Cuezcon (MH515r)

Cuezcon (MH515r)
Simplex Glyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description: 

This black-line drawing of the simplex glyph for the personal name Cuezcon (here, attested as a man's name) shows a tall grain storage container (cuezcomatl) sitting on a structure, perhaps wooden. These structures usually contained corn. The exterior may be thatched. The roof is pointed and probably also thatched. At the upper tip there are some black points that might be the tips of sticks that support the roof poking up through the thatch. The supporting base has a horizontal beam and three visible, vertical legs.

Description, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis: 

Two very different cuezcomates (as they are still called in Spanish) from the Codex Mendoza appear below for the purpose of comparison. Those two have the look of being ceramic or wood, as thatching is not apparent. Mexicolore offers a study by Ian Mursell of the cuezcomatl as an innovation that benefited the feeding and health of the population. The article includes many images of these storage structures of central Mexico. One of them, from the Codex Edgerton, is very reminiscent of this one from the Matrícula de Huexotzinco, with the sticks coming out of the top of the pointed thatched roof.

Added Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Gloss Image: 
Gloss Diplomatic Transcription: 

peo cuezcon

Gloss Normalization: 

Pedro Cuezcon

Gloss Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Source Manuscript: 
Huexotzinco, Matrícula de (MH)
Date of Manuscript: 

1560

Creator's Location (and place coverage): 

Huejotzingo, Puebla, Mexico

Semantic Categories: 
personal name
Writing Features: 
simplex or element as logogram
Cultural Content & Iconography: 
Agriculture, Gardens, Stockraising
Architecture, Construction, Buildings
Corn, Maize
Food, Eating, Cooking
Names (personal and/or theonym)
Wood, wooden things
Cultural Content, Credit: 

Jeff Haskett-Wood

Colors: 
black & white drawing (no color)
Shapes and Perspectives: 
frontal view
rectangular
thatched roof
triangular
vertical, upright
Keywords: 

corn, maize, maíz, almacenes, almacenamiento, granarios

Museum & Rare Book Comparisons: 
Museum/Rare Book Notes: 

This cuezcomatl is located in Atlatlaucan (probably originally Atlatlauhcan), Morelos. This corn storage container still shows thatching, and perhaps it once had a higher layer of thatch at the top, as suggested by the glyph above. This granary appears to be made with clay/adobe. It was photographed by Robert Jackson, 27 July 2022.

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

cuezcoma(tl), corncrib, maize storage structure, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/cuezcomatl

Image Source: 

Matrícula de Huexotzinco, folio 515r, World Digital Library, https://www.loc.gov/resource/gdcwdl.wdl_15282/?sp=109&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).

Historical Contextualizing Image: 
See Also: 

cuezcomatl (Mdz10v)

cuezcomatl (Mdz26r)

Cuezcontzin (CmpRG)

Cuezcon (MH676r)