman’s name. The flower is (xochitl) not botanically related to the cacao tree or its blossom. It is a flower that is used in a beverage called tejate (in Mexican Spanish today). The glyph shows a vertical flower with three visible petals and texturing. Sitting on top of the flower are two black cacao (cacahuatl) beans. Cacao was used for making a chocolate beverage.

Description, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis: 

A popular name for this tree in Ecuador is molinillo. Its botanical name is Quararibea funebris, so it is sometimes called the “funeral tree.” Apparently, the people of Villa de Izúcar (now Izúcar de Matamoros, Puebla) used to mourn deceased relatives under this tree. [See: Luis Manuel Cervantes Servin, Estudio etnobotanico, historico, de manejo y explotacion de "rosita de cacao" Quararibea funebris (La Llave) Vischer, Bombacaceae en los valles centrales de Oaxaca. Tesis de M.Sc. Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, 1999, p. 12.] See below for another example of this glyph.

Added Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Gloss Image: 
Gloss Diplomatic Transcription: 

agata . cacavaxochitl

Gloss Normalization: 

Ágata Cacahuaxochitl

Gloss Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Source Manuscript: 
Huexotzinco, Matrícula de (MH)
Date of Manuscript: 

1560

Creator's Location (and place coverage): 

Huejotzingo, Puebla

Semantic Categories: 
personal name
Writing Features: 
compound fully logographic
Cultural Content & Iconography: 
Flowers
Food, Eating, Cooking
Gender (female)
Names (personal and/or theonym)
Plants, Flora
Cultural Content, Credit: 

Jeff Haskett-Wood

Shapes and Perspectives: 
dotted, granular, textured
tripartite
Parts (compounds or simplex + notation): 
2
Reading Order (Compounds or Simplex + Notation): 
downward
Keywords: 

flores, bebidas, tejate, cacao, chocolate, nombres de hombres

Glyph or Iconographic Image: 
Glyph/Icon Name, Spanish Translation: 

Flor de Cacao

Spanish Translation, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Image Source: 

Matrícula de Huexotzinco, folio 885v, World Digital Library, https://www.loc.gov/resource/gdcwdl.wdl_15282/?sp=843&st=image.

Image Source, Rights: 

This manuscript is hosted by the Library of Congress and the World Digital Library; used here with the Creative Commons, “Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 License” (CC-BY-NC-SAq 3.0).

Orthography: 
"c" for g
"v" for u, uh, or hu
intrusive period
Historical Contextualizing Image: 
See Also: 

Cacahuaxochitl (MH796v)