huacalli (MH487v)
huacalli (MH487v)
This black-line drawing of the simplex glyph associated with Oztomecatl shows a pack frame (huacalli). This frontal view of the frame does have it resting on its side, with the top toward the viewer's left. It is something like a wooden ladder with straps, seemingly shoulder straps.
Stephanie Wood
The components of the word huacalli might include hua- (possession) and -calli (construction, container, when not referring to a house or a building, although even that works metaphorically). The huacal (in contemporary Mexican Spanish) is known to carry babies on the back, as discussed in Mexicolore. Some people, such as long-distance merchants, carried things for a living. The huacalli is something like the cacaxtli (see below).
Stephanie Wood
1560
Stephanie Wood
pack frame, carrying frame, marco de transporte, wooden, madera, baby carrier, portabebés
huacalli, back pack frame, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/huacalli.
Stephanie Wood
Available at Digital Florentine Codex/Códice Florentino Digital, edited by Kim N. Richter and Alicia Maria Houtrouw, "Book 10: The People", fol. 39v, Getty Research Institute, 2023. https://florentinecodex.getty.edu/en/book/10/folio/39v/images/0 Accessed 10 September 2025
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