escribano (CST28)
This painting of an escribano (the Spanish loanword for notary as it entered Nahuatl) is included here with the purpose of sharing its iconography so that it can be compared with hieroglyphs of notaries. As becomes apparent in the contextualizing image, this man has been carved from a scene that includes an interpreter and a high-ranking Spaniard (in the middle of the table). This high-ranking man was Francisco de Valdivieso, who was appointed corregidor for the part of the Mixteca that is centered at Teposcolula. The notary wears a green hat and a red shirt or cloak. He holds a writing implement to a piece of paper that has some alphabetic writing on it.
Stephanie Wood
Often, paper with writing has simple hash marks on it, and these are suggestive of alphabetic writing. But this example has almost legible letters. In the Matrícula de Huexotzinco, glyphs for tlacuilos, who often worked as escribanos in the Spanish colonial context, often have a focus on the writing implement. See some examples below. For more on the Codex Sierra, see Kevin Terraciano’s study (2021), especially pp. 37, 118, and 152 for the discussion about Valdivieso and for the transcription and translation of the companion text that identifies this scene of activity.
Stephanie Wood
1550–1564
Jeff Haskett-Wood
escrituras, escribir, notarios, plumas, papel, letras, alfabeto, hombres
nahuatlato, Nahuatl-speaking interpreter (could be Indigenous or of another ethnicity), https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/nahuatlato
notario
Stephanie Wood
Códice Sierra-Texupan, plate 28, page dated 1559. Origin: Santa Catalina Texupan, Mixteca Alta, State of Oaxaca. Kevin Terraciano has published an outstanding study of this manuscript (Codex Sierra, 2021), and in his book he refers to alphabetic and “pictorial” writing, not hieroglyphic writing. We are still counting some of the imagery from this source as hieroglyphic writing, but we are also including examples of “iconography” where the images verge on European style illustrations or scenes showing activities. We have this iconography category so that such images can be fruitfully compared with hieroglyphs. Hieroglyphic writing was evolving as a result of the influence of European illustrations, and even alphabetic writing impacted it.
https://bidilaf.buap.mx/objeto.xql?id=48281&busqueda=Texupan&action=search
The Biblioteca Digital Lafragua of the Biblioteca Histórica José María Lafragua in Puebla, Mexico, publishes this Códice Sierra-Texupan, 1550–1564 (62pp., 30.7 x 21.8 cm.), referring to it as being in the “Public Domain.” This image is published here under a Creative Commons license, asking that you cite the Biblioteca Digital Lafragua and this Visual Lexicon of Aztec Hieroglyphs.
