Chicome Calli (Mdz2r)

Chicome Calli (Mdz2r)
Simplex Glyph
Notation

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description: 

This simplex glyph plus notation represents the solar year (xihuitl) Chicome Calli (Seven House, or 7-House). It includes a house with the typical right angles and T-shaped wooden framing around the entry way. It is shown in profile, facing the viewer's right. The notation for seven consists of two groups of ones, five across the top, and two ones down the right side. The entire year date is painted turquoise blue. The date is boxed in the original, although this image fails to capture the outline of the box.

Description, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis: 

The color name (xihuitl) is a homophone for the word for year (also xihuitl). The boxing in is also typical for dates. The grouping of the ones in the notation recall the ancient system of counting on fingers and toes. It also results in a math equation: 5 + 2 = 7.

Joaquín Galarza argued that this standard sign for calli was half of a building. But, if we flipped the building over and joined the two pieces together, the beam across the top would not be continuous given the roof overhang at the end of the horizontal beam.

Added 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: 
calendrics
year name
homophony, rebus
numbers
phonetic dimensions
Writing Features: 
simplex or element as logogram
Cultural Content & Iconography: 
Numbers, Math
Time, Calendar, Frequency
Wood, wooden things
Cultural Content, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Colors: 
blue (turquoise)
Shapes and Perspectives: 
boxed in
circle, circular or rounded
facing right
profile view
rectangular
right angle(s)
Parts (compounds or simplex + notation): 
2
Reading Order (Compounds or Simplex + Notation): 
downward
Keywords: 

xiuhpohualli, año, turquesa, xihuitl

Glyph or Iconographic Image: 
Relevant Nahuatl Dictionary Word(s): 

acalli, ship, boat, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/acalli
chicome, seven, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/chicome

Image Source: 

Codex Mendoza, folio 02 recto, https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/objects/2fea788e-2aa2-4f08-b6d9-648c00..., image 14 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).