Otlatitlan (Mdz46r)

Otlatitlan (Mdz46r)
Compound Glyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description:

This compound glyph for the place name Otlatitlan includes two prominent visual components. One is the stalk of bamboo or cane called otlatl). A full set of teeth, with jaw, protrude from the stalk, in profile, facing to the viewer's left. These teeth do not have a semantic value, they provide the phonetic element for the locative suffix (-tlan) (near, telling where).

Description, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis:

Gordon Whittaker (Deciphering Aztec Hieroglyphs, 2021, 102) has discovered that the somewhat often a full set of teeth (top and bottom) are used, as here, when there is a ligature (-ti-) implied before the locative suffix -tlan.

Added Analysis, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Gloss Image:

Gloss Diplomatic Transcription:

otla titlan/pu^o

Gloss Normalization:

Otlatitlan, pueblo

Gloss Analysis, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Source Manuscript:

Mendoza/Mendocino, Codex (Mdz)

Date of Manuscript:

c. 1541, but by 1553 at the latest

Creator's Location (and place coverage):

Mexico City

Semantic Categories:

phonetic dimensions

place name

Syntax:

ligature -ti- (visual)

locative (visual not silent)

noun(s)

Writing Features:

compound of phonogram(s) & logogram(s)

Cultural Content & Iconography:

Anatomy, human body parts

Names (places)

Plants, Flora

Cultural Content, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Colors:

white/neutral

yellow or golden

Shapes and Perspectives:

vertical, upright

Parts (compounds or simplex + notation):

Reading Order (Compounds or Simplex + Notation):

left to right

Keywords:

bamboo, cane, reeds, teeth, bambú, caña, carrizo, dientes

Glyph or Iconographic Image:

Relevant Nahuatl Dictionary Word(s):

otla(tl), bamboo, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/otlatl
-tlan (locative suffix), by or among (a place), https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/tlan

Additional Scholars' Interpretations:

"Among the Bamboo" (Whittaker, 2021, 102); "Among Much Bamboo" (Berdan and Anawalt, 1992, 196)

Whittaker's Transliteration:

OTLA-titlan

Image Source:

Codex Mendoza, folio 46 recto, https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/objects/2fea788e-2aa2-4f08-b6d9-648c00..., image 102 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).