Mixcoatl (MH535v)
This black-line drawing of the compound glyph for the personal name Mixcoatl (“Cloud Serpent,” attested here as a man’s name) shows a profile view of a serpent facing right. Its eye is open and its protruding tongue is bifurcated. It has one large coil in the middle of its body. The bottom portion of its body is shaded, giving it a three-dimensionality. Three clouds hover over the serpent, and these are also shaded for three-dimensionality.
Stephanie Wood
Mixcoatl is a very popular name in the Matrícula de Huexotzinco, much more so than, for instance, Quetzalcoatl. It is akin to Ehecatl (or Ecatl) in popularity, perhaps. A Cloud Serpent was a sacred, natural force, seemingly connected to the swirling clouds that could portend rain. The cloud serpents almost all have the coil in their bodies, adding this swirling dimension of movement. According to Sahagún, it was a divine force among the Chichimecs, and carried a powerful significance for the Nahuas. Some scholars have seen it as a divinity associated with hunting, others as part of a Tlaloc complex (of clouds, rain, lightning, etc.), and others as a symbol for a whirlwind (remolino). A famous altepetl, Mixcoac, is now a neighborhood of Mexico City.
Stephanie Wood
1560
Jeff Haskett-Wood
clouds, nubes, serpientes
Mixcoatl, deity, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/mixcoatl
mix(tli), clouds, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/mixtli
coa(tl), serpent, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/coatl
Serpiente de las Nubes
Matrícula de Huexotzinco, folio 535v, https://www.loc.gov/resource/gdcwdl.wdl_15282/?sp=150&st=image
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).
