Chalcayaotl (MH529v)

Chalcayaotl (MH529v)
Compound Glyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description: 

This black-line drawing of the compound glyph for the personal name Chalcayaotl (“Chalca Combantant,” attested here as a man’s name) shows a turtle (ayotl) covered by a war shield (standing for combatant, yaotl) and behind all of this is a circular, scallop-edged drawing of what must be a precious green stone (chalchichuitl), which is the sign relating to the place name Chalco. "Chalca" is the ethnicity of the people from Chalco [singular, Chalcatl), plural, Chalca or Chalcah). The shield has a four-part division crossed by an X shape. The head and legs of the turtle are visible coming out from under the shield. The front legs are just single, bending, short lines; the back legs each have two short lines in the way of feet or claws. The tail does not appear.

Description, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis: 

Ayotl is a phonetic complement for yaotl, given that they are near homophones, and the turtle is used regularly in the Matrícula de Huexotzinco. This chalchihuitl is nothing like the jade of earlier signs. See below.

Added Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Gloss Image: 
Date of Manuscript: 

1560

Creator's Location (and place coverage): 

Huejotzingo, Puebla, Mexico

Semantic Categories: 
Syntax: 
Cultural Content, Credit: 

Jeff Haskett-Wood

Parts (compounds or simplex + notation): 
Reading Order (Compounds or Simplex + Notation): 
Keywords: 

shields, escudos, gems, joyas, jade, chalchihuites, turtles, tortugas

Glyph or Iconographic Image: 
Image Source: 
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).

Historical Contextualizing Image: