Mazatlan (Mdz12r)

Mazatlan (Mdz12r)
Simplex Glyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description: 

This simplex glyph of a deer (mazatl) also doubles for the place name Mazatlan. The glyph does not have the visual for the locative suffix -tlan that two other examples from the Codex Mendoza do have. The deer's antlers are white. Its coat is textured and painted brown, with some terracotta color on the upper lip and terracotta going to white on the jaw. Its head is shown in profile, looking to the viewer's left.

Description, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis: 

The antler that clarifies that this is a deer looks more like a reed than the antlers found in later manuscripts. This is intentional, owing to the fact that the deer is metaphorically called "acaxoch," or reed flower, according to Gordon Whittaker (Deciphering Aztec Hieroglyphs, 2021, 96).

Added Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Gloss Image: 
Gloss Diplomatic Transcription: 

maçatlan___. puo

Gloss Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Source Manuscript: 
Mendoza/Mendocino, Codex (Mdz)
Date of Manuscript: 

c. 1541, or by 1553 at the latest

Creator's Location (and place coverage): 

Mexico City

Semantic Categories: 
phonetic dimensions
place name
Syntax: 
locative (not visual)
noun(s)
Writing Features: 
compound of phonogram(s) & logogram(s)
Cultural Content & Iconography: 
Animals: Misc.
Mouth/Beak Open
Names (places)
Socio-Political Units, Cities, Towns, Neighborhoods
Cultural Content, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Colors: 
brown
white/neutral
yellow or golden
Shapes and Perspectives: 
dotted, granular, textured
facing left
profile view
Keywords: 

deer, antlers, las astas, la cornamenta, venado, nombres de lugares

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

maza(tl), deer, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/mazatl
-tlan, by, near, among, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/tlan

Karttunen’s Interpretation: 

"Deer Place" [Frances Karttunen, unpublished manuscript, used here with her permission.]

Additional Scholars' Interpretations: 

"By the Deer" (Whittaker, 2021, 69); "Place of Many Deer" (Berdan and Anawalt, 1992, vol. 1, p. 190)

Image Source: 

Codex Mendoza, folio 12 recto, https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/objects/2fea788e-2aa2-4f08-b6d9-648c00..., image 34 of 188.

Image Source, Rights: 

The Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford, hold the original manuscript, the MS. Arch. Selden. A. 1. This image is published here under the UK Creative Commons, “Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 License” (CC-BY-NC-SA 3.0).

See Also: 

Mazatlan (Mdz13v)

Mazatlan (Mdz47r)