michihuauhtli (FCbk11f253r)
This is a black and white sketch of a compound hieroglyph of a type of amaranth whose seeds look like fish eggs (michihuauhtli), is included in this digital collection for the purpose of making comparisons with related hieroglyphs. The term selected for this example comes from the text two pages prior to the image in the Digital Florentine Codex. There is no gloss, per se. This example shows a fish in profile facing toward the viewer’s left. The fish has a fin and a bifurcated tail. Surrounding the fish are tiny circles, some with little points at the top. These are either amaranth seeds (huauhtli) or fish (michin) eggs. A Spanish text says “como hoeuos [sic], de peces” (como huevos de peces; like fish eggs).
Stephanie Wood
In the Florentine Codex, huauhtli plant variations are numerous, but the drawings often look remarkably alike. The use of compound hieroglyphs next to the plants helps to clarify which plant is which, although some have no hieroglyphs. This compound should have been easy for a tlacuilo to read decades earlier, so it shows remarkable conservation for a later hieroglyph.
Stephanie Wood
Michioauhtli
michihuauhtli
Stephanie Wood
1577
Jeff Haskett-Wood
comida, semilla, semillas, pez, huevo
michihuauh(tli), hard yellow amaranth seeds that look like fish eggs, https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/michihuauhtli
el amaranto amarillo y duro (como huevos de peces)
Stephanie Wood
Available at Digital Florentine Codex/Códice Florentino Digital, edited by Kim N. Richter and Alicia Maria Houtrouw, "Book 11: Earthly Things", fol. 253r, Getty Research Institute, 2023. https://florentinecodex.getty.edu/en/book/11/folio/253r/images/0 Accessed 16 November 2025.
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.”
