Matlac (MH613v)

Matlac (MH613v)
Simplex Glyph
Notation

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description: 

This is black-line drawing of the simplex glyph for the notation and personal name Matlac ("Ten"). It is attested here as a man's name. It consists of two groups of five short black vertical lines, connected at their base horizontally. The two groups are also connected to each other. One group points upward and the other hangs down. The number ten would have been part of a calendrical name, drawn from the religious divinatory calendar, the tonalpohualli. The number would have been paired with a day sign, but that seems to have dropped away.

Description, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis: 

There are various possibilities that explain the loss of the day sign in this name--a shortening of what may have been a long name, a forgetting of the calendrical system, or a desire to disguise the continued use of the calendrical system, which the colonial clergy tried to root out.

Added Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Gloss Image: 
Source Manuscript: 
Huexotzinco, Matrícula de (MH)
Date of Manuscript: 

1560

Creator's Location (and place coverage): 

Huejotzingo, Puebla

Semantic Categories: 
personal name
numbers
Syntax: 
line connecting elements
noun(s)
Writing Features: 
simplex or element as logogram
Cultural Content & Iconography: 
Gender (male)
Names (personal and/or theonym)
Numbers, Math
Cultural Content, Credit: 

Jeff Haskett-Wood

Colors: 
black & white drawing (no color)
Shapes and Perspectives: 
linear or multiple straight lines
frontal view
symmetry
Keywords: 

diez, números, nombres de personas

Glyph or Iconographic Image: 
Relevant Nahuatl Dictionary Word(s): 

matlac(tli), ten, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/matlactli

Glyph/Icon Name, Spanish Translation: 

Diez

Spanish Translation, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Image Source: 

Matrícula de Huexotzinco, folio 613v, World Digital Library, https://www.loc.gov/resource/gdcwdl.wdl_15282/?sp=309st=image.

Image Source, Rights: 

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).

Historical Contextualizing Image: 
See Also: 

Matlactli (MH553v)

matlactli (T1871:1)