Yohuallan (Mdz6r)

Yohuallan (Mdz6r)
Simplex Glyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description: 

The simplex glyph for night (yohualli) stands for the place name Yohuallan. The locative suffix (-tlan), which drops the "t" when following the final "l" of the stem yohual, is not shown visually, but perhaps the celestial landscape provides a semantic locative. The glyph is a gray circle with four red and white eyes (or, some would say, stars) evenly placed inside the circle. Around the perimeter of the circle are eight more eyes or stars.

Gloss Image: 
Gloss Diplomatic Transcription: 

yoalan. puo

Gloss Normalization: 

Yohuallan, pueblo

Gloss Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Source Manuscript: 
Mendoza/Mendocino, Codex (Mdz)
Date of Manuscript: 

c. 1541, but by 1553 at the latest

Creator's Location (and place coverage): 

Mexico City

Semantic Categories: 
place name
Syntax: 
locative (not visual, but represented semantically)
noun(s)
Cultural Content & Iconography: 
Anatomy, human body parts
Celestial Phenomena
Names (places)
Time, Calendar, Frequency
Colors: 
gray
red
white/neutral
Shapes and Perspectives: 
circle, circular or rounded
Keywords: 

eyes, stars, estrellas, ojos, la noche, night time

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

yohual(li), night, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/yohualli
-tlan (locative suffix), place, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/tlan

Image Source: 

Codex Mendoza, folio 6 recto, https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/objects/2fea788e-2aa2-4f08-b6d9-648c00..., image 22, of 188.

Image Source, Rights: 

Original manuscript is held by the Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford, MS. Arch. Selden. A. 1; used here with the UK Creative Commons, “Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 License” (CC-BY-NC-SA 3.0)