Cipac (MH649v)

Cipac (MH649v)
Simplex Hieroglyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description:

This colorful painting of the simplex glyph for the personal name Cipac ("Crocodile") shows a bird's eye view of a crocodile with its arms and legs splayed. The pointed protrusions on its back are very much in evidence. A short tail hangs down below the body. A large pointed mouth points upward. An anthropomorphic face also appears, however, on the top of the animal's head. The entire creature is painted green.

Description, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis:

This name is a day sign. Originally, a name like this would have a number attached to it. Because of colonial edicts to stop using the tonalpohualli as a source for names, one thing that happened is that the companion numbers were dropped, perhaps as a stopgap measure to reduce the sacred nature of the name, or an inadvertent fading of the tradition. See Norma Angélica Castilla Palma, "Las huellas del oficio y lo sagrado en los nombres nahuas de familias y barrios de Cholula," Dimensión Antropológica v. 65 (sept.-dic. 2015), 186.

The thirteen-day cycle that was started by One-Cipactli was an auspicious time to be born according to a downloadable publication hosted by Mexicolore.

Added Analysis, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Gloss or Text Image:

Gloss/Text Diplomatic Transcription:

Andres tzinpac

Gloss/Text Normalization:

Andrés Cipac

Gloss/Text Analysis, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Source Manuscript:

Huexotzinco, Matrícula de (MH)

Date of Manuscript:

1560

Creator's Location (and place coverage):

Huejotzingo, Puebla

Semantic Categories:

calendrics

day name

personal name

Syntax:

adjective

noun(s)

Writing Features:

simplex or element as logogram

fading tradition, or an effort to disguise?

Cultural Content & Iconography:

Animals: Snakes

Gender (male)

Names (personal and/or theonym)

Religion (Indigenous)

Time, Calendar, Frequency

Cultural Content, Credit:

Jeff Haskett-Wood

Colors:

green (light)

Shapes and Perspectives:

bird's eye view

facing upward

Keywords:

calendarios, calendars, dates, fechas, días, days, caimanes, cocodrilos, cocodrilo, cipactli, nombres de hombres, tonalpohualli

Museum/Rare Book/Realia Comparisons:

Museum/Rare Book/Realia Notes:

This is a stone carving of a cipactli, or “earth monster,” according to the museum signage. The sign also reads: “Ancient Mesoamerican societies envisioned the earth as a fantastic creature, resembling a crocodile that floated on the waters of the primordial sea. In some cases it was also represented as a sawfish.” In offerings, cipactli “skin” was also found to be created from sharp spines, turtle carapaces, coral, mollusk shells, sea urchins, and sand dollars, among other things. Photograph by Stephanie Wood, Museo del Templo Mayor, Mexico City, 15 February 2023.

Glyph or Iconographic Image:

Relevant Nahuatl Dictionary Word(s):

cipac(tli), crocodile or caiman, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/cipactli

Glyph/Icon Name, Spanish Translation:

Caiman, o Cocodrilo

Spanish Translation, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Image Source:

Matrícula de Huexotzinco, folio 649v, World Digital Library, https://www.loc.gov/resource/gdcwdl.wdl_15282/?sp=381&st=image

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).

Orthography:

"tz" for ç

intrusive "n"

Historical Contextualizing Image: