tecuhtli (Mdz15v)

This turquoise diadem was actually called the xiuhhuitzolli (spelled variously) or xiuhtzontli, but it was a symbol for the position of tecuhtli (also spelled teuctli), for it was worn by high nobles who were leaders and residents of a teccalli (lordly house). Thus, the diadem is an logogram for tecuhtli. The red tie, possibly made of dyed leather, has a knot that is shaped much like the one on the maxtlatl) (loincloth).

In the original compound, the hair is indeed attached to the diadem, which is not required for just the tecuh- part of the name, so we might have removed it. But in the original compound, the hair (tzontli) has a semantic and phonetic role (-zom) in what follows the tecuh-. A glyph of tecuhtli carved into stone on the bottom of a sculpture of Xiuhcoatl held at Dumbarton Oaks, includes hair with the diadem, too. And another one can be found on the side of the "6 Reed Box" at the Ethnologisches Museum in Berlin. (See: Patrick Thomas Hajovsky, On the Lips of Others, 2015, 91, Figure 5.5, and page 84, Plate 3.) And see our museum comparison image from the Salón Mexica at the MNAH, below.