Tlaltetecuin (Verg19v)

Tlaltetecuin (Verg19v)
Compound Glyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description:

This black-line drawing of the compound glyph for the personal name Tlaltetecuin (“Pounding the Soil" or "Pounding the Earth,” attested here as a man’s name) shows two parcels of agricultural land (tlalli) and, above each parcel, a stone (tetl). The tlalli has a border on the lower line and the sides, but not the top. The tlalli is also dotted, seemingly to suggest agriculture. The stones are vertical, they have the curling ends, and the stripes across their middle sections. The reduplicated stone seems to refer to the verb tetecuini, to pound.

Description, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis:

Tlaltetecuin is also the name of a divine or sacred force or deity. If it no longer has a literal meaning, the elements of this compound may be entirely employed as phonograms.

This glyph has both textual and visual reduplication, and the visual reduplication could be seen in both the tlalli and in the verb, tetecuini, given the parcels and the two stones. The stones are taken here to be logographic and semantic rather than phonetic, in that they are probably considered to be doing the pounding. Signs for tlalli can have borders and elaborate designs that include circles (see below).

Added Analysis, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Gloss Image:

Gloss Diplomatic Transcription:

juā. tlal.tetecuin

Gloss Normalization:

Juan Tlaltetecuin

Source Manuscript:

Vergara, Codex (Verg)

Date of Manuscript:

1539

Creator's Location (and place coverage):

Tepetlaoztoc, near Tetzcoco

Semantic Categories:

personal name

phonetic possibilities

Syntax:

noun(s)

reduplication (in gloss/text)

reduplication (visual)

verb

Writing Features:

compound fully logographic

Cultural Content & Iconography:

Agriculture, Gardens, Stockraising

Gender (male)

Land Parcels, Use, Issues

Landscape Features

Names (personal and/or theonym)

Stones, Rocks, Lapidary, Masonry

Cultural Content, Credit:

Jeff Haskett-Wood

Colors:

black & white drawing (no color)

Shapes and Perspectives:

boxed in

dotted, granular, textured

rectangular

spiraling, swirling, coiling, curling

striped

Parts (compounds or simplex + notation):

Reading Order (Compounds or Simplex + Notation):

upward

Keywords:

pounding, pummeling, golpear, tierras, terrenos, sementeras, lands, parcels, parcelas, tenencia de la tierra

Glyph or Iconographic Image:

Relevant Nahuatl Dictionary Word(s):

tlal(li), land, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/tlalli
te(tl), stone, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/tetl-0
tetecuini, to pound, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/tetecuini

Glyph/Icon Name, Spanish Translation:

La Tierra Golpeada

Spanish Translation, Credit:

Stephanie Wood

Image Source:

Codex Vergara, folio 19v, https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b84528032/f46.item.zoom

Image Source, Rights:

The non-commercial reuse of images from the Bibliothèque nationale de France is free as long as the user is in compliance with the legislation in force and provides the citation: “Source gallica.bnf.fr / Bibliothèque nationale de France” or “Source gallica.bnf.fr / BnF.” We would also appreciate a citation to the Visual Lexicon of Aztec Hieroglyphs, https://aztecglyphs.wired-humanities.org/.

Historical Contextualizing Image: