centzontlatole (FCbk11f55v)

This iconographic example, featuring a mockingbird (centzontlatole, or centzontlahtoleh, literally, “possessor of 400 words”), is included in this digital collection for the purpose of making comparisons with related hieroglyphs. The term selected for this example comes from the Nahuatl text near the image in the Digital Florentine Codex. There is no gloss, per se. This example shows a painting of a gray and white bird, in profile, facing right. Its legs are crossed, seemingly suggesting movement along the landscape. The landscape is green and blue. Placing an animal in a landscape setting is done in such a way as to suggest European artistic influences, but the placement of two peaks may authentically reveal the Mesoamericans’ considerable interest in nearby peaks or mountains in their surroundings. Coming out of the mockingbird’s mouth is a dotted line leading to two speech scrolls. One is red, and it has a blue bead (of water or turquoise, both being precious) on the outside of the volute’s curl. Above this elaborated speech scroll is a smaller, simpler scroll that curls upward. It is also painted red, one of the colors associated with writing and painting. Seemingly underlining visually the large number of sounds a mockingbird can make, behind the bird’s head is another speech scroll, this one turquoise blue with one red bead near the start of the volute and another red and blue bead in a line that comes outward from the outside of the scrolling part of the volute. We should probably discount the literal translation of centzontlatole, and think of something along the lines of a bird with “many songs.” On another page in this section of the manuscript that treats birds, the word tlatolli refers to birdsong and 400 can just imply a large number.