Cuetzpal (Verg30r)

This simplex Nahuatl hieroglyph is a black-line drawing of the personal name Cuetzpal (“Lizard,” attested here as a man’s name). This is a day sign in the 260-day religious divinatory calendar. The lack of a companion number to the day name may be owing to the tlacuilo's desire to disguise that this was a calendrical name, given the colonial clergy's opposition. If this manuscript is as early as many believe, it would probably not be likely that this was a case of forgetting the iconography. Serious events in 1539 may have made Nahua tlacuilos more cautious when writing and painting about aspects of their faith. See Patricia Lopes Don for information about the Inquisition case against don Carlos Ometochtli, a Chichimecatecuhtli executed in late 1539, in Bonfires of Culture, 2010. Bradley Benton (The Lords of Tetzcoco, 2017, 46) also writes that the case “demonstrates that blatant disregard for Christianity had serious consequences.” This cuetzpalin is shown in a bird’s eye view, or else as climbing up a wall. Another very similar example of this glyph also appears on folio 32 verso. This lizard has a dark color, which may be a complement for the -pal- syllable (from palli, black).