maltia (Azca17)
In this iconographic example, a bloody, deceased person lies naked, face up, on the steps of a temple. The head is on the ground at the base of the steps of the pyramid. The arms and legs are stretched out in different directions, but one leg goes straight up, reaching higher than the probable calli that sits atop the pyramid/temple (perhaps teocalli). The gloss explains that the Xochimilca captured (maltia) a deceased person (miquetl) “there” (oncan). The location may be Tizaapan.
Stephanie Wood
In this scene, more attention is paid to the death than to the capture. The captive may have been sacrificed and thrown down the stairs. The deceased person may be male or female. The head of hair suggests curls. The person may have worn a headdress given that what appear to be golden feathers are spread out around the body. The site of the injury is unclear; most of the blood (dotted) appears underneath the corpse, accumulating on the ground. The blood spatter in the iconographic example of tlacamictia (see below) is somewhat similar.
Stephanie Wood
onca miquemaltique xochimillca
oncan omiquemaltique in xochimilca
Stephanie Wood
post-1550, possibly from the early seventeenth century.
Jeff Haskett-Wood
sangre, muerte, muertos, pirámides, escaleras, templos, plumas, pelo rizado, cabello, sacrificio
mique(tl), a deceased person, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/miquetl
maltia, to capture another person, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/maltia
capturar, tomar un cautivo
Stephanie Wood
The Codex Azcatitlan is also known as the Histoire mexicaine, [Manuscrit] Mexicain 59–64. It is housed in the Bibliothèque Nationale de France, and hosted on line by the World Digital Library and the Library of Congress, which is “unaware of any copyright or other restrictions in the World Digital Library Collection.”
https://www.loc.gov/resource/gdcwdl.wdl_15280/?sp=17&st=image
The Library of Congress is “unaware of any copyright or other restrictions in the World Digital Library Collection.” But please cite Bibliothèque Nationale de France and this Visual Lexicon of Aztec Hieroglyphs.
