Itzcoatzin (Mdz19r)
This compound glyph for the personal name Itzcoatl (or Itzcoatzin, in the reverential) includes two prominent elements. One is a yellow serpent (coatl) with an unusual shape, curving at the bottom but with a rectangular coil at the top. The serpent's head appears where these two sections meet. It is shown in profile, looking to the viewer's right. Its eye is open, as is its mouth, with red gums and white teeth visible. It has a small curve for a nose. The bending yellow serpent body (or other shape) has twelve obsidian points (itztli), fairly evenly spaced on its upper edge.
Stephanie Wood
yzcoaçi
Itzcoatzin (or Itzcoatl)
c. 1541, but by 1553 at the latest
Stephanie Wood
There are really many obsidian points, but we are counting them as one (a group).
rulers, gobernantes, Mexica, obsidiana, piedras, navajas, cuchillos, serpientes, culebras, víboras, serpents, snakes, knives, flints, points, puntas, nombres de hombres, cohuatl
![](https://aztecglyphs.wired-humanities.org/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/Itzcoatl19rGlyph.png?itok=ziQQsA4B)
itz(tli), obsidian blade, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/itztli
coa(tl), serpent, snake, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/coatl
Serpiente de Obsidiana, o Navaja-Culebra
Stephanie Wood
Codex Mendoza, folio 19 recto, https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/objects/2fea788e-2aa2-4f08-b6d9-648c00..., image 48 of 188.
Original manuscript is held by the Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford, MS. Arch. Selden. A. 1; used here with the UK Creative Commons, “Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 License” (CC-BY-NC-SA 3.0)
![](https://aztecglyphs.wired-humanities.org/sites/default/files/Itzcoatl19rContextShot.png)