Capolhuac (Mdz10r)

Capolhuac (Mdz10r)
Compound Hieroglyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description:

This compound glyph for the place name Capolhuac (or perhaps Capolohuac) includes a capolin, or Mexican cherry tree, and some water (atl). The locative suffix (-c) is not shown visually. The water that is shown looks like a cross-section of a canal, the apantli, but here it is just the water that is indicated, which the gloss supports. The water has the classic, wavy black lines showing movement, with one especially thick black line across the middles. The liner of the waterway is yellow. White droplets (perhaps meant to symbolize local jade beads?) and turbinate shells splash off the top of the water. The fruit tree has a leader and two branches. Each branch has fairly standard, two-tone green foliage, but springing out of this foliage are sprigs loaded with red cherry-like fruit. The trunk is terracotta in color.

Description, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis:

Berdan and Anawalt note that capulo means "full of cherries," which explains that addition to their translation, "In the Water Full of Cherry Trees." Capolin can refer to the tree or to its fruit. The locative suffix (-c) means on or in. The Mexican cherry has the Latin name Prunus salicifolia. Here is a photo of it, showing the red fruit.

There are a number of elements that look like an apantli but that stand simply for atl in this collection. We have put one example below, right. It could be that the atl is a phonetic indicator for the -hua (possession) in the place name. If so, then the name of the place could translate as "Where They Have Cherry Trees."

Added Analysis, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Gloss or Text Image:

Gloss/Text Diplomatic Transcription:

capuluac. pu^o

Gloss/Text Normalization:

Capolhuac or Capolohuac, pueblo (Capulhuac, today)

Gloss/Text Analysis, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Source Manuscript:

Mendoza/Mendocino, Codex (Mdz)

Date of Manuscript:

c. 1541, or by 1553 at the latest

Creator's Location (and place coverage):

Mexico City

Semantic Categories:

phonetic possibilities

place name

Syntax:

noun(s)

Cultural Content & Iconography:

Flowers

Names (places)

Plants, Flora

Socio-Political Units, Cities, Towns, Neighborhoods

Water

Cultural Content, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Colors:

Shapes and Perspectives:

cross-sectioned object

tripartite

wavy

Parts (compounds or simplex + notation):

Reading Order (Compounds or Simplex + Notation):

downward

Keywords:

nombres de lugares, topónimos, place names

Glyph or Iconographic Image:

Relevant Nahuatl Dictionary Word(s):

capol(in), Mexican cherry tree or the fruit of it, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/capolin
a(tl), water, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/atl
-hua, possessive suffix, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/hua
-c (locative suffix), at or in, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/c

Additional Scholars' Interpretations:

"In the Water Full of Cherry Trees" (Berdan and Anawalt, 1992, vol. 1, p. 176)

Glyph/Icon Name, Spanish Translation:

Donde Tienen Cerezos

Spanish Translation, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Image Source:

Codex Mendoza, folio 10 recto, https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/objects/2fea788e-2aa2-4f08-b6d9-648c00..., image 30 of 188.

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).