Tlacochteuctli (Mdz18r)

Tlacochteuctli (Mdz18r)
Compound Glyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description:

This compound Nahuatl hieroglyph for the title "Tlacochteuctli" contains a turquoise diadem (called the xiuhhuitzolli) with a red tie for the back of a person's head. The diadem is the sign for the term teuctli or tecuhtli, which refers to a high noble or lord. The glyph also has a reed (em>acatl) javelin (tlacochtli) coming out of the top of the diadem. Below the diadem is a man's head, the man who held the title. The tlacochtli has the eagle feather and down ball that are reminiscent of the arrow, but these are also the decorations on the calendrical symbol for acatl.

Description, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis:

Patrick Hajovsky (On the Lips of Others, 2015, 52) writes, "The crown and arrows phonetically signify the title of Tlacochtecuhtli (Lord of Darts) who was associated with the Tlacochcalco (House of Darts)." Two Nahua men in the Testaments of Culhuacan (Cline and León-Portilla) seem to have held the title of Tlacochteuctli--or else this had become part of their names. Other men seemed to have been governing, but these men did not have the privilege of using the noble title of "don," so the tlacochteuctli at the pueblo level was not as high status. Note the variations in spelling for teuctli vs. tecuhtli. We are tracking this in order to better illuminate orthographic patterns.

Added Analysis, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Gloss or Text Image:

Gloss/Text Diplomatic Transcription:

tlacochtectli. governador

Gloss/Text Normalization:

Tlacochteuctli, gobernador

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:

title/office

Writing Features:

compound fully logographic

Cultural Content & Iconography:

Politics, Power, Governance

Social Hierarchy, Commoners, Elites

Colors:

Shapes and Perspectives:

facing right

pointed (see also spiky)

profile view

tied, bound, or bundled

Parts (compounds or simplex + notation):

Reading Order (Compounds or Simplex + Notation):

downward

Keywords:

gobernadores, flechas, diademas, coronas, diadems, crowns, nobles, señores, teuctli

Glyph or Iconographic Image:

Relevant Nahuatl Dictionary Word(s):

Tlacochteuc(tli), Lord of Darts or Arrows, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/tlacochtecuhtli
tlacoch(tli), a javelin, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/tlacochtli
teuc(tli), a lord, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/teuctli
xiuhhuitzol(li), diadem, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/xiuhhuitzolli

Glyph/Icon Name, Spanish Translation:

literalmente, Flecha-Señor

Spanish Translation, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Image Source:

Codex Mendoza, folio 18 recto, https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/objects/2fea788e-2aa2-4f08-b6d9-648c00..., image 46 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).

Orthography:

teuc/tecuh (tracking)