Huitzilihuitl (TR30v)

Huitzilihuitl (TR30v)
Compound Glyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description: 

This compound glyph for the personal name Huitzilihuitl includes what is apparently meant to be a hummingbird (huitzilin), despite its having a hooked beak. (Hummingbird glyphs show a long, pointed beak.) This bird is shown standing in profile, looking toward the viewer's right. The feathers (ihuitl) at the back of its head are spiky, and around the perimeter of its body are eight, small, white, round feathers, possibly down feathers. Its eye is yellow and round, as though open. The bird-like figure also has some extra turquoise-blue tail feathers The overall effect of the name is Hummingbird-Feathers.

Description, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis: 

From the contextualizing image, we learn that this second ruler of Tenochtitlan is deceased, as he is bundled in white cloth and tied.

Added Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Gloss Image: 
Gloss Diplomatic Transcription: 

Vitzilihuitl.

Gloss Normalization: 

Huitzilihuitl

Gloss Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Date of Manuscript: 

ca. 1550–1563

Creator's Location (and place coverage): 

Mexico City

Semantic Categories: 
Syntax: 
Cultural Content, Credit: 

Jeff Haskett-Wood

Parts (compounds or simplex + notation): 
Reading Order (Compounds or Simplex + Notation): 
Glyph or Iconographic Image: 
Relevant Nahuatl Dictionary Word(s): 

Huitzilihuitl, a personal name, hummingbird feather; held, for example, by a ruler of Mexico-Tenochtitlan, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/huitzilihuitl
huitzil(in), hummingbird, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/huitzilin
ihui(tl), feather, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/ihuitl

Glyph/Icon Name, Spanish Translation: 

Las Plumas del Colibrí

Spanish Translation, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Image Source: 

Telleriano-Remensis Codex, folio 30 recto, MS Mexicain 385, Gallica digital collection, https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b8458267s/f86.item.zoom

Image Source, Rights: 

The non-commercial reuse of images from the Bibliothèque nationale de France is free as long as the user is in compliance with the legislation in force and provides the citation: “Source gallica.bnf.fr / Bibliothèque nationale de France” or “Source gallica.bnf.fr / BnF.”

Historical Contextualizing Image: