Moteuczoma Xocoyotzin (Mdz15v)

Moteuczoma Xocoyotzin (Mdz15v)
Compound Glyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description:

This compound glyph for the personal name Moteuczoma (or Motecuhzoma) Xocoyotzin (perhaps "Angry Like a Lord," the Younger) features a diadem in profile, facing toward the viewer's right. This turquoise-colored diadem (the xiuhhuitzolli) is a glyph for lord (teuctli or tecuhtli), which comes into play in the middle of the name (Motecuhzoma or Moteuczoma, spelled variously). The hair, tzontli, which appears under the diadem, may provide a phonetic complement for zoma (to frown in anger), the final part of the name. The small turquoise-colored elements--one floating in the air and one attached to the hair--have yet to be analyzed, but one may be a lip plug and the other an ear plug.

Description, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis:

The museum comparison, below, also includes the diadem and hair--along with perhaps the lip plug and ear plug. Speech scrolls on this stone carving may point to the fact that Moteuczoma was a huei tlatoani (great ruler, or tlahtoani, with the glottal stop), given that speech scrolls can stand for the verb tlatoa/tlahtoa, to speak.

Added Analysis, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Gloss or Text Image:

Gloss/Text Diplomatic Transcription:

motecçuma

Gloss/Text Normalization:

Moteuczoma (or Motecuhzoma)

Gloss/Text 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:

phonetic dimensions

Syntax:

possessive pronoun (no-, to-, i-, etc.)

syllable: te/tec (from teuctli/tecuhtli/diadem)

Writing Features:

compound of phonogram(s) & logogram(s)

Cultural Content & Iconography:

Emotions

Leather, hides

Names (personal and/or theonym)

Politics, Power, Governance

Social Hierarchy, Commoners, Elites

Colors:

Shapes and Perspectives:

facing right

profile view

tied, bound, or bundled

Parts (compounds or simplex + notation):

Number of Parts, Other / Comment:

The four elements counted here include the diadem, hair, lip plug, and ear plug, which all seem to be diagnostic for Motecuhzoma.

Keywords:

emperors, empires, rulers, gobernantes, emperadores, imperios, diademas, Montezuma, Moteuczoma, labrets, enchufes, tapones, labios, bezotes, adornos labiales, jewelry, jollas, lip plugs, lip-plugs, teuctli, nombres de hombres, personas famosas

Museum/Rare Book/Realia Comparisons:

Museum/Rare Book/Realia Notes:

Motecuhzoma. A bas relief stone carving on the underside of the lid of the so-called "Caja de Moctezuma Xocoyotzin," Museo Nacional de Antropología e Historia, Salón Mexica. The Museo describes the headdress as a xiuhitzolli [xiuhhuitzolli], which is the turquoise diadem. The museum signage also refers to it as the "imperial headdress." Photograph by Robert Haskett, 14 February 2023.

Glyph or Iconographic Image:

Relevant Nahuatl Dictionary Word(s):

mo-, pronominal prefix of a reflexive verb, third-person singular and plural, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/mo-1
teuc(tli), lord, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/teuctli
zoma, to frown in anger, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/zoma
tzon(tli), hair, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/tzontli
tlatoa, or tlahtoa with the glottal stop, to speak, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/tlatoa

Image Source:

Codex Mendoza, folio 15 verso, https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/objects/2fea788e-2aa2-4f08-b6d9-648c00..., image 41 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)

Orthography:

teuc/tecuh (tracking)