ilpitoca (Osu12v)

This iconographic example (practically a hieroglyph) comes from the Codex Osuna, folio 12 verso (or Image 27). It shows a man in a three-quarter view, facing toward the viewer’s left. His leg is protruding from a pair of wooden stocks (cepo, in the Spanish text). The stocks consist of two horizontal boards with three holes. Only one is being used in this case. In the Nahuatl gloss used here, the relevant verb is ilpitoca (to be tied or bound), since the stocks have made him immobile, and he cannot extricate himself. This man, Melchor Diez, wears a white cotton cloak that is tied on his shoulder, suggesting he might not be a macehualli, but perhaps rather a pilli.