tlacotl (Mdz5v)

tlacotl (Mdz5v)
Simplex Glyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description: 

This simplex glyph of osier twig flowers (tlacotl) also doubles as the place name Tlacopan. It shows three stalks painted a terracotta color with green leaves and multi-colored flowers at the top. The flowers are turquoise blue, white, red, and yellow. At the bottom of the stems or twigs is a horizontal white rectangle.

Description, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis: 

It seems that osier twigs were sometimes used by priests associated with Tlazolteotl to do penance. The twigs (or the arrows that were made from them) were used for piercing the tongue and ears in a blood-letting ritual act. (See Peter DeRoo, History of America before Columbus, 1900, 489, and Hartley Burr Alexander, Latin American, The Mythology of All Races, Vol 11, 1920, 78.)

Added 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

Syntax: 
noun(s)
Colors: 
blue (turquoise)
green (light)
red
white/neutral
yellow or golden
Shapes and Perspectives: 
horizontal
rectangular
tripartite
Glyph or Iconographic Image: 
Relevant Nahuatl Dictionary Word(s): 

tlaco(tl), osier twigs, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/tlacotl
-pan (locative suffix), https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/pan

Glyph/Icon Name, Spanish Translation: 

ramita de mimbre

Spanish Translation, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Image Source: 

Codex Mendoza, folio 5 verso, https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/objects/2fea788e-2aa2-4f08-b6d9-648c00..., image 21 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)