chiyan (Mdz13r)

chiyan (Mdz13r)
Element from a Compound

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description: 

This element for chia seeds (chiya(n) or chiyantli) has been carved from the compound sign for the place name, Tepechiapan. The representation of the seeds here consists of only three example, round black seeds, organized in a triangle with the point at the top.

Description, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis: 

Chiyan (salvia hispanica) or chia—as we know it in Spanish and English today—is a high-energy food source and a flavoring for beverages, and its oil has various purposes. For example, the Aztecs mixed chia oil with face paints, according to Cecilia Russell, https://www.mexicolore.co.uk/aztecs/ask-experts/did-the-aztecs-use-make-up. Because the oil was so important, the word chiyan can also translate as oily or as an oily seed (semilla oleaginosa, as found in Rémi Siméon). As the link to our dictionary entry for chiyan shows (drawing from the Florentine Codex), there were many regional variations on the chia oils.

Added Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Source Manuscript: 
Mendoza/Mendocino, Codex (Mdz)
Date of Manuscript: 

c. 1541, but by 1553 at the latest

Creator's Location (and place coverage): 

Mexico City

Syntax: 
noun(s)
Cultural Content & Iconography: 
Food, Eating, Cooking
Plants, Flora
Cultural Content, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Colors: 
black
Shapes and Perspectives: 
circle, circular or rounded
circle(s) (small, often concentric)
dotted, granular, textured
triangular
Keywords: 

hills, mountains, chia seeds, cerros, montañas, semillas de chia, chien, chiyen

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

chiya(n), chia seeds or oil, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/chiyan
chiyan(tli), chia seeds or oil, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/chiyantli

Additional Scholars' Interpretations: 

chia seeds

Glyph/Icon Name, Spanish Translation: 

chia

Spanish Translation, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Image Source: 

Codex Mendoza, folio 13 recto, https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/objects/2fea788e-2aa2-4f08-b6d9-648c00..., image 36 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).

See Also: 

Tepechiapan (Mdz13r)