Tetzon (MH640v)

Tetzon (MH640v)
Compound Glyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description: 

This black-line drawing of the compound glyph for the personal name Tetzon or Tentzon ("Noble," attested here as a man's name) shows the head of a man tilted back slightly. The hair {tzontli) on his head is pronounced. Also notable is his jutting chin with a significant beard (tenzontli, which breaks down into tentli + tzontli). The big hair and the beard are phonetic indicators.

Description, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis: 

Beards were known in the autonomous era (as this Olmec sculpture found in Puebla shows, but beards became thicker and more prevalent as European DNA became a factor as a result of colonization (whether as a result of violation or through consensual unions). Nahua and European views of hair were very different and affected how they perceived one another. For a study of some of these attitudes, see A. Turner, "Beard and Conquest," Revista de Historia Iberoamericana 6:1 (2013). The beard in this glyph seems especially black, thick, and long.

Wikipedia notes: "In the 15th century, most European men were clean-shaven. [But] 16th-century beards were allowed to grow to an amazing length (see the portraits of John Knox, Bishop Gardiner, Cardinal Pole and Thomas Cranmer). Some beards of this time were the Spanish spade beard, the English square cut beard, the forked beard, and the stiletto beard. In 1587 Francis Drake claimed, in a figure of speech, to have singed the King of Spain's beard." See below for an image of a forked beard.

Added Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Gloss Image: 
Gloss Diplomatic Transcription: 

tentzō

Gloss Normalization: 

Tetzon (if not Tetzon, then the name could be Tentzon, "Beard," but the letter "n" is often intrusive)

Gloss Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Date of Manuscript: 

1560

Creator's Location (and place coverage): 

Huejotzingo, Puebla

Writing Features: 
Cultural Content, Credit: 

Jeff Haskett-Wood

Shapes and Perspectives: 
Parts (compounds or simplex + notation): 
Other Cultural Influences: 
Keywords: 

beards, barbas, hair, pelo, cabello, faces, caras
, nombres de hombres, tetzon, tentzon, tetzontli, tentzontli

Glyph or Iconographic Image: 
Relevant Nahuatl Dictionary Word(s): 
Glyph/Icon Name, Spanish Translation: 

El Noble

Image Source: 

Matrícula de Huexotzinco, folio 640v, World Digital Library, https://www.loc.gov/resource/gdcwdl.wdl_15282/?sp=363&st=image.

Image Source, Rights: 

This manuscript is hosted by the Library of Congress and the World Digital Library; used here with the Creative Commons, “Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 License” (CC-BY-NC-SAq 3.0).

Orthography: 
Historical Contextualizing Image: