Poctepec (Mdz17v)

Poctepec (Mdz17v)
Compound Glyph

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description: 

This compound glyph for the place name Poctepec has two main elements. One consists of four curls of smoke (poctli) above a mountain or hill (tepetl). The smoke curls are purple on the outside and terracotta orange on the inside. Three of these curls (on the left) curl to the viewer's left. The one on the right curls to the right. The locative suffix (-c) (as given in the gloss) is not shown visually, but it combines with -tepe- to form -tepec, a visual locative suffix meaning "on the hill" or "on the mountain."

Description, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis: 

The terracotta/orange color may represent the heat or flame that can be detected just as the smoke rises from a fire. The use of purple approximates a dark gray or black.

Added Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Gloss Image: 
Gloss Diplomatic Transcription: 

poctepec. puo

Gloss Normalization: 

Poctepec, pueblo

Gloss Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Source Manuscript: 
Mendoza/Mendocino, Codex (Mdz)
Date of Manuscript: 

c. 1541, or by 1553 at the latest

Creator's Location (and place coverage): 

Mexico City

Semantic Categories: 
place name
Syntax: 
noun(s)
Cultural Content & Iconography: 
Fire, Tobacco, Incense, Smoke
Landscape Features
Names (places)
Socio-Political Units, Cities, Towns, Neighborhoods
Cultural Content, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Colors: 
green (dark)
green (light)
purple (light)/lavender
red
yellow or golden
Shapes and Perspectives: 
bell-shaped (upright)
spiraling, swirling, coiling, curling
Parts (compounds or simplex + notation): 
2
Reading Order (Compounds or Simplex + Notation): 
downward
Keywords: 

mountains, hills, montañas, cerros, smoke, humo

Glyph or Iconographic Image: 
Relevant Nahuatl Dictionary Word(s): 

poc(tli), smoke, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/poctli
-tepec, on the hill or mountain, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/tepec 

Karttunen’s Interpretation: 

"On the Hill of Smoke" (concurring with Berdan and Anawalt) [Frances Karttunen, unpublished manuscript, used here with her permission.]

Additional Scholars' Interpretations: 

"On the Hill of Smoke" (Berdan and Anawalt, 1992, vol. 1, 199)

Glyph/Icon Name, Spanish Translation: 

"El el Cerro del Humo"

Spanish Translation, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Image Source: 

Codex Mendoza, folio 17 verso, https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/objects/2fea788e-2aa2-4f08-b6d9-648c00..., image 45 of 188.

Image Source, Rights: 

The Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford, hold the original manuscript, the MS. Arch. Selden. A. 1. This image is published here under the UK Creative Commons, “Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 License” (CC-BY-NC-SA 3.0).

See Also: 

poctli (Mdz46r)

tepetl (Mdz32r)