Tecpan (Mdz32r)

Tecpan (Mdz32r)
Simplex Hieroglyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description: 

This simplex glyph stands for the place name, Tecpan. It can double as a glyph for the building, which has the same name. This building is shown in profile, facing to our right. It is basically a cal(li), but it has an important decoration along the top, just under the roof ledge. This decoration consists of four white circles on a black background. Each one also has a concentric black center. Terracotta-colored beams in the shape of a "T" hold up the roof overhang.

Description, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis: 

The town of this name (Tecpan) must have been the site of an important ruling palace (tecpan). A ruling palace in the state of Oaxaca that retains a circular pattern along its roof line is today called the Casa de la Cacica. Here is a detail of one of the circles.

Added Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Gloss or Text Image: 
Gloss/Text 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: 
place name
Syntax: 
noun(s)
Cultural Content & Iconography: 
Architecture, Construction, Buildings
Names (places)
Politics, Power, Governance
Social Hierarchy, Commoners, Elites
Socio-Political Units, Cities, Towns, Neighborhoods
Wood, wooden things
Cultural Content, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Colors: 
black
orange/terracotta
white/neutral
Shapes and Perspectives: 
circle(s) (small, often concentric)
facing right
profile view
rectangular
right angle(s)
T-shapes
Keywords: 

palaces, palacios, nombres de lugares

Museum/Rare Book/Realia Comparisons: 
Museum/Rare Book/Realia Notes: 

These bas relief stone carvings of what may be water droplets or precious green stone beads are reminiscent of architectural details on rulers’ palaces. Here, these concentric circles and the blue pigment inside them suggest water droplets or precious beads. Red pigment surrounds these drops, in the recessed spaces outside them. The contrast of blue and red, water and fire, has war associations, and this group of motifs includes arrows and probably a shield above them. Museo Sitio Xolotl. Photograph by Stephanie Wood, 3 February 2026.

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

tecpan, royal palace, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/tecpan
tecpancal(li), royal palace, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/tecpancalli

Image Source: 

Codex Mendoza, folio 32 recto, https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/objects/2fea788e-2aa2-4f08-b6d9-648c00..., image 74 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).