teocalli (FCbk12f42v)
This iconographic example of a teocalli (a Nahua devotional building) is presented in an unusual ¾ view. The steps on the lower level have shading for a three-dimensionality, too. The entryway to the little building on top is also shaded. That building has a design across the front (and perhaps the sides) with a black background and white circles. This facade is much like the starry cap at the top of the hill in the glyph for Citlaltepec. The same design is found on the temple of Capolteopan (Codex Mendoza f. 33r) and on one of the buildings atop the dual pyramid at Tlatelolco (Codex Mendoza f. 10r). The calli in the Florentine Codex Book 4, f. 11r, which stands for the date of Ome Calli. (2-House) also has these stars. Perhaps coincidentally, this 2-House date may connect in some way with the dual pyramids that each had a house atop. The one on the right–in the case of Tenochtitlan (as shown, for example, in the Códice Matritense, f. 269r, and the Durán Codex) and Tlatelolco (as shown in the teocalli glyph below from the Codex Mendoza, f. 10r)–may have had that same star design. See also the temple of Cuauhxicalco (Florentine Codex, Book 12, f. 41r). The houses on the right side of the dual pyramids or pyramids with two houses on top also have a connection, it seems, to Huitzilopochtli, the divine force associated with war and the sun. Ian Mursell (Mexicolore) makes the case that Huitzilopochtli was on the right as one might be looking at the pair of temples. So what is the connection between Huitzilopochtli and the stars? Were those stars representing the siblings he was believed to have defeated, along with the moon? (See: Miguel León-Portilla, Native Mesoamerican Spirituality, 1980.)
Stephanie Wood
We are accepting the designation of teocalli for this building, which is the keyword given to the image by the Digital Florentine Codex team. To understand more fully the visual representations and naming of the teocalli and teopan (also called teopantli and teopancalli) deserves further research. Some buildings have structures on top, and many of these buildings are glossed teocalli, but not exclusively. Two examples below that are referred to as teopan do not have a calli (building) on top, but occasionally one will. As the Spanish colony lived on, the term teopan/teopantli/teopancalli was the preferred term (over teocalli) for Nahuas’ references to Christian churches. Incidentally, Frances Karttunen sees no difference between teopan and teopantli in meaning, whereas James Lockhart suggests that teopan sometimes meant “at the church” and not just temple, church, or devotional building. See our Online Nahuatl Dictionary.
Stephanie Wood
1577
Jeff Haskett-Wood
templo, templos, arquitectura, estructuras, casas, capillas, estrella, estrellas, stars
teocal(li), temple or devotional building, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/teocalli
el templo
Stephanie Wood
Available at Digital Florentine Codex/Códice Florentino Digital, edited by Kim N. Richter and Alicia Maria Houtrouw, "Book 12: The Conquest of Mexico", fol. 42v, Getty Research Institute, 2023. https://florentinecodex.getty.edu/en/book/12/folio/42v/images/0 Accessed 24 June 2025.
Images of the digitized Florentine Codex are made available under the following Creative Commons license: CC BY-NC-ND (Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 International). For print-publication quality photos, please contact the Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana ([email protected]). The Library of Congress has also published this manuscript, using the images of the World Digital Library copy. “The Library of Congress is unaware of any copyright or other restrictions in the World Digital Library Collection. Absent any such restrictions, these materials are free to use and reuse.”
