Ihuitl (MH520v)
This black-line drawing of the simplex glyph for the personal name Ihuitl (here, attested as a man's name) consists of two upright feathers (ihuitl) connected by a line at their bases. The central calamus is very clear in both feathers, as are the downy barbs below the vanes.
Stephanie Wood
The presence of two feathers seems intentional. Perhaps it is a visual reduplication that suggests a plural reading for the name "Feathers."
Feathers permeate Nahua material culture (especially the work of artisans), they played a role in the economy (as tribute items and numerical symbols), and they held a significance in religious beliefs and practices associated with offerings/sacrifice and the vivifying energy called tonalli. {See Caplan 2020 in the bibliography, on the left.]
Stephanie Wood
lurenço yhuitl
Lorenzo Ihuitl
Stephanie Wood
1560
Stephanie Wood
feathers, plumas, quills, nombres de hombres
![](https://aztecglyphs.wired-humanities.org/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/Ihuitl_MH520v_SimplexPersName.png?itok=p0ZiWMvF)
ihui(tl), feathers, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/ihuitl
Las Plumas
Matrícula de Huexotzinco, folio 520v, World Digital Library. https://www.loc.gov/resource/gdcwdl.wdl_15282/?sp=120&st=image
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).
![](https://aztecglyphs.wired-humanities.org/sites/default/files/Ihuitl_MH520v_Context.png)