coztic apozonalli (FCbk11f207v)

This black-line drawing of the compound glyph for yellow liquid amber (coztic apozonalli), is included in this digital collection for the purpose of making comparisons with related hieroglyphs. The term selected for this example comes from the text near the image in the Digital Florentine Codex. There is no gloss, per se. This example shows an amber stone (apozonalli) coming from a flow of water (atl), which provides the phonetic start (a-) to the term. The water has the usual hieroglyphic elements of droplets at the tops of the streams and varying lines showing currents (movement) running through the streams. The water also comes out of a hole at the base of the nearby peak, reminiscent of some hieroglyphs of hills or mountains (tepetl) where water emerges from the red and yellow horizontal stripes at their bases (such as in the glyph for Ixicayan, Codex Mendoza 40r, or that of Colhuacan, found in its Relación Geográfica). The flames of fire in and on the stone here are semantic indicators that the stone is a type of amber, the kind that seems to have sparks flying from it and fire within it, according to the nearby text. The contextualizing image shows a man with a digging stick (huictli) and a stone he seems to have mined (given that mining of amber is discussed in the text). He wears a tilmatli (or tilmahtli) cloak, along with some European-influenced clothing with three-dimensional (shaded) fabric. The landscape setting also shows European artistic influence.