Coatepec (Osu35r)

Coatepec (Osu35r)
Compound Hieroglyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description: 

This painted compound Nahuatl hieroglyph represents the place name Coatepec ("Serpent Hill" or "Serpent Mountain"). It shows an undulating gray serpent in profile with a rattler tail and a protruding bifurcated tongue. Its visible eye is open. This serpent partially comes into contact with the top of a bell-shaped hill in green with red and yellow horizontal stripes at its base. While some hills provide a silent locative, this one has a role in the place name. The locative suffix (-c, meaning in or at) is no longer visible in the gloss at the edge of the page, where it has eroded.

Description, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis: 

A few other examples of the place name Coatepec appear in this digital collection, extracted from the Codex Mendoza, the Codex Telleriano-Remensis, the Azcatitlan Codex, and the Relación Geográfica of Cempohuallan (see below).

Added Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Gloss or Text Image: 
Gloss/Text Diplomatic Transcription: 

cohuatepe[c]

Gloss/Text Normalization: 

Coatepec

Gloss/Text Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Source Manuscript: 
Osuna, Codex (Osu)
Date of Manuscript: 

1551–1565

Creator's Location (and place coverage): 

Mexico City

Semantic Categories: 
place name
Syntax: 
noun(s)
Writing Features: 
compound fully logographic
Cultural Content & Iconography: 
Animals: Snakes
Landscape Features
Names (places)
Tongue Protruding/Noticeable
Cultural Content, Credit: 

Jeff Haskett-Wood

Colors: 
gray
green (light)
red
yellow or golden
Shapes and Perspectives: 
bell-shaped (upright)
bifurcated
facing right
profile view
Parts (compounds or simplex + notation): 
2
Reading Order (Compounds or Simplex + Notation): 
downward
Keywords: 

cerro, cerros, montaña, montañas, serpiente, lengua bífida, cascabel, nombres de lugares, place names, topónimo, topónimos

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

coa(tl), snake or serpent, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/coatl
tepe(tl), hill or mountain, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/tepetl

Glyph/Icon Name, Spanish Translation: 

En el Cerro de Serpientes

Spanish Translation, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Image Source: 

Library of Congress Online Catalog and the World Digital Library, Osuna Codex, or Painting of the Governor, Mayors, and Rulers of Mexico, https://www.loc.gov/resource/gdcwdl.wdl_07324/. The original is located in the Biblioteca Nacional de España.

Image Source, Rights: 

"The Library of Congress is unaware of any copyright or other restrictions in the World Digital Library Collection. Absent any such restrictions, these materials are free to use and reuse." But please cite the Biblioteca Nacional de España and this Visual Lexicon of Aztec Hieroglyphs if you use any of these images here or refer to the content on this page, providing the URL

Orthography: 
intrusive "h" or "hu"
Historical Contextualizing Image: 
See Also: 

Coatepec (Mdz32r)

Coatepec (TR26v)

Coatepec (CmpRG)

Coatepec (Azca12)