totecuiyo ichan (FCbk11f243r)

This iconographic example, featuring a chapel devoted to Jesus Christ (totecuiyo ichan), is included in this digital collection for the purpose of making comparisons with related hieroglyphs. The term selected for this example comes from the text near the image in the Digital Florentine Codex. There is no gloss, per se. This example shows a frontal view of a chapel (described in Spanish as an hermita) that has both Indigenous and European architectural characteristics. The entrance is an arch supported with columns. Inside the arch is a figure of Christ on a cross with what may be two friars. On Christ’s left is a robed man with a hood and a halo; his hands are in prayer. On the right of Christ is another robed man; this one has long hair and he has his hands in prayer, too. Other than these contents, the building looks much like a calli. This building is set in a landscape setting, which is a European artistic technique the tlacuilo must have learned from a colonial instructor. Especially interesting is the presence of two Nahuatl hieroglyphs, a stone (tetl) and a moon (metztli), on the platform just outside the chapel. These apparently refer to a place name Anderson and Dibble spell as “Temitztla,” changing the “e” to “i,” as a location of a chapel devoted to Christ; another one is said to be at Anahuac (Mexico City or somewhere on the coast?). The moon is drawn in a European manner, with a face rather than a rabbit, which was the Nahua pre-contact way.