Xaxal (MH514r)

Xaxal (MH514r)
Simplex Glyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description: 

This black-line drawing of the simplex glyph for the personal name Xaxal, from the word for sand (xalli), shows a bird's eye view of a parcel of land, a rectangle, with dots and small circles inside it. Thus, the sand would appear to be of different sizes, including perhaps small rocks.

Description, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis: 

The reduplication of the first syllable in the gloss of the name is not necessarily indicated visually, in that it differs negligibly from other representations of xalli. See an example below from the Codex Mendoza. In the Gran Diccionario Náhuatl, the term xaxalli (with the reduplication) means lovanillo (a cyst on a person, a burl on a tree). If that is the intended meaning for this personal name, then the sand glyph is just a phonetic clue.

Added Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Gloss Image: 
Gloss Diplomatic Transcription: 

dio xaxal

Gloss Normalization: 

Diego Xaxal

Gloss Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Source Manuscript: 
Huexotzinco, Matrícula de (MH)
Date of Manuscript: 

1560

Creator's Location (and place coverage): 

Huejotzingo, Puebla, Mexico

Semantic Categories: 
personal name
Syntax: 
noun(s)
reduplication (in gloss/text)
Cultural Content & Iconography: 
Anatomy, human body parts
Health, Medicine
Landscape Features
Names (personal and/or theonym)
Cultural Content, Credit: 

Jeff Haskett-Wood and Stephanie Wood

Colors: 
black & white drawing (no color)
Shapes and Perspectives: 
bird's eye view
circle(s) (small, often concentric)
rectangular
spotted or mottled
Keywords: 

sand, arena, stones, piedras

Glyph or Iconographic Image: 
Relevant Nahuatl Dictionary Word(s): 

xal(li), sand, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/xalli
xaxal(li), cyst or burl (see the Gran Diccionario Náhuatl), https://gdn.iib.unam.mx/diccionario/xaxalli

Glyph/Icon Name, Spanish Translation: 

El Lovanillo

Spanish Translation, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood (drawing from the GDN)

Image Source: 

Matrícula de Huexotzinco, folio 514r, World Digital Library, https://www.loc.gov/resource/gdcwdl.wdl_15282/?sp=107&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).

Historical Contextualizing Image: 
See Also: 

xalli (Mdz40r)