Ezquiyauh (MH535r)

Ezquiyauh (MH535r)
Compound Glyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description:

This black-line drawing of the compound glyph for the personal name Ezquiyauh (“It Has Rained Blood,” attested here as a man’s name) shows what may be a curved obsidian blade, possibly a semantic indicator for blood (eztli), and, below that, three streams that resemble rain (quiyahuitl).

Description, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis:

The curving blade might, alternatively, represent a cloud from which the raining blood falls. The iconography of rain in the second half of the sixteenth century can show the water streams coming down from clouds, as in this example from the Digital Florentine Codex. And see the example from the Codex Telleriano-Remensis, below. It may be worth noting that quiyahuitl (rain) is a day name in the 260-day divinatory calendar (the tonalpohualli).

The lines of current in the three streams suggest flow/movement. Water glyphs can sometimes be colored red to recall eztli. Cochineal dye, which is red, will sometimes look like blood (see below). Bloodletting, also shown in a pair of examples below, was a significant ritual.

Added Analysis, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Gloss Image:

Gloss Diplomatic Transcription:

Domigo hezquiyauh

Gloss Normalization:

Domingo Ezquiyauh

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:

Writing Features:

compound fully logographic

Cultural Content & Iconography:

Blood (human/animal/plant)

Gender (male)

Movement

Names (personal and/or theonym)

Religion (Indigenous)

Water

Weather, Climate

Cultural Content, Credit:

Jeff Haskett-Wood

Colors:

black & white drawing (no color)

Shapes and Perspectives:

tripartite

circle(s) (small, often concentric)

frontal view

Parts (compounds or simplex + notation):

Reading Order (Compounds or Simplex + Notation):

downward

Keywords:

blood, sangre, rain, lluvia, llover

Glyph or Iconographic Image:

Relevant Nahuatl Dictionary Word(s):

ez(tli), blood, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/eztli
quiyahui(tl), to rain, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/quiyahuitl

Glyph/Icon Name, Spanish Translation:

Lluvia de Sangre

Spanish Translation, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Image Source:

Matrícula de Huexotzinco, folio 535r, https://www.loc.gov/resource/gdcwdl.wdl_15282/?sp=149&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).

Orthography:

dropped "n"

intrusive "h" or "hu"

Historical Contextualizing Image: