Cuauhyocan (Mdz22r)

Cuauhyocan (Mdz22r)
Compound Glyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description: 

This compound glyph for the place name Cuauhyocan has one principal element: a tree (cuahuitl) standing on a hill (tepetl), but note that the usual -tepec is not part of this place name]. The tree has a leader and two branches, each one with a clump of green vegetation (not particularly two-toned in this example). The trunk is rather short, and it does not have diagonal black stripes on it, as so many trees do. The tepetl is a typical bell shape, painted a two-tone green, with rocky outcroppings, and the standard horizontal red and yellow lines near the base. The locative suffix (-can), which says "where there is/are," is not shown visually in a specific way, but perhaps the landscape provides a semantic locative.

Description, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis: 

The tepetl is silent, but it suggests that this tree (or stand of trees, woods) is located in a particular place or pueblo (altepetl), serving as what Whittaker would call a "semantic complement."

Added Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Gloss Image: 
Gloss Diplomatic Transcription: 

puo. quauhyocan

Gloss Normalization: 

pueblo, Cuauhyocan

Gloss Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Source Manuscript: 
Date of Manuscript: 

c. 1541, or by 1553 at the latest

Creator's Location (and place coverage): 

Mexico City

Semantic Categories: 
Cultural Content, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Shapes and Perspectives: 
Parts (compounds or simplex + notation): 
Reading Order (Compounds or Simplex + Notation): 
Keywords: 

trees, hills, mountains, woods, woodlands, cerros, montañas, monte, bosques, Quauhyocan

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

cuahui(tl), tree, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/cuahuitl
-yo(tl)-, having that characteristic or quality/inalienable possession, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/yotl
-can (locative suffix), https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/can-2

Karttunen’s Interpretation: 

"Place Full of Trees" (apparently agreeing with Berdan) [Frances Karttunen, unpublished manuscript, used here with her permission.]

Additional Scholars' Interpretations: 

"Place Full of Trees" (Berdan and Anawalt, 1992, vol. 1, 203)

Glyph/Icon Name, Spanish Translation: 

"El Lugar Lleno de Áboles"

Spanish Translation, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Image Source: 

Codex Mendoza, folio 22 recto, https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/objects/2fea788e-2aa2-4f08-b6d9-648c00..., image 54 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).