huacalxochitl (FCbk9f32v)

huacalxochitl (FCbk9f32v)
Iconography

Glyph or Iconographic Image Description: 

This iconographic example, featuring a flowering plant (huacalxochitl), is included in this digital collection for the purpose of making comparisons with related hieroglyphs. The term selected for this example comes from the keywords chosen by the team behind the Digital Florentine Codex. There is no gloss. This example shows a profile view of one large leaf (green with yellow edges) and a horizontal, frontal view of one large flower. This flower has the spathe (with a red interior and a green exterior) curling around the quintessentially large spadix (to use horticultural language about the anthurium’s pistil) which can measure up to 4 inches long. This spadix has a yellow textured base and a white upper half. The coloring of this flower is reminiscent of the Philodendron inlorescence. The leaf may well have the (Western) heart shape, not that the profile view allows confirmation. The DFC metadata calls this flower the laceleaf.

Description, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Added Analysis: 

This digital collection does not currently (August 2025) have a glyph representing the huacalxochitl. Consider also just the leaf of what may be the huacalxochitl in the gift-giving scene in Book 9, folio 29 verso, which is in the same ariod family.

Added Analysis, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Source Manuscript: 
Florentine/Florentinus, Codex (FC)
Date of Manuscript: 

1577

Creator's Location (and place coverage): 

Mexico City

Syntax: 
noun(s)
Cultural Content & Iconography: 
Flowers
Gifts, Offerings, Sacrifice
Religion (Indigenous)
Cultural Content, Credit: 

Jeff Haskett-Wood

Colors: 
orange/terracotta
red
white/neutral
yellow or golden
Shapes and Perspectives: 
facing left
profile view
Keywords: 

anturios, flores, hojas grandes, ofertas, huentli, regalos, gifts

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

huacalxoch(itl), a flower for gifts and offerings and a medicinal plant, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/huacalxochitl

Glyph/Icon Name, Spanish Translation: 

el anturio

Spanish Translation, Credit: 

Stephanie Wood

Image Source: 

Available at Digital Florentine Codex/Códice Florentino Digital, edited by Kim N. Richter and Alicia Maria Houtrouw, "Book 9: The Merchants", fol. 32v, Getty Research Institute, 2023. https://florentinecodex.getty.edu/en/book/9/folio/32v/images/0 Accessed 30 August 2025.

Image Source, Rights: 

Images of the digitized Florentine Codex are made available under the following Creative Commons license: CC BY-NC-ND (Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 International). For print-publication quality photos, please contact the Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana ([email protected]). The Library of Congress has also published this manuscript, using the images of the World Digital Library copy. “The Library of Congress is unaware of any copyright or other restrictions in the World Digital Library Collection. Absent any such restrictions, these materials are free to use and reuse.”

Historical Contextualizing Image: