Deciphering Aztec Hieroglyphs_ A Guide to Nahuatl Writing 9780500518724, 9780500776346

Table of contents :
Cover
Title Page
Dedication
About the Author
Other Titles of Interest
Contents
Introduction
Chapter 1: The World of the Aztec Scribe
Chapter 2: General Principles
Chapter 3: An Essential Hieroglyphic Grammar
Chapter 4: Phonetic Writing: The Nahuatl Script in 16th-Century Central Mexico
Chapter 5: Names and Glyphs that Ruled an Empire
Chapter 6: The Origins of Nahuatl Writing: The Teotihua Script
Chapter 7: Writing in Tongues: How Aztec Hieroglyphs Came to Record Spanish
Where to Go from Here
Select Bibliography
Key to the Exercises
Sources of Illustrations
Index
Copyright

Citation preview

For Michael D. Coe

(Cf. Codex Florentinus, Bk. 1, Addendum II)

About the Author: Gordon Whittaker is Fiebiger Professor Emeritus of Anthropology at the University of Göttingen, where he has held joint positions in the Institute of Ethnology and the Department of Romance Philology. He has written extensively on Aztec language, writing and civilization. His areas of specialization are Linguistic Anthropology and the Anthropology of the Americas.

Other titles of interest published by

Thames & Hudson include: Reading the Maya Glyphs Michael D. Coe and Mark Van Stone Mexico: From the Olmecs to the Aztecs Michael D. Coe, Javier Urcid and Rex Koontz The Art of Mesoamerica: From Olmec to Aztec Mary Ellen Miller An Illustrated Dictionary of the Gods and Symbols of Ancient Mexico and the Maya Mary Miller and Karl Taube Be the first to know about our new releases, exclusive content and author events by visiting www.thamesandhudson.com www.thamesandhudsonusa.com www.thamesandhudson.com.au

Contents Introduction CHAPTER 1 The World of the Aztec Scribe CHAPTER 2 General Principles CHAPTER 3 An Essential Hieroglyphic Grammar CHAPTER 4 Phonetic Writing: The Nahuatl Script in 16th-Century Central Mexico CHAPTER 5 Names and Glyphs that Ruled an Empire CHAPTER 6 The Origins of Nahuatl Writing: The Teotihua Script CHAPTER 7 Writing in Tongues: How Aztec Hieroglyphs Came to Record Spanish Where to Go from Here Select Bibliography Key to the Exercises Sources of Illustrations Index

Introduction

As a supreme cultural achievement, writing has fascinated and transformed societies from its very beginnings in the mid-fourth millennium BC down to the present day. Three of the four indisputable hearths of early writing systems—Mesopotamia, Egypt, and China—have been well studied and a sizable body of literature, academic and general, is available on each. Younger than the other centers of civilization, Mesoamerica has been the least studied and continues to evoke mystery. Indeed, its very status as a birthplace of writing has only been fully recognized in the last fifty years, following the breakthrough in the decipherment of Maya glyphs in the 1970s. Even now, comparative studies of writing and handbooks on writing systems devote scant attention to Mesoamerica. The Maya script has finally begun to attract the interest of comparativists, and literature on the subject has been growing incessantly—unlike the Aztec script, on which not a single book has been published. It is this gap that the present volume intends to fill, unlocking the mysteries of Aztec writing for a wide readership for the first time. The Aztec writing system is actually one of several that developed in Mesoamerica in Prehispanic times. Zapotec writing was already flourishing in the 1st millennium BC, but the small number of known inscriptions has unfortunately made decipherment all but impossible to date. The same may hold true for the Isthmian script of the 1st millennium AD, although wouldbe code-breakers have more, and longer, texts to work with. And yet a fullfledged writing system with a more than adequate corpus has been hiding in plain sight for some 500 years—the Nahuatl-language hieroglyphic script that came into bloom in the Aztec Empire and continued to evolve even after the cultural upheaval and societal horrors of the Spanish conquest and its aftermath, only to lose its vibrancy in the waning years of the 16th century.

This book itself began with colorful images and signs, as a series of presentations and workshops in Europe and the United States from 2001 onwards. The research behind it has a somewhat longer history. It began when my father, forgetting that his ten-year-old son was actually interested in Romans, not Aztecs, brought home a comic narrating Bernal Díaz del Castillo’s vivid account of the Conquest of Mexico (the Aztec capital, also known as Mexico Tenochtitlan). From this grew a love for all things Aztec. Practice in decipherment followed, when as a schoolboy, now sixteen, I was allowed into the basement of Sydney’s Mitchell Library to retrieve the nine ponderous volumes of Viscount Kingsborough’s Antiquities of Mexico that I had requested to see, but the librarian was in no condition to carry. Discovering in it a beautiful hand-painted reproduction of the Codex Mendoza, I spent my spare hours thereafter comparing hieroglyphs with their Spanish glosses and trying to figure out how the writing system worked. Later, I was fortunate to track down the Anderson and Dibble edition of Book 10 (the only volume available to me) of the Codex Florentinus, which had been compiled in the late 16th century under the editorship of Franciscan friar Bernardino de Sahagún. Since the published text was bilingual (Nahuatl with an English translation), I went to work comparing the structure of the Nahuatl words with their English equivalents, and in so doing gained my first experience with the Nahuatl language. Soon after, in 1968, I plucked up my courage and wrote to the leading specialist in Mexico, Ángel María Garibay, for advice on my Nahuatl analysis, not realizing that he had died just a few months earlier. His student, Alfredo López Austin, today Mexico’s foremost expert on Mesoamerica, very kindly replied, taking the time to gently correct my Nahuatl, offer me encouragement, and guide me towards the best tools for further study of the language. Some three years later, as a freshman at Brandeis University in Massachusetts, I was given a printout of a microfilm copy of the Codex Vergara by John Glass, who had compiled a catalogue of so-called pictorial manuscripts for the multi-volume Handbook of Middle American Indians. It was this codex, and John Glass’s kindness, that led eventually to the making of this book—the culmination of half a century of careful, forensic study. The decisive stimulus in writing the volume came from my former Yale doctoral advisor, mentor, and dearest of friends, Michael D. Coe, who

recommended me to Thames & Hudson and was a constant source of encouragement right up to his untimely death in 2019. One would think, given the spectacular forms and colors of Aztec hieroglyphs (dubbed “glyphs” for short), that scholars would have been attracted to them like bees to honey, but the extraordinary fact is that no handbook of writing has devoted more than a page or so to the subject and most neglect even to mention the existence of the Aztec script, let alone its characteristics. This is the first book ever written on the writing system of the Aztec Empire, and indeed of Nahuatl writing as a whole. Its objective is as much to dispel misconceptions about the nature of Aztec writing as to reveal the patterns, characteristics, and genius of the system. The oversimplifications that were inevitable in explanations for colonial-period learners have also led today in some quarters to the assumption that, in its basic make-up, Aztec writing could hardly match, let alone exceed, in complexity and sophistication the finely honed system fashioned centuries earlier by the Maya; and indeed, to a lack of recognition that the hieroglyphs enshrined in Aztec and other Nahuatl manuscripts are actually elements of true writing. However, I hope it will become clear that the Nahuatl system has a number of surprises in store for students of writing. On the one hand, its multimodal and multifunctional approach to writing, freely incorporating aspects of iconography (such as iconicity, size, proportion, orientation, and color) in writing in a manner similar to the techniques of modern advertising; and on the other, its unparalleled flexibility in the way it derives phonetic sign values (that is, sounds) from word signs. The attitude towards Aztec accomplishments has been all too frequently marred by a perception that the playful and unrestrained nature of this Central Mexican script reflects a kind of iconography (often inaccurately referred to as “pictography”) with but a veneer of incipient writing, a mere forerunner of the sophisticated Maya system. It didn’t help that Aztec hieroglyphs were commonly glossed, or transcribed, by indigenous and Spanish scribes for the enlightenment of the hieroglyphically illiterate. Like the supporting wheels of a child’s first bicycle, these glosses sometimes conveyed a false sense of security to the unwary and a false impression of the balance in the mechanics of the system. Many a glossator (a glossing scribe) misheard or mistook here and there a reading or explanation offered by the indigenous hieroglyphist (the original scribe), immortalizing errors

and inaccuracies that eventually found their way into the analyses of modern scholars who, as a result of disciplinary divisions, frequently lack sufficient knowledge of the Nahuatl language and of other, comparable writing systems to be able to catch such instances and then correct the interpretation. Working on the iconography of Central Mexican manuscripts, it is all too easy to misunderstand, and underestimate the significance of, hieroglyphs, and to mistranslate the names and terms they represent. Let us consider the name of a prominent 14th-century king, Achitometl. This name has been translated somewhat incongruously as “Water Chia Maguey” simply because the name glyph contains elements depicting water, chia seeds, and a maguey plant (a type of agave). Deep examination of Nahuatl and comparative writing systems, however, shows that the first two elements, and a further one depicting a water source or spring, are actually phonetic. They represent sounds, not semantics, and are read a, chi, and to(n)2, spelling out the word achìtōn, “a little bit.” Only the plant is semantic—the logogram, or word sign, ME(TL) stands for the Nahuatl word metl, “maguey.” The whole sequence yields a name meaning “A Little Bit of Maguey” (see Chapters 2 and 3 for further information on the principles involved). The mistake had been to assume that the recognizable elements in a compound sign are necessarily units of meaning simply because they are iconic—that is, because they look like objects and living things. This is the same mistake that was made by the 5th-century scholar Horapollo when he attempted to decode Egyptian hieroglyphs. It was not until the early 19th century that the true principles of the script were discovered, when Champollion applied his intimate knowledge of the latest stage of the Egyptian language, Coptic, of associated languages, and of the history and culture of Egypt to the task of decipherment. Most specialists on Mesoamerican iconography have tended to be art historians with only a superficial knowledge of Nahuatl, while specialists on writing systems are usually epigraphers, philologists, and linguists. Each discipline has its own focus and traditional perspectives, and art history has indeed contributed much to the understanding of Aztec art, iconography, and codices. However, its non-linguistic disposition has resulted in a longterm and severe underestimation of the relevance and value of the writing system to an appreciation of the Aztec graphic communication system as a whole, in which iconography, writing, and notation are equal but distinct

sub-systems. This volume will remedy the imbalance by dissecting and describing the writing system in lavish detail, presenting a holistic overview of this fascinating vehicle for the intellectual blossoming of Nahuatl civilization and the Aztec state. The approach to reading Aztec glyphs that I am presenting here illuminates the uniqueness of Aztec writing. Some specialists on Maya writing have suggested that phonetic signs in the Nahuatl system are just like their Maya counterparts—that is, that they merely represent one consonant followed by one vowel (e.g. ma, me, mi, mo). Yet this disregards the fact, known for almost two centuries now, that there are many instances of pure phoneticism involving Nahuatl signs beginning with a consonant and a vowel but also ending with a consonant (e.g. cac, can, cax, or pal, pil, pol). There are even, as I will demonstrate, a number of two-syllable sequences (e.g. acol, cochin, ocuil, quinatz, teca) that are reminiscent of the disyllabograms of 8th-century Japan. To deny all this is to do injustice to the system by forcing it into a reductive Maya template on the assumption that all Mesoamerican systems, unlike the diverse systems of Mesopotamia and environs, adhered to a single set of principles. One of the remarkable things about Nahuatl writing is that it is a nameoriented system, with a strong focus on the representation of names of people and places, titles, professions, and the like. Sadly, we do not have the usual corpus of texts with full sentences that we are accustomed to in the Maya area and in other regions of the world, since libraries and archives were burned in the course of the Spanish conquest. Nonetheless, there are a number of names in glyphic form that take the form of sentences, giving us some idea of the potential of Nahuatl writing for recording texts, and indeed there are some isolated instances of actual sentences in early manuscripts, notably the Codex Xolotl. It is important to keep in mind that the capabilities of a system and its actual use are two very different issues. I will examine an array of glyphs for the names of the foremost rulers and places in the history and politics of Aztec-period Central Mexico, allowing you to see how the principles of the writing system work in practice. I will also investigate whether the 4th-century writing system of the great Classic-period city of Teotihuacan can be identified as the ancestor of the Aztec system of the Postclassic. In the city’s elite architectural complexes of Techinantitla and La Ventilla two series of simple and compound glyphs exhibit characteristics that we find again in the Aztec

system a millennium later. Probable phoneticism in the compounds strongly suggests that the language of the glyphs was an early form of the same language that was spoken by the Aztecs, Nahuatl. Finally, I will explore the writing system’s terminal period of development, the mid- to late 16th century, when the heirs to the last generation of Aztec scribes went about refining and adapting Nahuatl writing to the challenges of Spanish colonial rule. All this will show that Aztec glyphs do not represent, as has previously been suggested, mere “writing without words.” This claim mistakenly equates iconography and notation with writing and divorces writing from its essential relationship to language. Moreover, it belittles the nature of writing as a millennia-old and worldwide phenomenon that has added precision to graphic communication since its inception. Indeed, the very idea of writing without words is self-contradictory. The Nahuatl verb tlàcuiloa means “write,” “paint,” and “draw,” yet these multiple meanings do not imply or prove that the Nahua saw no distinction between writing, iconography, and art. They merely underscore the fact that writing in the Aztec world was outlined and painted with a brush. The contextual use of the verb established the intended meaning, in the same way that Ancient Egyptian seš, “write, inscribe, paint, draw,” was unambiguous in a given context, as was Ancient Greek gráphein, “write, scratch, brand, draw, depict,” and is Modern Chinese xiě, “write, depict, paint, draw.” An Aztec scribe was well aware that paintings, which did not represent words (although they could obviously be described with them in various ways), were not the same thing as machiyōtl, or signs, which were linked to precise readings—specific words and names in the Nahuatl language. It is worth noting that the Mexican Spanish word machote —“form letter, rough draft, blank form, template, prototype”—is a direct descendant of this script-related term from Aztec times. In this book, the analysis of the Aztec writing system and of the structure of its hieroglyphs is my own, unless otherwise noted. It should be stressed, however, that the individual components of many signs have long been recognized, given an oft transparent relationship between an iconic glyph and its gloss, but the underlying glyphic structure and the principles behind it have rarely been accurately described. You will find references to current literature on the individual manuscripts, the glyphs of which are discussed in this volume, in the bibliography. I would like to express my

gratitude to all my colleagues who have so kindly discussed various aspects of this subject matter with me over the years and helped me in various ways, including Juan José Batalla, Agnieszka Brylak, David Carballo, María Castañeda de la Paz, Michael Coe, Lori Diel, Davide Domenici, Michael Dürr, Sven Gronemeyer, Byron Hamann, Claudine Hartau, Christophe Helmke, Jin Yang, Benjamin Johnson, Patrick Lesbre, Alfredo López Austin, Angela MacDonald, Julia Madajczak, Katarzyna Mikulska, Mary Miller, Barbara Mundy, Jesper Nielsen, Jerome Offner, Justyna Olko, Ramona Schaubitzer, John Sullivan, Katarzyna Szoblik, Micaela Verlato, Alexander Vovin, Catherine Whittaker, and David Wright Carr, and last, but by no means least, I would like to thank my editors at Thames & Hudson, Ben Hayes, Jen Moore, and Colin Ridler, and designer Aman Phull, for their endless patience and skillful guidance during the preparation of this volume.

Pronunciation guide Vowels short a e i o

as in: idea egg in echo

long ā ē ī ō

as in: father vein believe do

Note that there is no distinctive u, although ō often sounds like it (as in English do). The spellings cu, hu, cuh (or uc), and uh each represent a single consonant. There are also no diphthongs: ai, ei, ia, and oa each consist of two vowels in separate syllables. This means that ia, for example, is pronounced as in “Maria,” not as in “Marcia.”

Consonants qu (before e, i) c (elsewhere) ch cu (initially) cuh/uc (finally) hu (initially) uh (finally)

as in: quiche scan chocolate cuadrilla

c (before e, i) z (elsewhere) x p

as in: cent so sherry up

marihuana

y

yes

l m n

chili tomato no

t tl tz

ocelot atlas quartz

A grave accent (`) over a vowel indicates that the vowel is followed by a glottal stop (the unwritten sound in the middle of English uh-oh). Alternative spellings for the glottal stop are h and . Vowel length and glottal stops are not integral features of the hieroglyphic system. At the end of a syllable, cu (pronounced kw) is written as cuh or uc, as in the spellings tēcuhtli, tēuctli (both roughly TEYKW-tli) “lord/lady,” often mispronounced as tey-KOO-tli or tey-OOK-tli (with the capitalized section stressed). There are only two syllables in this word!

Stress In a Nahuatl word or name the accent falls predictably on the second-last syllable.

Key concepts acrophonic alternate biscript classifier connector element epigraphy gentilic graphic syllepsis hieroglyph hieroglyphics hysterophonic index (pl. indices) logogram logosyllabic macron morpheme

a phonetic value derived from the initial syllable of a polysyllabic word base or logogram an alternative sign with the same value as another (cf. variant) a text in two writing systems a semantic element that relates to the category or class of a word a line binding two name types, morphemes or syntactical units a minimal graphic unit with a value the study of inscriptions and manuscript texts a sign for a member or members of a named town or polity the use of one or more values of a sign in two contexts or functions simultaneously an iconic sign (also simply “glyph”) a writing system or script consisting primarily of iconic signs (hieroglyphs) a phonetic value derived from the final syllable of a polysyllabic word base or logogram a subscript number (used in distinguishing identical transliterations for different signs) a semantic sign standing for a word or morpheme combining logograms and syllabograms a horizontal stroke over a vowel to mark it as long a minimal unit of meaning

multivalent phonetic complement phonetic indicator phonogram letter capital uncial syllabogram polyvalent semantic complement semantic indicator sign stimulus diffusion transcription transliteration narrow transliteration broad transliteration value variant

having more than one value a phonetic sign or signs adding to the reading of a logogram a phonetic sign or signs aiding in the reading of a logogram a phonetic sign an alphabetic sign an upper-case letter (used by convention in representing the pronunciation of a logogram) a lower-case letter (used by convention in representing the pronunciation of a phonogram) a syllabic sign see multivalent a semantic sign or signs adding to the reading of a sign or signs a semantic sign or signs aiding in the reading of a sign or signs a graphic form consisting of a free-standing element or a compound of elements a process in which an idea or concept (such as writing), rather than a physical item, passes from one culture to another the conversion of a sign or sequence of signs into a linguistic sequence the conversion of a sign or sequence of signs in one writing system into an equivalent sign or sequence of signs in another a transliteration that includes such details as vowel length and glottal stops, where known in the language behind the writing system a transliteration that excludes such details as vowel length and glottal stops, if not essential to the writing system the reading (phonetic or semantic content) of a sign a distinctive variation in the form or shape of a sign that has no impact on the value

Conventions used in this book ōcēlōtl /kw/ tlan patol A(TL)

the standard spelling of a linguistic form (in a given language) a distinctive sound (in a given language) a phonetic value of a single sign (in a writing system) a disyllabogram (phonetic sign with a two-syllable value) a logographic value of a single sign (with contextual expansion or reduction) .oc. an abbreviated spelling (at the points represented by the full stops) CIHUA-COATL two signs in a glyphic compound or sequence CUAUH•TEMAL two signs with a degree of merging CONQUEST a semantic complement or classifier COZCA COZCACUAUH(TLI) a semantic indicator (written superscript) reinforcing the semantic value of a logogram HUITZ—tlan a glyphic sequence joined by a connector in the form of a tethering line

aacol

a sign with a phonetic indicator (written superscript)

te2

a sign with a subscript numerical index differentiating its value from that of another sign a plus sign joins two values of a single sign that are used simultaneously (graphic syllepsis) curly brackets enclose an equation indicating the internal structure of a derived value curly brackets enclose a value or values acting on the base value of a reflexive verbal logogram (containing the reflexive pronoun mo-)

TOL-te2+ca2 teca{=te2+ca2} MO{TECUH-zo2}ZOMA

Chronology The Aztecs used a calendar that followed a 52-year cycle, beginning with 1 Tochtli, later 2 Acatl, as in the Codex Mendoza. Opposite, you see a rough correlation with our own calendar. The broad scheme of Mesoamerican cultural periods, as relating to Central Mexico, is as follows: Preclassic (c. 1800 BC–AD 150) Classic (c. AD 150–900) Postclassic (c. AD 900–1521)

Aztec (Mexica Tenochca) history 1325 1376 1396 1417 1428 1431 1440 1469 1481 1486 1502 1519 1520 1520 1521 1525

Traditional correlation for the date (2 Calli) of the foundation of Mexico Tenochtitlan Accession of Acamapichtli as the first king Accession of Huitzilihuitl Accession of Chimalpopoca Accession of Itzcoatl, fourth king and first emperor Defeat of the Tepanec state and foundation of the Aztec Empire Accession of Motecuhzoma I Ilhuicamina Chalchiuhtlatonac Accession of Axayacatl Accession of Tizocic Tlalchitonatiuh Accession of Ahuitzotl Accession of Motecuhzoma II Arrival of Spanish adventurers under Fernando (“Hernán”) Cortés Assassination of Motecuhzoma II and accession of Cuitlahua Smallpox death of Cuitlahua and accession of Cuauhtemoc Fall of the city of Mexico and end of the Aztec Empire Murder of Cuauhtemoc on trumped-up charges during Cortés’ Honduras expedition

Tochtli 1 1246 1298 1350

1402 1454 1506 5 1250 1302 1354

1406 1458 1510 9 1254 1306 1358

1410 1462 1514 13 1258 1310 1362

1414 1466 1518 4 1262 1314 1366

1418 1470 1522 8 1266 1318 1370

1422 1474 1526 12 1270 1322 1374

1426 1478 1530 3 1274 1326 1378

1430 1482 1534 7 1278 1330 1382

1434 1486 1538 11 1282 1334 1386

1438 1490 1542 2 1286 1338 1390

1442 1494 1546 6 1290 1342 1394

1446 1498 1550 10 1294 1346 1398

1450 1502 1554

Acatl 2 1247 1299 1351

1403 1455 1507 6 1251 1303 1355

1407 1459 1511 10 1255 1307 1359

1411 1463 1515 1 1259 1311 1363

1415 1467 1519 5 1263 1315 1367

1419 1471 1523 9 1267 1319 1371

1423 1475 1527 13 1271 1323 1375

1427 1479 1531 4 1275 1327 1379

1431 1483 1535 8 1279 1331 1383

1435 1487 1539 12 1283 1335 1387

1439 1491 1543 3 1287 1339 1391

1443 1495 1547 7 1291 1343 1395

1447 1499 1551 11 1295 1347 1399

1451 1503 1555

Tecpatl 3 1248 1300 1352

1404 1456 1508 7 1252 1304 1356

1408 1460 1512 11 1256 1308 1360

1412 1464 1516 2 1260 1312 1364

1416 1468 1520 6 1264 1316 1368

1420 1472 1524 10 1268 1320 1372

1424 1476 1528 1 1272 1324 1376

1428 1480 1532 5 1276 1328 1380

1432 1484 1536 9 1280 1332 1384

1436 1488 1540 13 1284 1336 1388

1440 1492 1544 4 1288 1340 1392

1444 1496 1548 8 1292 1344 1396

1448 1500 1552 12 1296 1348 1400

1452 1504 1556

Calli 4 1249 1301 1353

1405 1457 1509 8 1253 1305 1357

1409 1461 1513 12 1257 1309 1361

1413 1465 1517 3 1261 1313 1365

1417 1469 1521 7 1265 1317 1369

1421 1473 1525 11 1269 1321 1373

1425 1477 1529 2 1273 1325 1377

1429 1481 1533 6 1277 1329 1381

1433 1485 1537 10 1281 1333 1385

1437 1489 1541 1 1285 1337 1389

1441 1493 1545 5 1289 1341 1393

1445 1497 1549 9 1293 1345 1397

1449 1501 1553 13 1297 1349 1401

1453 1505 1557

CHAPTER 1

The World of the Aztec Scribe Over the span of more than three millennia before the Spanish invasions in the wake of Columbus, the American continent bore witness to the rise and fall of civilizations as diverse in character and achievement as those of the Eurasian-African landmass. A wide variety of complex societies emerged in Mesoamerica, the vast culture area stretching from the fringe of the northern Mexican desert down through the Isthmus of Tehuantepec into the Yucatán peninsula, then southwards along the trade routes of the Pacific coast as far as Costa Rica, and on to the western flanks of the Andes in South America. These cultures flourished, building the first cities of the Western Hemisphere, fostering the flowering of arts and sciences, and developing graphic communication systems that could rival those of the Eastern Hemisphere in their creativity and efficiency. The Nahuatl-speaking Mexica, or Aztecs, and the Quechua-speaking Inca are the stuff of legend because they reigned over the greatest—and last—imperial civilizations of the Americas. The still young Aztec Empire (Fig. 1.1) was not in decline but still expanding and rising to its zenith in the early 16th century, only to be destroyed willfully and wantonly by Spanish adventurers on a quest for gold and glory.

1.1. The core region of the Aztec Empire: Tenochtitlan, Tetzcoco and Tlacopan to the west (at bottom), the surrounded enemy states of Huexotzinco (with Atlixco), Tliliuhquitepec, Tlaxcallan and Cholollan to the east (at the top, in typical Aztec orientation). The shield and weapons symbolize the state of ritual war between them, the xōchiyāōyōtl (see p. 41).

Mesoamerica stood out in one significant way from all other regions in the Americas: through the invention of the graphic recording, or communication, system known as writing. The origins of Mesoamerican writing are lost in the mists of time, but there is general agreement that

writing is attested no later than the second half of the 1st millennium BC, and perhaps as early as 900 BC as an innovation of the Olmec civilization, the so-called mother culture of Mesoamerica, in the Isthmus area. The early Zapotec state of Taniquiecache (or Monte Albán) in Oaxaca, founded midmillennium, and the largely contemporary Epi-Olmec city-states to the Isthmian south were the first to adopt and elaborate writing as a versatile cultural tool and political weapon. Writing, a system of language-related signs, did not develop in isolation. It was but one of three independent graphic recording systems— writing, iconography, and notation—that, when brought together, made up the complex communication system that we see in the codices (leporellolike screenfold books) of the region (Fig. 1.2). Codices are painted manuscripts on animal hide (like our parchment) or on paper fashioned from the mashed and pounded leaves of a native fig tree (amate, from Nahuatl āmatl, “paper, book”) or from the rough fiber of the maguey plant, a type of agave. Only four such codices survived the Spanish onslaught in the Maya region of southern Mesoamerica. A similar number are known from the Mixtec area of western Oaxaca, and another handful from the Puebla-Tlaxcala region to the north, which shared many of the conventions of Mixtec books and art. However, in the Valley of Mexico, the heartland of Central Mexico, none of the codices that have come down to us is an indisputable survivor of the Prehispanic period, although one in particular (Fig. 1.3), a tax record of the Aztec Empire, is an exact copy of a precolonial document, if not the original itself.

1.2. The Codex Fejérváry-Mayer: an Aztec screenfold book.

1.3. The Matrícula de Tributos.

Stone monuments, ceramics and murals from all parts of Mesoamerica and from all periods attest to the dominance and universal appeal of iconography, a system of concept-related symbols and symbolic representations. We see iconography even today, not only in Mesoamerica but around the globe, in the washroom icons at airports and stadia and in the crosses and crescents at houses of worship, for example, and often unaccompanied by writing. Understanding iconography does not require knowledge of the language of a particular society or societies. Only the symbols themselves and the conventions they convey need to be understood. In Mesoamerica there are very few known items of stone or other materials that bear writing but not iconography (among them are several early stone monuments from Monte Albán; Fig. 1.4).

1.4. Stelae 12 and 13, Monte Albán.

Writing is tailored to a specific language and thus in many parts of the world, even today, is often the prerogative and the tool of an elite with the time, means, and training to command it. With their specialized knowledge, scribes were typically part of that elite. By contrast, the accessible and readily acquired conventions of symbol-based communications, which were frequently of a pictorial (or iconic) nature, made iconography the domain of no single class, but of society as a whole. One need only know the narrative, conventions and associations to interpret and understand the message. A deity or other supernatural being could be readily identified by one or more characteristic elements of their clothing, or by something they hold, or by some action they are shown performing. A European parallel for this would be the representation of a saint, who can be identified by clothing (for example, Mary’s blue gown), by something held (such as Peter’s keys), by something acted out (George slaying the dragon), or even by something placed nearby (a tower for Barbara or a broken wheel for Catherine of Alexandria). Outside the Maya area, iconography is the rule, not the exception. It is an effective medium because it is monumental in and of itself—it can be recognized and evaluated from a distance, by a diverse crowd assembling in a public area, whereas a written text is characteristically viewed close-up, and access to it can be limited by such factors as education and status.

Iconography is interpreted, not read, with the help of words chosen by the beholder, whereas writing is read with words chosen by the author. In most Mesoamerican societies, including that of the Aztecs, the two systems coexist, in much the same way as illustrations and text occur together in present-day books and newspapers, sometimes in balanced symbiosis, sometimes with one medium dominant over the other, as pictures are in graphic novels. The third medium, notation, is a system of units known variously as notes (as in music), marks (as in pottery batches), and numerals (as in calculations and tallies). It serves to differentiate, order, and enumerate, and, unlike iconography, both the sequence and placement of these units is crucial for their correct interpretation, whereas, unlike writing, notation has no rigid, linear relationship to language. Although older than writing, numerical notation frequently becomes absorbed by the latter, in which it constitutes an autonomous subsystem with its own rules and reading order. This is true of modern writing systems, in which a number such as 13 is read in non-linguistic order and not sign by sign (as “one-three,” or the like), and it is true of Mesoamerican cultures (Fig. 1.5), in which two bars (for ten) with three dots above, below, or beside them (the southern Mesoamerican tradition) or simply thirteen dots or disks (the northern Mesoamerican, including the Aztec, tradition) stand for the same.

1.5. Maya numerals in columns: zero, represented here by a red shell, and 1 to 19, represented by combinations of dots for 1 and bars for 5 (Codex Dresden, p. 44b).

As a rule, Maya monuments, like monuments worldwide, place these media side-by-side or one above the other (Fig. 1.6), with text in columns supplementing information displayed in an accompanying pictorial section (Figs 1.7a, 1.7b), which may show a scene, a symbol, or a being, such as a ruler or deity. In Mixtec (Fig. 1.8a) and Aztec manuscripts, on the other hand, iconography reigns supreme, with writing for the most part relegated to dates and to personal-name captions beside the heads, and place-name captions under the feet, of actors in a historical drama or genealogical narrative. This is similar to our practice when we annotate photos. To make it clear which names and dates relate to which persons, places and events, Aztec codices often link the name glyphs and dates to their referents by a cord, so that the name of an individual seems to float like a balloon tied loosely behind the person’s neck, and the name of a place often trails beside the referent like a tethered tag (Fig. 1.8b).

1.6. The symbiosis of graphic recording systems: writing, notation, and iconography in three successive registers of a Maya manuscript (Codex Dresden, p. 18b).

1.7. The juxtaposition of iconography and writing: a) the Egyptian ivory tablet of predynastic pharaoh Den; b) an inscription commemorating the capture of elite foes by Bahlam K’uh IV (at right), on Lintel 8 at Yaxchilan.

1.8. Juxtaposing sign, symbol and symbolic representation: a) Mixtec lords, with a calendrical name and three dates above their heads, conduct a three-day water-borne assault on an island stronghold (Codex Nuttall, p. 75); b) Cuauhtlatoa, with his name above him, defends the city of Tlatelolco, named below his feet, against a soldier from Tenochtitlan, the name glyph of which is tethered to the enemy’s foot (Codex Telleriano-Remensis, f. 33v).

It is not always easy to recognize the message in an iconographic communication. Sometimes symbols resemble glyphs in the degree of their conventionalization—the extent to which they are standardized in style, shape, size and level of abstraction. And sometimes they retain a form and size related to nature, and are integrated into scenes and portrayals as if part of the landscape and part of the depiction. In Lucas Cranach the Elder’s early 16th-century painting of the mystical marriage of Catherine of Alexandria (Fig. 1.9), we see four female saints grouped around Mary. Each saint is identifiable by a symbol that is, for the most part, indistinguishable from an object in everyday life—seated to Mary’s right is St. Catherine, holding one of her attributes, a sword, while another, a hooked wheel, lies on the ground beside her; St. Dorothy holds a basket of roses; the tower identifying St. Barbara is on a hill behind her. St. Margaret alone stands out because of the dragon resting discreetly at her feet.

1.9. The Mystical Marriage of St. Catherine, Lucas Cranach the Elder, c. 1516.

Precisely this kind of integration occurs frequently in Mesoamerican iconography, so the beholder must be quite alert to catch all the references. And it is important to note that there can be multiple layers of iconography, like the skins of an onion or the nested shells of a Russian matryoshka doll. In the example above, the specific symbols of the saints are nested within the broader symbolic representation of the mystical marriage as a whole. Similarly, there can be multiple layers of writing (compare, for example, in European scripts the letters c and h within the higher unit ch, each of these three with its own distinct pronunciations in context, or the semantic and phonetic units nested within a Chinese character). The distinction between an individual symbol and a glyph is sometimes blurred. In our own society we can ask ourselves whether the characteristic yellow M logo of the McDonald’s fast-food chain is an example of writing or iconography, or a blend of both—would an M in any other typeface and color evoke the same associations? Normally, such blends are only possible, and effective, when an isolated symbol or glyph is involved, an early case in point being the famous interlocked Chi Rho monogram of the Roman emperor Constantine’s troops. From the once independent confederation of Tlaxcallan to the east of the Valley of Mexico comes a magnificent document, the so-called Lienzo de Tlaxcala, that, sadly, only survives in copies. In this beautifully illustrated pictorial manuscript, which consists of many framed scenes depicting episodes in the Conquest of Mexico (not the country, but the Aztec capital after which it was named) in somewhat Europeanized style but from the perspective of Tlaxcallan, place glyphs can hover in corners, detached from the iconography in the scenes they complement. On occasion, however, they merge with the scene and are then a layer within a layer. Sometimes the result can seem fairly incongruous, which tips off the beholder that the unexpected item has a special function, but sometimes the sign is indistinguishable from a real-life detail that fits into the scene seamlessly. In such cases, it is the knowledge of the viewer that supplies the correct interpretation and reading. In the second frame of the Lienzo (Fig. 1.10), we see the Spaniards under Fernando (“Hernán”) Cortés arriving in Iliyocan in September 1519, where they are received kindly by the Tlaxcaltec populace. The name of the town is written alphabetically, but it is also physically present in the scene: the tree in the middle of the illustration, an alder (īlītl in the Nahuatl language), is an abbreviated

rendition of the place name, which means “Where There Are Lots of Alders.” So here we have a glyph (or sign) hiding in plain sight. Actually, it can be read as a glyph or interpreted as a symbol of the town. Glyphs that stand for entire words are known as logograms, or word-signs. Such a sign in isolation is often impossible to distinguish from a symbol, because the two overlap functionally in this context. The alder can be read as the sign ILI., a typically abbreviated way of writing a name like Iliyocan, or it can be interpreted as a symbol for the town, in much the same way as a bear is the symbol for Berlin. How can we tell whether a particular graphic form is a sign or a symbol? Context will often be a guide, but the distinction was not necessarily important to the author, who thrived on the dualism in Mesoamerican thought and art.

1.10. Iliyocan (Lienzo de Tlaxcala, frame 2).

Let’s compare this scene with the 28th frame in the Lienzo (Fig. 1.11a), where we see Cortés and his allied troops in July 1520, recovering in the Tlaxcaltec town of Xaltelolco after their narrow escape from the Aztec capital. In this case, we can recognize two glyphs for what they are because they hover in space above, and detached from, the scene. One, the moundlike sign directly below the alphabetical form of the place name, is the glyphic equivalent of the toponym. Xaltelolco means “At Sand Hill,” and we indeed see a dotted hill or mound (telol- ‘mound, low hill’) of sand (xāl-), even if the color of the mound suggests a more verdant rise. Below the place glyph we see more writing. Just as the central positioning of the place glyph shows that its function is to name the overall setting or site of the event depicted, the placement of a glyphic compound closely behind the

head of the most prominent personage addressing Cortés indicates that its focus is more narrow: it names him specifically. This time it is the name of a Tlaxcaltec leader. The upper element of the name glyph is a yellow star— not in typical Mesoamerican style as an eye or white disk (Fig. 1.11b, 1.11c) in the darkened firmament, but rather as a run-of-the-mill European star, reflecting the extent to which Spanish artistic conventions were being adopted by indigenous scribes for use in a native system. If the star is Spanish in style, the accompanying elements are certainly not. They are curlicues, a very common element in Central Mexican iconography and writing. As a general rule, if they are gray (or purplish-gray) they symbolize smoke; if yellow, excrement. Normally, they occur in clusters of three, but this can vary. If they are tilted to point sideways, they are known as speech scrolls, and are usually white, but can be blue (for turquoise, a precious stone), or even blue and red, if a highborn person has a say in the event depicted. Here, however, we are dealing with smoke given off by a wandering star.

1.11. Hispanicized vs. Aztec style in the depiction of stars: a) Xaltelolco (“At Sand Hill”; Lienzo de Tlaxcala, frame 28); b) Yohuallan (“In the Night”; Codex Mendoza, f. 37r); c) Citlaltepec (“On Star Mountain”; Codex Mendoza, f. 17r).

In the Nahuatl writing system employed by the Aztecs and their neighbors, logograms—signs for whole words or other semantic units—can be multivalent (or polyvalent), which means that they have more than one value or reading. If we had a similar writing system, as, for example, the ancient Egyptians did, we could have a disk with rays represent not only the word “sun” but also “star,” and perhaps semantically related terms such as

“day” and “heat.” Here, too, context would be the guide to the correct reading in a given instance. The smoke curlicues can be read as POC(TLI), “smoke (n.),” and POPOCA(C), “smoke (vb.),” but, when used phonetically (that is, for their sound alone), the most common reading is simply po. What does all this mean? Capitalized sequences indicate semantic units: logograms (or wordsigns). Lower-case sequences, on the other hand, are purely phonetic units and, thus, reveal the language of the communication. The abbreviations “(n.)” and “(vb.)” stand for “noun” and “verb,” and are added whenever the English meaning is ambiguous, as in the case of “smoke.” Finally, parentheses surround parts of the semantic value that are added or left off, depending on the context. Nahuatl nouns (e.g. pōctli, “smoke”) usually end in -tli (which becomes -li after an l and -tl after a vowel), so when a logogram is alone, or read last in a compound, this suffix is often added, although it can be left off in a personal name. The verb form in names is typically in the present or perfect/preterite tense (e.g. popōca means literally “(it) smokes, (it) is smoking,” whereas popōcac means “(it) smoked” or “(it) has been smoking”), so the variable part is placed in parentheses. The present tense in Nahuatl corresponds roughly to the English present (as in “sings”) and present progressive (as in “is singing”), while the perfect (or preterite) corresponds to the English perfect (as in “has sung”), preterite (as in “sang”), and perfect progressive (as in “has been singing”). If we now combine the two units, the star (Nahuatl cītlal-) and smoke (noun pōc- or, more likely, verb popōca), we end up with a coherent glyphic sequence: CITLAL-POPOCA. This corresponds well to the name of one of the four primary lords of Tlaxcallan at the time, Citlalpopoca, lord of Quiyahuiztlan, who is familiar to us from other sources. His name means “He Smokes Like a Star” and describes the passage of a comet. Before we proceed further, a few words concerning the Aztecs and their neighbors are in order. The term “Aztec” refers, strictly speaking, to any of several Chichimec (roughly equivalent to our term “barbarian”) peoples from Aztlan, a mythical homeland on the northern periphery of Mesoamerica, who descended upon the mostly Nahuatl-speaking city-states of Central Mexico in the 13th century AD and established themselves as new forces to reckon with in the region. Through marriage alliances with the old Toltec and Colhua royal houses, and with each other, they skillfully set

about legitimizing their political status, founding new dynasties whose militaries and machinations determined the course of late Prehispanic Mexico. In the narrower sense current today, “Aztec” refers to only one of the so-called Azteca Chichimeca—the Mexitin, who settled the marshy islands near the western shores of Metztliapan (“In the Waters of the Moon”), the lake network that once dominated the Valley of Mexico. These island settlements were collectively known as Mexico (“In the Navel (or Center) of the Moon”) and their inhabitants as Mexica. The northern settlement was known as Xaltelolco, as the historian Chimalpahin Cuauhtlehuanitzin tells us, just like the town in Tlaxcallan that we saw above. When it had gained sufficient political weight to acquire its own royal dynasty, the growing town also received a new name, Tlatelolco (“At the Hill/Mound”)—the implication being that its inhabitants were now placing their town on a firmer footing and no longer building on sand (xāl-)! Renaming settlements as a result of changing circumstances and fortunes was not uncommon. The future rival of the Aztec Empire, Tlaxcallan (“By the Tortillas”), was originally known by a rougher name, Texcallan (“By the Boulders”). Finally, the epithet “Aztec” in its broad, imperial, sense refers to more than just the Mexica: it names the alliance of the Mexica of Tenochtitlan with the Acolhuaque of Tetzcoco, situated on the eastern shore of the lake, and with the Tepanecs of Tlacopan, on the western, that paved the path to an empire that dominated Mesoamerica from 1431 to 1521. The southern settlement of the Mexica took the name Cuauhnochtitlan (“Beside the Cactus Fruit of the Eagle”), a little-known fact we learn from two early sources, the Historia de Tlaxcala of Diego Muñoz Camargo and the anonymous Historia de los mexicanos por sus pinturas. After the death of the settlement’s founding father, Tenoch, the young town was renamed in his honor, first as Tenochco (hence the name Tenochca for the population), then as Tenochtitlan (“Beside the Rock Cactus Fruit”), in clever allusion both to the founder and to the original name. This is commemorated on the first painted leaf, or folio, of the Codex Mendoza (Fig. 1.12), a three-part manuscript prepared around 1535–50 for the first viceroy of New Spain, Antonio de Mendoza.

1.12. The foundation of Mexico Tenochtitlan (Codex Mendoza, f. 2r).

The first section of the codex, including the leaf illustrated here, is one of the earliest and most important documents recounting Mexica history. The other two sections lay out the taxes of each province in the Aztec Empire and chart the life cycle and societal relationships of a typical Mexica man and woman, respectively. At the beginning of the first section we see the founders of the future capital arranged around the town’s waterbounded quarters, along with their name glyphs and alphabetic glosses to aid the non-indigenous viewer. They are surrounded by reeds (the blue

plants) and rushes or cattails (the green plants), symbolizing the marshy beginnings of the site. Tenoch is seated on a woven mat, symbolic of lordship, his face darkened with reddened sides to indicate that he is a priest. Before him, in the very center of the scene, looms an eagle astride a nopal cactus. The eagle symbolizes the patron deity of the Mexica, Huitzilopochtli, whose name can be interpreted variously as “Hummingbird Sorcerer” or “Oriented to the Left (or South) Like a Hummingbird.” In his role as the sun at zenith heating the south, Huitzilopochtli characteristically takes the form of a soaring eagle, rather than a hovering hummingbird. According to the Mexica migration myth, the god in the guise of an eagle led them to the site of their future capital, where he came to rest on a cactus. The huge eagle and cactus in the center of this folio of the Codex, surrounded by the leading actors in the foundation drama, are, thus, a symbolic representation of this epochal event. But they are much more than that. They are also a dual-function glyphic compound recording both the predynastic and dynastic names of the future city. The earlier name, Cuauhnochtitlan, is represented by the eagle (cuāuh-) atop the cactus fruit (nōch-). In the rendition of place names, the suffix -titlan (“by, beside”) is frequently left unwritten. The sequence is, thus, written CUAUH2NOCH.—the period at the end is a device to indicate that we are dealing with abbreviated writing, a common feature in Aztec manuscripts. The city’s later name, Tenochtitlan, is represented by the stylized rock (te-) at the base of the cactus and its fruit (nōch-): thus, TE-NOCH. It is important to note that sign order is determined less by the actual order of the elements in a name than it is by aesthetic requirements—signs are arranged in a manner that is artistically pleasing or reflects their possible juxtaposition in nature. Thus, the first name is read downwards, the second upwards! No other writing system is so flexible in its arrangement of signs, although Egyptian hieroglyphic texts offer many parallels. Here again, context, not to mention a knowledge of naming practices and of the language behind the signs, is the guide to the correct reading. The foundation page in the Codex Mendoza has much more to offer us. Curling around the page from the top left is a blue band of squares, each containing one of four glyphs for the year names Acatl (“Reed”), Tecpatl (“Flint”), Calli (“House”), and Tochtli (“Rabbit”). Each of these is preceded by a number from 1 to 13. Together, these two sequences of numbers and

names form a 52-year cycle of year dates that recur endlessly, beginning with 1 Tochtli (see p. 16). In the course of the 15th century, repeated crises of drought and famine around a year 1 Tochtli brought this initial date into disrepute. In the light of this, the Aztec emperor reigning at the time of the Spanish arrival, Motecuhzoma II (r. 1502–20), is credited with shifting the date of the toxiuhmolpilia (“binding of our years”) festival, a ritual repeated at the opening of each 52-year cycle, to the next point in the cycle, 2 Acatl, in the hope that it would be more auspicious. All manuscripts in traditional style backdate the beginning of earlier cycles to the new initial point, as we see here also, near the bottom right-hand corner. The years covered on this page run from 2 Calli (1325), according to tradition the year in which Tenochtitlan was founded, to 13 Acatl (1375), with a new cycle beginning in 1351. The year-binding is represented iconographically by a cord tied around the year sign (Acatl) of the date 2 Acatl. Linked to its frame by a line is a so-called fire-drill, an instrument for kindling fire. This represents the kindling of the new fire in the ceremony that marked the onset of a fresh cycle. Aztec year dates are normally cited with equivalent dates in our calendar, but it should be kept in mind that these are only approximate. The Aztec year began at a different point in the year, and the correlation between the two calendars shifted every four years when our calendar inserted a leap year. The Aztec year remained immutably 365 days long. Below the name of the young city we see a shield with reed arrows behind it. This is a symbol corresponding to the Nahuatl phrase in mītl, in chīmalli, literally “the arrow(s), the shield,” a kenning for war. And it is war indeed that is depicted below the foundation scene. Twice we see a warrior grasping an enemy prisoner with his shield hand, while the main temple of the defeated town or city burns in the background. Flames and smoke emerge from the shrine as its thatched roof collapses. This is standard iconography for the defeat or conquest of a town. Beside and partially behind each symbol of a burning temple is a sign—the name glyph of the town in question. In both cases the underlying element is a large hill or mountain (tepē-). The mountain is an unusual sign. Often it is read as a logogram, TEPE(TL), but just as often it is not read at all, serving instead as a so-called classifier for toponyms in general. As in the case of Middle Egyptian determinatives, a classifier or, to put it more precisely, a semantic complement (see Chapter 2) signals to the beholder that the accompanying

glyph names something in a particular category, in this case a place. This practice is an inheritance from the south, from the older traditions of Zapotec and Mixtec writing, in which the actual sign for the place name itself was placed above, or superimposed on, a highly stylized mountain glyph. Occasionally, we see water gushing out of the base of the mountain. This stands for the Nahuatl expression in ātl, in tepētl (conflated as āltepētl), literally “the water, the mountain,” a kenning for “sovereign community”—a city, or town. The map of a community will often mark its borders by naming distinctive features lined up along the edges of the map. Many such features are hills. When the glyph is not a classifier but a sign to be read, it takes the value TEPETL as a landmark—the hill or mountain itself—and TEPE. (usually for -tepēc, “At the Hill of …”) as a town or city. Both of the place glyphs on our page use the mountain sign in its function as a semantic complement. The left-hand one depicts a hill with a curled summit, and this is the key to its reading. The gloss names the city as Colhuacan—literally “Where There’s a Bend,” a reference to the bent mountain nearby. So the glyph is an interesting example of the influence of iconography on writing: the mountain sign, unread but nevertheless semantically relevant, is curled (with no little exaggeration!) at the top to indicate the reading COL. for cōl-, “bent, curved.” Colhuacan, up to this point a major player in the politics of the central highlands, was a city-state directly to the southeast of Mexico Tenochtitlan. It was renowned as the successor of Tollan, the capital of the Toltec state until the 13th century. Toltec culture, famed for its arts and sciences, was regarded by the Aztecs as the epitome of civilization, much as Roman culture was in the European Middle Ages. The name Colhuacan is sometimes translated as “Where There Are Ancestors” (also cōl-), a folketymological reference to its cultural preeminence as a bridge between Tollan and Tenochtitlan. In the case of the second town, we see a wall (tenān-) with stepped parapet superimposed over the mountain sign. The glyph, read TENAN., is an abbreviation for the name of the once-powerful Chichimec city of Tenanyocan (literally “Where There Are Lots of Walls”), situated directly to the northwest, opposite Mexico. By the latter half of the 14th century, the might of Colhuacan and Tenanyocan was on the wane. A new Chichimec power was rising in the Valley—Azcapotzalco, capital of the Tepanec state, which dominated the western shore of Lake Metztliapan. The Mexica,

previously subject to Colhuacan, fell now under the sway of Azcapotzalco and its ambitious ruler, Tezozomoc, who in a series of bloody campaigns subjugated, one by one, the towns and cities around the Valley’s shores. It was not until 1431 that Tenochtitlan cast off the Tepanec yoke, aided by its allies Tetzcoco and Tlacopan, until now reluctant vassals of Azcapotzalco. This was the founding event of an empire that was to flourish for the next eighty-eight years. At the time of the early conquests recorded at the bottom of the Mendoza page, however, the Mexica were still tributaries of Azcapotzalco. The following page of the Codex Mendoza (Fig. 1.13) is dedicated to the reign of the first king of Mexico Tenochtitlan, Acamapichtli, who, according to the codex, ascended the throne in the year 1 Tecpatl (1376) and reigned until 8 Tecpatl (1396). 1 Tecpatl years were associated in Aztec cosmology with great beginnings. The establishment of a new dynasty, the start of a migration, and the foundation of a state are all typical 1 Tecpatl events. From this initial date a curved line leads to the seated figure of the ruler. A shorter line connecting a glyph to the back of his head names him as ACA•MAPICH(TLI) (“Handful (māpīch-) of Reed (āca-) Arrows”). At this time his title was cihuācōātl, “Female Serpent,” named after the formidable goddess of Colhuacan. The title is indicated by the serpent with a young woman’s head that rises up from the back of his diadem and leans forward. This is a further instance of iconography merging with writing. His glyph of rank is treated as if it were, and perhaps was, a badge of office worn on the head. Whether it was ever worn or not, in terms of graphic communication it is clearly both a symbol and a compound sign. From 8 Acatl (1383) onwards, as we see here, the king was no longer cihuācōātl. Under his successors we know that the offices of tlàtoāni, “king,”—literally “speaker”—and cihuācōātl, the prime minister of state, were assigned to separate individuals, and the name was reinterpreted accordingly as “Female Twin” (cōātl can mean “serpent” and “twin”), an apt term for the emperor’s counterpart, who was primarily responsible for internal affairs. The office of tlàtoāni (plural: tlàtòquè) is characterized by the turquoise diadem, a concrete symbol, and by the turquoise speech scroll, an abstract symbol.

1.13. The reign of Acamapichtli (Codex Mendoza, f. 2v).

Acamapichtli looks towards the same symbol of war that we saw on the previous page of the codex. It is slightly different this time, since a turquoise àtlatl, or spearthrower, has now been added to the weaponry. This alerts us to the fact that both symbols and signs can vary considerably in their graphic details according to the whim and taste of the scribe. Once we get accustomed to this, it becomes fairly easy to pick out the salient features that distinguish one sign or symbol from another. Below the war symbol and to its right are matching sets of four signs and symbols. The left-hand column consists of the heads of slain enemy captives. We know they are

dead because their eyes are closed. We know that they are (or, better, were) captives because they have a double-feather emblem with down tied to the back of their hair. The emblem identifies each as a mālli (“captive”) of Huitzilopochtli, who is symbolized by the down feathers. The head with the double-feather emblem is, consequently, a glyph with the reading MAL(LI), and we will see later that this sign also gets considerable use as a phonetic sign mal divorced of its semantic value. A line connects each feather-adorned head with a further glyph. These glyphs occur both in this column and in the next to its right. Although they are identical, or nearly identical—there is a single flower in the last sign on the left, but there are two in its counterpart on the right—their functions and their readings are distinct, yet related. The glyphs in the first column are socalled gentilics—signs that name members of a social or political group, especially persons named after the town, city or larger political unit they come from. All four signs on the right are linked to the symbol of a burning temple, so it is not hard to guess that they are the names of the hometowns of the deceased warriors. The signs remain the same because they are abbreviations, much as “Ven.” in our system is the abbreviation for both “Venice” and “Venetian(s).” The glyphs in both columns read, from top to bottom, CUAUH•NAHUA., MIZQUI., CUITLA•WATERWAY, and XOCH(I)-MIL., doing double duty for the city-state Cuauhnahuac and its population, the Cuauhnahuaca, Mizquic and the Mizquica, Cuitlahuac and the Cuitlahuaca, and Xochimilco and the Xochimilca. With the exception of Cuauhnahuac, these are all communities along the lower arm of Lake Metztliapan, southeast of the island city of Mexico Tenochtitlan. Cuauhnahuac is today the city of Cuernavaca, across the mountains to the south of the Valley. Xochimilco (“In the Fields of Flowers”) has long been famous for its floral gardens on reclaimed plots of land (chinampas, from Nahuatl chināmpan) in the sweet-water stretches of the lake. In the Codex Vaticanus A (also called the Codex Rios; Fig. 1.14) the Italian annotator, aware of the inherent ambiguity in reading place signs, glossed the sign for the Toltec capital, Tollan (present-day Tula, Hidalgo), as both “Tolteca” and “Tulan.” The glyph, a clump of rushes (tōl-), should actually be read TOL. On f. 42r of the Mendoza (Fig. 1.15) we find further confirmation of this bifunctional characteristic of place signs. This page lists the taxes due from Tepeyacac, a province east of the Valley of Mexico that, from the mid-15th century on, guarded the imperial frontier against

three enemy states, Tlaxcallan, Cholollan, and Huexotzinco. The alphabetic glosses show us that the heads and their name glyphs relate to Tlaxcalteca, Chololteca, and Huexotzinca captives, this time living ones because their eyes are open! In the first two cases, the glosses oscillate between the singular forms of the gentilics, ending in -tēcatl, and the plurals, ending in tēcà. Why are the three listed as tax items? This brings us to one of the most controversial aspects of Aztec civilization, one that never ceases to evoke revulsion in the hearts of modern citizens accustomed to the concept of total warfare against soldiers and civilians alike (the Spanish practice of which utterly horrified the Aztecs), but not to the very Mesoamerican practice of human sacrifice of captured soldiers.

1.14. The glyph for Tollan and the Toltecs (Codex Vaticanus A, f. 8v).

1.15. Gentilics of enemy states (at top left; Codex Mendoza, f. 42r).

The Aztec universe was a dynamic, ever-changing complex of horizontally and vertically juxtaposed regions called topan (realms “beyond us”—not simply “above us,” as it is often misleadingly translated), into and even through which deities and, to some extent, lesser beings (including humans after death or other transformations) could travel. These regions were envisioned as beginning just beyond the mortal realm, above, below, and beside us. In the tradition of modern-day Milpa Alta on the southern rim of the Valley of Mexico, a family member could be buried tlecuilpan, not “above the hearth” but, contextually, “in (or even under) the fire pit,”

expressed with the same -pan localizer. There were two highly desirable realms in the Aztec cosmos. One was Tlalocan, the storm god’s world of flowers and song, the other Tonatiuhichan, the Valhalla-like residence of the sun god. Tlalocan offered a happy afterlife to those who died a watery death —for example, by drowning or succumbing to a disease associated with water—but access to this world could only be attained by a twist of fate. Suicide by drowning was not an option. Of the diverse otherworlds, Tonatiuhichan offered an afterlife that warriors could work towards. Death on the field of battle, or, if captured, on the high altar of a temple, was well honored. A living warrior gained access to a higher rank by taking prisoners for the gods, just as a dying warrior gained access to this higher realm by giving his life for the gods. Unlike most humans, who wandered after death through the nine realms of Mictlan (“By the Dead”), where the bones of ancestors from this and prior ages of the world awaited reconstitution and rebirth, not only soldiers who died on the field of battle but also women who died in childbirth could aspire to a seat in the sun god’s hall. The Aztec Empire had an “arrangement” with Tlaxcallan and its allies to meet at regular intervals for ritualized battles in the so-called xōchiyāōyōtl, the “flowery war,” the ostensible goal of which was not to win territory but to win captives for sacrifice to the gods. Human sacrifice, or death in battle, was deemed the ultimate expression of gratitude to the gods, who had sacrificed themselves at the dawn of time for the benefit of the cosmos and mankind. It fell to Tepeyacac as a border province to supply such captives. So much for international affairs in the reign of Acamapichtli, and for the pattern that they set for the future. In domestic politics two queens were instrumental in the establishment of his dynasty—sisters by the names of Ilancueitl and Atotoztli. The exact nature of their relationship to Acamapichtli varies from source to source and has been much debated. We won’t get into that here. But let’s look at one of those sources to get an impression of the way information is encoded. Aztec historical manuscripts are a colorful mix of scenes, symbols, and signs. To understand what we see, we need to understand the conventions employed by the scribes. We must not forget that in the course of the 16th century indigenous scribes, who could no longer work full-time in the palaces of the beleaguered nobility, were becoming increasingly exposed to the artistic conventions of their Spanish overlords. This influence was, however, for the most part

cosmetic (as we saw above in the case of the star in the name of Citlalpopoca), with little effect on native principles of iconography and writing. A far more serious problem for indigenous society was the steady loss of Prehispanic knowledge as the inevitable consequence of the destruction of Aztec libraries, the persecution of those persisting in the old religion or preserving the traditions it enshrined, and the confusion that arose from attempts to reconstruct genealogical and historical relationships from the few copies of manuscripts that survived an enduring Spanish onslaught. The ever-dwindling number of elders with a thorough or adequate command of traditional knowledge only complicated matters for those interested in interpreting documents or writing their own accounts of the Prehispanic past. There are many errors in our source material that involve such simple things as confusing two persons with the same name, or two years with the same recurring date, or one glyph with another. The following example will illustrate this. On the left-hand side of a two-page spread in the Codex TellerianoRemensis (Fig. 1.16) we see the familiar year band, this time blue on red, running down the margin. This places the events within a specific time frame: 12 Tecpatl to 5 Tochtli, which the contemporary annotator, correcting his predecessor, equates with AD 1400 to 1406. This time frame seems to mark the waning years of the reign of Acamapichtli, which would put it at odds with the earlier dates given in other sources, including the Codex Mendoza, as we saw earlier. At the bottom end of the band the year 5 Tochtli is connected by a line to a mummy bundle seated on an icpalli, a woven-reed throne. Unlike the black lines connecting glyphs and figures in the middle of the layout, the line leading from 5 Tochtli to the mummy bundle is brown, in the ink and the hand of the primary annotator, who wrote the Spanish commentary below the figures on each page. This annotator was probably a Spaniard acting as an intermediary between the scribe (the painter of the figures and attendant glyphs) and the viewer, who sought to understand the content of what he or she beheld. Errors that enter into a manuscript can have various sources: they can be introduced by scribes and annotators alike on the basis of their own limited knowledge and assumptions or on information supplied by consultants.

1.16. Acamapichtli and his successor, Huitzilihuitl (Codex Telleriano-Remensis, f. 29v–30r).

Next to the year band are two rulers on their thrones. The same annotator that corrected the year correlations now adds his own error to the previous ones. He identifies the second ruler as Huitzilihuitl (in normalized spelling). Huitzilihuitl was the son and successor of Acamapichtli. The glyph, however, is a monkey’s head. This can only be read as OZOMA(TLI) (“Monkey”), which is not a known name for a Mexica ruler but rather one borne by the ruler of Cuauhnahuac in the hotlands to the south, beyond the volcanic rim of the Valley of Mexico. Ozomatli was a powerful sorcerer king with an enchantingly beautiful daughter whose elusive hand was sought in marriage for Acamapichtli’s son, Huitzilihuitl. The legend of how her heart was won is vividly told in the Nahuatl-language Crónica Mexicayotl. The misidentified ruler is seated next to the year 2 Acatl, a recurring date that later was chosen to begin the calendrical cycle of 52 years. This was the second anniversary of the death of a migration-period lord of the Aztecs at Chapoltepec (today a verdant park within the confines of the Mexican capital). In 1299 the forces of Colhuacan had surrounded the Aztecs there, defeated them and carried off their lord and his daughters to be sacrificed. In traditional accounts this lord is called Huitzilihuitl the Elder. We must assume that the indigenous consultant for the annotator of the Telleriano-Remensis had confused the earlier lord with the later king. The latter is correctly identified on the bottom right-hand side of the layout

by the compound glyph HUITZIL•IHUI(TL), consisting of the head of a hummingbird (huītzil-) surrounded by feathers (ìhuitl) of down. In the middle of the double-page spread we encounter a group of dynasts gesturing and interacting with each other in various ways. All of them are elite personages who had a direct or indirect role in the establishment of the royal lineage of Mexico Tenochtitlan. Male rulers, living and dead, are conventionally seated on thrones of interwoven reeds (icpalli), while women, regardless of their status, are shown kneeling. The two women depicted in the upper middle of the left-hand scene are described in historical accounts as sisters who became queens. A line connects them to signal their relationship, while a further line leads from the lower woman to the throne below, on which a mummy bundle sits. There are two ways to indicate the death of a ruler: one is to depict him hunched forward with eyes closed, as in the Mendoza. The other, and more common, convention is to replace the cloaked figure of the ruler with his mummy bundle, as here. The glyph attached to the deceased ruler names him as Acamapichtli, using a variant of the glyph we saw earlier in the Mendoza. However, this is not, as the annotator thought, the ruler of Tenochtitlan but rather the man after whom he was named—Acamapichtli the Elder, king of Colhuacan, at whose court his younger namesake and kinsman grew up. A curved line runs from the deceased ruler’s head to the first of the two kneeling women, Ilancueitl, who is identified by two glyphs. The first, directly behind her head, is her name, while the second, above the latter, is the city with which she is associated: Colhuacan. This noblewoman is variously described as the wife (and now widow) of Acamapichtli and as one of his two daughters. The manner in which the link between the two is depicted here is ambiguous and will allow either interpretation. There is a persistent tradition that, upon the assassination of Acamapichtli the Elder, his barren queen fled with her foster-son, Acamapichtli the Younger, to her sister, Atotoztli, in Coatlichan. There Atotoztli helped raise the boy. To the lower right of the left-hand page we see Acamapichtli as a child receiving valuable advice (symbolized by the turquoise speech scroll) and then heading east to his foster-aunt. This is symbolized by the footprints leading up to the next sub-scene, in which we see a now mature young Acamapichtli as a ruler engaged in discussion with Atotoztli in Coatlichan (“Home of the Serpent,” named in the compound glyph above the queen). Between them are baskets of produce, presented as

gifts. Again ambiguity reigns supreme in accounts of the narrative. Some sources have the young king marrying Atotoztli for dynastic reasons and bringing her to the fledgling capital. Others regard him as the son of Atotoztli, rather than her spouse. Here, too, a case can be made that the divergent accounts come from confusion over the interpretation of pictorial representations of the events. The scene in which the two are in discussion, with gifts placed between them, is a widely shared convention depicting the establishment of a marriage or dynastic alliance. However, such negotiations between two parties can concern other matters as well. It is worth noting that the lines extending from Acamapichtli and Atotoztli connect them with Tenochtitlan and not with each other. The arrangement of the iconographic information here can be interpreted in two ways: either the young ruler is marrying Atotoztli and escorting her to the capital or he is inviting her (as his foster-aunt and surrogate mother) to come and live with him in Tenochtitlan. Both versions occur in the alphabetic sources that have come down to us. Some speak of Atotoztli journeying to the island city, others of Ilancueitl, but the scenarios are parallel. Furthermore, the versions that have Acamapichtli of Tenochtitlan marrying Ilancueitl, instead of Atotoztli, have once again their counterpart in the ambiguous nature of the iconographic and glyphic source material. The king of Tenochtitlan has been confused with his older namesake. Let us now look at how the two queens are identified glyphically (Fig. 1.17). In the case of Ilancueitl, whose name means “Old Woman’s (ilan-) Skirt (cuēitl),” we see directly behind her a skirt with a multicolored fringe. This is the logogram CUE(ITL). Resting on top of the skirt is a row of teeth. From the logogram TLAN(TLI) (for tlān-, “tooth, teeth”) come the phonetic values tlan and tla. These in turn are read lan and la if a preceding sign ends in an l sound. And that’s what we have here. Dangling from the cord tied around the waistline of the skirt is the glyph for another element of the human anatomy, the liver and gallbladder. This oft highly stylized sign is both the logogram EL(LI) (for ēl- , “liver, internal organs”) and the phonetic sign, or phonogram, derived from it for the syllables el and il. Iconography once again is at play. The cord from which this syllable sign, or syllabogram, dangles looks very much like a decorative element attached to the skirt, but is in fact a sign to be read in its own right. It represents the syllable i2, the phonetic value extracted and abbreviated from the initial of the verb ilpia, “bind, tie.” Its function here is to indicate which of two

possible phonetic readings for the EL sign, namely el or il, is correct in the given context. In this case it must be il. The entire glyphic compound is, thus, to be read i2il-lan-CUEITL, which matches pretty closely the name in question, Ilancueitl. In this compound the sign represented by the superscript i2 functions as a so-called phonetic indicator. The sequence illan is a typical phonetic spelling, often referred to as a phonetic complement, for the word ilan-, while CUEITL is a logogram for the word cuēitl. Both spelling types, phonetic and logographic, involve complements of signs in interaction.

1.17. Queens Atotoztli and Ilancueitl (Codex Telleriano-Remensis, f. 29v).

The usual strategy for writing a word is to use a logogram, if available, or, in the case of a compound term, a combination of logograms for each of the lexical units in the word in question. The compound sign for the name Huitzilihuitl, which, as we saw above, consists of two logograms, is a good example of this. If no logogram is available for one or each of the constituent parts of a word or name, a typical solution is to select for this purpose a phonetic sign or signs. Far less frequent is a combination of

purely phonetic signs, something typical of the later 16th century, when the Spanish alphabet was becoming the dominant graphic system in all contexts for writing Nahuatl. If there is no sign for a particular syllable in the inventory of phonetic signs—the so-called syllabary—the spelling is abbreviated at this point. In fact, abbreviated writing is as prevalent in Aztec manuscripts as in Roman inscriptions, even when signs are available for all syllables. We can see an example of this in the way the name of the second queen is written. She seems to have water streaming down her back from her hair as if she were fresh out of the shower. Yet it is the water (ā-) that names her, not the glyph hovering on a leash behind her. Her name is Atotoztli, as we know from other sources. The meaning of the name is obscure, but it is highly likely that the first part has to do with water, as the glyph suggests, while the second part is probably the emotive form of a word for a parrot species. The iconographically influenced glyph is an abbreviation, which we can represent as A., much as we would write A. as an abbreviation for Anne. The abbreviation attached to Atotoztli’s person, instead of detached in an accompanying glyph, is comparable to the S on the chest of Superman. It is writing, but it is also a symbol integrated into the scene itself, a naming feature we also know from Classic Maya monuments. That the S on Superman is a sign turned symbol is underscored by the fact that in China he is known as Chāorén ( , “Superperson”), yet displays the very same S, not a C, nor indeed a Chinese character, on his chest. The late 16th-century Aztec encyclopedia known as the Codex Florentinus (or Florentine Codex), while heavily Europeanized in its illustrative style, offers us another powerful example of the interplay between iconography and abbreviated writing that is so much a part of Mesoamerican, and especially Central Mexican, graphic communication. This magnificent twelve-book work in three volumes, compiled in Nahuatl and Spanish under the direction of friar Bernardino de Sahagún, is profusely illustrated by framed vignettes that relate to the text in some way. Most of these are in full color. Some—unfortunately all too few—include glyphic information of one kind or another. In Book 10, dedicated to the virtues and vices of people from all walks of life, classes and professions, the āhuiyani—“fun-lover,” or courtesan—figures prominently. We will see her again later, when we take a closer look at virtues and vices as expressed in iconography and writing. But for now it will suffice to examine her dual

depiction in Chapter 15 of Book 10 (Fig. 1.18) as both a young, unmarried teenager with unbound hair (a) and with the characteristic tufted hairstyle of a mature woman (b). We observe her in each frame standing barefoot and in relaxed pose on grassy terrain or before a verdant backdrop of rolling plain and tall volcanoes. She wears a long shift and skirt, and carries flowers in one hand. The flowers in these apparently innocent scenes look to all intents and purposes like something she had plucked on her stroll through the countryside. But they are more than this. They are a symbol of sensuality and sexuality given free rein. In the hands of a free-spirited woman they correspond to the Nahuatl term xōchihuà, “seducer/seductress,” literally “(s)he has flowers.”

1.18. The āhuiyani holding sign and symbol (Codex Florentinus, Book 10, Ch. 15).

Less conspicuous, but no less revealing, is what these women hold in their other hand, and what they are standing in. If we peer closely at the frames we discover that the substance is water, which in Aztec iconography and writing is typically blue and fringed by an alternating sequence of white drops and seashells. In these framed depictions we see that the water is gushing from each woman’s hand and emanating from her feet. The water (ā-) in each case is an iconographic play on āhuiyani, which would be read a. as an abbreviation of her class name. Note the contrast between the A. for Atotoztli and the a. for āhuiyani. The small capitals indicate that the abbreviation consists of a logogram related in meaning to the name, whereas the lower-case abbreviation is entirely phonetic, since there is no etymological connection between the term for water and the term for courtesan.

In this chapter we have taken a brief tour of the Mesoamerican world as reflected in Aztec manuscripts and seen the main features of the graphic communication system that the Aztecs put to such efficient and aesthetic use. The harmonious and colorful mix of sign and symbol that we have so far encountered will, I hope, have whetted your appetite for more. In the next chapter we will be exploring in detail the principles of Nahuatl writing and the inner workings of this fascinating and yet so unusual system.

Exercise The following tableaux from the Lienzo de Tlaxcala illustrate episodes in and after the conquest of Aztec Mexico from the perspective of the Tlaxcaltec allies of the Spaniards. For the purpose of this exercise the sites of various skirmishes and battles have been arranged out of chronological order. In normalized spelling, the glossed place names are: (a) Zacatepec, (b) Tlacopan, (c) Teocalhueiyacan, (d) Tepotzotlan, (e) Cuauhtinchan, (f) Quecholac, (g) Ayotochcuitlatlan, and (h) Tepexic. In jumbled sequence, the meanings of these names are: (1) “Where There’s a Tall Temple,” (2) “By the Armadillo Excrement,” (3) “At Grass Hill,” (4) “At the Cliff,” (5) “In the Stalks,” (6) “At the Redbird Waters,” (7) “By the Humpbacked Hills,” and (8) “Home of the Eagles.” Match the place names in translation with their corresponding glyphs and Nahuatl names. Which glyphs have kept their autonomous status and which have been integrated into the landscape and events as part of the symbolic representation?

Chapter 2

General Principles Classical Nahuatl, the elegantly complex and flowery language of the Aztecs and many of their neighbors in Central Mexico, served as a prestigious lingua franca, the primary vehicle of oral communication throughout what was a richly multilingual Aztec Empire. Its literary sophistication greatly impressed generations of Spanish religious and lay scholars in the early colonial period that followed the fall of Mexico Tenochtitlan in 1521. Unlike the language, the skillful blend of hieroglyphic writing, notation, and iconography that constituted its multimodal system of graphic communication was never fully mastered by those few Spaniards intrigued by it, who instead relied on indigenous scribes and scholars to record and interpret data in the system. Notation and iconography were comparatively easy to grasp, but hieroglyphics—a writing system with signs of high iconicity (predominantly signs of a pictorial nature with a visible relationship between form and meaning)—proved to be too far removed from European experience with alphabetic writing to be properly comprehended. It is only recently that the system has begun to reveal its inner workings—the intricate and flexible rules, or grammar, governing its usage. What follows here and in the next chapter is a minimal hieroglyphic grammar that lays out the essence of this fascinating system. The key concepts that we will employ are summarized on pp. 13–15. At the heart of any language lies a combination of nouns (for the most part, words for discrete items or concepts) and verbs (put simply, words for carrying out an action or for being a certain way). The rest is, by and large, window dressing that adds precision and contextual detail to this basic structure. The same is true of writing. The core consists of nouns and verbs, with a lesser role played by pronouns (e.g. “he,” “she,” “they”), adjectives (e.g. “great,” “good,” “red”), adverbs (e.g. “very,” “today,” “here”), prepositions (e.g. “in,” “for,” “to”), and the like, which are present to varying degrees in the languages and, thus, the writing systems of the world. In the earliest known stages of Mesopotamian cuneiform and Egyptian hieroglyphics, this core was paired with numerals from an autonomous system of notation in order to record elite events in a

framework of dates and to enumerate and label items received and allocated by the state.

The construction set of writing The fundamental building blocks were set in place very early in the development of writing systems. These blocks, found in most systems, including our own today, are logograms and phonograms. As a general rule, logograms, or word-signs (that is, signs standing for words), are the base from which phonograms, or phonetic signs, were originally derived. Phonograms are typically syllabograms (syllable-signs) or letters (alphabetic signs). In some systems, a logogram has both its original value (also known as a reading), consisting of the meaning and pronunciation of a specific word, and a secondary value consisting of part or all of just the phonetic part of the logographic value. Take, for instance, the English “ewe,” which could be represented as an iconic sheep-shaped glyph meaning “female sheep” and pronounced /yu/. Divorced of the semantic part—the meaning “ewe”—our theoretical sign would now be available for writing similar-sounding words, such as “yew” and “you,” which could otherwise be rather difficult to devise signs for. If Spanish-speaking Mexico had such a system instead of the alphabet employed today, it could well have a sign that depicted a cat (or even just the head of a cat) and use it as a logogram GATO (meaning “cat” and pronounced /gato/). When transliterating from a hieroglyphic script to our own, logographic values, such as our fictional GATO, are conventionally written in small, bold capitals (upper-case letters) and represent words in the language in question. Regular (non-bold) script is used to represent the semantic part of a logogram’s value (that is, its meaning), which in our fictitious instance would be CAT. The phonetic part (that is, its pronunciation) is by convention written in uncials (lower-case letters) between diagonal slashes—in the above case this would be /gato/. If a sign has a phonetic value (that is, a value used only for a sound or sequence of sounds without regard to meaning), it is represented by bold uncials—a typical phonetic value derived from a logogram such as GATO would be ga. In such an instance, our sign, still depicting a cat, could be used with similar signs in sequence to write such Spanish words as galante (e.g. ga-lan-te), “gallant”; pagano (pa-ga-no), “pagan”; and amiga (a-mi-ga), “female friend.” Logographic and phonetic values can occur together in a string of

signs representing a word. Taking our fictional instance one step further, we could have a string GATO-par-do for gatopardo, “ocelot,” literally “graybrown cat,” with the adjectival component of the word represented by two phonetic signs, syllabograms for par and do, because it would be difficult to come up with a logogram for the adjective. An alternative, of course, would be to create a logogram in the form of an ocelot. Mesoamerican writing systems typically relied on both strategies, so that a single word could be written logographically, phonetically, or with a combination of logographic and phonetic signs (that is, a logosyllabic sequence), depending on the taste, tradition, and requirements of the scribe. Let’s now take an actual example from Mesopotamia. In protocuneiform there are a number of signs based on the form of the human body. One of them depicts a head with the area between nose and chin marked by hatching. In its later, more abstract form, , rotated at a 90° angle to the left of its original orientation, this sign functions as a logogram, and is read in Sumerian as KAG, “mouth,” in which MOUTH is the semantic part of the value and /kag/ the phonetic (Fig. 2.1). The latter provides the base for a phonetic value, ka, to be used anywhere that this sequence of sounds needs to be written, regardless of the meaning of the sequence in which it occurs. If a sign has more than one logographic value, as is often the case in Mesopotamian cuneiform (for example, the semantically related ZU2, “tooth, teeth,” for the KAG sign) and Japanese kanji, it may have more than one phonetic value. A sign is called multivalent (or polyvalent, to use a hybrid term) when it has two or more values, regardless of type. Sometimes, if a phonetically derived value becomes closely associated with a specific word, this can give rise to a new logographic value (for example, SU11, “date-palm fibers,” and ZUH, “steal,” which are phonetically similar, but semantically unrelated, to ZU2, “tooth, teeth”). The KAG sign has a pattern that can be tabulated as shown opposite.

2.1. The Sumerian KAG (“mouth”) sign and its multivalency.

In contrast to Maya hieroglyphics, in which signs, generally speaking, are restricted to one logographic and, if at all, one phonetic value, the

Mesopotamian, Egyptian, Chinese, and Japanese systems often go beyond that. Aztec writing has a flexibility comparable to these systems, although most signs have only one or two such values. The Aztec LEG sign is a rare exception (Fig. 2.2).

2.2. The Aztec LEG sign with its multiple values. Base values logographic KAG “mouth” DUG4 “speak, say” INIM “word” GU3 “voice, cry” ZU2 “tooth, teeth” KIRI3 “nose”

Derived values logographic phonetic KANx “gate, door” ka

SU11 “date-palm fibers” zu2, su11 ZUH “steal” KIR4 “hyena”

If the many values of the Aztec LEG glyph seem a little exaggerated, a comparison with Japanese writing might serve as an apt counterweight. The Japanese kanji, or logogram, (primary value: SEI, “life, be born; student”), to mention an extreme but by no means unique example, has no fewer than twenty-five logographic values. You may well ask how such a system can possibly function. The answer is context. The correct reading of the sign is determined by its surroundings; that is, the context in which it is found. Additional signs help to point the reader in the right direction. Certain values occur typically as part of a logographic sequence (for example, when two logograms are juxtaposed like the two units of the term “word-sign”) or as part of a sequence consisting of a logogram for a verb followed by syllabograms that steer the reader to the correct identity and pronunciation of the logogram in question. Context is essential. When insufficient context is present, the correct reading is impeded. Saga, a 9th-century Japanese emperor, was highly impressed when an intellectual at his court, Ono no Takamura, succeeded where all others had failed and cracked a puzzle the emperor had designed that consisted of no less than twelve instances of the same sign, and

thus no viable context to go by. The challenging sentence (Fig. 2.3) was virtually unreadable. It consisted of repetitions of a sign that was borrowed from a Chinese logogram originally depicting a child, which was also one of the intended meanings.

2.3. Emperor Saga’s challenge to Ono no Takamura.

Takamura’s brilliant solution came from testing various combinations of indigenous (ne) and Chinese-derived (KO, ko, SHI, shi) logographic and phonetic values until he had a meaningful, if not particularly profound, sequence: ne-ko KO KO-ne-ko shi-SHI KO KO-shi-SHI Neko [no] ko koneko, shishi [no] ko kojishi. “A cat’s offspring is a kitten, a lion’s a lion cub.” Aztec glyphic compounds frequently present a challenge to us because, like Saga’s courtiers, we lack contextual information that would have guided an indigenous readership to the correct reading or, in the case of abbreviated writing, to the full reading.

Transliteration and transcription When we represent the signs, especially a sequence of signs like the Japanese example above, in one writing system by the signs of another (such as our own), we create what is called a transliteration. This means that each sign in system A (e.g. ) is represented by a sign (or sequence of signs, such as ka) in system B. In the transliteration of many scripts, each sign is separated from the next by a hyphen or similar marker (when part of a single word) or by a space (between words). Ideally, if two or more signs in system A are transliterated with the same sign or signs in system B, the latter are distinguished from one another by adding indices—subscript numbers (e.g. ka2, ka3, and so forth—ka1 is usually just called ka for the sake of simplicity). This way, a sign and its transliteration are always uniquely linked. This is standard practice in cuneiform studies for such unrelated languages as Sumerian, Akkadian, and Hittite, but not (yet) in Egyptian, East Asian, and Mesoamerican epigraphy—the study of writing as a system of signs in inscriptions and manuscripts.

While transliteration involves an exact replacement of a sequence of signs by those of another writing system, such as our alphabet, transcription goes a step further, merging the content of the written units into a sequence that reproduces or reconstructs the actual linguistic forms of the words behind the individual signs. As a rule, alphabetic transliteration and transcription share the same basic orthographic conventions. That is, they spell out the words in roughly the same way. In cuneiform languages, the phoneme /š/ is transcribed š, following the practice in transliteration, whereas in the most common system of Romanization (Hepburn) for Japanese it is written sh. In Mesoamerican studies, on the other hand, it is written x, following colonial practice. This parallelism in transliteration and transcription will be followed here. Nahuatl conventions are generally the same as those of the Spanish (and, for that matter, English) alphabet. The spellings that should be carefully noted, however, are: /k/ /s/ /ts/ /č/ /š/ /w/ /kw/

is written

c before a and o, but qu before e and i z before a and o, but c before e and i tz ch x hu, but uh at the end of a syllable cu, but cuh, cu or uc at the end of a syllable

The transcription of /kw/ in final position (at the end of a syllable) varies according to the orthographic tradition preferred by individual scholars. Because cuh is a better match (c + uh) for the actual sequence of phonetic elements (/k/ + /w/) and is most common in Mexico and internationally in rendering names of prominent rulers and deities (e.g. Motecuhzoma, Mictlantecuhtli) it will be used here alongside the inverted spelling, uc, which is now the most common choice in academic publications. Incidentally, in Nahuatl orthography the u never represents a vowel (there is no /u/), but rather a /w/ or related labial element. A final point: the values assigned to glyphs are not intended to be abstract formulae or linguistic reductions. They should instead correspond, as closely as possible, to the way the indigenous users of the script meant the glyphs to be read, yet not filling in details more appropriately left to the transcription. In Nahuatl writing, vowel length (indicated by a macron—a

horizontal stroke over the vowel—as in ā) and the glottal stop (the sound we hear in the middle of, for example, Cockney English glo’al and bo’al for standard glottal and bottle, transcribed variously as h or , or as a grave accent, , over the preceding vowel) are not part of the phonetic values of signs. Logographic values, on the other hand, are tied to actual words, so a narrow transliteration of their values would include them, where such information is available. For many Aztec technical terms and names we lack this information, since the terms no longer exist or have never been recorded by linguists. For this reason it is practical to employ a broad transliteration that leaves off both vowel length and glottal stops. The logographic value will, nonetheless, be unambiguous where these details are known, just as comprehension of a Latin text is not hampered by the lack of macrons over long vowels in modern editions.

Numeration and color: painting with numbers Of the three graphic recording systems that we find around the world— iconography, notation, and writing—the latter is the youngest. All three exert an influence upon each other, but there is usually an unequal relationship among them. This is because writing tends to absorb notation, in particular numeration (that is, numerals and their rules of combination), as a semi-autonomous subset. In our own system, numerals are combined in ways distinct from letters. The numeral “32,” for example, is hierarchically arranged and equivalent to “thirty-two,” and is read as such, yet in German the same number is read as zweiunddreißig (literally “two-and-thirty,”— consider also the four-and-twenty blackbirds in one of our nursery rhymes) with the components reversed. In Aztec writing, and in the Nahuatl system as a whole, numbers are handled differently from logograms and phonograms. As a general rule, none of the numerals below twenty is distinguished by its own unique sign. Instead, a sequence of digits in the form of small (monochrome or individually colored) disks, each standing for the numeral 1, is the standard notational device for such numbers. Sometimes, a correct reading of the higher numbers is aided by grouping the disks in sets of five or, less commonly, four. These are most commonly seen accompanying day signs in the Aztec divinatory calendar, which consists of the numbers 1 to 13 combined with

20 day names in an eternally rotating dyadic cycle of 260 days (13 × 20) (Fig. 2.4). Four of these day names recur in the names of years in the solar calendar (Fig. 2.5), again combined with the numbers 1 to 13 in a cycle of 52 years (13 × 4). When a day from this series is used as a year name, it is frequently set together with its numerical coefficient within a square frame. Both the frame and the year are often painted turquoise or blue, a play on the fact that the Nahuatl words for year (xihuitl) and turquoise (xihuitl) are homophones.

2.4. Thirteen numbers accompanying twenty day signs in a section of the divinatory cycle (Codex Magliabechiano, f. 11r–13v).

2.5. The four rotating year names of the solar calendar (Codex Mendoza, f. 1v).

The numerals 1 to 13, when integrated into the writing system, are best treated as (compound) logograms and for that reason they are written in small capitals (e.g. CHICOME) when they are not simply represented by numeral signs (e.g. 7): CE OME EI NAHUI MACUILLI CHICUACE CHICOME CHICUEI CHICUHNAHUI/CHIUCNAHUI MATLACTLI MATLACTLONCE MATLACTLOMOME MATLACTLOMEI

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13

The numbers 1 to 10 can optionally take a special combining form that attaches to the following noun: (CE)CEM-, (O)OM-, (E)E-, (NA)NAUH-, (MA)MACUIL-, (CHI)CHICUACEM-, (CHI)CHIC(O)OM-, (CHI)CHICU(E)E-, (CHI)CHICUHNAUH- (or (CHI)CHIUCNAUH-), and (MA)MATLAC-. The simple bound form means the same as the free one, whereas the reduplicated form with its repeated initial syllable means “one each/every,” “two each,” etc., and is used in counting grouped items. The god of games, song, and dance, for example, is known by the calendrical name Macuilxochitl (“5 Flower”). When we cite Nahuatl dates, by the way, we should not use translations because names are not the same thing as words, even when we know the underlying meaning. So the day Macuilli Xochitl is best referred to as 5 Xochitl, rather than 5 Flower. Translations of names in this book will only

be included for the sake of clarification, and will be enclosed in parentheses to emphasize that point. Now let’s look at the series of day names in the divinatory calendar that we saw in Fig. 2.4, starting with the traditional first day of the cycle, Cipactli. The twenty day names are as follows. Those that can also name years are underlined: CIPACTLI EECATL CALLI CUETZPALIN COATL MIQUIZTLI MAZATL TOCHTLI ATL ITZCUINTLI OZOMATLI MALINALLI ACATL OCELOTL CUAUHTLI COZCACUAUHTLI OLIN TECPATL QUIYAHUITL XOCHITL

Dragon Wind House Lizard Serpent Death Deer Rabbit Water Dog Monkey Grass Reed Jaguar Eagle Vulture Movement Flint Rain Flower

Depending on scholars’ preferences, some of these names can be written with slightly variant forms (e.g. “Ehecatl,” “Quauhtli,” “Quiahuitl”), most of which derive from competing Spanish scribal traditions of the 16th century and have equal validity. A notable exception is “Ollin,” which is often seen, but is based on a misanalysis of the name and should be avoided. Further, note that some of the translations given here are arbitrary or simplified. A cipactli in everyday life was a run-of-the-mill crocodilian (a crocodile, alligator or caiman, depending on the region), whereas in its context as a supernatural beast, and as a day name, it was the equivalent of what in Eurasia is called a dragon. Moreover, Malinalli refers to a species of tall grass, not to grass in general. The literal translation of Olin is indeed “Movement,” but as a day name it refers specifically to seismic activity—

earthquakes (tlālōlīn). And finally, Tecpatl means “Flint(stone),” but can also be translated as “Flint Knife,” which is how it is represented. Exactly half of the day names belong to members of the animal kingdom, while the rest denote items of culture (Calli), nature (Atl), or natural phenomena (Olin, in connection with earthquakes). This means that animate and inanimate items in the series are equally balanced. The Spanish glosses that accompany Aztec dates often pluralize the names that follow the numbers, as if there are that many items as opposed to juxtapositions of a number series with a name series, as you would notice if you examined the handwritten Spanish translations accompanying Figs 2.4 and 2.5. The date written navi oçelotl (NAHUI OCELOTL) does not mean quatro tigres, or “Four Tigers,” but rather “4 Jaguar.” In Aztec and other 16th-century manuscripts we do find many instances in which numerical signs are not calendrical coefficients but indeed counters of the number of items they are attached to. This is common on tax lists and in historical accounts, indicating such things as how many instances of a particular product are due, or how many workers are available for a specific task, or, in one instance, how many prisoners were sacrificed. Three glyphs stand for base numbers in the Aztec vigesimal system (that is, one based on 20, rather than 10, as in our decimal system): a banner for 20, (CEN)TECPAN(TLI) (Fig. 2.6) a bottlebrush-like sign for 400 (20 × 20), (CEN)TZON(TLI) (Fig. 2.7) an incense bag for 8,000 (20 × 400), (CEN)XIQUIPIL(LI) (Fig. 2.8) In each of these logographic values, the numeral in parentheses should be replaced by the appropriate combinatory form of the numeral required by the specific context. If there are two banners, the value would be ONTECPANTLI, and so forth. This particular sign has been consistently misread in the academic literature to date: on the assumption that the value of the sign was the same as the term for “banner” in Nahuatl, it has been read PANTLI, backed up by the fact that numerals can indeed be combined with a numeral classifier of this shape. There are, however, problems with this. First, the term for “banner” in the Mexica dialect of Tenochtitlan was pānitl, not pāntli, and the term in the dialect of the cultural capital, Tetzcoco, was pāmitl. Second, the classifier pāntli refers to single units (a line, a ridge of a furrow, or a row), not general units of 20, as required by the glyphic contexts. The actual Nahuatl classifier represented by the BANNER sign is tecpāntli (from the verb tecpāna, “to line up, set in order”), which classifies units of 20. This is confirmed by the

alphabetic glosses in the Matrícula de Tributos, the Conquest-period source for the tax section of the Codex Mendoza. So the number of cacao bundles recorded in Fig. 2.6 is to be read MATLACTECPANTLI, “200” (that is, 10 × 20), not MATLACPANTLI, “10.” By extension, the BANNER sign can also be read (CEM)POHUAL(LI), the basic word for 20 without a classifier. In Fig. 2.7, the sign for 400 (20 × 20), (CEN)TZON(TLI), resembles a bottlebrush or fir tree but actually stands for a head of hair (tzontli). Finally, an incense pouch (xiquipilli) is the sign for 8,000 (20 × 400), which is read (CEN)XIQUIPIL(LI).

2.6. Tax items from the province of Cuetlaxtlan: 200 bundles (tlamāmālli) of cacao (cacahuatl), written MATLACTECPAN—TLAMAMALLI•CACAHUATL (Codex Mendoza, f. 49r).

2.7. 800 (2 × 400) conch shells, written ONTZONTLI TAPACHTLI, or simply ONTZONTAPACHTLI, from Cihuatlan (Codex Mendoza, f. 38r).

2.8. 8,000 bunches each of blue, red, and green precious feathers from the Gulf Coast province of Tochtepec: CENXIQUIPILLI—XIUHTOTOTL, CENXIQUIPILLI—TLAUHQUECHOL, CENXIQUIPILLI—TZINITZCAN (Codex Mendoza, f. 46r). Color is an important distinguishing factor in Aztec writing. Here each color identifies the kind of bird whose feathers are to be submitted: blue for the cotinga (xiuhtōtōtl), red for the roseate spoonbill (tlāuhquechōl), and green for the mountain trogon (tzinitzcan). Size is also a key factor in the Aztec system: if the green feathers had been at least a third longer, the final glyph would have had to be read CENXIQUIPILLI— QUETZALLI “8,000 feathers of the quetzal (quetzaltōtōtl).”

In the Codex Telleriano-Remensis, the number of individuals sacrificed at the inauguration of the Great Temple of Huitzilopochtli and Tlaloc in Tenochtitlan is tallied on folio 39r (Fig. 2.9). Under the blue-framed year CHICUEI (8) ACATL, roughly correlating to our year 1487, we see the emperor Ahuitzotl, who had ascended the throne in the previous year, presiding over the sacrificial ceremonies. Sacrificial candidates from three defeated citystates (represented by chalk-covered figures holding and wearing paper ornaments—symbols of soldiers dedicated to a ritual death) mill about beneath the temple stairs. Below them are two incense pouches (2 × 8,000) and two rows of five HAIR glyphs (10 × 400). Taken together, these yield a sacrificial total of ONXIQUIPILLI [IHUAN, “and”] MATLACTZONTLI (that is, 20,000). Note that the scene skillfully blends iconography (the larger framework) and hieroglyphics (name glyphs, and the inner sequence linking the date by thick black connectors to three further glyphs; see Chapter 3 for further details).

2.9. Inauguration of the Great Temple of Tenochtitlan in 1487 (Codex Telleriano-Remensis, f. 39r). The emperor Ahuitzotl (“Water Beast”) watches as symbolic figures representing sacrificial candidates from various named polities arrive. The total number of captives sacrificed is given in the bottom right-hand corner.

As mentioned above, a numeral is read with its reduplicated value when it means “[number] each”; for example, MAMACUIL-, “five each,” as opposed to MACUIL-, “five.” In the tax records of the Aztec Empire, as preserved in the Matrícula de Tributos and the Codex Mendoza, lengths of cloth are indicated by a FINGER glyph standing for the Nahuatl measure mātl (literally “hand, arm”). The same measure applied to land boundaries and ground plans is represented instead by a HAND glyph. Although this was envisioned as the distance from the tip of a raised arm to the toes of the opposite foot, the mātl is thought to have been standardized at approximately 2.5 meters (8¼ feet) in length. When single digits (the term comes aptly from Latin digitus, “finger”) pop up alongside other numerical glyphs in the tax records, it is a mātl-length of cloth that is indicated. In Fig. 2.10 two cloth signs are topped by the HAIR sign, indicating that 400 (CENTZONTLI) bundles of each design are to be delivered to the capital, while the two finger signs flanking this stipulate that the cloth is to be OMMATL (“2 mātl”) in length.

2.10. 2 × 400 bundles of cloth 2 mātl in length (400 per design) to be submitted as part of the tax paid by the province of Tepecuacuilco (Codex Mendoza, f. 37r).

Arranging and ordering signs The first thing we need to do before we can start reading Aztec glyphs is to establish the framework and consider the order in which the elements in a composite glyph are to be read. Many signs consist of, or include, elements that have a face (such as an animal head) or face in a particular direction (such as a building). Since Nahuatl writing is largely name-based and notelike, the majority of non-calendrical glyphs occur as names and terms for people and places. When referring to a person, a glyph or series of glyphs tends to face in the same direction as the individual it is connected to. Connectors are usually short lines that link the back or top of someone’s head to the naming elements. The glyphs appear to trail behind, hover above, or, very rarely, float in front of the person like a helium balloon (Fig. 2.11).

2.11. Aztec judges and their titles (from right): mixcōātlaīlōtlac, ezhuahuacatl, ācatlīyacapanēcatl, tequīxquināhuacatl (Codex Mendoza, f. 68r).

The connected individuals are normally portrayed in a standard pose: standing, walking, running, fleeing, fighting, or sitting with their feet in front of them (in the case of men or deities) or tucked under them (in the case of women). A ruler’s name glyph may be attached to the throne rather

than to its occupant. Similarly, when a place glyph is directly linked to a person, the latter will either stand on the glyph in question or be connected to it at the foot. When a connector separates one glyph or glyphic element from another, we are dealing with a separation of categories such as name and rank (Fig. 2.12a), name and place (see Fig. 1.17), event and place (Fig. 2.9), event and year (again, Fig. 2.9), or, rarely, of morphemes (units of meaning; Fig. 2.13) and syntactical units (once again Fig. 2.9; see also Fig. 3.39). A short connector is also frequently employed to link a deceased ruler to his successor, while longer lines show family relationships, linking husband and wife (and these to their children, where present). Connectors between glyphs can be transliterated as an em dash (—).

2.12. a) Acamapichtli (“Handful of Reed Arrows,” written ACA•MAPICHTLI) of Tenochtitlan in the year he acquired the prime-ministerial office of cihuācōātl (lit., “female serpent,” written CIHUA•COATL; Codex Mendoza, f. 2v); b) successive rulers of Tlatelolco: Cuauhtlatoa (“He Speaks Like an Eagle,” written CUAUH2-TLATOA) and the much-maligned Moquihuix (probably a foreign name, written phonetically in abbreviation as oc•ihui2; Codex Mendoza, f. 19r). The latter is a graphic pun on these signs’ logographic values, OC, “wine” (foam as hair) and IHUINTI(C), “drunk” (indicated by the wine god’s golden nose-plug)!

2.13. Morphemic connectors: OXI—tlan, HUITZ—tlan, YAO—NAHUAC2. for the place names Oxitlan (“By the Unguent”), Huitztlan (“By the Thorns”), and Yaonahuac (“Near the Enemy”) (Codex Mendoza, f. 46r, 47r, 51r).

Occasionally, when the opportunity arises, a glyph for a name, title, profession or status may be merged with the person it refers to, or with a classifier—a semantic complement (see pp. 74–78)—for the same. We see this in Fig. 2.12a, where the title cihuācōātl, written CIHUA•COATL, sprouts from the head of Acamapichtli. A further instance of this is the title mixcōātl (“cloud serpent”), written as part of the sequence MIX•COATL-MAN —.TECUHTLI, in which the title emerges from a male classifier (Fig. 2.14a), as does the title tēzcacōācatl on the following page of the Mendoza. The title mixcōātl is repeated by a unitary logogram below—a variant of the same split-feather device, the aztaxelli, that we see in the title of the head judge at the right of Fig. 2.11. The diadem connected to the classifier represents the title tēcuhtli (or tēuctli), “lord,” an abbreviation in this case for the more specific title tlācatēcuhtli (tlācatēuctli) “lord of men (literally, people).” However, since the male head can function both as a classifier and as a logogram with the values TLACA(TL) “person, man” and OQUICH(TLI) “man,” this may be another instance of graphic syllepsis.

2.14. a) The title mixcōātl merged with the MAN classifier and repeated with an alternate glyph below (Codex Mendoza, f. 17v); b) Queen Atotoztli (“Water Parrot”) with an abbreviation of her name flowing down her hair and back (Codex Telleriano-Remensis, f. 29v).

I introduced you in Chapter 1 to a queen by the name of Atotoztli. Her name, which seems to mean “Water Parrot,” is drastically abbreviated in Fig. 2.14b, so much so that one could be forgiven for assuming that the single element retained, the WATER glyph, is actually just a stream of water flowing down her freshly washed hair. This element, read A. or a. (that is, logographically and/or phonetically, since the sign has both functions and both are relevant here), is attached to the queen’s head because ā-, “water” is homophonous with ā-, “top of the head.” A glyphic element may be minimal and reduced to the head of a person or creature (as in the day names of Fig. 2.4), a reduction known as pars pro toto (a part for the whole). The opposite process, totum pro parte (a whole for a part), is evident when something difficult to depict is embedded in a larger graphic context. We can see an instance of this in the SHOULDER glyph (Fig. 2.15), a phonetic sign read acol that derives its value from Nahuatl àcol-, “shoulder.” The shoulder is indicated only by the projecting bone, a feature that serves to distinguish the glyph from the ARM sign, MA2, “capture, catch, hunt.”

2.15. The SHOULDER sign, inspired by the Nahuatl word for “shoulder,” in the place name Acolnahuac (“Near the Curve of the Water[’s Edge]”) written acol•nahua./NAHUAC (Codex Mendoza, f. 17v).

For aesthetic or cultural reasons, elements of glyphic scripts may be arranged in a non-linguistic order that would appear to impede reading. This is often the case with the way the names and titles of Egyptian pharaohs are recorded in cartouches. For the throne name of the 19thdynasty pharaoh Merenptah, for example, which is conventionally transcribed Ba en Re [or Ra], mery Amun, “Soul of Re, Beloved of Amun,” there are no fewer than four distinct sign orders—Re-Amun-mery-ba-en, mery2-Amun-Re-ba-en, ba-en-Re-Amun-mery, and Re-ba-en-Amunmery2—none of which reflects the actual linguistic sequence. We are so used to spelling rules and a fixed arrangement of elements in a sentence that we often feel that a different ordering would obscure or prevent recognition of the intended meaning. Here again, context is key. We are all too familiar with typing errors, such as when we type “teh” for “the” or “adn” for “and,” but these do not usually affect our ability to unravel the correct reading. Within a given context, as in the case of pharaohs’ names and titles, the identity of the jumbled word or words is generally clear enough. Experiments with European languages have demonstrated that scrambled texts can be deciphered, often with only minor reduction in the speed of comprehension, so long as the first sign remains in place. However, not even this is necessary. You can judge this for yourself by reading the following sentence. Despite the fact that these words are quite short, you should have little or no difficulty understanding it. Fi yuo acn reda iths, eth poitn ahs bnee maed. Let’s now see how this would have worked with a series of Aztec place names. The context would be clear to the reader not only because logographic elements in place glyphs, such as those for “town” or “mountain,” recur over and over again and, thus, are easily recognized, but also because such elements will tend to be more frequent in one position within a place name than in another. An element meaning “town,” for example, would be expected in initial position in a Mixtec place name, even though it appears at the base of a place glyph. Neither in Mixtec nor in Aztec glyphic compounds is there a fixed reading order from top to bottom, and the reverse is quite common, especially if the placement of elements works better, or is more aesthetically pleasing, in one particular arrangement. In Fig. 2.16 several place glyphs are compared and

contrasted. The place names behind the glyphs all end in the postposition tlān, “by, in, among,” and yet each puts the phonogram for the latter—the TEETH sign—in a different position relative to the logogram for the lexical morpheme (the noun). In the context of place glyphs, the TEETH sign rarely stands for a non-final element in the underlying name, and so the reading order of the elements in such place glyphs is largely predictable.

2.16. Variable positioning of a graphic element for a final morpheme in a glyphic compound: -tlān, written tlan (the TEETH sign), in the place names a) Mixtlan (“In the Clouds”); b) Mazatlan (“By the Deer”); c) Teciuhtlan (“In the Hail”); and d) Atlan (“In the Water”) (Codex Mendoza, f. 46r, 47r, 51r, 54r).

Even in cases where the individual elements could represent morphemes or syllables in various parts of a word or name, context and oral tradition would once have supplied the correct reading. Compare the glyphs in Fig. 2.17. The illustrations come from successive pages in the Codex Cozcatzin and have one glyph in common—the glyph above the seated noble in the right-hand column in Fig. 2.17a, and the one in the left-hand column in Fig. 2.17b. However, each is read differently, dependent on the context. The first is in the column for landowners and is read upwards as TECPAN-CIHUA(TL), designating a lord by the name of Tecpancihuatl (“Woman of the Palace”). The second, situated in the column for place names, is read downwards as CIHUA-TECPAN2 and names land in an area known as Cihuatecpan (“Women’s Palace”).

2.17. One compound glyph, two reading orders: a) the personal name written TECPANCIHUA(TL); b) the place name written CIHUA-TECPAN2 (Codex Cozcatzin, pp. 9, 10).

Tecpancihuatl might seem like an odd name for a man, but we are not familiar with the circumstances surrounding his birth and childhood that might have influenced the choice of name. Nahuatl naming has many surprises in store for us, not least of which are rulers called Cuitlahua (apparently, “He Has Excrement,” perhaps a reference to having been born in a meconium-soiled state) and Ayactlacatl (“Nobody,” as in “Nobody is king of Cuauhtitlan”!). You will note that the HOUSE element in Fig. 2.17b lacks the distinctive row of white disks on a black border that serves as the identifying feature of a palace. In such instances, we speak of glyphic variants—slightly varying forms of the same glyph that share the same value. When there is a radical or complete difference in form between two glyphs sharing the same value, it is more appropriate to speak of glyphic alternates. Orientation is another feature of the script that is unusual in comparative perspective. In Fig. 2.12b we saw the name glyph for Moquihuix, the king of Tlatelolco, Tenochtitlan’s sister city. In the Mexica civil war of 1473, Moquihuix lost to Axayacatl of Tenochtitlan. The final act, shown in Fig. 2.18, took place atop the pyramid of Tlatelolco’s burning Great Temple, when he plunged to his death (arguably with a helping hand from his victorious neighbor). His name glyph, like a loyal servant, shares his fate and hurtles alongside in the same headlong orientation. This is typical. Glyphs share the orientation of their referents. In the case of a lowly thief (ichtecqui), stoned to death as punishment, the glyph for his occupation lies prone beside his head on the ground (Fig. 2.19). The compound sign,

consisting of a skein of maguey-fiber (īch-) rope that an obsidian blade neatly severs (tequi), is purely phonetic: ich•tequi.

2.18. Moquihuix rushing with his name glyph towards an ignominious fate (Codex Mendoza, f. 10r), while Axayacatl presides over the compound glyph MITL•CHIMALLI, “arrows [and] shield,” a kenning for war.

2.19. The glyph for “thief” (ich•tequi) lies prone beside the stoned culprit it labels (Codex Mendoza, f. 71r).

Dimensionality—where size matters In Aztec writing, the size of a glyph relative to others has an impact on the reading. In a folio from the Codex Mendoza we see a list of towns conquered by the emperor Motecuhzoma I Ilhuicamina in the mid-15th century (Fig. 2.20). At first glance, it looks like the town of Atotonilco (“By the Heated Waters”), in the top right-hand corner, rebelled and needed to be reconquered later in his reign. This is suggested by the fact that Atotonilco appears again at bottom left, and is glossed as such. But all is not what it seems. The scribe who wrote the glosses failed to notice, or take into account, the difference in dimension between the two place glyphs. The

first is standard-sized, whereas the second is twice the size of its neighbors. When this happens, the adjective huēi, “large, great,” is part of the reading of the enlarged sign. The second glyph is actually the name for a separate town, Hueiatotonilco—known today as Atotonilco el Grande.

2.20. The semantics of size: Atotonilco vs. Hueiatotonilco (Codex Mendoza, f. 8r).

Two other glyphs from the Codex Mendoza are contrasted in this manner. As accompanying glosses confirm, in the first instance (Fig. 2.21a) the four swirling elements stand for a span of four days (NAUHILHUITL) following the birth of a child, whereas in the second instance (Fig. 2.21b) they represent a span of eighty days (that is, four twenty-day METZTLI2, or “months”), a tax period.

2.21. a) The DAY sign ILHUITL, “day, feast day”; b) the enlarged DAY sign has the values CEMPOHUALILHUITL, “20 days,” and METZTLI2, “20-day month” (Codex Mendoza, f. 57r, 19r).

Abbreviation Latin inscriptions provide us with many excellent examples of abbreviation, a practice that has come down to us in much the same form. Words are clipped by dropping all but the initial letter or letters, or by removing letters at different points beyond the initial. On the façade of the Pantheon in Rome the following inscription (without the letters in square brackets) has been on prominent display for close to two thousand years: M[ARCVS]•AGRIPPA•L[VCII]•F[ILIVS]•CO[N]S[VL]•TERTIVM•F ECIT

“Marcus Agrippa, son of Lucius, consul for the third time, built it.” Aztec writing functions in much the same way. Many signs, simple and compound, abbreviate the spellings of Nahuatl words and names. The Codex Aubin (Fig. 2.22) contrasts Spanish-based alphabetic abbreviation with the Aztec practice. This is an example of a biscript—a text in two writing systems. Four migration-period leaders of the Mexitin (the later Mexica) are named in abbreviated alphabetic form and also in hieroglyphs that render the same names. Spanish (and other European) writing usually adds a full stop at the end of a word that has been abbreviated. In transliterating Aztec writing, full stops are inserted at all points where part of a word or name is omitted. The names (in standardized orthography) and their biscriptual abbreviations are as follows:

2.22. Alphabetic and hieroglyphic abbreviations for the names of four migration-period Mexitin leaders (Codex Aubin, f. 4r). Name: Sp. abbrev.: Az. abbrev.:

Cuauhcoatl quauh. CUAUH2COATL

Apanecatl apane. A-pan.

Tezcacoacatl tezca TEZCA-COA.

Chimalman chimal. CHIMAL.

There are clear differences in the way each system abbreviates. The alphabetic abbreviations reduce three of the names to their first morpheme, except in the case of Apanecatl (“The One From Apan, Riverside”). The hieroglyphic abbreviations, on the other hand, reduce to the initial morpheme only in the case of Chimalman (“She Laid Out a Shield”). The name of the first leader, Cuauhcoatl (“Eagle Serpent”), is written in full, whereas those of the second and third are merely lacking a derivational suffix—unless the name of the third is actually to be read TEZCA-COATL (“Mirror Serpent”), as in other alphabetic sources, instead of as an abbreviation of the title tēzcacōācatl (“The One From Tezcacoac, At the Place of the Mirror Serpent”). Most often in Aztec writing, and in the Nahuatl system in general, the initial section is retained, but there are a number of instances in which this, like other sections, can be dropped. This means that any section of a word or name may be subject to abbreviation. Two such examples of initial abbreviation appear in a list of high officials in the Codex Mendoza (Fig. 2.23), most of them derived from the names of places associated with their seats of office. The title ticocyahuacatl (“The One From Ticocyahuac [obscure but probably from an original Teconquiyahuac, At Pottery Gate]”) is written in drastically reduced form as oc, a phonogram derived from the frothy logogram OC(TLI), “pulque, wine,” while tocuiltēcatl (literally, “The One From Tocuillan, By the Place of Trumpets”) is reduced to ocuil (a value derived from the logogram OCUIL(IN), “worm, caterpillar”).

2.23. Two high-ranking officials of the Aztec state with abbreviated glyphs for their titles ticocyahuacatl and tocuiltēcatl (Codex Mendoza, f. 65r).

Classifiers—semantic complements In many languages there is a special type of word, the so-called classifier, that marks an item, especially a numbered one, as belonging to a particular category or class. In Indonesian, for example, orang, ekor, or buah is inserted between a numeral, such as se-, “one,” or empat, “four,” and a term for a human, animal, or thing, respectively (as in seorang guru, “one teacher,” and empat buah buku, “four books”). Similarly, in Nahuatl we have tetl (literally, “stone”) for roundish items (now a general classifier, even for people, as in centetl tlācatl, “one person”), tlamantli (“layer”) for layered or stacked items, and ōlōtl (“shelled corncob”) for corncobs, cacao pods, and the like. As in Indonesian, they are quite arbitrary and not strictly applied. Egyptologist Angela McDonald has argued persuasively that the linguistic term “classifier” is inexact in relation to writing systems. That is because in written, as opposed to spoken, language there is a special type of classifier that is not simply the written equivalent of the spoken one but is rather a silent semantic reference with no correspondence in the spoken language. This type is known in Mesopotamian cuneiform and Egyptian hieroglyphic studies as a determinative, and in Sinology as a radical. While in the former a determinative is a free-standing sign placed beside a logogram or phonetic sequence, in Chinese a radical is a bound semantic

element placed within a compound sign, the so-called character, alongside a phonetic element that aids in ascertaining the pronunciation of the word in question. In spoken Chinese, for example, there is a singular third-person pronoun, tā, that is invariable, regardless of whether it refers to a man, a woman, a deity, or an animal or thing. By contrast, in contemporary written Chinese we have four separate signs, one for each context, although the pronunciation remains the same. The first is in its origin a single-element logogram, whereas the other three share a phonetic element ( ) but are differentiated semantically by the radicals (“woman”), (“person”), and (“cult”): [“it”], [“she”], [“he”] and [“divine being”]. Unlike a logogram, which has both a semantic value (that is, the meaning of a specific word) and an associated phonetic value (that is, the sound or sequence of sounds for the word in question), a classifier of this type has a semantic association only, and often an arbitrary one at that. Such a classifier is best referred to as a semantic complement—an element that adds a semantic reference or association not already contained in, or intended by, a neighboring (or compounded) sign or signs. The towns of Huitzilopochco and Coyohuacan (now Churubusco, Mexico’s Hollywood, and Coyoacán, once home to Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, respectively, both communities part of the urban sprawl of today’s Mexico City) were once nestled on the sweet-water banks of what was in Aztec times an extensive lacustrine environment in the Valley of Mexico. Their glyphs reflect this idyllic situation, although the names do not (Fig. 2.24). Huitzilopochco (“By [the Temple of] Huitzilopochtli”), abbreviated in writing to HUITZIL.LAKE, is named after the patron deity of the Mexica, Huitzilopochtli (“Hummingbird Sorcerer”). Neither in his name nor in the name of the town is there any reference to water, much less a lake. The same is true for Coyohuacan (“Where There Are Coyotes”), the glyph of which reads COYO.LAKE. In both cases we are dealing with a semantic complement, LAKE.

2.24. Place names set against the backdrop of a lake: a) Huitzilopochco (Codex Mendoza, f. 20r) and b) Coyohuacan (Codex Xolotl, Sheet 3).

In compounded place glyphs the most common semantic complement is the MOUNTAIN element, which is identical to the logogram TEPE(TL), “mountain, hill,” but serves as a general classifier for toponyms. In this function, the Aztec sign reflects the fact that towns in Central Mexico were frequently situated beside or on mountains and that the very word for an autonomous city or town, āltepētl, includes the term. As a semantic complement, this bifunctional sign is of quite varied frequency. Indeed, its relative prevalence is, at least in part, a regional phenomenon. On the tax sheet for the province of Huaxtepec, for example, we have a sequence of four place glyphs with the MOUNTAIN element, only one of which—the second—employs it as a logogram read TEPE. (Fig. 2.25).

2.25. The MOUNTAIN element in the place glyphs of Huaxtepec province (Codex Mendoza, f. 24v).

The first king of Tenochtitlan, Acamapichtli, celebrated victories in the late 14th and early 15th centuries over four city-states in the sweet-water zone of Lake Metztliapan (see Fig. 1.1) in the Valley of Mexico and across the mountains to the south. The Codex Mendoza records the affiliation of each group of sacrificed captives by connecting the glyph for the relevant polity with the semantic complement CAPTIVE (Fig. 2.26a).

2.26. a) Sacrificed captives (recorded downwards) from the towns of Cuauhnahuac, Mizquic, Cuitlahuac, and Xochimilco (Codex Mendoza, f. 2v); b) captives from Tlaxcallan, Cholollan, and Huexotzinco (Codex Mendoza, f. 42r).

As a logogram, the double-feather device (tēmalli, tīmalli) attached to the hair is read TEMAL(LI), “[badge of] honor,” and MAL(LI), “captive” (plural, MALTIN), while as a phonogram it is recorded with the derivative values temal, mal and maltin (for the name Martín). In Fig. 2.26a we have the same element in combination with a male head, each with the mouth area painted red and, for the most part, with closed eyes as a mark of death. The sign serves in this context as a classifier that converts the glyph for a specific town or polity into a gentilic—a glyph naming a member or members of the population of that town or polity. The victories recorded for the reign of Acamapichtli include captives taken in the towns of Cuauhnahuac (“Near the Trees”), Mizquic (“By the Mesquite Trees”), Cuitlahuac (“Where There Is Excrement” [?!]), and Xochimilco (“In the Fields of Flowers”), all of them located in the sweet-water zone of the lower lake system in the Valley of Mexico and across the mountains to the south. This set of glyphs is written in downward sequence as CUAUH•NAHUAC—CAPTIVE, MIZQUI.—CAPTIVE, CUITLA.WATERWAY—CAPTIVE, and XOCHI-MIL.—CAPTIVE. In these transliterations, the full stop indicates a missing element and the interpunct (•) a merging of the previous named element with the next. In the third, the semantic complement WATERWAY has been added because the island town once lay midstream in a narrow passage of water connecting two sections of the lake system. The

malodorous place name itself may refer to fertilization or have some other significance now lost to us. In Fig. 2.26b, prisoners of war taken more than a century later are listed as tax items to be sent at regular intervals to Tenochtitlan from the frontier province of Tepeyacac. These were won in highly ritualized engagements fought periodically between the Aztec empire and nearby independent states to the east in the so-called xōchiyāōyōtl, or “flowery war.” In downward sequence we have the glyphs for Tlaxcallan, Cholollan, and Huexotzinco, each connected to a male head. The first two have the same double-feather device that we saw above. However, in the Matrícula de Tributos, the model for this section of the Codex Mendoza, the CAPTIVE element is also present on the third. All three heads are distinguished from one another by the presence or absence of a headband, lip plug, and chin ornament, or combination of these. Each of these is a further semantic complement, ETHNIC, which is actually a small subcategory of complements (in head or full-figure form) for particular ethnic groups. It is important to note that the alphabetic glosses confirm the reading of these glyphic sequences as gentilics: TLAXCAL.—CAPTIVE-ETHNIC1, “Tlaxcalteca,” CHOLOL. —CAPTIVE-ETHNIC2, “Chololteca,” and HUEXO-tzin.—ETHNIC3, “Huexotzinca.” The transcribed values can be understood as singular (e.g. Huexōtzincatl) or plural (Huexōtzincà), as context demands. In English the same form is used for both. In addition to MOUNTAIN, LAKE, WATERWAY, CAPTIVE, and several ETHNIC classifiers, semantic complements also include: BABY, MAN, MAIDEN (an unmarried woman), WOMAN (distinguished from MAIDEN by two upturned tufts of hair), OLD_MAN, OLD_WOMAN, DECEASED_MAN, DECEASED_WOMAN, WIDOW, WIDOWER, HOUSE, LAND, STONE, and MAT. The various human classifiers are common in census records and in lists of workers and professions.

Semantic and phonetic indicators In contrast to a semantic complement, which adds information to a sign or sequence, a semantic indicator is an element that repeats, and thus reinforces, information contained in a neighboring (or compounded) sign or signs. Nahuatl writing has some rather colorful instances of semantic indicators. The name of the town Cozcacuauhtenanco (“At the Walls of the

King Vulture”) is one example. The corresponding glyph (Fig. 2.27a) depicts a king vulture above, and linked by a short connector to, parapets— to all appearances a straightforward logographic compound. However, on closer inspection we detect a jeweled necklace (cōzcatl) adorning the vulture. This would not necessarily be of significance, were it not for the fact that the term for “king vulture” in Nahuatl is cōzcacuāuhtli, literally “necklace eagle.” The unusual thing here is that the sign for “king vulture” is not a compound of NECKLACE and EAGLE but rather of NECKLACE and KING_VULTURE. The addition of the necklace is intended as a semantic indicator that reinforces the value of the avian logogram. The entire glyphic compound is thus written COZCACOZCACUAUH-TENAN., with the semantic indicator in superscript small capitals.

2.27. Semantic indicators in the glyphs for the towns of a) Cozcacuauhtenanco (“At the Walls of the King Vulture”; Codex Mendoza, f. 13r); b) Epazoyocan (“Where There Are a Lot of Epazote Herbs”; Codex Mendoza, f. 22r); c) Mictlan (“By the Dead”; Codex Mendoza, f. 43r); d) Tecpan (“Palace”; Codex Mendoza, f. 5v); e) Teopantlan (“By the Temple”; Codex Mendoza, f. 42r); and f) Tonatiuhco (“In the Sun”; Codex Mendoza, f. 34r).

The town of Epazoyocan (“Where There Are a Lot of Epazote Herbs”) is represented by a compound glyph (Fig. 2.27b), written EPAEPAZO., that would appear to have more to do with a skunk (epatl) than with herbs, given the larger size of the mammal in the compound. However, the skunk

is merely a semantic indicator, reinforcing the reading of the logogram for the derivative term epazōtl, “epazote,” a pungent herb used in seasoning. In the glyph for Mictlan (“By the Dead”; Fig. 2.27c), written MICMIC., a skull (the logogram for the verb mic-, “die”) serves as a semantic indicator for the mummy bundle, the logogram for mic(qui), “dead,” with values MIC(QUI) and MICQUE. Whereas the semantic indicators in the previous three instances were either positioned below or beside the logogram being reinforced, in the place sign for Tecpan (“Palace”; Fig. 2.27d) it lies atop the PALACE logogram: TECTECPAN. The diadem, read TEC(UH) (or TE(U)C), “lord,” is there to support the value TECPAN of the PALACE sign. In similar fashion, the solar half-disk in the glyph for Teopantlan (“By the Temple”; Fig. 2.27e) reinforces the logographic value of the stepped pyramid, the typical base for Aztec temples. The half-disk, a logogram read TEO(TL), “deity, divine,” is resplendent in the glyphs of seven different sites named in the Codex Mendoza. It should be distinguished from a full solar disk, which, in addition to the values TONATIUH, “sun” (as in the glyph for Tonatiuhco, Fig. 2.27f) and TEO2(TL), can be read TLACA2, “(at) midday” (see Chapter 3, Adverbs, pp. 97–98). Teopantlan is, thus, written TEO TEOPAN., lacking only the TEETH element for the postposition. A more complicated use of the SUN sign manifests itself in the name glyph (Fig. 2.28) of Tlacateotl, king of Tlatelolco, who was assassinated by order of Maxtla, usurper of the throne of Azcapotzalco, in or around 1427. One of the scribes responsible for the alphabetic glosses in the Codex Telleriano-Remensis failed to grasp the hieroglyphic information contained in this iconographic-hieroglyphic composition. Seeing a solar disk above Tlacateotl’s head and mistaking the dark element along the lower rim of the disk for a related phenomenon in the heavens, he surmised that the compound was the depiction of a solar eclipse, and that the king was standing on land darkened by the eclipse. Nothing could be further from the intent of the indigenous scribe who painted the composition. The “eclipsed land” is simply the hieroglyph for the king’s capital, Mexico Tlatelolco, the sister city of powerful Mexico Tenochtitlan. The place name refers to a settlement “on (-co) a round (-ol-) hillock (tlatel-),” and that is what we see in the place glyph, TLATEL•OL2., below his feet.

2.28. Tlacateotl of Tlatelolco (Codex Telleriano-Remensis, f. 31r).

The supposed eclipse of the sun above the king’s head is simply a rendition of his name, which means “God (teōtl) at Midday (tlàcà),” a reference to the Central Mexican sun god Tonatiuh, or to the specifically Mexica deity Huitzilopochtli in his solar aspect. The glyph has two values, each corresponding to an element in the king’s name. What’s unusual is the fact that not one but possibly both values are to be read here. This feature, which I have dubbed graphic syllepsis, will be discussed in detail in Chapter 4 (Phoneticism, pp. 136–41). As for the glyphic element at the lower rim of the sun disk, it is the STONE sign, which has a logographic value, TE(TL), and a derivative phonetic value, te. A phonetic sign or signs accompanying a logogram, and adding to the value of the latter, is known as a phonetic complement and transliterated with uncials before or after the logogram as required by context. By contrast, a phonetic sign that adds nothing to the logogram but instead points to the correct reading of the logogram is known as a phonetic indicator and is transliterated in superscript characters. Depending on how the STONE element functions in Tlacateotl’s name glyph, we end up with two quite different analyses. If we understand it to be a phonetic complement, the transliteration would have to be TLACA2-te., with the SUN element read solely as TLACA2, “at midday,”

and the second half of the name (teōtl) abbreviated to te. If, however, we detect graphic syllepsis at play in the glyphic compound, which would mean that both of the logographic values of the SUN element are active, we would have to regard STONE as a phonetic indicator and transliterate the compound accordingly as TLACA2+teTEO2(TL). An argument can be made for each of these alternatives. Here, the plus sign identifies the two logographic values in the compound as coming from the same element, simultaneously applied. On this sunny note we can end the presentation of the general principles underlying Nahuatl writing and now proceed to an overview of hieroglyphic grammar.

Exercise From various provinces come the following tax items and quantities. How many of each item is required and how is this expressed? 1. The first item is a bundle of bamboo (otlatl) poles from which spears (tlacochtli) are to be fashioned.

2. The following items are (a) jingle bells (coyolli), (b) axes (tepoztli), (c) bowls of a yellow stone (tecozahuitl) used in dying and painting, (d) jars of wild honey (cuauhnēcuhtli/cuauhnēuctli), (e) bags of cochineal (nōcheztli), and (f) blankets (cuāchtli). Note that when a bag (xiquipilli) is literally involved, and depicted as such, it is not to be understood in its numerical

sense. In the latter instance, the glyph of an incense pouch is used (as above). What do the fingers above the blanket glyph indicate?

3. In this detail from f. 2r of the Codex Mendoza you see the founding fathers of Tenochtitlan residing in the four quarters of the capital. Their names are, in normalized spelling and clockwise from the left center outwards: Tenoch (“Rock Cactus Fruit”), Xocoyol (“Foot Jingles”), Metzineuh (“He Has Cast Down the Agave”), Acacitli (“Reed Hare”), Ocelopan (“Jaguar Banner”), Cuauhpan/Cuappan (“Eagle Banner”), Ahuexotl (“Water Willow”), Xomimitl (“Foot Dart”), Atototl (“Water Bird”), and Xiuhcaque (“He’s Got Turquoise Sandals”). The Spanish annotator has made a couple of mistakes. Can you find the misidentified individuals by comparing the meanings of their names with the elements in their glyphs? Some glyphic elements occur more than once. How many of them can you tentatively relate to part of the Nahuatl names?

Chapter 3

An Essential Hieroglyphic Grammar Nouns As labels for material and immaterial things, such as those represented by the day names Itzcuintli (“Dog”), Miquiztli (“Death”), Quiyahuitl (“Rain”), and Olin (“Movement”), nouns are the unit of language that we come across most often in Aztec writing. For the most part, such glyphs represent proper nouns, that is, names for persons and places, but also dates, titles, professions, and social categories. Persons so named may be human or divine. We encounter nominal (that is, noun) glyphs as the names of rulers and other nobles, in which case they usually occur as compounds— combinations of noun + noun, or noun + verb). Names of commoners are frequently composed of a single nominal (noun) element, e.g. Yaotl (“Soldier”) or Xochitl (“Flower”), while those of the nobility tend to have two elements, one of which may be verbal, e.g. Chalchiuhnenetl (“Jade Doll”) or Xiuhtlatonac (“He Has Shone Like Turquoise”). Nahuatl nouns belong to two formal categories: animate (for beings and a few things the Aztecs considered capable of self-movement, such as stars, mountains, and sometimes stones) and inanimate (for everything else). Animate nouns can be individualized and take a plural, whereas inanimates cannot—they are treated collectively. A noun logogram stands for a simple or compound lexeme (a word together with its variant forms, such as bluebird and bluebirds for the noun BLUEBIRD, or live, lives, and lived for the verb LIVE), and its values reflect this. The Akkadian logogram corresponds, for example, to four contextually different forms of the noun šarrum, “king”: šarrum, “king (subj.)” šar, “king of”

šarram, “king (obj.)” šarrim, “of the king” In Aztec writing, the values of the noun logogram can be represented by the following formula:

(RDP)STEM(SG/PL) The abbreviation (RDP) indicates the possibility of reduplication—doubling up the initial consonant and lengthening the following vowel of the word, or of the main element in a compound. This is an optional but fairly common feature of plurals, but from time to time it can occur as an emotive element in a singular form, e.g. Mimich (from mich-, “fish”). STEM refers to the lexemic base—that is, the unchanging core of a word (e.g. Spanish gat-, “cat,” or habl-, “speak”). Let’s take a representative example—the Aztec sign for GRASSHOPPER:

3.1. The GRASSHOPPER sign and its values.

The stem of the noun GRASSHOPPER is chapol-, corresponding to the logographic value CHAPOL. This is the form we encounter when it is the first constituent in a compound (e.g. Chapoltepēc, “On Grasshopper Mountain,” written CHAPOL-TEPE.). In the singular, the nominal ending (or suffix) -in is added: thus, we have CHAPOLIN. The great majority of Nahuatl nouns, however, take a variant form of the suffix -tli, which becomes -li after an l, and -tl after a vowel: thus, logographic TOCHIN or TOCHTLI, “rabbit,” CALLI, “house,” and ACATL, “reed.” The plural, on the other hand, is characterized by alternative suffixes, with or without reduplication: -tin (only after a consonant) -mè (after a consonant or a vowel), and - ` (the glottal stop—after a vowel, but not represented in the script) Depending on the local variety of Nahuatl, we could end up with the following plural forms: chapoltin, chāchapoltin, chapolmè, or chāchapolmè, “grasshoppers.” Of these suffixes, the first is most common in Classical Nahuatl texts, yielding the standard logographic value

CHACHAPOLTIN.

The singular and plural forms are part of the logographic values and not omitted elements, as in the case of an abbreviation. This can be seen, among other things, in the fact that a phonetic value, maltin (used in the early colonial period to write the Spanish name Martín), is derived from such a value: MALTIN, “captives.” The citation value of a noun logogram, outside of a specific context, can be represented in the following ways: CHAPOL(IN) TOCH(TLI) CHAPOLIN TOCHTLI

Now let’s examine a typical Nahuatl noun in its various hieroglyphic contexts: cuāuhtli, “eagle.” As is so often the case with faunal glyphs, the EAGLE sign can be represented either by its full body (Fig. 3.2a) or pars pro toto by its head (Fig. 3.2b). The sign for the town of Cuauhtlan (“By the Eagles”) is written either in this abbreviated fashion as CUAUH2. or, with the teeth element tlan appended for the suffix -tlān, “by,” as CUAUH2-tlan (Fig. 3.2c). When pertinent to a discussion or listing, such variants of a single sign can be differentiated by subscript letters (e.g. CUAUH2a for the fullbodied form and CUAUH2b for the head variant), whereas alternate glyphs, like glyphs with the same pronunciation, will always receive separate subscript numbers.

3.2. Cuauhtlan, written: a) CUAUH2.; b) CUAUH2.; c) CUAUH2-tlan (Codex Mendoza, f. 10v, 24v, 13v).

The basic singular form of the noun is attested in Fig. 3.3a. The calendrical name Ome Cuauhtli (“2 Cuauhtli”) has been abbreviated here to Ome Cuauh. This is because the nominal suffix is an optional feature in

names. In Fig. 3.3b, CUAUH2(TLI) is not primary but an embedded element in the verb TLATO(A), “speak,” forming both a personal name Cuauhtlatoa (“He Speaks Like an Eagle”), read CUAUH2-TLATOA-LORD, and the title cuāuhtlàtò (literally “he has spoken like an eagle”) of a military governor, in which case it would be read CUAUH2-TLATO-LORD.

3.3. a) OME CUAUH2(TLI), a provincial governor; b) CUAUH2-TLATO(A), a king of Tlatelolco (Codex Mendoza, f. 18r, 19r).

The plural form, (cuā)cuāuhtin, “eagles,” is attested in the place name Cuauhtinchan (“Home of the Eagles,” a syncopation of cuāuhtin īnchān, literally “eagles, their home”). In the Codex Mendoza we see a single eagle superimposed on a house (Fig. 3.4a). Incidentally, the Mendoza scribe distinguishes between the two values of the HOUSE sign—CAL(LI), “house,” and CHAN, “home”—by superimposing a compounded glyphic element over HOUSE when the latter is to be read as CHAN, but by juxtaposing the element when CAL(LI) is meant. The Lienzo de Tlaxcala and the Historia ToltecaChichimeca employ a different strategy in order to distinguish singular from plural. The plurality in the name Cuauhtinchan is represented in the Lienzo by two eagles within a cave (Fig. 3.4b), using superimposition in a similar fashion to the Mendoza to point to the reading CHAN2, whereas singularity in the place name Cuauhtlichan (“Home of the Eagle,” syncopated from cuāuhtli īchān, “eagle, its home”) is represented in the Historia ToltecaChichimeca by a single eagle in a cave (Fig. 3.4c). When a sign is written twice as an indicator of plurality, it will be transliterated as a superscript 2 immediately following the logogram (e.g. CUAUHTIN2, using the plural value).

3.4. Cuauhtinchan written a) CUAUHTIN•CHAN (Codex Mendoza, f. 42r) and b) CUAUHTIN2•CHAN2 (Lienzo de Tlaxcala); and c) Cuauhtlichan written CUAUHTLI2•CHAN2 (Historia Tolteca-Chichimeca, f. 32v).

This method of repeating a sign to mark plurality is reminiscent of Egyptian hieroglyphic practice, in which two instances of a sign mark the dual (a pair), and three the plural:

You will have noted that names outside of a mythological context are usually rendered as single proper nouns, even when they derive from phrases or sentences. This is because they are recognized as abstracted name units, not as literal phrases. Compare, for example, our Shakespeare, the Italian surname Bevilacqua (“Drink the Water!”), or the Spanish place name Miramar (“View the Sea!”). In Nahuatl we can see this process of adaptation and fusion at work in such personal names as Xihuiltemoc (from xīhuitl temōc, “he has descended like a meteor”) and in such place names as Alhuexoyocan (from ātl huexōyòcān, “where the water is full of willows”; Fig. 3.5a). For an especially intriguing example of this, see the discussion of the name of the emperor Tizocic in Chapter 5 (pp. 149–51). Due to the frequent reduction of ātl in a phrasal name or sentence name to āl, the WATER sign may take on the phonetic value al in addition to its base value a (Figs 3.5b, c)

3.5. The reduced values (AL, al) of the WATER sign ATL in a) the fused phrasal place name Alhuexoyocan, written AL•HUEXO. (Codex Mendoza, f. 26r); b) the personal name Acatonal, written ACA-TONALal (Codex Xolotl, Sheet 2); and c) the personal name Calhua, written CALalhua4–MAN (Codex Vergara, f. 22v).

When it is the initial element in a compound, EAGLE (like all nouns) is reduced to its stem form, cuāuh-. The place sign for Cuauhquechollan in the Codex Mendoza (Fig. 3.6a) is preceded at the right by unglossed calendrical elements MACUIL-XOCH(ITL) (“5 Xochitl”) compounded with a MOUNTAIN element. The entire glyph can be transliterated as MACUIL-XOCH.MOUNTAIN and names in all likelihood a subdivision of Cuauhquechollan or its calendrical by-name: Macuilxochic—a place with the same name existed further south in the province of Coyolapan. Cuauhquechollan proper is represented by an EAGLE element with a split-feather device on its head. This device, known as the aztaxelli, was, as Justyna Olko has observed, dedicated to the god Tezcatlipoca. Like the double-feathered tēmalli (see Chapter 2, p. 76), it was emblematic of courage in the face of death. Although the cuāuhquechōlli has yet to be discussed in the academic literature, let alone identified, it is almost certainly the hawk-eagle, whose erectile crest is reminiscent of the aztaxelli. As we see in Fig. 3.6b, the glyphic element has the logographic value QUECHOL2(LI) in addition to AZTAXEL(LI). In combination with the EAGLE sign, we arrive at a logographic reading CUAUH2-QUECHOL2 for Cuauhquechollan (“By the Hawk-Eagles”).

3.6. a) Macuilxochic Cuauhquechollan (“At 5 Xochitl” “By the Hawk-Eagles”; b) Quecholac (“At the Quechol Waters”) (both Codex Mendoza, f. 42r).

Interestingly, we not only have an eagle with the split-feather device on its head in the Cuauhquechollan glyph, but also one with the double-feather device tēmalli attached to its head in the sign for Cuauhtemallan in the Lienzo de Tlaxcala (Fig. 3.7). This is the Maya city-state beyond the southern borders of the Aztec Empire that gave its name to the modern state of Guatemala. Although the name Cuauhtēmallān (“By the Mass of Trees”), a Nahuatl translation of the local K’iche’ for “Many Trees,” has obviously to do with trees (cuauh-), not eagles (cuāuh-), it is the sign for the latter that is found in the compound. An eagle with a warrior’s feather device tucked into its crest makes a semantically compatible grouping of elements that would have been far more appealing to the Aztec eye and soul than a lifeless compound of TREE/WOOD elements—although we have exactly that in another manuscript (the Codex Tlatelolco). What we have in the Lienzo is a phonetic element (cuauh2) combined with the TEMAL logogram. The Nahuatl term tēmalli refers generally to a swelling (especially of pus), but also to a clump, bunch, or heap of something. The double-feather device appears to get its name from the swelling of pride associated with a warrior’s recognition for bravery in combat.

3.7. Cuauhtemallan, written cuauh2•TEMAL. (Lienzo de Tlaxcala). The double-feather device is shown here doubled probably because one hung from each side of the eagle’s head.

In the glyph for the town of Cuauhhuacan (“Where There Are Eagles”; Figs 3.8a, b) a tree element is used as a phonetic indicator to reinforce the reading of the EAGLE logogram. While the readings of both elements are the same, namely CUAUH2 and cuauh, the actual words behind the logograms TREE/WOOD and EAGLE differ in vowel length (cuauh- and cuāuh-, respectively), a feature not reflected in the writing system.

3.8. Cuauhhuacan, written: a) cuauhCUAUH2.—CONQUERED; b) cuauhCUAUH2.MOUNTAIN (Codex Mendoza, f. 5v, 32r).

Just as a noun varies in form in different contexts (singular, plural, and embedded in a compound), so too can the sign for a noun vary. When the sign for a specific noun varies minimally—for example, in style, color, or detail—we speak of variants. When, however, the forms that a sign takes are radically or completely different from each other, we are dealing with alternates. The EAGLE noun cuāuh- has two variants, as we have seen above in Fig. 3.2, but together they make up one of two alternates that appear in the Codex Mendoza: apart from the bird form, there is a feather alternate which itself has two variants, one consisting of a single eagle feather, and another of several feathers bunched together. In Fig. 3.9a the compound sign for the high official known as the cuāuhnōchtli (literally “eagle cactusfruit,” a sacrificial metaphor for “heart”) is composed of an eagle feather and a human heart—the feather functions as a semantic indicator (CUAUH3) reinforcing the reading CUAUHNOCH(TLI) for the HEART sign. By contrast, in Fig. 3.9b an array of eagle feathers adorns a banner in the name glyph of one of Tenochtitlan’s founders, Cuappan (assimilated from cuāuh-pān, “eagle banner”).

3.9. The feather alternates of the EAGLE sign: a) the official title CUAUH3CUAUHNOCH(TLI), “cuauhnōchtli” (Codex Mendoza, f. 65r); b) the personal name Cuappan, written CUAUH3•PAN (Codex Mendoza, f. 2r).

Pronouns As we have seen, the Aztec system—and Nahuatl writing in general—is heavily name oriented. While the system is highly sophisticated in its characteristics, its use in the vast majority of documents that have come down to us is largely limited to naming. By this I mean that most glyphs are nominal: predominantly names of persons, peoples, and places, but also titles, professions, ranks, statuses, and conditions. Aztec writing is, as a consequence, strictly third-person oriented. Even when direct speech is cited, it is given obliquely in the third person. This is reminiscent of polite speech patterns in pre-modern times (“Would my lady care to …?”) and even of modern situations where certain prominent individuals habitually refer to themselves by name in the third person. In a writing system it is not that easy to come up with logograms for the pronouns, which is why they tend to be spelled phonetically, or at least with the help of phonetics. A notable exception is the Anatolian hieroglyph for the first-person pronoun “I”:

In most contexts, pronouns standing in for nominal categories take the form of prefixes—bound forms attached to the front of nouns, as in niMēxìcatl, “I’m a Mexica [or, an Aztec],” tiMēxìcatl, “you’re a Mexica,” and tiMēxìcà, “we’re Mexica.” This third-person bias is reflected in the fact that none of the early manuscripts has a phonogram for the syllables /ni/ and /ti/, although these would have been needed in order to render most of the bound pronouns for the first and second persons: Person 1 2 3

Singular ni- “I” ti- “you” — “(s)he, it”

Plural ti- “we” am/n- “you” — “they”

The second-person plural am-/an-, “you,” is potentially recordable via the WATER sign, which has the base value a(N), but there is no known instance of this. When words and names containing the syllables /ni/ and /ti/ are written phonetically, these syllables are simply omitted in the spelling. Thus, the Spanish name Diego, which would have been pronounced tiyecò in Nahuatl, is consistently written (y)e-co. Not until the late 16th century do we have sporadic scribal strategies for representing /ti/. There is no prefix for the third person. So Mēxìcatl means both “Mexica” and “(s)he’s a Mexica.” However, there are independent (that is, free-standing) pronouns for all three persons. Such pronouns are used for emphasis and in statements such as “It’s her” and “I, not you,” where there’s nothing to attach to. The independent pronouns are: Person 1 2 3

Singular nèhuātl “I,” tèhuātl “you” yèhuātl “(s)he, it”

Plural tèhuāntin “we” amèhuāntin “you” yèhuāntin “they”

The second and third persons also have a so-called reverential or honorific form, used in order to be polite or give honor to the referent. Such reverential pronouns are formed by dropping the final -tl (singular) and -tin (plural) and replacing them with -tzin and -tzitzintin, respectively. Of these, yèhuātzin is actually attested. It occurs in the late 16th-century Codex Mexicanus in a marginal statement on the Christian articles of faith. As Lori Boornazian Diel astutely notes in her analysis of the codex, the sequence (Fig. 3.10) she reads from the left as “cac-e-huauh-tzin” must stand for ca

yèhuātzin, “it is he.” Actually, the sequence is phonetically even closer to the Nahuatl: the SANDAL sign CAC(TLI) has the phonetic values cac and ca, the BEAN sign (Y)E(TL) the value (y)e, and the AMARANTH sign HUAUH(TLI) the values huauh and hua2, which with final tzin, the upended RUMP sign, yields a remarkably accurate ca (y)e-hua2hua3-tzin. The oddly dissimilar foliage of the amaranth disguises the integration of a phonetic indicator— the non-amaranth leaf attached to the right of the plant derives hysterophonically (that is, from its stem-final syllable) from the LEAF sign IZHUA(TL) and has a phonetic value hua3.

3.10. The pronominal phrase ca yèhuātzin, “it is he (rev.),” written ca (y)e-hua2hua3-tzin (Codex Mexicanus, p. 54).

Far more common in Nahuatl writing are the indefinite pronouns: tē- “someone, people”; “someone’s, people’s” tla- “something, things”; “of something, of things” The former has two glyphic counterparts (the STONE and LIPS signs, read te and te2, respectively), while the latter has one (the TEETH sign, read tla; see the discussion of tlaàhuilīlli in Sentences, pp. 117–18). It is not unusual for both alternates for tē- to co-occur, with one serving somewhat superfluously as a phonetic indicator to the other. The Codex Florentinus has some interesting examples of glyphic tē- in a section of Book 10 devoted to types of noble women (Fig. 3.11): tētzon, “one’s hair,” written te-TZON; tēizte, “one’s nails,” written te-IZTE; tēīxcuàmōl, “one’s eyebrows,” written teIXCUAMOL, all read upwards. These are akin to our expression “one’s flesh and blood.”

3.11. Metaphors for noble women: a) tētzon, “one’s hair”; b) tēizte, “one’s nails”; c) tēīxcuàmōl, “one’s eyebrows” (Codex Florentinus, Bk. 10, f. 32v, 33r).

Adjectives: size and color matter True adjectives, like huēi (“large, great”), are so few as to be virtually nonexistent as a class in Nahuatl. The adjectives we have are, strictly speaking, participles formed from the perfect tense of the verb. Thus, tomāhuac (“thick, fat”) is literally “that has grown fat,” and yamānqui (“soft”) is “that has gone soft.” Adjectives of any kind are quite rare in Aztec manuscripts, with the exception of color terms. As discussed in Chapter 2 (pp. 70–72), iconographic features such as dimensionality and orientation play an unusually prominent role in Nahuatl writing and can express adjectival meaning. We have seen that huēi is indicated by writing the modified element (for example, a temple) larger than other signs. The same thing is true of adjectives for other dimensions, such as “tall,” “wide,” and so forth, which cause the glyph for the modified item to be shaped accordingly. Color terms, all of which are derived from verbs, are rendered by painting the glyph for the modified item the color intended (Fig. 3.12c). An alternative to this is to use a colored disk or oval as the element in a compound conveying the color term. Occasionally, both strategies are employed at the same time, as in the alternative ways of writing the name for the town of Tlatlauhquitepec (“At (-c) Red (tlatlāuhqui) Mountain (tepē-)”; Figs 3.12a, b).

3.12. Color modification, in: a) Tlatlauhquitepec, written (TLA)TLAUH.•TEPE. and, with a semantic indicator, b) (TLA)TLAUH(TLA)TLAUH.•TEPE.; c) Xoxouhtla, “Where There’s a Lot of Blue(-Green),” written (XO)XOUH-tla-MOUNTAIN (Codex Mendoza, f. 8r, 51r).

Sometimes a flower is the receptacle for the color, even though the flower has neither a counterpart in the word or name it represents nor an association with the item named. In such instances we can speak of a pseudo-semantic complement. In the Matrícula de Huexotzinco, the personal name Cocoztic (“Really Yellow”) is written (CO)COZ.•FLOWER (Fig. 3.13a), while the name Matlalihuitl (“Blue-Green Feather”) is rendered MATLAL•FLOWER-IHUITL (Fig. 3.13b).

3.13. The FLOWER element as a container for a color term: a) yellow in Cocoztic; b) blue-green in Matlalihuitl (Matrícula de Huexotzinco, f. 518v).

Color is not an optional feature in Aztec writing. Far more so than in Egyptian hieroglyphs, the Aztec script uses color to convey meaning. In the absence of a referent, the color terms themselves are almost always represented by the relevant colors, not by logograms or phonetic spellings. In Fig. 3.14 we see examples of this convention.

3.14. Non-modifying color terms represented by the color itself: a) Tlappan (“On the Red”), written TLAUH•pan2 (Codex Mendoza, f. 39r); b) Texopan (“On the Turquoise”), written TEXO-pan2 (Codex Mendoza, f. 43r).

Diminutives are a category of adjectival suffixes in Nahuatl that may carry the sense of smallness (-tōn), dearness and preciousness (-tzin), or age and wretchedness (-zol). They all have glyphic equivalents. The first two diminutives are differentiated in the Codex Tepetlaoztoc (also known as the Codex Kingsborough or the Memorial de los Indios de Tepetlaoztoc) by age: -tōn, “little” (Fig. 3.15a), is the Hispanicized child version (read TON, tzin2) of the adult RUMP element standing for -tzin, “honorable, dear” (Fig. 3.15b), the inspiration for which comes from the similarity of the latter to tzīn-, “backside, rump.” The glyph for the third suffix, -zol, “old and shabby, worn-out” (Fig. 3.15c), is a phonogram based on ZOL(IN), “quail.”

3.15. Diminutives: a) -tōn in Calton (“Little House”), written CAL-TON (Codex Tepetlaoztoc, f. 4v); b) -tzin in Tepoloatzin (“He Destroys People”), written te2-pol2-ohua-tzin (Codex Tepetlaoztoc, f. 5v); c) -zol in Teuhzoltzapotlan (“By the Dusty Old Zapote Trees”), written te-zolTZAPO. (Codex Mendoza, f. 48r).

The negative augmentative, -pōl, similar in sense to our slang expressions “dirty big” and “humongous,” is attested either as po or pol2, using the SMOKE sign, POC(TLI), which we just saw in Fig. 3.15b, or as pol, using POLO(A), “destroy,” as in the glyph for Acapolco (“At the Big Old

Reeds”; Fig. 3.16a). The term āca-, “reed,” can be written as the plant itself, transliterated ACA(TL), or as a reed arrow, ACA2(TL). Here the yellow reed arrow is a semantic indicator for the plant sign. By convention, the reed plant is usually painted blue. Deer antlers are often also blue (Fig. 3.16b), because the deer is metaphorically known as the ācaxōch, or “reed flower.”

3.16. a) The augmentative -pōl in the glyph for Acapolco (“At the Big Old Reeds”), written ACA2 ACA•pol. (Codex Mendoza, f. 13r); b) reed-blue antlers in the glyph for Mazatlan (“By the Deer”; Codex Mendoza, f. 47r).

A number of compounds with adjectival force are found in illustrations adorning the Codex Florentinus, where they often lie or float unobtrusively in the landscape as if part of the scene. The strongly European-influenced style of the depictions makes it all the harder in some cases to recognize the glyphic nature of part of the illustration. In Book 10, in a list of the qualities of the archetypal spirited woman, we see a woman crouching in the open air beside a head and heart that appear to hover in space before her (Fig. 3.17a). The compound, despite its disarmingly European style, is Aztec writing and to be read downwards as OQUICH-YOLLO, corresponding perfectly to Nahuatl oquichyōllò, “vigorous, resolute”—literally “manhearted.”

3.17. Qualities of good and bad noblewomen: a) resolute; b) persevering; c) degenerate and disconsolate (Codex Florentinus, Bk. 10, f. 35v, 36r).

In Fig. 3.17b, the honorable woman, known as a cuāuhcihuātl, literally “eagle-woman,” is depicted iconographically as a woman with an eagle’s head. The two-part glyph floating in front of her is read upwards as YOLLOTETL, matching Nahuatl yōllòtetl, “persevering, spirited, tough, stubborn.” The HEART element is again in European style, but the STONE above it is close to the traditional form. Finally, we come to the characteristics of the bad noblewoman (Fig. 3.17c). To her left we have what appears to be a person in the background mourning over a corpse. This is a kind of cryptography—cryptic writing hidden in plain view. It’s actually a glyphic compound, TLACA-MIC., that renders a term found in the accompanying alphabetic text: tlācamicqui, “degenerate,” literally “dead (micqui) as a human being (tlāca-).” To her right we have an incongruous juxtaposition of a human leg and an item in outline that resembles nothing in nature. Such incongruous combinations are tell-tale glyphic compounds. The lower element is a conventionalized rendition of a liver (ēl-) and gallbladder, read EL or ELLEL, while the LEG element is, as we saw in Chapter 2 (p. 55), an unusually multivalent sign, one of the readings of which is ACI(C), “arrive.” Together, the compound .ELLEL-ACIC records Nahuatl īēllelàcic, “afflicted, disconsolate,” a term found in the accompanying alphabetic text. A catalogue of cave types in Book 11 of the same codex describes the āōztōtl, or watery cave, as, among other things, “dark as night.” The Nahuatl term mixtecomac, literally “in a cloud vessel,” is represented hieroglyphically at the top of an uncolored illustration (Fig. 3.18) accompanying the description. The metaphorical expression, written MIXix•TECOMA., consists of a goblet (tecoma-) surrounded by a cloud (mix-) with an eye (īx-) embedded in it to the left. The EYE is a phonetic indicator for the CLOUD element.

3.18. The darkness of a cave expressed as a glyph (Codex Florentinus, Bk. 11, f. 245v).

Adverbs Temporal (that is, time-related) adverbs are attested in several codices, including the Codex Mendoza, the Codex Xolotl, and the Codex TellerianoRemensis. In Fig. 3.19, the term aoc, “no longer, no more,” is found in the personal name Aoctlacuani (“He Doesn’t Eat Anymore”), written from the bottom right a-oc-tla-CUA. plus the semantic complement MAN, with WATER and WINE elements rendering the adverb phonetically.

3.19. The adverb a-oc, “no longer” (Codex Vergara, f. 20v).

The time of day is represented by TLATHUI(C) (Fig. 3.20a), for tlathui, “it’s dawning,” TLACA2 (Fig. 3.20b), for tlàcà, “at midday,” and YOHUAC (Fig. 3.20c), for yohuac, “at night.” In Fig. 3.20a the element for dawn consists of rays emanating upwards from a corncob on top of a rectangle with diagonal lines separating inverse scrolls. The rays represent the verb TLATHUI(C), “dawn,” the corn (cen-) both ce(n), “one,” and CEMPOHUAL(LI), “twenty” (usually differentiated by size and/or context), and finally the rectangle the noun ILHUI(TL), “day, feast day,” with its embedded, interacting speech scrolls for phonetic ilhui (from ilhuia “say [to someone]”). This gives us TLATHUIC CEMPOHUAL-ILHUITL, “it dawned on

the twentieth day.” The historian Fernando de Alva Ixtlilxochitl, studying this passage on the death of the tyrant Tezozomoc, tells us that he died in the year 13 Acatl (1427) at dawn on a day 13 Acatl, the “último de su semana,” that is, “the last day of its week.” This refers to the end of a period of 13 days in the divinatory calendar. However, a day 13 Acatl in a year 13 Acatl also falls on a feast day, the last day of a 20-day “month” in the solar calendar, and it is this that the Codex Xolotl is referring to. The Codex Florentinus records in another context the sentence Auh in tlathuic in oncān tlacempōhualtì, in ye huel ìcuāc ilhuitl […], “And when it dawned on the 20th day, when it was the feast day […]” (Book 2, Chapter 34). In a further instance of graphic syllepsis, the overlarge date in Fig. 3.20a stands both for the day and for the year of the same name.

3.20. The time of day: a) dawn, 13 Acatl); b) midday; c) night (Codex Xolotl, Sheet 8).

The abbreviated form of the name of Tlacateotl of Tlatelolco (see pp. 80–81 and 156–57) in Fig. 3.20b is simply a solar disk, which can be read TONATIUH, “sun,” or, as here, TLACA2, “at midday.” On hearing news of the demise of Tezozomoc, two Acolhua fugitives from the tyrant, Nezahualcoyotl and Tzontecocha of Tetzcoco, head off under cover of night (Fig. 3.20c) to attend the despot’s funeral. The NIGHT glyph above them is simply a curved firmament, which is normally colored gray in painted manuscripts. It can be read YOHUAL(LI), “night,” and YOHUAC, “at night.”

Quantifiers Three quantifiers are known. The word oc, “more,” can be extracted from the personal name Aoctlacuani, which we have seen above. Similarly, the

name of the king of Colhuacan, Achitometl (“A Little Bit of Maguey”), whom we will encounter below, provides us with the words achi, “a little,” and achìtōn, “a little bit.” His name glyph (Fig. 3.21a) is written out of order downwards as chi-METL-to(n)2-a in a bow to aesthetics.

3.21. Quantifiers, in: a) Achitometl (“A Little Bit of Maguey,” Codex Xolotl, Sheet 3); b) Huixachtecatl (Codex Xolotl, Sheet 5); c) Huixachtitlan (Codex Mendoza, f. 17v); d) Huaxtepec (Codex Mendoza, f. 24v).

The opposite quantifier, ixachi, “a lot,” is attested indirectly. The hill near Colhuacan on which the New Fire ceremony was performed at the beginning of a cycle, Huixachtecatl, is named after the thorny huixachin, “huisache,” a type of sweet acacia. The name of the hill (Fig. 3.21b) is read from left to right as hui—xach—teca{te2+ca2}., the middle sign deriving from a logogram depicting a tied bunch of guaje pods. The huisache and guaje are legumes belonging to the same family, and their pods are depicted similarly in their respective primary glyphs (Figs 3.21c, d). For this reason, the secondary glyph has two logographic values, HUAX2(IN), “guaje,” and IXACHI, “a lot, many.” From the latter the phonetic value xach is derived hysterophonically. It’s worth noting that the term huixachin is popularly taken to be a blend of huitz-, “thorns” and ixachi, “a lot of, many.”

Postpositions A Nahuatl place name is typically a combination of a noun and a postposition. Postpositions are like our prepositions in meaning but are relational suffixes attached to the end of a word stem. A rare example in English is -ward(s), as in “homewards” or “seaward.” The most common of these in Nahuatl are -co, “at, by,” -pan, “on, in,” and -tlān, “by, among.” The first, which reduces to -c after a vowel, is usually left unexpressed in

early hieroglyphic writing, but is increasingly found in manuscripts during the second half of the 16th century, especially in Acolhuacan on the eastern flank of the Valley of Mexico (e.g. Tenanco, “At the Walls,” is written upwards as te-nan-co in the late 16th-century Codex Tepetlaoztoc; Fig. 3.22a). However, in the Conquest-period place glyph for Coyocac (Coyocā-c, “By the Waterhole”; Fig. 3.22b) the entire name is already written phonetically as coyo-cac, with a coyote head and a sandal (cac-) representing the final syllable, including the postposition.

3.22. Basic postpositions: a) -co in Tenanco (“At the Walls”), written te-nan-co (Codex Tepetlaoztoc, f. 5v); b) -c in Coyocac (“By the Waterhole”), written coyo-cac; c) -pan in Tochpan (“On the Rabbits”), written TOCH-pan; d) -tlān in Tochtlan (“By the Rabbits”), written TOCH-tlan (Codex Mendoza, f. 13r, 52r, 50r).

The postposition -pan can be written two ways. The more common strategy is to use the BANNER element PAN(ITL) for its phonetic value pan, as in Tochpan (Tōch-pan, “On the Rabbits”; Fig. 3.22c). Alternatively, a single FOOTPRINT element derived from PANO(C) “ford, cross over,” and placed for semantic reasons in or above the accompanying sign carries its phonetic value pan2, as we saw in Fig. 3.14. This contrasts with one or more FOOTPRINT elements positioned below the accompanying sign, as in Xocoyocan (“Where There’s a Lot of Sour Fruit”), written XOCO-yocan (Fig. 3.23b). While the place glyph for Tlaltizapan (Tlāl-tīza-pan, “On the Ground Chalk”; Fig. 3.23a) must be read with pan2 as .TIZA-pan2-HILL because of the upper placement of the FOOTPRINT element, the glyph for Tizayocan (Tīza-yò-cān, “Where It’s Chalky”; Fig. 3.23c) must be read TIZA-yocan-HILL because of the lower placement. The reading of the FOOTPRINT element derives in this context not from the logographic value PANO(C) but from O2(TLI), “road, path,” the primary phonetic value of which

is (y)o2, corresponding to -yò(cān) “(where it’s) full of, (where there’s) a lot of.”

3.23. Contrastive placement of the FOOTPRINT element: pan2 above in a) Tlaltizapan (“On the Ground Chalk”); yocan below in b) Xocoyocan (Where There’s a Lot of Sour Fruit”) and c) Tizayocan (“Where It’s Chalky”) Codex Mendoza, f. 52r, 55r, 22r).

Like -pan, the postposition -tlān also has two hieroglyphic forms. By far the more common is the TEETH element, consisting of two, but occasionally three (Fig. 3.22d) or even four, upper front teeth, as in Ichcatlan (Ichcatlān, “By the Cotton”; Fig. 3.24a) and Huitzillan (Huītzil-lān, “By the Hummingbirds”; Fig. 3.24b). The comparatively uncommon suffix -tlà, “where there’s a lot of, where there are many” which is often indistinguishable from -tlān in alphabetic texts when voiceless final n is omitted, is represented hieroglyphically by the same TEETH element, as we saw in the place sign for Xoxouhtla, “Where There’s a Lot of Blue(-Green)” in Fig. 3.12c. Because of this, it is sometimes difficult to know in alphabetic and hieroglyphic texts whether we are dealing with the one or other form (see, however, examples of late differentiation in Figs 3.38b, c).

3.24. a) -tlān in Ichcatlan (“By the Cotton”), written ICHCA-tlan; b) Huitzillan (“By the Hummingbirds”), written HUITZIL-lan; c) Ahuacatlan (“By the Avocadoes”), written AHUACAtlan2; d) Cuauhtecomatlan (“By the Wooden Goblets”), written CUAUHTECOMA-tlan2 (Codex Mendoza, f. 55r, 21v, 39r, 40r).

A rare alternative to this is the SET_OF_TEETH element in frontal or profile view, as in Ahuacatlan (Āhuaca-tlān, “By the Avocadoes”; Fig. 3.24c). This element can be cut into the sign it modifies or it can project from it like a set of dentures, as in Cuauhtecomatlan (Cuauh-tecoma-tlān, “By the Wooden Goblets”; Fig. 3.24d). In such cases, the SET_OF_TEETH lacks the characteristic red gums of the TEETH element and the lower teeth are set in a fleshless mandible. In the fragmentary (and possibly Aztec-period) Matrícula de Tributos and its post-Conquest relative, the Codex Mendoza, the most conservative Aztec manuscripts we have, there is an overwhelming tendency to use the TEETH element for -tlān and to reserve the SET_OF_TEETH for the postposition -titlan, “among, next to” (Fig. 3.25).

3.25. The postposition -titlan in: a) Nextitlan (“Among the Ashes”), written NEX•titlan; b) Cuauhtitlan (“Among the Trees”), written CUAUH•titlan; c) Otlatitlan (“Among the Bamboo”), written OTLA-titlan (Codex Mendoza, f. 20v, 5v, 46r).

There are no less than thirty-eight known instances of the TEETH element for -tlān, but only two attestations of its use for -titlan (transliterated titlan2; Fig. 3.26). The SET_OF_TEETH element, on the other hand, is almost evenly divided in usage between the two postpositions—nine instances for titlan (transliterated titlan), seven for -tlān (transliterated tlan2).

3.26. Rare secondary use of the TEETH element for -titlan: a) Amacoztitlan (“Among the Yellow Paper [Trees]”), written aAMA•COZ-titlan2; b) Tepetitlan (“In the Mountains”), written TEPE•titlan2 (Codex Mendoza, f. 23r, 31r).

Another prominent postposition in Nahuatl is -nāhuac, “near, close by.” This suffix sounds similar to the term nāhuatl, “clear and pleasantsounding,” so it’s not hard to understand why Aztec scribes hit upon the idea of using the corresponding logogram NAHUA(TL) for the postposition. The popular city of Cuernavaca, the name of which has been transformed over time to appear derived from Spanish cuerna, “horns,” and vaca, “cow,” is the most well-known example of a place with a name bearing this relational suffix. Behind the modern name lies the original Nahuatl Cuauhnāhuac (“Near the Trees”). The glyph for the Aztec city (Fig. 3.27a) is composed of the tree sign CUAUH with an inset toothless mouth, from which a speech scroll emerges. Here the logogram NAHUA(TL) has the phonetic value nahua, giving us the sequence CUAUH•nahua. However, given the strict association of this glyphic element with the postposition nāhuac in place glyphs, it would be appropriate to regard the element as having a derivative logographic value NAHUAC, giving us an alternative transliteration: CUAUH•NAHUAC. This process of secondary derivation of logograms is well known from the history of Chinese, where, for example, the character for a kind of scorpion came to be used via its phonetic value as a derivative logogram for what is now wàn, “10,000.” Again, in ascertaining sign values it is important to determine how the indigenous reader would have predictably read the sign (not the entire word) in a given context—predictability is the key here. If two individuals read a sign or element the same way, then that is its value, or one of its values.

Fortunately, Mesopotamia and China give us abundant information on, and examples of, these processes. The temple in Tenochtitlan called Huitznahuac, literally “Near the Thorns (huitz-),” has a glyph of similar design (Fig. 3.27b). For the town of Yaonahuac (“Near the Enemy”; Fig. 3.27c), however, a different form was chosen, perhaps because of the difficulty of inserting the standard element into a round glyph that already has a sideways extension. The Yaonahuac alternate, NAHUAC2, consists of a floating bundle of speech scrolls linked by a short connector to the YAO(TL) logogram, a shield and māccuahuitl sword.

3.27. The postposition -nāhuac in a) Cuauhnahuac (“Near the Trees”), written CUAUH•NAHUAC; b) Huitznahuac (“Near the Thorns”), written HUITZ•NAHUAC; c) Yaonahuac (“Near the Enemy”), written YAO—NAHUAC2. (Codex Mendoza, f. 23r, 19r, 51r).

The verb-derived suffix -mān, “where there is” follows the general pattern of writing place-name formatives phonetically. For this purpose the HAND element MA(ITL), with its phonetic value ma(n), is employed. The garrison town of Oztoman (“Where Caves (ōztō-) Are Found”) on the Tarascan frontier in the west has a particularly attractive place glyph (Fig. 3.28) that seems to be composed of the head of a monstrous being with a hand raised in greeting! The creature is an earth monster whose open jaws are the mouth of a cave. The head functions here as a CAVE logogram. The HAND element above it is always in upright orientation when it has the values MA(ITL) and ma(n). This is to distinguish it from the ARM sign read MA2, “capture,” AN2(A), “grab,” and POLO(A), “destroy,” phonetic ma2(n), which has a horizontal or diagonal orientation.

3.28. The place glyph for Oztoman (“Where Caves Are Found”), written a) OZTOa-man; b) OZTOb-man (Codex Mendoza, f. 18r, 10v).

Now we come to the compound postpositions—those composed of a noun plus -c/-co, -pan, or -tlān. The most widespread are -tzinco, “at lesser, at the bottom of, below” -āpan, “on the waters of,” -tēnco and -tēmpan, “at the edge of,” -īxco, “on the surface of,” -yacac, “at the point of, on the ridge of (literally, at the nose of),” -nacazco, “beside, on the flank of (literally, at the ear of),” and -(t)icpac, “on top of.” For -tzinco the RUMP element is used (Fig. 3.29a). This element has the logographic value TZIN(TLI), for tzīn-, “backside, bottom, base,” and the primary phonetic value tzin, but in the context of place names it is used so consistently for -tzinco that it seems advisable to regard it in this context not as an abbreviation (tzin.) but rather as a secondary logogram with the value TZINCO.

3.29. The postpositional compound -tzinco in a) Tenantzinco (“At Lesser Tenanco [At the Walls]”), written TENAN-TZINCO; b) Xochimilcatzinco (“At Lesser Xochimilco [In the Fields of Flowers]”), written XOCHI-MIL.TZINCO (Codex Mendoza, f. 10v, 24v).

A very frequent element in place glyphs, -āpan, “on (or at) the waters of,” refers to waterways, especially rivers and canals. The term for a waterway, āpantli, derives from this postpositional compound, and for this reason the WATERWAY logogram APAN(TLI) is used phonetically for the

compound with the value apan (Fig. 3.30). The value has to be deemed phonetic because in the context of a place name a final -āpan can only be a postposition, not a noun.

3.30. The postposition -āpan in a) Totolapan (“On the Turkey (tōtol-) Waters”), written TOTOL•apan; b) Chilapan (“On the Chili (chīl-) Waters”), written CHIL•apan; c) Ocoapan (“On the Pinetree (oco-) Waters”), written OCO-apan (Codex Mendoza, f. 25r, 48r, 37r, 39r).

A few compound postpositions that, like -tzinco, reference body parts, can round off the discussion. These are based on the eye (īx-), nose (yaca-), lips (tēn-), and ear (nacaz-). The EYE element is found in the postposition (t)īxco, “on the surface of, in front of.” Since this postposition has no competition in a place-name context, we can safely assign the element the secondary logographic value (T)IXCO. In the place name Matixco (“In Front of the Arms (mā-)”; Fig. 3.31a) the position of the EYE element is semantically apt in relation to the double HAND element, yet the combination is not iconography but iconographically influenced writing. We can transliterate the glyph as MA2-TIXCO. The initial T variant is a socalled ligature, appearing when the preceding element ends in a vowel. Historically, it comes from the original absolutive suffix of the noun, but has long since lost that identity. The glyph in Fig. 3.31b names the town of Cuahuitlixco (“In Front of the Trees (cuahuitl)”) by superimposing a tilted EYE element on the trunk of a generic tree.

3.31. The postposition -īxco in a) Matixco (“In Front of the Arms”), written MA2-TIXCO; b) Cuahuitlixco (“In Front of the Trees”), written CUAHUITL•IXCO; Codex Mendoza, f. 21v, 24v).

An elegant postpositional glyph is the LIPS element in named places. Given the fact that lips, like eyebrows and eyelashes, are not a feature of traditional Aztec art, the LIPS element, in order to be recognizable, is actually a representation of the lower front quadrant of the face in profile, from the upper lip to the chin. It occurs both with and without teeth. The Valley of Mexico is a lacustrine environment and so it will come as no surprise that -tēnco figures prominently in names referring to water. There are two ways of writing Ātēnco, “At the Water’s Edge.” The first, and standard, method has WATER flowing around the LIPS element (Fig. 3.32a). The second places the LIPS element within the WATERWAY element (Fig. 3.32b). The primary values of WATERWAY are, as mentioned above, APAN and apan, but here its secondary logographic value, A2, “water,” is intended. Several towns in the Valley have Ātēnco in their name, such as Huexotla (“Where There Are Many Willows”) Atenco and Chalco (“In the Hollow”) Atenco. The latter is a clever instance of graphic syllepsis from the Codex Xolotl (Fig. 3.32c). Chalco is read downwards and Atenco from the right in such a way that the POT element co is the final element in both names, not unlike two words intersecting on a Scrabble board:

3.32. The postposition -tēnco in Atenco (“At the Water’s Edge”), written a) A•TEN.; b) A2•TEN. (Codex Mendoza, f. 51r, 27r); c) Chalco (“In the Hollow”) Atenco, written chal-co-A•TEN. (Codex Xolotl, Sheet 2).

chal

co

TEN A2

A related and semantically equivalent expression, -tēmpan, “on the rim of,” is written with the LIPS element in the same abbreviated way as -tēnco, as we see in the title of a functionary known as the ātēmpanēcatl, written ATEN. (Fig. 3.33).

3.33. The ātēmpanēcatl, a high official (Codex Mendoza, f. 65r).

The postposition -yacac, “at the point or ridge of,” is written by attaching a NOSE element to one of the accompanying elements, typically a

logogram or semantic complement. The glyph for Tepeyacac (“At the Point of the Mountain”; Fig. 3.34a), the town by the hill on which the future Basilica of Guadalupe would be built, is identical to that for Tlayacac (“At the Point”; Fig. 3.34b). The difference lies in the status of the MOUNTAIN element. In the first instance it is a logogram that is part and parcel of the name, while in the second its role is that of a semantic complement adding to the context of the NOSE element. The place glyph for the town of Huaxyacac (“At Guaje Point,” modern Oaxaca City; Fig. 3.34c) is an intriguing departure from the usual. The nose is not projecting from the accompanying sign but the reverse—the guajes (huāx-) are sprouting from the nose. But there’s more to it than meets the eye. There is no NOSE element here but rather an entire face with the nose as the point of juncture with the guajes. The term for “face,” xāyaca-, is functioning here as a phonetic indicator, while the nose on the face is at the same time a logogram. This is a further instance of graphic syllepsis. MOUNTAIN

3.34. The postposition -yacac in a) Tepeyacac (“At the Point of the Mountain”), written TEPE•YACA.; b) Tlayacac (“At the Point”), written .YACA.-MOUNTAIN; c) Huaxyacac (“At Guaje Point”), written HUAX-YACAxayaca. (Codex Mendoza, f. 42r, 24v, 44r).

We shall end the discussion of compound postpositions that reference a body part with -nacaztlan, “beside,” and -nacazco, “at the side of,” which consist of an EAR element with or without an explicitly written base postposition -tlan, “next to” (related to -titlan, not -tlān), or -co. Cuauhnacaztlan (“Beside the Trees”; Fig. 3.35a) lacks the latter, whereas Oztonacazco (“At the Side of the Caves”; Fig. 3.35b) in the late 16thcentury Codex Tepetlaoztoc includes one.

3.35. The EAR element, in a) Cuauhnacaztlan (“Beside the Trees”), written CUAUH•NACAZ. (Codex Mendoza, f. 13v); b) Oztonacazco (“At the Side of the Caves”), written OZTO-NACAZ-co (Codex Tepetlaoztoc, f. 4v).

While we’re talking about the EAR element, let’s examine a category from the last page of the Codex Mendoza, on which various livelihoods that embody virtue or vice are displayed. Exemplifying vice are the thief, the drunk, and the scandalmonger. The latter is depicted with the EAR element floating above him and linked by a connector to each side of his head (Fig. 3.36). This is a transparent rendition of the reflexive verb monacazquetza, “listen attentively,” literally “rise up at the ears.” Since the third-person reflexive prefix mo- is incorporated into the sign value for a reflexive verb, the pertinent logographic value in this case is MONACAZQUETZ(A).

3.36. The eavesdropper and scandalmonger (Codex Mendoza, f. 70r).

The CAVE element turns up once again in our example for the postposition -icpac, “on top of.” This relational suffix sounds very similar to īcpa-, “thread,” and consequently the THREAD logogram ICPA(TL) does service with a secondary logographic value, (T)ICPAC, as we see in the place glyph for Oztoticpac (“On Top of the Caves”; Fig. 3.37). The initial T is the ligature -t(i)- that we encountered above in -titlan, where it is obligatory, and with -īxco, where it is conditional, appearing only after a vowel.

3.37. Oztoticpac (“On Top of the Caves”), written OZTO-TICPAC (Codex Mendoza, f. 10v).

Before we wrap up this section, one last postposition remains to be considered: -cān, “where, when.” In early manuscripts, from the first half of the 16th century, this is left unexpressed hieroglyphically (except in the sequence -yò-cān, which, as discussed above under -pan, is written yocan; see p. 100). However, towards the end of the century we see a strong tendency to render -cān as can, using the logogram AN2(A), “grasp,” not

with its primary phonetic value an2 but with its secondary value that derives from the verb with object marker qu(i)-/c-, “him, her, it,” attached. We have come across this strategy already in Chapter 2 in the section on graphic syllepsis (pp. 136–41), and will see it again in Chapter 5, where the verbal logogram I, “drink,” occurs with the secondary phonetic value qui in the name glyph for Quinatzin (pp. 138–39, 159–60). The initial consonant in this value clearly derives from the object marker. The strategy is employed in order to derive consonant-initial phonetic values from signs with vowelinitial values. In the glyph for Tlilhuacan (“Where There’s Black”; Fig. 3.38a) we have a complex sequence TLIL-hua2-can. Incidentally, the logogram AN2(A) is formed by inserting the WATER element, phonetically a(n), into the grip of the MA2, “capture, hunt,” sign. The WATER element plays a similar role in distinguishing glyphically the postpositions -tlān and -tlà. In the Codex Tepetlaoztoc, WATER is appended to the TEETH element for this purpose. Thus, Acatla (“Where There Are a Lot of Reeds”; Fig. 3.38b) is written ACA-tla-a and Atzoyatla (“Where There Are a Lot of Atzoyatl Bushes”; Fig. 3.38c) ATZOYA-tla-a. There is no reason to consider the WATER element a phonetic indicator for ACA(TL) and ATZOYA(TL). In the section on the NOSE element, the ambiguous glyphs for Tepeyacac and Tlayacac in the early Codex Mendoza were discussed. Here, too, the much later Codex Tepetlaoztoc is more specific. Tlayacac (Fig. 3.38d) is now written with an initial tla and the MOUNTAIN semantic complement has been dispensed with.

3.38. Late conventions: a) can for -cān in Tlilhuacan (“Where There’s Black”); b) tla-a for -tlà in Acatla (“Where There Are a Lot of Reeds”) and in c) Atzoyatla (“Where There Are a Lot of Atzoyatl Bushes”); d) tla- in Tlayacac (“At the Point”) (Codex Tepetlaoztoc, f. 3r, 4r, 4v).

Verbs

Words that label actions, events, and states of being, and constitute the nucleus of a sentence or clause, are known as verbs. Most verbs in Aztec hieroglyphic manuscripts are found in names of persons and places. In cases where personal names take the form of phrases and sentences, we are able to glean information about the way in which verbs are handled in hieroglyphic writing. Moreover, there are a number of actual sentences in a handful of manuscripts, notably the Codex Xolotl, which is a collection of copies of an interconnected body of documents from the Aztec period, and the Codex Aubin, which is a late compilation of semi-legendary and historical data in the form of annals. The next section will deal with that topic in detail. Nahuatl verbs fall into two basic categories: intransitive and transitive verbs. Intransitive verbs have a single participant (the subject), while transitive verbs have at least two, a subject and one or more objects. A special category is the reflexive verb, which is essentially a transitive verb with a single participant acting on him/her/itself, as, for example, in English “she washed herself.” The reflexive prefix mo- is part of the value of the corresponding verb logogram. For an example of this, see the discussion of the name Motecuhzoma in Chapter 5 (pp. 152–53). All verbs are modified by tense and mood. At the core of the verb is the present stem and the perfect stem. The third-person (singular) present tense is the citation form for a Nahuatl verb. It is also one of the two (singular and plural) forms encountered most frequently in hieroglyphic and alphabetic texts relating history. The other is the perfect tense. These tenses are distinguished in several ways. Put simply, some verbs form the perfect by adding -c, others by dropping the final vowel (and then, in the case of verbs ending in ia and oa, adding a glottal stop), while a handful just add a glottal stop. Examples are: Present: Perfect:

cuīca cuīcac “sing”

xīma xīn “plane”

choloa cholò “flee”

mā mà “catch”

Since glottal stops and vowel length play no significant role in Nahuatl writing, the second and third types are treated identically there. Furthermore, the fourth type is identical glyphically in the present and perfect tenses. The convention for the logographic values of verbs is to

write the variable part of the verb in parentheses. For the sample verbs above the transliteration is as follows: Logogram:

Value:

CUICA(C)

XIM(A)

CHOLO(A)

MA2

Sentences The Codex Telleriano-Remensis presents us with a magnificent but all too rare example of a hieroglyphic sentence in unadulterated Aztec style and content (Fig. 3.39). The sentence is extracted from a larger hieroglyphiciconographic framework depicting the prime event of 1487: the inauguration of the recently enlarged Great Temple of Tenochtitlan, only the latest in a series of such grand projects undertaken by new rulers seeking to outmatch the piety of their predecessors. For the larger context, see Fig. 2.9. The key sequence begins with a year date, written CHICUEI•ACATL•XIHUITL, at the top, the turquoise (xihuitl) color of the date and surrounding frame standing for xihuitl, “year.” Thick black connectors link this date to a sequence of three glyphs directly below it. These are read upwards.

3.39. A hieroglyphic sentence recording the inauguration of the Great Temple of Tenochtitlan in 1487 (Codex Telleriano-Remensis, f. 39r).

The first (at bottom) is the compound sign for the Aztec capital and is written TE-NOCH., the standard abbreviation for Tenōchtitlan, which, in accordance with the glyphic elements, is generally understood to mean “By the Rock (te-) Cactus (nōch-).” Aztec place names are actually locative phrases (like the German pub name Zum Schwarzen Bären “At the [Sign of the] Black Bear”), so the verb and general context are the guides to whether we translate them as “to,” “in,” or “from” [place name]. The sign above it is a hand drill (mamalhuāztli; also known as a fire-drill), an instrument used in fire-making. The HAND_DRILL sign, when employed as a verbal logogram, is read TLEMAMAL(I), “make fire with a hand drill,” and MOMAMAL(I), “be inaugurated, be dedicated.” The latter is its primary value, and is the one intended here. The subject of the verb is the double temple-pyramid above with its shrines in red and blue to Huitzilopochtli in his solar aspect and to Tlaloc, the god of rain and storms, respectively. You will have noticed that this

glyph is much larger than the other two. As we saw in the section on adjectives (pp. 93–97), a dimensional adjective (such as “large,” “wide,” or “tall”) is represented by altering the size of the glyph for the modified word accordingly. In the case above, the exaggerated proportions of the templepyramid indicate that huēi, “large, great,” is intended: huēiteòcalli, “great temple,” is in fact the very term used in 16th-century Nahuatl texts to describe the imposing structure. Taken all together, the logographic string in Fig. 3.39 can be transliterated as CHICUEI•ACATL•XIHUITL—HUEITEOCALLI—MOMAMAL—TENOCH. “[In] the year 8 Acatl the Great Temple was inaugurated in Tenochtitlan.” We can find exact parallels to this in the extensive Nahuatllanguage writings of the prolific colonial-period historian Domingo de San Antón Muñón Chimalpahin Cuauhtlehuanitzin. Chimalpahin’s 3rd Account records the following (here in normalized spelling with the relevant terms in bold print): 8 Ācatl xihuitl 1487: Nicān īpan in ō momamal in teòcalli in īcal catca tlācatecolōtl Huītzilōpōchtli … “The year 8 Acatl (1487): In which was inaugurated the temple that was the house of the were-owl [that is, devil] Huitzilopochtli …” … momamal in āltepētl īteòcal Huītzilōpōchtli Mēxìco … “the temple of Huitzilopochtli was dedicated in the city of Mexico …” The only things missing from the hieroglyphic statement in the Codex Telleriano-Remensis are the kinds of unessential words and forms that we might also drop when writing notes or sending a brief message to someone. A hypothetical sequence such as “22 Nov. 1963: Kennedy assassinated, Dallas” would be unambiguous and linguistically adequate as a communication. An educated reader would be capable of fleshing out the sentence, reinforced by a knowledge of the language and the context. It is highly regrettable that so few examples of hieroglyphic sentences have come down to us from the 16th century, but the few instances available to us are sufficient to illustrate the way the system worked and to confirm its potential as a method of communication. The problem for us is determining how much sentence structure was present in the system before the Spanish

Conquest and to what extent it may have been a response to, or influenced by, European writing in the initial decades of the colonial period. A clue to the extent of pre-Conquest usage can be found in a historical episode recorded on Sheet 3 of the Codex Xolotl (Fig. 3.40). First, an overview of the plot. An ambitious and troublesome Chichimec (fur-clad barbarian) from the north by the name of Yacazozoloca (1) descends upon the cultured post-Toltec city-state of Colhuacan (2) to the south and seeks an audience with its king, Achitometl (3), whom he threatens with war unless the latter agrees to hand over a daughter in marriage. The king, who, like his queen Xilocihuatl (4), is understandably somewhat distraught over this turn of events, tearfully expresses his regrets that both daughters are already spoken for and explains that he is merely following orders from the preeminent Chichimec authority in the land, Nopal (5) of Tenanyocan, to the northwest. One daughter, Atotoztli (6), has been betrothed to the haughty Chichimec’s immediate overlord, Huetzin of Coatlichan to the east (out of view at upper left), while the other, Ilancueitl (7), is on her way across the lake to marry an upcoming protégé of Colhuacan, Acamapichtli of Tenochtitlan, off to the west (out of view at lower left). Neither daughter is particularly thrilled by the new suitor, judging by the fact that they are weeping and burying their faces in their hands.

3.40. Yacazozoloca’s quest (Codex Xolotl, Sheet 3).

Name glyphs identify individuals and locales. Speech scrolls flow in various directions from the lips of the key players and point to the information they impart. The early 17th-century historian Fernando de Alva Ixtlilxochitl, a direct descendant of the royal house of Tetzcoco, once possessed the Codex Xolotl, which he studied and interpreted with the help of elderly nobles still versed in Nahuatl writing and historical tradition. Sometimes his consultants were unable to recall the exact contextual reading of a multivalent glyphic element or compound, leading him to record variant potential readings of a name. These alternative renditions have the advantage of giving us a more complete insight into the values of a sign than we would otherwise have. Take the villain of our piece, for example. Ixtlilxochitl was evidently unable to link the name definitively to an oral tradition, and so had to reconsider his name glyph each time—over a span of some forty years— that he wrote on the subject. As a result of these continuous reevaluations of the material, we end up occasionally with two or more readings of a name. Our Chichimec upstart appears, thus, as Yacazozoloca in Ixtlilxochitl’s early writings and as Yacanex in later works. Both Nahuatl forms are plausible. The first means “(He) Snorts,” literally “He Makes a

Rumbling/Whirring Sound (zozoloca) With the Nose (yaca-),” while the second, “Nose Ash” (from yaca- and nex-, “ash”), is the name of a plant. The glyph (Fig. 3.41a) shows dotted double-lines emanating, and curling outwards, from a nose, which would fit Ixtlilxochitl’s first reading well. An upward or outward flow of dotted lines ending in two or more dotted curls is the related WIND logogram for ECA(TL), “air,” EECA(TL), “wind,” and IIYO(TL), “breath, toil” (Fig. 3.41b). An unordered arrangement of dots (usually a shapeless or rounded mass), on the other hand, would be read IZTA(TL), “salt,” XAL(LI), “sand,” NEX(TLI), “ash, cinders,” CHIYA(N), “chia,” or even OC(TLI), “pulque, wine,” none of which in combination with the NOSE sign is quite as appealing as the image of a snorting barbarian. If, then, we opt for the earlier reading, we can transliterate the name satisfactorily as YACA•ZOZOLOCA. When Yacazozoloca addresses the king, two glyphs emerge from his speech scrolls (8; see detail in Fig. 3.41a), one the head of a young woman or maiden, the other a set of teeth. The MAIDEN glyph has one value, ICHPOCH(TLI), but two possible translations: as a free-standing noun it means “adolescent female, young unmarried woman,” but as a dependent noun with a possessive pronoun prefixed to it the meaning shifts to “daughter.” The context here requires the latter. The TEETH glyph is purely phonetic, and can be read tlan or tla. The brevity of Yacazozoloca’s utterance makes it probable that this is a verb, and the best candidate in this regard is ìtlan(i), “ask for, request.” The sequence tlan ICHPOCH stands, then, for [qu]ìtlani īichpōch, “he asks for his daughter.” Hieroglyphic sentences are always couched in the third person.

3.41. a) Yacazozoloca seeks a bride (Codex Xolotl, Sheet 3); b) Ecatl (“Air”), read upwards from left as eECATL—MAN (“Air, Breeze”; Codex Vergara, f. 27r).

One of Achitometl’s responses places a compound glyph (9; detail in Fig. 3.42), a banner atop a bean, beside the name glyph of his daughter Ilancueitl. As given, the compound is meaningless: it cannot be logographic since neither banners nor beans fit the context. It must be phonetic, yet pan(BANNER)-e(BEAN) is as opaque as the reverse, e(BEAN)-pan(BANNER). The solution lies in a simple scribal error, one that helps to confirm a Prehispanic date for hieroglyphic sentences. In copying an earlier, now lost, manuscript in the 1540s, the scribe has inadvertently substituted the BEAN sign for the very similar RUBBER sign, which has the basic phonetic values ol, lo, and olo2, from the logographic values OL(LI), “rubber, ball,” OLOLO(A), “roll something into a ball,” and TELOLO(TLI), “ball.” The bean sign is typically oval, but note that in Fig. 3.41b, where it serves as a phonetic indicator, it is round like a rubber ball. The RUBBER sign is typically circular, but both BEAN and RUBBER are black with a white area centered at the top, although in the case of BEAN the white area may simply be an open notch, while in the case of RUBBER the enclosed white area is optional. A manuscript old enough to need copying would presumably have been written and painted more than a quarter of a century earlier and, thus, before the Conquest. The original compound glyph would have been read pan-olo2, “she is (being) transported across” (Nahuatl panōlo), referring to Ilancueitl, who, as the diagonal line of footprints indicates, was on her way across the lake to her future husband. This was a convenient excuse as to why she could not be given to Yacazozoloca!

3.42. Ilancueitl prepares to be taken across the lake. The transport verb is in the top right-hand corner below the speech scroll (Codex Xolotl, Sheet 3).

The furry Chichimec was no doubt interested in more than a mere status upgrade. He was surely eyeing the dowry a royal bride would bring into any marriage. Both daughters’ dowries (10) can be seen in greater detail in Fig. 3.43—they are fertile plots of land off the nearby island of Xicco (“In the Center,” represented by the coiled sign XIC(TLI) “umbilical cord, center” just below the plots) in the so-called chināmpan. These are areas of reclaimed land along the lakeshore, known today as chinampas. The MAT glyph, read PETLA(TL), “mat,” or CHINAM2(ITL), “fence of reeds or cornstalks bounding a plot,” combined with the BANNER glyph, is visible in the water between the two plots. The compound reads as CHINAM2-pan. Within each plot is the name glyph for one of the king’s daughters, A-to3-TOZTLI for Atotoztli (“Water Parrot”) and i2-lan-CUEITL for Ilancueitl (“Old Lady’s Skirt”). Even though the value of a sign can automatically be reduplicated, such as TOZTLI, “parrot,” to TOTOZTLI (see Chapter 4, pp. 131–33, for further information on this), Atotoztli’s name here includes an extra sign, to3 from TOC(TLI), “young maize,” to make the reduplication explicit. Repeating the first consonant and vowel of a word or morpheme is an emotive feature in naming (above all, a characteristic expressing affection or familiarity; cf. our Mimi and Lulu).

3.43. The chinampa dowries of Atotoztli and Ilancueitl (Codex Xolotl, Sheet 3).

The name glyph for Ilancueitl is a composite of the TEETH phonogram (base value tlan) and the logogram CUE(ITL), “skirt.” Between these two elements appears to be the phonogram i2, a hand holding a cord, derived from the logogram ILPI(A), “bind, tie.” A variant of this, consisting only of the cord, is present in Ilancueitl’s name sign on f. 29v of the Codex Telleriano-Remensis (see Fig. 1.17). In Nahuatl /tl/ becomes /l/ after an /l/. In the writing system, however, any sign with a value beginning with tl, such as tlan or tla, can also be read with an initial l, even when the value of the preceding sign does not end in an l. Thus, tla(n) can be read la(n). Combined with i2, this gives us i2-lan, for ilan-, “old woman.” It would seem that poor Ilancueitl might have been named after a hand-me-down skirt! Below the daughters’ names we see a three-layered compound glyph consisting of teeth over a paddle above a black disk. This is a composite phonetic sign. We are already familiar with the TEETH glyph, tla(n). The PADDLE sign is our next challenge. The term for “paddle” in Nahuatl is āhuictli, a compound of ā-, “water,” and huictli, “digging stick.” Since the DIGGING_STICK sign (Fig. 3.44) has the phonetic value hui, it would be a reasonable conjecture that the PADDLE sign has the value ahui. The black disk below it has the logographic value TLIL(LI), “black,” from which we can extract corresponding phonetic values (t)lil and (t)lilli. Of the various potential values for each of the three glyphic elements, only one combination yields a satisfactory reading: tla-ahui-lilli, a good match for

Nahuatl tlaàhuilīlli, “irrigated land,” an apt description for the chinampa plots.

3.44. The DIGGING_STICK sign (the middle glyph). The sequence is to be read upwards from the left: ma-huihui(t)z—MAN, for Mahuiz (“Awesome”) (Codex Vergara, f. 42v).

The remaining details in Fig. 3.40—(11) and (12)—are the reign lengths and names of Achitometl and his immediate successors. But, before we move on from Achitometl and his dynasty, I will leave the final word to the Chichimec suitor. More than a little peeved at being spurned by the court of Colhuacan, Yacazozoloca returned home, where he promptly sent an aggrieved message to his lord Huetzin, Atotoztli’s fiancé. The message consists of a sequence of three glyphs to the right of a speech scroll, all on a dotted line leading to Huetzin (Fig. 3.45).

3.45. Yacazozoloca sends his tax statement to Huetzin (Codex Xolotl, Sheet 3).

Up to now, Yacazozoloca and neighboring Chichimec lords had regularly paid tribute to their overlord, Huetzin, in the form of rabbit meat

and furs. This was about to change as a result of the slights Yacazozoloca felt he had received at the hands of Achitometl and Huetzin. Supported by his allies, the rejected suitor proclaimed: ca2 tlan TOCHTLACALAQUILLI! Statements in Nahuatl are introduced by the particle ca, which has no meaning in itself. The corresponding sign, the MOUTH/LIPS glyph, has two phonetic values, te2 (from TEN(TLI), “lips”) and ca2 (from CAM(ATL), “mouth”), of which only the latter makes sense here. The next sign is the TEETH glyph, tlan. This relates to tlan, the perfect tense of the verb tlami, “come to an end, be over, finished.” And, finally, the trussed rabbit on a spit stands for the tribute in rabbits, tōchtlacalaquīlli. Taken together, the sequence reads: ca2 tlan TOCHTLACALAQUILLI

Ca tlan (in) tōchtlacalaquīlli!

“The rabbit tribute has come to an end!” This is, perhaps, the rough Chichimec equivalent of President George Bush, Sr.’s “Read my lips: No more taxes!” It did not end well for Yacazozoloca. We encounter a further occurrence of the TEETH glyph with this verbal function on Sheet 9 of the Codex Xolotl (Fig. 3.46). A century or so after the Yacazozoloca affair, Nezahualcoyotl, heir to the throne of Tetzcoco, was on the run from Maxtla (“Loincloth”), tyrant of Azcapotzalco, but at the same time organizing resistance to Maxtla’s rule and recruiting allies from other oppressed city-states in the Valley of Mexico. These were the events leading to the successful revolt against Azcapotzalco that laid the foundation for the Aztec Empire. In Fig. 3.46, a comet-tailed being appears over the plain of Chiauhtlan in the northeast of the Valley to two noblemen of Tetzcoco, proclaiming to them that Maxtla’s rule has now run its course. Its name glyph (1) is a compound of EAGLE (CUAUH2) and RADIATE (TONA(C), “shine,” “be warm, hot”), yielding CUAUH2.TONAC, for Cuauhtlatonac (“It Radiates Like an Eagle”). Drawing on this scene in the Codex Xolotl for his Sumaria Relación, Ixtlilxochitl neglects to name the beast, but reads the name glyphs for the noblemen as “Tlaçacuilotzin” and “Tlalpãhuehuetzin,” adding the optional honorific suffix -tzin. His rendition is on the mark. The glyphs are written (2) TLATZACUILLOTL (“Wooden Door”) and (3) TLAL.HUEHUETL (an abbreviation for Tlalpanhuehuetl, “Field Drum”), a

compound of UPRIGHT_DRUM.

TLAL(LI),

the oblong

LAND

sign, and

HUEHUE(TL),

3.46. A portentous creature appears on the plain and prophesies the fall of Maxtla (Codex Xolotl, Sheet 9).

In the middle of the scene are two sentences exclaimed by the supernatural being, to be read from left to right. The first consists of a verb (4) and three nouns (5, in vertical sequence), the second (6) of a verb and noun. All four of the nouns are names. Ixtlilxochitl understands these utterances to mean (quoting here from his original manuscript): mirad tlaxcala huexutzinco tula y otras partes bienen sobre bos otros y el tirano maxtla se acabara … “Behold! Tlaxcallan, Huexotzinco, Tollan, and other places are coming over to you and the tyrant Maxtla will be finished …” However, his translation of the first sentence is inaccurate. The glyphic sequence is as follows: TLACHIY(A)/ITTA(C) TLAXCAL. HUEXO-tzin. TOL.

This seems a little vague, since hieroglyphic sentences lack subject and object markers—except for an occasional indefinite object pronoun te(2) (for tē-), “someone, people,” or tla (for tla-), “something, things.” The EYE glyph (4) has several logographic values, including IX(TLI), “eye, face,” TLACHIY(A), “look, watch, observe,” and ITTA(C), “see.” Here the value

represents, technically speaking, an imperative (the verb form used in giving orders), but it actually functions as an interjection (that is, an exclamation): [xi-]tlachiya[-cān], “look!, see!, behold!” The glyphs in (5) are abbreviated, so TLAXCAL. HUEXO-tzin. TOL. can either be place names, for the cities of Tlaxcallan, Huexotzinco, and Tollan Cholollan, or gentilics for their inhabitants, the Tlaxcalteca, Huexotzinca, and Tolteca Chololteca. The CATTAIL sign (for TOL(IN), “cattails, rushes”; Fig. 3.47) is here tied in a bunch and laid horizontally, with the intention of recalling the form and orientation of the DEER_FOOT glyph (with its basic values CHOCHOL(LI), “deer foot,” CHOLO(A), “flee,” CHOLOLTI(A), “put to flight,” and CHOLOL, “Cholollan, Chololteca”) that represents Tollan Cholollan (modern Cholula), the cultural successor of Tollan Xicocotitlan, as an ally of Tlaxcallan and Huexotzinco in later Aztec history. Ixtlilxochitl, however, thought the abbreviated reference was to the latter Tollan (modern Tula), the former Toltec capital some distance away to the northwest. TLACHIY(A)

3.47. (1) CATTAIL variant, read TOL., for Tollan/Tolteca; (2) DEER_FOOT glyph, read CHOLOL., for Cholollan/Chololteca (Codex Xolotl, Sheet 9).

The Codex Xolotl and its interpreter, Ixtlilxochitl, make it clear in previous sections that these cities are allies of Nezahualcoyotl, and we know from the historian that the fugitive prince was awaiting their troops at this time on the plain of Chiauhtlan, where the omen-bearing comet announces their arrival: TLACHIY(A) TLAXCAL. HUEXO-tzin. TOL.

[Xi-]tlachiya[-cān]!: Tlaxcal[tēcà], Huexōtzin[cà], Tōl[tēcà]!

“Behold!: Tlaxcalteca, Huexotzinca, Tolteca (Chololteca)!” The comet’s final pronouncement (6) on Maxtla is brief and to the point: tlan MAXTLA

Tlan Māxtla!

“Maxtla is finished!” And so is this chapter.

Exercise 1. The glyphs for the city-states of (a) Yacapichtlan (“By the Point”) and (b) Tlayacapan (“In Front”) in the province of Huaxtepec are related in form, yet differ in significant ways. What elements make up their respective signs? How would you transliterate them? Incidentally, the bug climbing the mountain in a threatening manner is a kind of beetle (pīnacatl). As you can imagine, it’s unlikely to have any semantic relevance here. What do you suspect is its role? And, after consulting Chapter 4, can you suggest its probable value?

2. The following glyphs all render the same place name—Mollanco (“At the Place Next to the Sauces”). The base of the name is the word mōlli, “sauce, gravy, broth,” which we discover in its Spanish form, mole, on every self-respecting menu of Mexican cuisine today. Your quest is to decipher the make-up of each of these compound signs and transliterate them. You don’t have to recognize anything other than the body part. A tip: one of the other elements is a ball (telolòtli) of rubber (ōlli). Attempt to come up with your own analysis on the basis of context, one sign value, the iconic forms and, of course, the meaning of the place name.

How much of each composition is likely to be phonetic and how much logographic?

3. Apply your skills as a budding decipherer and polyglot to the analysis of the following glyphs and the names of the cities to which they refer. To make this more interesting, the names and their translations are not in the same order as the signs, something that can actually happen in parallel texts. Some glyphic elements turn up more than once in these compound signs. Comparing the glyphs with the forms and meanings of the place names, match the two sets. Link the composite elements in the glyphs with the linguistic segments and meanings of the actual names, determining the probable values of the elements. Where do you see abbreviation? And which glyphic elements are not represented in the names?

Calyahualco (“In the Circle of Houses”) Chiconquiyauhco (“At 7 Rain”)

Petlacalco (“At the House of Mats”) Petlatlan (“By the Mats”) Tepetitlan (“Next to the Mountain”) Tepetlhueiyacan (“Where the Tall Mountain Is”) Teticpac (“On the Rocks”) Tlachyahualco (“In the Circle of the Ballcourt”) Tliltepec (“At Black Mountain”) Xaxalpan (“On the Sands”) Xiuhhuacan (“Where There Is Turquoise”) Xiuhtepec (“At Turquoise Mountain”)

Chapter 4

Phonetic Writing: The Nahuatl Script in 16th-Century Central Mexico For a long time it was a commonplace in the study of writing systems that phoneticism was not present at the birth of writing. Enshrined in Ignace Gelb’s 1952 classic A Study of Writing is the conviction that the first stage in the evolution of writing around the world was a purely logographic one. According to Gelb’s theory, based entirely on his experience with Near Eastern systems, signs first stood for whole words, and not yet for sounds. Only after some time had passed—a matter of centuries—did the first experiment in phoneticism allegedly take place, an expansion of the fledgling system into a logosyllabary, in which logograms were transformed into syllable signs by using them for their pronunciation alone. This was necessary in order to write the varying forms of words, such as “paint, paints, painted,” in which affixes modify the meaning (as, for example, in Sumerian), or “write, wrote, written,” in which meaning is altered via internal change and suffixation (as in Akkadian). The Sumerian expression nitah kalag-a, “strong man” (or “mighty male”!), a staple of royal inscriptions, is written in texts of the Ur III period, at the end of the 3rd millennium BC, with a combination of logograms (for nitah, “man, male,” and kalag, “strong, mighty”) and a syllabogram (for the final syllable with the nominalizing suffix -a): The ga sign is a phonogram (and specifically a syllabogram) derived from the logogram GA, “milk.” Its earliest form depicts a milk vessel but, like all other signs, it has become more abstract over time and now lies at right angles to its original orientation. It has nothing whatsoever to do with the royal epithet except for its function as a phonetic complement. Gelb’s evolutionary scheme is no longer tenable. This is partly because he developed it in ignorance of East Asian and Mesoamerican systems—

and with a profound disdain for them—and partly because evidence has since come to light from the earliest stages of writing at Abydos in Egypt and Uruk in Mesopotamia that phoneticism developed hand in hand with the elaboration of the logographic inventory. Early Shang inscriptions from China, the so-called oracle bones, provide ample evidence that here, too, phoneticism was present from the beginning. At first it was limited in scope, but over time it gained more and more traction in the system. In Mesopotamia it is clear that the syllabary was not invented overnight but gradually expanded on the analogy of the signs already functioning in this way. When we see a chart of a syllabary, we often have a tendency to view it as a holistic creation. Yet this can be an illusion inspired by the fact that scribes normalize the sign inventory through frequent use just as we develop a characteristic handwriting from individual signs learned in school. Another factor that can influence the growth of phoneticism in a writing tradition is the adaptation of a system to the language of a new community. When Sumerian texts came to be written by Akkadian scribes, who spoke an unrelated (Semitic) language, there was a dramatic increase in the development of syllabograms for the purpose of writing their non-Sumerian names and, gradually, their own Akkadian texts. In similar fashion, as will be discussed in Chapters 6 and 7, exposure to the Zapotec and Maya scripts to the south may have triggered an impulse among the elite of Teotihuacan to develop the Nahuatl system, just as exposure to the Spanish alphabet after the Spanish Conquest seems to have led to an increase in the use of phonetic signs by Aztec scribes, not only to write Nahuatl but also to record Spanish words and names. Interest in the comparative study of writing systems, and in their relationship to iconography and notation, has been steadily growing in recent years, fanned in no small part by the spread of knowledge about Mesoamerican and East Asian systems, which in many ways challenge long-held assumptions about the nature of writing, its variability, and its origins. The exotic unfamiliarity of the Maya script, the decipherment of which first gained steam during the 1970s, has attracted scholars and lay persons alike, many of whom have benefited from the growing comparison of New and Old World systems. While the Maya script has now begun to find a place in handbooks on writing systems, Aztec writing has to date not fared anywhere near as well. If it is mentioned at all, it is quickly dismissed

as a mere forerunner of writing—something along the lines of Plains Indian “pictography.” But, as we have already seen, this is far from an accurate or adequate assessment of this long-overlooked Central Mexican phenomenon. It is especially in the area of phoneticism that Aztec writing shines brilliantly.

Perspectives on the nature of the Aztec syllabary Since the beginning of the millennium, there has been an upsurge of interest in the Aztec system, and in Nahuatl writing in general. International conferences, first and foremost the “Sign & Symbol” series that takes place annually in Warsaw, are increasingly offering a venue for an exchange of data and ideas on the typology of writing systems, iconography, and notation, where in particular the character of phoneticism in hieroglyphic systems such as the Egyptian, Maya, and Aztec scripts has become a focal point of interest. This has had the effect of alerting students of writing systems from other disciplines to both the innovative features and the typologically familiar characteristics that Aztec writing offers up for comparison with better-known systems worldwide. One topic that has provoked some discussion has been the nature of the Aztec syllabary—in particular the question as to exactly how flexible the Aztec system is in representing Nahuatl syllables. A dissenting view on this flexibility has come in recent years from a circle of scholars in Maya studies. Inspired by his years of experience as an epigrapher, Alfonso Lacadena proposed in 2008 that the Aztec system was typologically akin to Maya hieroglyphic writing. In the Maya script, phoneticism takes a narrow and generally well-disciplined form, permitting only syllabograms of a strictly (C)V—(consonant+)vowel—shape. In order to write the final consonant of a word, a sign with a value beginning with that consonant, and usually repeating the vowel of the word’s previous syllable, was employed. So, for example, the word kakaw, “cacao,” in Classic Mayan, a Ch’olan language, was written ka-ka-wa (Fig. 4.1). Convinced that a syllabic system of writing must be composed only of CV signs, Lacadena rejected values in the Aztec syllabary that violated this perceived typological norm, such as CVC (e.g. cac), VC (e.g. il), and disyllabic CVCVC (e.g. patol) signs. However, the first two types are common in Mesopotamian cuneiform and the third is well-attested in, for example, the 8th-century Japanese classic anthology known as the Man’yōshū.

4.1. Maya kakaw, “cacao,” written ka-ka-wa. The comb-like element at left is the first ka, followed at right by a variant form of the same, a full-bodied fish, below which is a two-flapped element read wa.

A further issue has been the fundamental nature of a sign in the Aztec system. Lacadena, followed closely by his colleague Marc Zender, has regarded a logogram as always retaining its identity, even when used phonetically. Such instances in which a logogram, or sequence of logograms, is arbitrarily and temporarily used for its pronunciation alone are known as rebus, an example of which would be the English sentence I

can read well (in Aztec style): According to their argument, once a logogram, always a logogram. But this is problematic for several reasons. First of all, function is paramount. A sign can only be properly called a logogram when it is used as a logogram. It does not retain this status when its function changes, since status is ruled by context and usage. The rebus use of a logogram changes the latter into a phonogram. All phonetic signs in Aztec writing and, by extension, in

Nahuatl writing throughout Central Mexico are derived by rebus from logograms. Therefore, the distinction between CV signs and non-CV signs used phonetically is an arbitrary one. The motivation for the separation of the two comes from the fact that in the Maya system—as in the older Linear scripts of the Aegean—a sign is, with remarkably few exceptions, either a logogram or a syllabogram, and not both. If a sign has a logographic value, it has as a general rule no syllabic value, and vice versa. Most signs have a single value. In the Aztec system, on the other hand, signs frequently have multiple logographic values, and these generate multiple phonetic values, just as in Sumerian and Akkadian cuneiform. This is the norm in Nahuatl writing, not the exception, and it cannot be compared with the occasional and ad hoc use of rebus in the entertainment section of our newspapers, where it is intended as a mere puzzle for amusement and not as part and parcel of the standard mode of communication. My curiosity about hieroglyphic phoneticism and the relationship of logograms to phonograms in Aztec writing was first sparked by a Christmas present. During the winter break of 1971 I was rescued from my deserted freshman dorm by the kindness of John and Kerry Glass of Concord, Massachusetts. Years earlier, John had compiled the monumental catalogue of so-called Mesoamerican pictorials (for the most part, manuscripts with iconography and/or hieroglyphic writing) for the Handbook of Middle American Indians, a vital tool for Mesoamericanists. Ensconced before their fireplace on an especially cold and snowy evening, I was presented with a printout of a microfilm of the late 16th-century Codex Vergara, which, as I discovered to my utter delight, was filled with Aztec hieroglyphs naming people and places. These glyphs from the Tepetlaoztoc area of the Valley of Mexico set me on my quest to understand the character of the system behind them. One sign in particular (on f. 48r) caught my eye and seemed to capture the very essence of Nahuatl phoneticism—the name glyph of a man called Tepalecoc (“He Arrived With Someone’s Help,” referring to circumstances of his birth; Fig. 4.2). Although I was unaware of it at the time, this glyphic compound had first been discussed by Joseph M. A. Aubin, an indefatigable collector of Central Mexican manuscripts, in 1849.

4.2. Tepalecoc, read te2-pal-e-co-oc (Codex Vergara f. 48r).

What fascinated me about this name glyph was the co-occurrence of several syllabic types in one glyphic group. Under the influence of Spanish alphabetic texts, the typical compounding of earlier glyphs has given way to a sequential ordering of elements in columns, as te2-pal and e-co-oc, similar to our sequential positioning of letters in lines. The various elements are loosely arranged in two columns read upwards from the right. The syllabic types present are CV (te2, co), V (e), CVC (pal), and VC (oc). This is very much the way such a name would be written in cuneiform. A syllable ending in a consonant could either be written with a CVC sign, where available, or with a CV-VC combination, in which the vowel of the first sign is matched by the vowel of the second. This is a neater way of representing such syllables than in the Linear scripts of the East Mediterranean and in Classic Maya texts. Each of the signs in the name Tepalecoc has a syllabic value derived from a logographic one: te2 from TEN(TLI), “lip(s),” pal from PAL(LI), “black dye,” e from E(TL), “bean,” co from COM(ITL), “jug,” and oc from OC(TLI), “pulque.” If we were to take pal and oc to be logograms used ad hoc as rebuses, the same would be true, for example, of e from E(TL), “bean.” The sign clearly depicts a bean and it occurs alone as the Aztec glyph for the town of Etlan (“By the Beans”; Fig. 4.3).

4.3. Etlan (“By the Beans”), written E. (Codex Mendoza, f. 44r).

For convenience, here is a brief summation of the key points of agreement and disagreement between my (Mexicanist) analysis and the Mayanist standpoint of Lacadena and Zender on the structure of Aztec writing: Structural features logograms monosyllabograms: (C)V CVC VC disyllabograms multiple values per sign: logographic phonetic phonetic indicators abbreviation: initial syllable omissible initial and medial omissible

Whittaker + + + + + + often often often + + + +

Lacadena/Zender + + + extremely rare fewer than a dozen cases never + -

These differing perspectives reflect the influence of their respective subdisciplines. Thus, the tendency to see only structured CV phoneticism and to reject the existence of multiple phonetic values per sign reflects a Mayanist awareness of exactly these limitations in the Maya script, an expectation that this is typologically binding in writing systems, and a conviction that Mesoamerican systems all share the same principles and structure. With regard to typology, in the standard Sumerian syllabary known as Proto-Ea, dating to the early 2nd millennium BC, we have a number of instances in which a sign (named here in small capitals) has multiple phonetic values spelled out, including CVC and CVCV: LUM

PA

PI

MI

lu-um hu-um gu-um gu-uz

hu-ud ha-ad

wi-i we-e wa-a

me-e mi-i

KAD5 ka-ad ha-ad

GUR7 ku-ru ka-ra

Aubin had come to a similar conclusion about the Aztec script in the mid19th century. On the basis of a painstaking analysis of manuscripts from

Acolhuacan in the Valley of Mexico, Aubin compiled an extensive syllabary that documented not only numerous instances of CV signs, which were adopted by Lacadena, but also a wide range of signs exhibiting the shapes CVC and VC, which were not. All of this was achieved not by starting from a preconceived notion of how the system should behave, but by carefully examining the evidence to let it speak for itself. His selfpublished articles are rare collector’s items today but still have an enormous significance for our understanding of Aztec writing.

The structure of the Aztec syllabary At the core of the syllabary is the open syllable, (C)V, because of its frequency in Nahuatl words, and a basic formula governing value extension and reduction: (CV1)CV1(N) This means that from an open-syllabled logogram the following phonetic

values may be derived: Now let’s take an example of a glyph with final /N/—that is, a stem-final nasal consonant: Signs with a CV value automatically acquire an additional CVN (that is, CVn/CVm) value. The reverse is also true: a sign with a CVN value also has a corresponding CV value. This phenomenon is closely matched by the pattern in early alphabetic texts, in which open syllables—those ending in a vowel—often acquire a final /n/, and syllables ending in /n/ just as often lose it. The Tira de Tepechpan offers good examples of this tendency among indigenous scribes. The name of the Spanish viceroy, Antonio de Mendoza, is written both hieroglyphically and alphabetically (Fig. 4.4a). The compound glyph behind the seated viceroy’s head is read upwards as men-toza, applying the elements me(n), from ME(TL) “maguey,” and toza(n), from TOZA(N) “gopher.” This is an exact fit for the Nahuatl pronunciation of the name Mendoza. Above and to the right of the glyph is the alphabetic spelling medoça, which by contrast lacks syllable-final /n/. In

Fig. 4.4b the name of the Spanish archbishop Juan de Zumárraga is rendered alphabetically as çoma/racan, with an extraneous final /n/ added. The phenomenon arises from the fact that syllable-final /n/ was devoiced (that is, it lost its characteristic vibration in that position) and was lightly articulated, and so was prone to dropping. Nahuatl words ending in the nasal are as a result very frequently written without it in the voluminous Codex Florentinus.

4.4. The inconstancy of final /n/: a) glyphic men-toza and alphabetic medoça for Mendoza; b) çomaracan for Zumárraga (Tira de Tepechpan, Plate 17).

All phonetic signs are derived from logograms with related values. Furthermore, a logogram with a reduplicated value can yield an unreduplicated phonetic value, and vice versa. A few examples will serve to illustrate this: Logogram

CVN phonogram an ←

CV phonogram a←

Logogram A(TL) “water”

XAM(ITL) “adobe” PAN(ITL) “banner” TEN(TLI) “lips”

(chi)chin ← min ← ton ← → xan → pan → ten

chi ← (mi)mi ← to ← → xa → pa → te2

COM(ITL) “pot”

→ con

→ co

CHIYA(N) “chia” MI(TL) “arrow” TOTO(TL) “bird”

The CHIA logogram CHIYA(N) is a well-attested instance of this flexibility. This sign in the form of a dot-filled lozenge or diamond has its phonetic base value, chi, in the glyphic sequence for Chipiltepec (Fig. 4.5a), but its reduplicated value, chichi, with a final nasal in the abbreviated name glyph for Chichincatl (Fig. 4.5b), a steward (calpixqui) from Tlatelolco, and in the declaration of war, the Chīchīmēcayāōyōtl (Fig. 4.5c), against Chichimec rebels in the northeast.

4.5. The CHIA sign: a) from left, chi-pil-te2TEPE. for Chipiltepec (Codex Tepetlaoztoc, f. 5r); b) above from left: chichin. CAL. for Chichincatl calpixqui (Codex Xolotl, Sheet 8); c) between the protagonists: chichim. for Chīchīmēcayāōyōtl (“Chichimec War”; Codex Xolotl, Sheet 3).

Of course, one could consider the latter two to be more drastic abbreviations—just a simple chi. However, we have ample evidence that the Nahua read signs in appropriate contexts with reduplicated values. If this were not the case, we would encounter numerous instances in which a syllabogram or an alternate sign repeated the syllable in question. Yet this is quite rare. It is important to keep in mind that, as in Mesopotamia and

Japan, readings vary in context. Crucial to us is how an Aztec would have read the signs, not how a linguist might reduce the variation to a bare-bones citation form. We are not dealing with random strategies that fill in elements missing in the structure of the system, but rather with a simple, predictable, and universally applicable pattern of contextual values that closely matches patterns not only in the language behind the glyphs, Nahuatl, but also in alphabetic texts written by indigenous scribes in the 16th century. Failure to recognize this will result in transliterations that are often far removed from the names and terms they represent, and will give a false impression of a rigidity in the system that was not actually present. To illustrate the basic differences in interpreting the structure of Nahuatl phoneticism, here are some contrastive examples of the way glyphic compounds and sequences are read in the Whittaker and Lacadena transliteration systems: Underlying name or word Chipiltepec

System of transliteration Whittaker chi-pil-te2TEPE.

Lacadena chi-HUIPIL-te2-TEPE

Tepalecoc Ilancueitl

te-pal-e-co-oc i2il-lan-CUEITL

te-PAL-e-ko-OK EL-la-kwe

Hueiapan

HUEI•aAPAN2

A1-a

Xomimitl Cocopin Anton doña (“lady”) Domingo Mendoza vicerey/visrey (“viceroy”) san(to) (“saint”) fray (“friar”) Pala(n)cizco (“Francisco”)

XO•MIMITL coco-pin an-ton ton-a to-min-co men-toza ix-il-e xan PALAI pala(n)-cici-co

xo-mi ko-pi a-to to-a to-mi-ko me-TOSA ix-e-i xa pa pa-si-ko

The strategies for writing non-CV syllables and sequences vary from writing system to writing system, as shown below. V1 means “Vowel 1” and indicates where a vowel in one sign matches the one in the following sign. The Aztec system is, interestingly enough, not very similar to its Mesoamerican colleague to the south, the Maya system. Instead, the Aztec system most closely resembles the Sumerian, and is in fact the most

complex of the four. The simplest of the four, Mycenaean Linear B, is the one that the Maya script is most alike, which helps to explain why some Mayanists tend to see the structure of the Linear scripts as a model. But, even so, they diverge significantly in detail. Phonetic sequence CVC VCCV

Sumerian

Mycenaean

Maya

Aztec

CVC, CV1-V1C VC-CV

CV V-CV

CV1-CV1 V1-CV1-CV, V-CV

CVC, CV1-V1C VC-CV, VCCV

Disyllabograms and more One area in which Nahuatl writing excels is in the use of disyllabograms, a highly unusual category of syllable signs that is otherwise only known from Japan, where it is called nigōgana. Disyllabograms have, as the name suggests, a two-syllable structure. Such signs are, of course, far less useful than CV and VC signs, since fewer words share the same disyllabic sequences. For that reason, it is much easier to rhyme monosyllabic words than disyllabic ones. Nevertheless, although rare, disyllabograms do have a function, and are efficient in that one sign can do the work of two. In Japan they arose from the necessity to find a way around an imperial edict in the 8th century that forebade place names to be written with more than three characters—four-character names had to be reduced, and so the disyllabogram was born. In the Aztec system, we find them as one of several devices available to the scribe in writing names. Let’s take the example of the name Tlacochin in the Codex Tepetlaoztoc (Fig. 4.6).

4.6. Tlacochin (Codex Tepetlaoztoc, f. 4v).

The nobleman’s name glyph is written in columnar sequence, beginning with a logogram that has two variant readings, TLACOCH(TLI) and TLACOCH(IN), both meaning “Javelin.” The former reflects the standard

form of the word (tlacōchtli) in Classical Nahuatl, whereas the latter is an obsolete form of the same, preserved in naming. Below the javelin with its harpoon-like tip is a worm, teeth, and a jug. We already know that the teeth are a phonogram for the syllable tlan or tla, and that the jug, when used as a phonogram, has the value con or co. These serve as phonetic indicators for the first two syllables of the name. But what about the worm? The standard value of the sign is logographic: OCUIL(IN), “worm.” However, there is a dialect term, hitherto unrecorded in the Valley of Mexico, that means “earthworm”: ìcochin. The glyph for the same serves here as a disyllabogram with the value cochin, the first hieroglyphic evidence proving that a particular word was known in the Valley. The entire column can be transliterated as tla-coTLACOCHINcochin, with cochin as a phonetic indicator identifying the correct noun suffix as -in, not -tli. A rare instance of a trisyllabogram, of which only a handful are so far known, is found in the Codex Mendoza, where it occurs in the glyphic compound for the town of Cozamaloapan (“On the Waters of the Rainbow”; Fig. 4.7). The sign, transliterated cozama.apan, employs a weasel (cōzama-) element phonetically for the unrelated rainbow term (cōzamālō-), plus a waterway (āpan-) for homophonous, and related, āpan, “on the water(s).”

4.7. Cozamaloapan (“On the Waters of the Rainbow”; Codex Mendoza, f. 46r).

Graphic syllepsis—punning with glyphs In previous chapters we have touched on the integral role played by such iconographic devices as dimension and especially color in Aztec writing. Over the course of the 16th century, this role weakens as Nahuatl writing in its broadest sense reacts to the conventions and appearance of Spanish monochromatic (black-on-white) texts, but at its finest, the Aztec system made great use of color and multimodality.

One of the founding fathers of Mexico Tenochtitlan has the colorful name Xiuhcaque (“He’s Got Turquoise Sandals”—not unlike Elvis’s “Blue Suede Shoes”). His glyph in the Codex Mendoza (Fig. 4.8a), composed of a turquoise-blue sandal, is read logographically as XIUH•CAC. A noble with virtually the same name, Xiuhcactli (“Turquoise Sandals”), is listed in the cadaster, or land registry, of the Codex Cozcatzin (Fig. 4.8b). This time, instead of blue footwear we see a generic sandal (cac-), beneath which a sheaf of herbal grass (xiuh-) lies, distinguished by its turquoise color (again xiuh-). The compound is to be read xiuh•XIUH-CAC, but there is more to this than meets the eye. The herbs are phonetic and yet their color is logographic, so the very same sign has two functions at once—a case of what I call graphic syllepsis.

4.8. a) Xiuhcaque (“He’s Got Turquoise Sandals”; Codex Mendoza, f. 2r); b) Xiuhcactli (“Turquoise Sandals”; Codex Cozcatzin, p. 5).

In linguistics, syllepsis refers to the use of a single word in two senses or functions simultaneously. It is always clever and often witty, and is the basis of the simple pun. A typical instance would be a hypothetical lunchtime chat among cannibals: “Why didn’t you like the clown?”—“Don’t know. Tasted kind of funny.” In the context of an anthropophagic meal, the words “like” and “funny” are each used in two distinct senses at the same time. This is semantic syllepsis. When the play involves elements of writing we can speak of graphic syllepsis. A letter at a word junction in a crossword puzzle is an instance of syllepsis because it is graphically part of two entirely different words at one and the same time.

A complicated instance of graphic syllepsis involves the Shang logogram in the jiǎgǔwén (oracle-bone script) representing Old Chinese *du , “receive” (Fig. 4.9a)—the asterisk in such forms marks a reconstruction based on historical and comparative linguistic evidence. The sign depicts two open hands between which is a boat. The latter is a phonetic element deriving from the logogram for Old Chinese *tu, “dugout canoe, boat,” (Fig. 4.9b), but it is placed in such a way as to conjure up the image of a boat being handed over. This means that the BOAT element has a dual function. Fundamentally, it serves as the phonetic element at the core of the logogram. But, at the same time, it represents an object changing hands.

4.9. a) Shang *du , “receive”; b) *tu, “dugout canoe, boat.”

In Aztec writing we have similar cases. A notable instance is the convention for the term Tōltēcà, “Toltecs” (a pre-Aztec polity), “artisans,” “civilized people,” which is written with cattails (tōl-) sprouting out of the jaw region of a human face (Fig. 4.10a). The lower face has two possible syllabic readings: te2 (from tēn-, “lips”) and ca2 (from logographic CAM(ATL), Nahuatl cama-, -can, “mouth”), both of which are intended here. Together, they give us TOL-te2+ca2. The term for “agricultural worker” (tlāltēca-) employs the same device: TLAL-te2+ca2 (Fig. 4.10b). Given the frequency of this combination, the sign can be classified as having the composite value teca{=te2+ca2} and transliterated simply as a disyllabogram, teca.

4.10. a) Tolteca (Codex Xolotl, Sheet 1); b) Tlaltecatl (Codex Xolotl, Sheet 3).

The founder of Tetzcoco, Quinatzin, was another person on whom the epithet Tlaltecatl was conferred, but in his case the epithet, bestowed in honor of his endeavors in support of agriculture, is written in abbreviated fashion just with the logogram for LAND, TLAL(LI). Although we lack syllepsis in the sign for his epithet, his primary name glyph (Fig. 4.11) makes up for it. Since Quinatzin was not a native speaker of Nahuatl, his name lacks a Nahuatl etymology. For that reason it is written phonetically: quiquinatz. The disyllabogram chosen for the name comes from the logogram (QUI)QUINATZ(A), “growl, bark,” which depicts a barking dog or deer, depending on the scribe’s preference. The rising speech scrolls indicate the barking, but what about the water at the animal’s snout? This relates to the logogram (QU)I(C), “drink, imbibe.” The element is applied here as a phonetic indicator, qui, supporting the reading quinatz of the main element. But there is more to it than that. On its own, this element shows water entering or issuing from a human mouth. Here, however, it has been merged with the animal head that is part of the quinatz element, as if the dog or deer is drinking and barking at the same time, or perhaps just drooling while barking! This is graphic syllepsis because qui is a phonetic indicator, but at the same time it is made to look like something the animal is doing while barking. (Incidentally, although this variant of the DRINK logogram appears to show liquid exiting the snout rather than entering, this is nothing more than a stylistic convention—the WATER element consists of a liquid flow with, ideally, two or more splashing extensions ending in alternating droplets and seashells. If the water is painted entering the mouth,

it becomes more difficult to have the flow ending in the requisite drops and shells.)

4.11. Quinatzin, founder of Tetzcoco. His gentilic, Acolhua, is written above his head as aacol., while his name, Quinatzin Tlaltecatl, recorded as a two-part name glyph behind his head, is read upwards as quiquinatz.—TLAL. (Codex Xolotl, Sheet 3).

Since we just had the example of Tlaltecatl a moment ago involving the LAND logogram, this would be a good time to bring up a related case of syllepsis. In the place glyph for the town of Acamilixtlahuacan (“Where There Is a Plain With Fields of Reeds”; Fig. 4.12a) the same LAND element is used for both Nahuatl mīl-, “fields,” and ixtlāhua-, “plain.” The INVERTED_EYE element has been added as a disyllabic phonetic indicator ixtlauh for the logographic value IXTLAHUA(TL). All together, this gives us in transliteration ACA-MIL+ixtlauhIXTLAHUA.

4.12. a) Acamilixtlahuacan (“Where There is a Plain With Fields of Reeds”); b) Teocuitlatlan, written TEOCUITLAtlatlan—CONQUERED (“Beside the Gold”; Codex Mendoza, f. 13v, 36r).

Now let’s move upscale from animals, plants, and minerals to precious metals. The place glyph for Teocuitlatlan (“Beside the Gold”; Fig. 4.12b) consists of the sign (and symbol) for gold, TEOCUITLA(TL), a yellow disk with an internal pattern of two interlaced loops in cross formation with corner dots, giving off flames as if undergoing smelting. This is a sylleptic play. The flames have the logographic value TLATLA(C), “burn,” but here the derivative phonetic value tlatla(n) is intended. In transliteration this would be TEOCUITLAtlatlan. Here we have an overlap in functions: tlatlan is both a phonetic indicator for TEOCUITLA and a phonetic complement for the suffix -tlān. This happens frequently in cuneiform, where a phonetic sign following a logogram ending in a consonant has a value beginning with the final consonant of the logogram but adding a vowel or more belonging to a suffix (see p. 124). The syllepsis in the glyph for Teocuitlatlan is twofold: the double phonetic function of tlatlan as both an indicator and a complement, and the pseudo-semantic function of the BURN element that evokes an image of smelting. I will end this chapter with a particularly intriguing instance of graphic syllepsis, one that underscores the playfulness and ingenuity of Aztec phoneticism. The little town of Mexicatzinco (“Little Mexico”), located on the lakeshore just south of Tenochtitlan, is rendered quite creatively—and mischievously—in glyphs. In the Codex Aubin a squatting male with feathers in his hair clutches his bloody chest while defecating (Fig. 4.13a). The eagle down in his hair identifies him as a Mexica. The Mēxìca- in the place name is homophonous with the gentilic meaning “Aztec,” but is not the same word—it is the combining form of Mēxìco, “city of Mexico.” So the depicted Mexica is phonetic: mexica. What we see extruding from the nether regions of this hapless individual is a maguey (me-) plant, which supplies the phonetic value me. The verb “relieve oneself; (esp.) excrete, defecate” is xīxa, which lends the acrophonic value xi to the mix. And finally, the anatomical part active in this endeavor is the tzīn-, “buttocks, anus, base,” which gives us the phonetic value tzin for the diminutive -tzin in the postposition -tzinco. But there’s more. Attaching the Mexica head element naturalistically via a torso to the buttocks produces a syllepsis in which a single human figure supplies two readings, mexica and tzin, at the same time. Moreover, excreting a spiny maguey plant, which should be a rather unpleasant experience all in all, gives us a second syllepsis in a phonetic indicator that combines me and xi.

If the red splotches on the fellow’s chest are blood, we have the value ez (from ez-, “blood”) as well, which would give us a compounded phonetic indicator in the form me•ez•xi. This would be of interest because the etymology of the name Mexico (from mētz-xic-co; see Chapter 5, p. 146) requires the assumption of an original assimilated pronunciation Mēxxìco. This is masked by a scribal tendency to write double continuants (consonants like l, z, and x) within a word stem as single letters. The phonetic spelling would match the original pronunciation because the sequence me-ez-xi would be automatically read by a native speaker in assimilated form as mexxi. The rendition in the Codex Cozcatzin (Fig. 4.13b) seems rather tame by comparison. This is a straightforward combination of the Mexica head, read mexica, and juxtaposed buttocks, tzin, the latter with surrounding regions for context. The onus is, however, on a reader with an intimate understanding of Nahuatl to recognize a posteriori that the upside-down orientation further suggests the Nahuatl prefix tzīn-, “downwards.” And on that note we descend to the next chapter, which discusses name glyphs in relation to the major cities and rulers of the Aztec Empire.

4.13. Mexicatzinco (“Little Mexico”), written a) me•ez•ximexica•tzin. (Codex Aubin, f. 22v); b) mexica•tzin. (Codex Cozcatzin, f. 17r).

Exercise Your next challenge involves a biscript. In the codices we frequently encounter glyphs accompanied by alphabetic glosses. The Codex Florentinus turns the tables on this practice and applies occasional glyphic glosses to the alphabetic text, as we have seen in Chapter 3.

For the purpose of this exercise a hieroglyphic sentence, illustrated opposite, has been coupled with an actual alphabetic text from an appendix to Book 1 of the Codex. The addendum contains a series of rhetorical devices and sayings in Nahuatl, among them the following: Āxcān tōna, tlathui. Quìtōznequi itlà yancuic mochīhua, yancuic tlamanitiliztli ompēhua. Ànozo tlàtoāni motlālia, mopèpena. Teōtl cuālo; tlālōlini. In teōtl quìtōznequi tōnatiuh, q.n. itlà tēmàmauhtì mochīhua. Àzo yāōyōtl, àzo tlàtòcāmiquiliztli. Āxcān mīxtlàpachmana in tōnatiuh, q.n. tlàtòcāmicoa ànozo polihui in āltepētl, ànozo cualli tlamanitiliztli polihui, ànozo tlamatini miqui. Zan cocoxtiuh in tōnatiuh, q.n. àmō tōna, àmō tlatotōnia, àmō totōnqui in tōnalli; mīmīxtēntoc. Auh in īcaquiztica quìtōznequi àmō chicāhua in nemiliztli, àmō chicāhuac in tlàtoāni. Tēl achi cualli in mochīhua, yēcè àmō chicāhuac. Now the sun is shining; dawn is breaking. It means that something new happens, a new tradition begins. Or a king is installed, is elected. The deity is devoured; there is an earthquake. The deity: that is, the sun. It means that something terrible happens. Perhaps war, perhaps the death of a king. Now the sun is cast face-down. That is, there is a king’s death, or the citystate perishes, or a good custom perishes, or a sage dies. The sun goes weakly. That is, it does not shine, it does not give off heat, the sun’s rays are not hot; it stays overcast. And, as for its import, it means life is not healthy, the king is not strong. Even when what is done is somewhat good, nonetheless he is not strong.

1. Make a note of all the glyphic elements you recognize in the sequence. 2. Examine the extract, compare the glyphs, and finally locate the parallel passage. With the help of the translation provided, determine its literal meaning. What does the saying refer to? Transliterate the glyphic sequence. The only element new to you is the yellow one in the second compound glyph. It depicts hay (pachtli). What role does it play in the sequence?

Chapter 5

Names and Glyphs that Ruled an Empire In the previous chapters we have examined the typical nature of Nahuatl writing as attested in codices of the 16th century. Words and names of the precolonial period are characteristically recorded either logographically (that is, with one or two logograms each) or logosyllabically (a combination of a logogram and one or more syllabograms). In order to ascertain the proportional distribution of types it would be instructive to consider the manner in which thirty of the most prominent names in Aztec history are constructed hieroglyphically. These are the names of city-states (Mexico Tenochtitlan, Tlatelolco, Acolhuacan Tetzcoco, and Tlacopan) and their monarchs.

Mexico Tenochtitlan The capital of the Aztec empire was the greater southern half of an urban complex consisting of two cities, Tenochtitlan and Tlatelolco, on an island in the middle of a sweet-water lake region in the Valley of Mexico (Fig. 5.2). Together, these were known as the city of Mexico, after which the modern state takes its name. In Nahuatl literature, we often find the name for the larger unit, Mexico, juxtaposed in no fixed order with the name of one of its two constituent units. Thus, the capital is referred to both as Mexico Tenochtitlan and as Tenochtitlan Mexico. We know from a comparison with the Otomi version of the name that Mexico (Nahuatl Mēxìco, with stress on the second, not first, syllable) originally meant “In (co) the Center (xīc-, literally “navel”) of the Moon (mētz-),” a reference to Metztliapan (“In the Waters of the Moon”), today the ever-dwindling lake known as Lake Texcoco. On Aztec monuments and in post-Conquest manuscripts the capital of the Aztec empire is, nevertheless, represented solely by the glyph for Tenochtitlan, to underscore the fact that, after Tlatelolco was conquered by its sister city in the brief civil war of 1473, only the southern section of the city of Mexico actually ruled the empire.

The name Tenochtitlan, which means “Beside (-titlan) the Rock (te-) Cactus Fruit (nōch-),” is read upwards in its glyphic form (Fig. 5.1) as TE-NOCH., the lower element of which is the canonical form of the STONE sign. As mentioned in Chapter 1, the population of the city was called Tenochca, which presupposes an earlier form of the town name: Tenochco (“Beside the Rock Cactus Fruit” or “At Tenoch’s Place,” if called after its founder). We know from two unrelated sources that the original settlement was known as Cuauhnochtitlan (“Beside the Cactus Fruit of the Eagle”), a reference to the cactus on which Huitzilopochtli, the god that led the Aztecs on their great migration into Central Mexico, landed in the guise of an eagle.

5.1. Tenochtitlan (Codex Mendoza, f. 19r).

5.2. Tenochtitlan in 1519 (city names in white, the hill of Huixachtecatl in orange, and Lake Metztliapan in blue).

Acamapichtli The glyph for Acamapichtli is straightforward (Fig. 5.3), but crafted to look like part of the iconographic depiction of this first king (tlàtoāni, plural tlàtòquè). The arrows that the ruler is holding are actually his name glyph: ACA•MAPICH(TLI), “Handful (māpīchtli) of Reed (āca-) Arrows” (see pp. 37, 45, and 66). The ruler’s status as a lesser king subordinate to a greater power, that of Azcapotzalco, is indicated by the insignia in his hair—the socalled cōzòyahualōlli—and his seat of cattail rushes. Contrast the manner in which the first three rulers of Tenochtitlan are depicted with the more regal manner of the kings from Itzcoatl down to Cuauhtemoc.

5.3. Acamapichtli (“Handful of Reed Arrows”; Primeros Memoriales, f. 51r–53v).

Huitzilihuitl The name of the second king is a nominal compound, like that of his father, Acamapichtli. It means “Hummingbird (huītzil-) Down Feathers (ìhuitl),” written HUITZIL•IHUI(TL), with the down surrounding the hummingbird (Fig. 5.4). Hummingbird down is an emblem of Huitzilopochtli, for which reason the Mexica—the Aztecs of Tenochtitlan and Tlatelolco—are represented iconographically and glyphically with down in the hair on their forehead.

5.4. Huitzilihuitl (“Hummingbird Down Feathers”; Primeros Memoriales, f. 51r–53v).

Chimalpopoca The ill-fated third king, son of Huitzilihuitl, has a name that consists of a verb, popōca, “give off smoke,” with a noun, chīmal-, “shield,” embedded in it, and is accordingly written CHIMAL-POPOCA (Fig. 5.5). This is an example of a so-called sentence name. If the verb is transitive (that is, can take an object), the noun compounded with it expresses the object. If not, it has an oblique relationship to the verb. This is the case here. The name means “He Smokes Like a Shield,” a reference to war—a kenning for which is mītl chīmalli, “arrows [and] shield.”

5.5. Chimalpopoca (“He Smokes Like a Shield”; Primeros Memoriales, f. 51r–53v).

Itzcoatl Huitzilihuitl’s half-brother, Itzcoatl, is both the fourth king and, after the conquest of Azcapotzalco, the first emperor (cemanāhuactlàtoāni, or “world king”). As in the case of Acamapichtli, his name glyph is disguised as a physical object on the person of the king, a blend of iconography and hieroglyphics (Fig. 5.6). A serpent (cōātl) with a spine of projecting obsidian (ītz-) arrowheads rises up from the back of his headdress. The compound, read ITZ•COA(TL) (“Obsidian Serpent”), is parallel in form to that for the title cihuācōātl (see pp. 37, 66), which in the Codex Mendoza curls forward from the back of Acamapichtli’s headdress. Note Itzcoatl’s turquoise diadem, the xiuhhuitzōlli, an emblem of autonomous kingship; his turquoise cloak, the xiuhtilmàtli; and his tepotzòicpalli, a throne of interwoven reed with a backrest.

5.6. Itzcoatl (“Obsidian Serpent”; Primeros Memoriales, f. 51r–53v).

Motecuhzoma I Ilhuicamina The fifth king and second emperor was a half-brother of Chimalpopoca. He has two primary names, the first of which, Motecuhzoma (or Moteuczoma —but never the heavily Hispanicized “Montezuma” or the only slightly less garbled “Moctezuma”), means “He Is Angry (mozōma) Like a Lord (tēcuh-, or tēuc-).” This is a reference to the sun god at its zenith, but probably also to a scowling baby Motecuhzoma at birth! The glyph (Fig. 5.7a) is an

abbreviation, read .TECUH. (or .TEUC.). Although he is generally referred to as Motecuhzoma (with and without the by-name Ilhuicamina) in Nahuatl literature, his second name is far more common in hieroglyphic writing. This compound sign (Fig. 5.7b), read ILHUICA-MINA, “He Shoots (mīna) the Heavens (ilhuica-),” consists of a layered sky band, representing the multilayered heavens, and an arrow piercing it. His third name, Chālchiuhtlatōnac “He Has Shone Like Jade,” on the other hand, is never attested in hieroglyphic writing.

5.7. a) Motecuhzoma the Elder (huēhuè) as a mummy bundle after death (Codex TellerianoRemensis, f. 34v); b) the compound glyph for Ilhuicamina (Codex Mendoza, f. 7v).

Axayacatl The sixth king and third emperor was a young grandson of Motecuhzoma I. His name glyph, read A•XAYACA(TL), literally “Water (ā-) Face/Mask (xāyacatl),” refers to the brine fly and its larvae, a delicacy (Fig. 5.8).

5.8. Ayaxacatl (“Water Face/Mask”; Primeros Memoriales, f. 51r–53v).

Tizocic Tlalchitonatiuh The eldest of the three grandsons of Motecuhzoma to ascend the throne, Tizocic has shared in the fate of his grandfather insofar as his name is concerned. The literature, academic and popular alike, cites him almost invariably under the mangled Spanish form of his name, Tizoc. The latter is

meaningless in Nahuatl, although there has been no end to creative attempts to etymologize it as such. The consensus has been that the (Spanish!) name means “Pierced/Bled One (or Leg).” In all such instances, the fact that the fourth emperor’s name is consistently rendered in Nahuatl alphabetic texts as Tizocicatzin (or “Tiçocicatzin,” with the honorific suffix -tzin), or, in its commonly abbreviated form, as Tizocic (“Tiçocic”), has been ignored. Nahuatl scholarship is steadily improving and so it is only a matter of time until the same rigorous standards expected in studies of Classical Latin or Classical Japanese will be applied generally to the study of Classical Nahuatl, both in its alphabetic and hieroglyphic form. Grammatically, the name Tizocic cannot derive from the verb zō, “pierce,” and, thus, cannot mean “Pierced One,” “Bled Leg,” or the like. It is rather a syncope of the phrase tēezzo àcic, which means “He Has Arrived (àcic) Well-Born (tēezzo, literally “as one’s [flesh and] blood”)” and refers to the circumstances of his birth. It is comparable to the names Hualacic (“He Got Here”), Tepalecoc (“He Arrived With Someone’s Help,” with a dialect term for “arrived,” ècoc), and especially Tlilocic (“He Has Arrived Blackened”), a comparable syncope of the phrase tlīllò àcic. Hieroglyphically, a constant feature of Tizocic’s name compound is the LEG sign (see p. 55), here with its logographic value ACI(C), “arrive(d).” This is also true of the stone monument named after him, the so-called Tizoc Stone (better, Stone of Tizocic; Fig. 5.10), which exhibits the LEG glyph, but— unfortunately—further details on it, or attached to it, have been too severely eroded to allow analysis. In the Primeros Memoriales, compiled by indigenous authors under the editorship of the great Franciscan scholar Bernardino de Sahagún, a turquoise earplug ornament hangs from the leg (Fig. 5.9a). This has the logographic value TEEZZO, “well-born” and, in all probability, the phonetic value zo2 (see the discussion under Motecuhzoma II, p. 152). The dots covering the LEG sign are phonetic and have the value tiz (from TIZA(TL), “chalk”). Taken together, the compound reads tizTEEZZO•ACIC or tiz-zo•ACIC, depending on the intended value of the PLUG element. In similar fashion, the Codex Mendoza (Fig. 5.9b) records the name logosyllabically as tiz•ACIC. The Codex Telleriano-Remensis, on the other hand, adopts a purely phonetic approach (Fig. 5.9c). The first part of the name, originally tēezzo, “well-born,” is accurately rendered here as te•zo, a clever blend of the phonetic values of the elements STONE (te) and PIERCE (zo). The latter element, long mistaken for a logogram, has been

responsible for generations of false etymologies down to the present day. In contrast to the multiple glyphic renditions of his first name, his second name, Tlalchitonatiuh (“Earthbound Sun”), never appears in glyphic form.

5.9. Tizocic: a) Primeros Memoriales, f. 51r–53v; b) tiz•ACIC (Codex Mendoza, f. 12r); c) te•zo (Codex Telleriano-Remensis, f. 38v)

5.10. The Stone of Tizocic (or “Tizoc Stone”); Tizocic’s name glyph can be seen behind the elaborate headdress of the emperor, in the center of the view.

Ahuitzotl The eighth king and fifth emperor, Ahuitzotl, bears the name “Otter,” a compound of ā-, “water,” and huitzō(tl), an Otomanguean loanword for “dog” found also in the canine term tehuitzōtl, literally “dog on the rocks.” The glyph (Fig. 5.11) displays the dog-like otter with water flowing down its back and around its tail, and is to be read: aAHUITZO(TL). The WATER

element reinforces part of the logographic value and so has the function of a semantic indicator (see Chapter 3, pp. 78–79).

5.11. Ahuitzotl (“Otter”; Primeros Memoriales, f. 51r–53v).

Motecuhzoma Xocoyotl The main element in the name glyph (Fig. 5.12) of the tragic ninth king and sixth emperor, Motecuhzoma Xocoyotl (“Motecuhzoma the Younger,” or simply Motecuhzoma II), who was on the throne when a Spanish expeditionary force under Hernán Cortés arrived in 1519, is a turquoise diadem, the abbreviation (.TECUH., “Lord”) that we saw above for Motecuhzoma Ilhuicamina (Fig. 5.7a). Attached to this is the PLUG element (which can take the form of a plug for the nose, ear, or lip), here read zo2, an element also found in the glyph for Tizocic in the Primeros Memoriales. This is usually enough to identify him.

5.12. Motecuhzoma Xocoyotl (Primeros Memoriales, f. 51r–53v).

However, on occasion the name is written more fully. On the Xiuhcoatl sculpture (Fig. 5.13a) in the Dumbarton Oaks collection, we have three elements: a DIADEM (TECUH), a PLUG (zo2), and a FRINGED_SCROLL with curling tongues rising out of a standard speech scroll. The FRINGED_SCROLL element, which in iconography symbolizes heat (as of a burning offering or

temple), steam (as of a quenched fire), and heated speech, has in hieroglyphic writing the logographic value MOZOMA, “be angry.” Glyphs for reflexive verbs, such as mozōma, have a two-part (bimorphemic) logographic value consisting of the reflexive prefix (mo-, “him/her/itself”) and the verb base. A noun or phonetic indicator preceding, and acting on, the verb base is best placed in curly brackets between the reflexive prefix and the verb base. Together, the compound can be transliterated MO{TECUHzo }ZOMA, “He Is Angry Like a Lord.” An explicit representation of the 2 reflexive prefix is found occasionally in manuscripts. The phonetic value mo2, derived from the logogram MOLOC(TLI), “covert feathers,” is sometimes inserted into the DIADEM sign, resulting in the abbreviated spelling mo2•TECUH. (Fig. 5.7b).

5.13. The glyph for Motecuhzoma, above the frame year 2 Acatl (1487): a) MO{TECUHzo }ZOMA; b) mo •TECUH. (Codex Telleriano-Remensis, f. 41r). 2 2

Cuitlahua The name of the tenth king and seventh emperor, Cuitlahua (often confused in Spanish sources with the name of a town and spelled Cuitlahuac), is written in abbreviation as CUITLA. with the logogram EXCREMENT (Fig. 5.14). In translation the name, “He Has Excrement,” may appear odd, but is probably a reference to him appearing at birth covered in meconium—

unless it is an oblique reference to gold, teōcuitlatl, literally “divine excrement.” At least three Central Mexican rulers bore this name. It should also be kept in mind that a negative-sounding name may have served the purpose of protecting a baby from evil, as such names once did in rural southern China, by making the child seem undesirable.

5.14. Cuitlahua (“He Has Excrement”; Primeros Memoriales, f. 51r–53v).

Cuauhtemoc The eleventh king and last emperor, Cuauhtemoc, bears a name generally mistranslated as “Descending Eagle,” or the like (Figs 5.15 and 5.34). Grammatically, however, it can only mean “He Has Descended (temōc) Like an Eagle (cuāuh-),” which, if it were not already his name, would have been a fitting sobriquet for a young monarch who fought valiantly for his empire but ultimately lost. In transliteration it is CUAUH2•TEMOC, with the second logogram deriving from the downward orientation of the first, rather than from a separate element.

5.15. Cuauhtemoc (“He Has Descended Like an Eagle”; Primeros Memoriales, f. 51r–53v).

Mexico Tlatelolco The glyph for Tenochtitlan’s sister city, Tlatelolco (“On the Hillock/Mound”), in the Codex Mendoza (Fig. 5.16) is actually the one for the latter’s predecessor, the town of Xaltelolco (“On the Sandy Hillock” or “At Sand Hill”). There are four elements in the glyph: XAL(LI), “sand,”

EARTH, (TLAL(LI)), TLATEL(LI),

“hillock, mound,” and (OL)OL2, “round.” The first, XAL(LI), always takes the form of dots against a colorless background (e.g. in the name Xaltocan, “Where It’s Sandy”; Fig. 5.17a), whereas EARTH (Fig. 5.17b) is characterized by rows of alternating dots and horseshoe-like markings against a yellow-brownish and/or purplish-grayish background. In Fig. 5.16 we see a clever blend of XAL(LI) with the color of the EARTH element, thus merging the earlier and later forms of the name in one hieroglyphic representation. The last element, (OL)OL2, derives its value from the markedly round shape of the HILLOCK element. The entire glyph can be transliterated as XAL/EARTH•TEL•OL2. to reflect the dual nature of the hillock markings.

5.16. Tlatelolco (“On the Hillock/Mound”; Codex Mendoza, f. 19r).

5.17. Sand vs. earth: a) XAL(LI), “sand,” in the glyph for the conquered town of Xaltocan (“Where It’s Sandy”), written XAL•tocan with the SPIDER element as a disyllabogram for toca(n) (Codex Mendoza, f. 3v); b) TLAL(LI), “earth,” in the glyph for Tlalcozauhtitlan (“Beside the Yellow Earth”), read upwards as TLAL-COZAUH. (Codex Mendoza, f. 8r).

Cuacuauhpitzahuac

The first king of Tlatelolco bears the name Cuacuauhpitzahuac (“Longhorns”), referring to antlers (cuācuauh-) that are long and slender (pitzāhuac). Ideally, the name glyph, shown in the Codex Xolotl sprouting from his head (Fig. 5.18a), would depict attenuated antlers—a manipulation of the glyph’s size and shape being the standard device for representing dimensional adjectives. With the introduction of cattle after the Spanish Conquest the term cuācuahuè, “horned animal,” became specialized as the term for the new species. As an unexpected outcome of this, the logogram for the founding ruler of Tlatelolco in the Codex Florentinus (Fig. 5.18b) takes the anachronistic form of a bull! In instances in which the name glyph is modified in size and shape to clearly display extended and tapering horns, the appropriate transliteration would be CUACUAUH•PITZAHUAC, with the logographic value for the dimensional adjective (PITZAHUAC) included. If a manipulation of form is absent, or insufficiently evident to supply the additional value, the transliteration should be simply CUACUAUH., indicating an abbreviated spelling.

5.18. Cuacuauhpitzahuac: a) wearing his name glyph (Codex Xolotl, Sheet 5); b) semantically updated (Codex Florentinus, vol. 8, f. 5r).

Tlacateotl Back in Chapter 2 we saw that a 16th-century scribe had mistaken the glyph for Tlacateotl’s name, which means “[Sun] God at Midday,” for the depiction of a solar eclipse (see pp. 80–81). In the Codex Florentinus version (Fig. 5.19), the SUN element shines forth again, but in Europeanized guise, whereas STONE, with its phonetic value te, remains close to its Aztec form. The SUN glyph has several logographic values, including TONATIUH, “sun,” TLACA2, “at midday,” and TEO2(TL), “deity,” of which the latter two are relevant here. If both are intended, then we have an instance of graphic

syllepsis (for which see Chapter 4, pp. 136–41). In this case, the STONE element, te, is a phonetic indicator for the second logographic value in the name glyph, TEO2(TL). However, in late 16th-century manuscripts from the Tepetlaoztoc area in the east of the Valley of Mexico we repeatedly see te used as a phonetic abbreviation for the word teōtl. Erring on the side of caution, I will take it as such here as well. The rod-like element between SUN and STONE has a logographic value TLACO(TL), “rod, staff, pole,” and a derivative phonetic value tlac, which serves as a phonetic indicator for the SUN logogram. Taken together, we have two possible analyses. If SUN is interpreted sylleptically—that is, is read as both TLACA2 and TEO2(TL), as in the Codex Xolotl—then each logographic value has its own phonetic indicator in order to stress the syllepsis: tlacTLACA2•teTEO2(TL). The alternative is to read the logogram with a single value, TLACA2, preceded by a phonetic indicator and followed by an abbreviated phonetic complement: tlacTLACA -te. 2

5.19. Tlacateotl (“[Sun] God at Midday”; Codex Florentinus, vol. 8, f. 5v).

Cuauhtlatoa The name Cuauhtlatoa does not mean “Speaking Eagle,” a common assumption, but rather “He Speaks (tlàtoa) Like an Eagle (cuāuh-).” The eloquence of the eagle, a bird that symbolizes nobility and prowess in war, is indicated iconically by the varicolored speech scrolls (Fig. 5.20). Of the two possible variant readings of the verbal logogram TLATO(A), the present tense, TLATOA, is the relevant one in this case. The perfect (or preterite)

tense,

TLATO,

is relevant when the same glyphic compound, TLATO(A), is used for the title cuāuhtlàtò, or military governor.

CUAUH2-

5.20. Cuauhtlatoa (“He Speaks Like an Eagle”; Codex Florentinus, vol. 8, f. 5v).

Moquihuix The last king of Tlatelolco was the controversial Moquihuix, a cranky dynast who was toppled (literally, from a pyramid) by his cousin Axayacatl of Tenochtitlan for treating his wife, the latter’s sister, with disrespect. Every family has its ups and downs, and, as it turns out, so do their glyphs. In the Codex Mendoza (Fig. 2.18), we saw Moquihuix plummeting to his death with his name glyph careening beside him. The Codex Cozcatzin (Fig. 5.23) portrays him moments later, lying sprawled out at the foot of the temple stairs with the alcoholic contents of his name glyph spilling out behind his head. The choice of phonetic signs cannot be attributed to innocent coincidence—it is part of a general trend to depict Moquihuix hieroglyphically as well as historically as an uncouth wretch. The WINE element (Fig. 5.22) has the logographic values OC, “pulque, wine,” and IHUINTI(C), “get drunk,” from which the phonetic values oc and ihui2(n) derive. By a process of graphic syllepsis (see Chapter 4, pp. 136–41), which is surprisingly common in Nahuatl writing, both phonetic values are employed simultaneously in Fig. 5.23, along with ix (cf. Fig. 5.21), derived from the superimposed EYE element, IX(TLI). This yields the slightly abbreviated sequence .oc+ihui2•ix, an almost perfect match for the king’s name, which, incidentally, has no Nahuatl etymology and may be of foreign origin. Regrettably, in the past, scholars—taken in by the name glyph’s WINE element and the red face of the Codex Mendoza variant—have all too often assumed that the name means “Drunkard” or the like.

5.21. Moquihuix (Codex Florentinus, vol. 8, f. 5v). Moquihuix’s name has been drastically abbreviated to a mere .ix (from IX(TLI), “eye, face”).

5.22. Moquihuix stands on the Tlatelolco place glyph with his own name glyph (drastically abbreviated to a WINE element, read sylleptically as .oc+ihui2.) trailing behind his head, while fending off a soldier from Tenochtitlan (Codex Telleriano-Remensis, f. 36v).

5.23. Moquihuix and his name glyph sprawling at the foot of the temple stairs (Codex Cozcatzin, f. 15r).

Acolhuacan Tetzcoco The double name Acolhuacan Tetzcoco (Fig. 5.24) is parallel to Mexico Tenochtitlan in that the first name refers to a larger polity and the second to the city proper. Acolhuacan is the province in which Tetzcoco is situated, just as Mexico is the island metropolis to which Tenochtitlan and Tlatelolco belong. Acolhuacan means “Where There Is a Curve” (in the lakeshore) and is written aacol. in phonetic abbreviation (see Chapter 6, pp. 178–90). The name Tetzcoco has not been subjected to much analysis to date but the variant form Tetzicoco, written TETZCO., suggests strongly that it means “At (-co) the Rocks (te-) Stuck Together (tzicò-),” closely matching what we see in the logogram, which depicts flowers sprouting from three cliffs pressed closely together.

5.24. Acolhuacan Tetzcoco (Codex Mendoza, f. 3v).

Quinatzin Tlaltecatl The historian Fernando de Alva Ixtlilxochitl informs us that the Chichimec founder of Tetzcoco was not a speaker of Nahuatl. Nor does his primary name, Quinatzin, appear to be of Nahuatl origin. The corresponding name glyph (Fig. 5.25a) is a compound of upward-inclined speech scrolls and, variously, a deer’s or dog’s head. Influenced by this, some have sought to interpret his name as “Barking Deer” or the like. One scholar has even gone so far as to relate the name to a purported Nahuatl quina, “bark of a deer.” No such word exists. The closest we come to a term of similar shape and meaning is quiquinatza, a transitive verb meaning “grunt, squeal, growl at [someone].” This is still a far cry from the name Quinatzin. To make the verb viable as a name, we would need something like tēquiquinatza, “he growls at people,” but this is not attested in the sources on Quinatzin. A further complication is the fact that the latter’s name has, in contrast to the verb, a glottal stop at the end of the first syllable and is written accordingly in several alphabetic Nahuatl texts as Quihnatzin. This corresponds to Quìnatzin in the Jesuit orthography of Rincón and Carochi. So the name cannot under any circumstances be related to the verb. Why then do we have a barking deer (or, alternatively, dog) in the various hieroglyphic renditions? This has to do with phoneticism. A logographic value (QUI)QUINATZ(A) of the verb “bark, grunt, growl” supplies a phonetic value quinatz that adequately matches the name (minus the reverential suffix -tzin). An unreduplicated form of the verb is not directly attested for Classical Nahuatl but is supported by forms in related UtoAztecan languages (with reflexes of initial /kw/ rather than /k/) and by Tetelcingo Nahuatl cuinatza, “growl, grunt at [someone].” Quinatzin’s secondary name, Tlaltecatl, is actually an epithet. We can, by the way, dispense with the reverential suffix -tzin on most names of Nahuatl nobility, and certainly on epithets such as “Tlaltecatzin.” The historian Ixtlilxochitl has a tendency to apply the suffix liberally to the names of his Acolhua ancestors, but we need only follow him in cases where we are uncertain about the exact form of the underlying name or where the name is given in all sources only with the suffix. With regard to Quinatzin’s second name, tlāltēcatl, “he of the land” is a term for “farmer” and was bestowed on Quinatzin for being the first Chichimec to embrace agriculture. The glyph (Fig. 5.25b), balanced on the ruler’s back, is a

variant of the cultivation.

LAND

sign, a subdivided rectangle with internal markings for

5.25. a) Quinatzin (Mapa Quinatzin, Sheet 1); b) Tlaltecatl (Primeros Memoriales, f. 52r).

Techotlala The name glyph of the first native speaker of Nahuatl in the Acolhua line, Techotlala, has less to do with deer and dog sounds than with those produced by birds. Indeed, the name appears to refer to the song of a particular species of bird, judging by the BIRD element in the name glyph (Fig. 5.26a). A number of birds catalogued in the Codex Florentinus’s treatise in Nahuatl on fauna (in Book 11 of what amounts to the first encyclopedia compiled in the Americas) have onomatopoeic names similar to Techotlala’s, or are recorded as having a song of similar shape. We have, for example, the tlalalacatl, “white-fronted goose,” the āchalalactli, a kind of duck named after its call—chala chala chala—and the cuauhtatala, “golden-fronted woodpecker,” literally “wood (cuauh-) pecker (tatala).” If the second half of the king’s name, tlala, is the call of a bird, then the first half, Techo-, should be a bird’s name. However, no such bird is known. The closest would be the cocho, “white-fronted parrot,” and the tecochtli, which in the Xalitla dialect of Nahuatl is a woodpecker, but the beak of the bird in Techotlala’s name glyph is hardly that of a woodpecker. The parrot would only be a possibility if combined with te-, “rock, stone,” as tecocho, “parrot of [or on] the rocks,” and then reduced to techo, but this is highly unlikely, even if a resultant te[co]chotlala, “he chatters like a parrot,” is attractive as the nickname of an infant! A solution presents itself if we examine the alternate glyph for the king in the Primeros Memoriales (Fig. 5.26b). The STONE element is clearly

visible, but no bird is anywhere to be seen. Instead, water flows over the stone. It is evident that an entirely different analysis is called for. The glyphic composition of STONE and WATER elements suggests a semantic relationship to Nahuatl tlālā-, “silt,” in which case it would be a complex logogram with the value TLALA(TL), rather than an abbreviation that preserves only the initial and (part of the) final syllable: te.a. Yet if only the first half of the name has been abbreviated (as .TLALA), what might be behind this first half? Once again, syncope must be considered. A reduction of adjectival tecochyò (from tecochtli, “ravine, gully”) would fit. Embedded in tlāla(tl) as te[co]chyòtlāla, “ravine silt,” this would give us a semantically plausible name for the son of a king called Tlaltecatl (“He of the Land”). As for the BIRD element in Fig. 5.26a, it is a phonogram with the value cho, derived hysterophonically from the logogram COCHO “parrot.” The two elements are an abbreviation: TE-cho. Thus, in Fig. 5.26a the glyphic compound preserves the first half of the name, while in Fig. 5.26b it is the second half.

5.26. Techotlala (“Ravine Silt”), written: a) TE-cho. (Codex Xolotl, Sheet 5); b) .TLALA (Primeros Memoriales, f. 52r).

Ixtlilxochitl The short-lived reign of Ixtlilxochitl fell victim to the expansionist policies of the Tepanec state, which in a series of campaigns conquered Acolhuacan in the early 1400s. Ixtlilxochitl himself was hunted down and assassinated. His name, which means “Vanilla (tlīlxōchitl) on His Face (īx-),” is written transparently—and read upwards logographically as IX-TLILXOCHI(TL) (Fig. 5.27). īx- is the equivalent of both “eye” and “face,” which explains why the latter meaning is written with the EYE element. The black-tipped FLOWER

element is a good match for Nahuatl tlīlxōchitl, which means literally “black flower.”

5.27. Ixtlilxochitl (“Vanilla on His Face”; Primeros Memoriales, f. 52r).

Nezahualcoyotl The fugitive prince Nezahualcoyotl fled Tetzcoco after witnessing the assassination of his father but succeeded over time in building an alliance with Itzcoatl of Tenochtitlan and Totoquihuaztli of Tlacopan that brought about the downfall of Tepanec Azcapotzalco, the restoration of the Acolhua state, and the foundation of the Aztec Empire between 1428 and 1431. Nezahualcoyotl, who is broadly credited (not least by writers of Acolhua descent) with having transformed Tetzcoco into the intellectual capital of the empire, bears a name that emphasizes his piety: “Coyote (coyōtl) of the Fast (nezahual-),” an expression of his lone and lean asceticism (Fig. 5.28). The logographic compound in his name glyph includes a FASTING_COLLAR element, and is transliterated as NEZAHUAL-COYO(TL).

5.28. Nezahualcoyotl (“Coyote of the Fast”; Primeros Memoriales, f. 52r).

Nezahualpilli Nezahualpilli, whose name means “Child (pilli) of the Fast (nezahual-),” a reference to Nezahualcoyotl, shared in many of his father’s qualities as well as in name and glyphic elements (Fig. 5.29). The logographic compound can be transliterated as NEZAHUAL-PIL(LI).

5.29. Nezahualpilli (“Child of the Fast”; Primeros Memoriales, f. 52r).

Cacama The king of Tetzcoco at the beginning of the Spanish Conquest in 1519 was Cacama, whose name refers to the secondary ears on a maize plant (cacamatl; Fig. 5.30). His name glyph consists of the corresponding logogram CACAMA(TL).

5.30. Cacama (Primeros Memoriales, f. 52v).

Coanacoch The last king of Tetzcoco, Coanacoch (“Serpent (cōā-) Earplug (nacochtli)), murdered in 1525 by order of Hernán Cortés alongside Cuauhtemoc (p. 154) and Tetlepanquetza (p. 166), has a logographic name glyph that depicts the ornament in question (Fig. 5.31). It should be transliterated as a single unit: COANACOCH(TLI).

5.31. Coanacoch (“Serpent Earplug”; Primeros Memoriales, f. 52v).

Tlacopan The relatively small Tepanec town of Tlacopan is the third of the three capitals governing the Aztec Empire, alongside the Mexica city of Tenochtitlan, the primary capital, and the Acolhua city of Tetzcoco. It earned its status by providing the first two with a bridgehead in their rebellion against the yoke of nearby Azcapotzalco. The place glyph for Tlacopan, which means “In (-pan) the Brushwood (tlacō-, also “staff, switch, rod”),” displays three or more stalks growing in dense undergrowth. The variant in the Codex Mendoza (Fig. 5.32) is logographic with the same ROD element (tlac) as a phonetic indicator at, and as, its base that we saw in the glyph for Tlacateotl (Fig. 5.19). It can be transliterated as tlacTLACO.

5.32. Tlacopan (Codex Mendoza, f. 5v).

Totoquihuaztli I The king of Tlacopan at the time of the Aztec rebellion against Azcapotzalco was Totoquihuaztli I, whose name glyph combines a bird

element with footprints heading upwards (Fig. 5.33). The king’s name, however, has nothing to do with birds or their movements. The glyph is, instead, a phonetic rendition, toto-quehua., of Totoquihuaztli, “FireStoker”; literally “Fire-Stoking (tōtoquī-) Instrument (-huāztli).” From the BIRD logogram, TOTO(TL), derive the phonetic values to and, less commonly, toto. The footprints in upward orientation can be read logographically as EHUA(C), “rise,” or (QU)EHU(A), “raise.” When logograms for transitive verbs beginning with a vowel are used as phonograms, as here, they can be read with and without the object prefix c-/qu-. We saw this also in the case of Quinatzin (pp. 159–60). In Totoquihuaztli’s name it is the variant with the prefix added, quehua, that is intended. In Fig. 5.33 the king sits in front of the place glyph for Tlacopan, read upwards as tlaTLACO-pan. The logogram is infelicitously drawn, since it more closely resembles the CATTAIL logogram TOL(IN) than the conventional form of the TLACO(TL) sign. He is speaking with his wife Ilancueitl, who is named after the queen of Acamapichtli’s time, from whom she is descended. The abbreviated glyphic sequence is read downwards as .lan-CUEITL. A line tethered like a leash leads from the royal pair to their son, Chimalpopoca.

5.33. Totoquihuaztli I (“Fire-Stoker”) chats with his wife Ilancueitl, while their son Chimalpopoca seeks distraction elsewhere (Codex Xolotl, Sheet 6).

Chimalpopoca The compound sign for Chimalpopoca (“He Gives off Smoke in War,” literally “He Smokes Like a Shield”), transliterated CHIMAL•POPOCA, is a variant of the one associated with the Tenochca king of the same name (see p. 147).

Totoquihuaztli II For this name glyph see under Totoquihuaztli I (p. 165).

Tetlepanquetza Like Cuauhtemoc of Tenochtitlan (p. 154), Tetlepanquetza, the last king of Tlacopan, ended his brief reign ignominiously in the jungles of Maya Acallan, where he was summarily executed on trumped-up charges of conspiracy by Hernán Cortés in 1525. He is shown hanging with his name glyph from a tree beside Cuauhtemoc in Codex Vaticanus A (Fig. 5.34). As has happened so often with regard to the peoples and cultures of the Americas, his name is frequently hypercorrected to “Tetlepanquetzal,” on the mistaken belief that it has something to do with the prized feathers of the quetzal bird. In reality, it means “He Casts a Spell on People” (literally “He Raises up (quetza) People (tē-) in (-pan) Fire (tle-).” The name glyph consists of the LIPS element (te2) below a logogram in the form of a banner (pan, at right) with red flames representing fire (TLE(TL), to the left of the banner), read as the abbreviation te2-TLE-pan.

5.34. The murder of Cuauhtemoc and Tetlepanquetza (Codex Vaticanus A/Rios, f. 90r).

The Triple Alliance The Codex Osuna portrays in hieroglyphs the three heads (in ētetl tzontecomatl) of the Triple Alliance (in Ēxcāntlàtòcāyōtl), the league of city-states that ruled the Aztec Empire from 1431 to 1521 (Fig. 5.35). The three capitals, each governed by a huēitlàtoāni, or “great king,” are arranged with Mexico Tenochtitlan, the dominant power, in the middle, Acolhuacan Tetzcoco, the senior partner, to the left, and Tlacopan to the right. The alphabetic glosses reduce the first two name pairs to “mexico”

and “tetzcuco,” whereas the hieroglyphic writing abbreviates the unglossed names in these pairs to TE•NOCH. and aacol., respectively.

5.35. The Triple Alliance that governed the Aztec Empire (Codex Osuna, f. 34r).

Beside each city glyph is a compound sign consisting of a diadem and speech scrolls. Taken separately, the diadem is read TECUH(TLI) (also spelled TEUCTLI), TEC, “lord,” and the speech scroll (or scrolls) has the value TLATO(A), “speak, rule.” In combination, however, this becomes the verb TLATO(A) in the specialized sense of “rule, govern,” and, abbreviated as TLATO., for the derivative nouns tlàtoāni, “king,” and tlàtòcāyōtl, “rulership, kingdom, reign.” It is the latter that is intended here. All three are āltepētl, urban communities of varying size and degree of autonomy with a monarchical system of government and a hinterland—in essence, city-states. The corresponding logogram is directly below the glyphs for Tetzcoco and Tlacopan, and is composed of WATER, A(TL), and MOUNTAIN, TEPE(TL). The term for “city” or “city-state” in Nahuatl is the fused form of the kenning ātl tepētl (literally “water [and] mountain”). Although in origin a compound (ATL-TEPETL), the glyph can also be taken as a unit and transliterated as ALTEPE(TL). The full transliteration of the glyphic sequence is, from left to right: aacol.-ALTEPETL TLATO. TE•NOCH. TLATO. TLACO.•ALTEPETL TLATO.

This completes our survey of high-profile Aztec-period toponyms and personal names in the codices. Reviewing the composition of each of the thirty name glyphs, taking the older or more common form in the case of alternative spellings, it turns out that the overwhelming majority (23) are entirely logographic, while only a handful are syllabic (4) or include a syllabic element (3).

How does this compare with the relative percentages of sign types that we find on two stone disks (temalacatl) dating to the reigns of Motecuhzoma Ilhuicamina (1440–69) and Tizocic Tlalchitonatiuh (1481– 86)? Such wheels, when used as platforms for the so-called gladiatorial combat, are known as (cuāuh)temalacatl or “(eagle) wheels.” The upper surface of these disks typically presents the image of a radiant sun, in the center of which is a recess with either a crossbar for tethering a select captive soldier or a receptacle for receiving the heart of the (usually) unlucky combatant afterwards. A wheel of this type, serving as an altar, bears the name cuāuhxīcalli or “eagle bowl.” Both imperial stones are cuāuhxīcalli. The Stones of Motecuhzoma and Tizocic are of special interest to us because they display around their sides a series of hieroglyphs naming prestigious conquests and, in one instance, the conqueror (Tizocic). There are no other surviving monuments that have non-calendrical glyphic sequences. Each stone has eleven corresponding glyphs in the same order, while the Stone of Tizocic has an additional four. The signs appear to be arranged chronologically from left to right, with the predynastic conquest of Colhuacan (in the 1340s) initiating the series. The first of the supplementary four conquests names the conquering emperor as Tizocic. In Fig. 5.36 we see a schematic representation of the correspondence of the glyphic sequences on the two stones, along with a reconstruction of the probable coloring these signs would have received in codex style.

5.36. The glyphic series on the Stones of Motecuhzoma (inner ring) and Tizocic (outer ring), painted in codex style. The sun disk is restored from the Stone of Tizocic.

There is general agreement on the key elements in Glyphs 1 (COL., for Colhuacan), 2 (TENAN., Tenanyocan, Tenanco, or Tetenanco), 3 (XOCHIMIL., Xochimilco), 4 (chal., Chalco), 6 (aacol., Acolman or Acolhuacan), 10 (MIX., Mixtlan), 11 (CUETLAX., Cuetlaxtlan), 12 (MATLA., Matlatzinco or Matlatlan), and 13 (TOCH., Tochpan or Tochtlan). Where there are alternative town identifications, the first-named is supported best by the historical context and by alphabetical sources. A more precise reading for Glyph 10 on both stones is MIXix., with the EYE element embedded as a phonetic indicator. On the Stone of Tizocic, Glyph 6 consists of the more elaborate aacol•man, in which the upturned hand on the SHOULDER element adds a value to the sign sylleptically, just as it does in the Codex Mendoza.

The remaining signs are more difficult to interpret, and no consensus has been reached to date. Glyph 5 has been variously taken to represent either Azcapotzalco or Xaltocan, depending on what creature one discerns in the middle of the sign. I will come back to this in a moment. The crucial, and multiple, STONE element (te) in Glyph 7 has inspired identification of the town as Tecaxic, Tepanohuayan, Tetepanco, Tenanco, or Tetenanco. I consider Tetellan (“By the Stony Ground”) more promising, given the irregular form of the complex sign on the Stone of Motecuhzoma. The SUN element in Glyph 9 can be read as TEO2(TL), “deity” or TONA(C), “shine,” with secondary values TONAL2(LI), “day, sunshine, fate” and TONATIUH, “sun,” suggesting identification of the town in question as Tonatiuhco, Teotitlan or Teotenanco. Glyph 14 has been thought to comprise a logographic compound naming the town of Ahuilizapan (the modern Orizaba), commonly understood to mean “In the Pleasure (āhuil-) Waters.” This, however, is wishful thinking—a folk etymology based on the fact that the glyph depicts a man joyfully throwing his arms up while bathing. The Nahuatl name, I almost regret to divulge, can more accurately be rendered as “On the Irrigation (àhuiliz-) Waters.” So the glyph is not logographic but rather a phonetic compound: ahuil.•apan (see Chapter Three, pp. 104–5, for a discussion of apan). The final sign in the extended series, Glyph 15, exhibits two elements, water and cypress. Although often identified as Axocopan, a far better case can be made for Alhuexoyocan, given its close resemblance to the town’s sign (Fig. 3.5a) in the Codex Mendoza. Huexotla and Huexotzinco can be ruled out because they fail to account for the WATER element. Glyphs 5 and 8 are special cases. The first has ignited considerable controversy, most of it swirling around the identity of the creature depicted in the glyph. If an ant (āzca-), a reference to Azcapotzalco would be compelling. If a spider (toca-), then Xaltocan. Both identifications are motivated more by the historical context than by the glyphic form on the Stone of Tizocic, where the elusive being looks far more like a toad (tamazol-). In this case, either Tamazollan or Tamazolapan, both in the Mixteca Alta, a highland region southwest of the Valley of Mexico, would be prime candidates. Nevertheless, on the Stone of Motecuhzoma no toad is in sight. Given the shape of the creature here, the ant hypothesis regains some plausibility. Although James Cooper Clark, the star-crossed editor of the magnificent 1938 facsimile of the Codex Mendoza, was probably wrong

in proposing that Azcapotzalco is recorded on the Stone of Tizocic, his proposal seems to be on the mark with regard to the earlier monument, and has received support more recently from Emily Umberger, whose work on Aztec imperial monuments is second to none. We must, of course, take the entire glyph into account, which means that the element behind the creature also needs to be explained. It depicts a mountain, the top of which is tilted at an angle like the cap of an open bottle. Azcapotzalco means “At the Anthill,” the second part of which (pōtzal-, “mound”) derives from the verb pōtza, “throw up earth, burrow.” Thus, one possibility is that this element represents a hollowed-out mountain or hill. We are informed by Aztec historian Hernando de Alvarado Tezozomoc that his ancestor, Motecuhzoma Ilhuicamina, commissioned a temalacatl to commemorate the Mexica victory over Azcapotzalco in the war of independence. If this is that stone, we would expect Azcapotzalco to be named on it. And yet if the glyph for Azcapotzalco is engraved on the Stone of Motecuhzoma, then what are we to do with the apparent toad on the Stone of Tizocic? It seems likely that we are dealing with an instance of updating, in which a later monument replaces one name in a standard sequence by another in order to record a more recent event or a new focus. As mentioned above, the two alternatives that spring to mind are the Mixtec city-states of Tamazollan and Tamazolapan. On this latter monument as well there is a SPLIT_MOUNTAIN element in the background, but here an anthill must be ruled out on contextual grounds. An attested value of the element is tlapan, “split, broken,” as in the Codex Mendoza glyph for the town of Tlapaniquitlan. Combined with the TOAD element, this would yield a reading TAMAZOL•(t)lapan, a close rendition of the name of the prominent polity in the west of Coaixtlahuacan province, a prized acquisition in the reign of Motecuhzoma Ilhuicamina. Though much smaller than nearby Coaixtlahuacan, which was founded according to one Aztec tradition (in the Annals of Cuauhtitlan) by Toltec settlers from Toltitlan Tamazolac in the Valley of Mexico, Tamazolapan distinguished itself by possessing the greatest number of civil and ritual buildings in the entire Mixtec area, according to archaeologist Stephen Kowalewski. It should be noted that an alternative case could be made for the more southerly city-state of Tamazollan, which seems to be represented on page 23 of the Mixtec Codex Nuttall/Tonindeye by a halved (not split) mountain, but this would involve

interpreting half an Aztec glyph by recourse to a Mixtec glyph with no relation to the Aztec name of the town, a somewhat questionable approach. So what do we do with the other special case, Glyph 8? On the Stone of Tizocic the sign displays a rounded mound with horseshoe-like markings typical of the glyph for Tlatelolco, for which reason it has been identified as referring to this city. On the Stone of Motecuhzoma, on the other hand, the same mound is studded with the EYE element, which precludes an identification with Tlatelolco. The EYE element can be read as a logogram, with the values IX(TLI), “eye, face,” and CITLAL(IN), “star,” or as a phonogram (ix), none of which is applicable here. However, superimposed on a curved and darkened background the complex can be read YOHUAL(LI), “night.” This suggests that the earlier glyph refers not to Tlatelolco, conquered after Motecuhzoma’s death by Axayacatl, but to Yohuallan, the southernmost city-state annexed by Motecuhzoma’s predecessor, Itzcoatl. By the time that Tizocic commissioned his own sun stone, the conquest of Tlatelolco was still fresh in Tenochca minds, motivating a revision of the glyphic form to reflect the new development. As in the case of Glyph 5, the replacement was made possible by a felicitous resemblance between an earlier glyph and the updated form. The proportion of purely logographic glyphs to partially or fully phonographic (that is, logosyllabic and syllabic) glyphs on each of the two sun stones is identical: 73% to 27%, but only if we take the TOAD•SPLIT_MOUNTAIN compound on the Stone of Tizocic to be fully logographic. However, if this glyph is logosyllabic (TAMAZOL•lapan), the ratio becomes 67% to 33% and phoneticism goes up. If we compare this with the forty-four glyphs for the conquests of Motecuhzoma Xocoyotl at the end of the Aztec period, we come up once again with a ratio of 73% to 27%. Interestingly, if we compare this with the first forty-four conquests recorded in the Codex Mendoza (from the foundation of Tenochtitlan down to the reign of Motecuhzoma Ilhuicamina), which we might expect to be inherited signs from the formative years and thus more conservative, the proportion of purely logographic to logosyllabic and syllabic glyphs is instead 68% to 32%, similar to the Stone of Tizocic. On the basis of these statistics, we can confidently state that in the Aztec period the proportion of phonetic and semi-phonetic compounds fluctuated between 27% and 33%. By contrast, of the first forty-four glossed glyphs in the late 16th-century Codex Vergara no more than 20% are logographic, whereas an astounding

80% are at least partially phonetic. This suggests that the large-scale phoneticism that permeates late 16th-century manuscripts is the end result of a trend that only began in or after the final years of the Aztec Empire. The exceptional number of fully syllabic spellings in these late manuscripts, especially in codices from the Tepetlaoztoc area in the Valley of Mexico, is likely to be the Nahuatl response to the stimulus of the alphabetic writing introduced by the Spanish. However, one of the four completely syllabic spellings above is likely to predate Aztec writing by no less than one thousand years—the glyphic compound for the province of Acolhuacan. This will be the subject of the next chapter.

Exercise This greenstone monument from Tenochtitlan commemorates a major renewal of the Great Temple of Huitzilopochtli and Tlaloc. In the upper register, two Mexica rulers pierce their ears in a blood-letting ritual. Their blood flows around a grass ball (zacatapayolli) adorned with instruments of self-flagellation and -perforation, then merges between two serpent-headed incense-burners and pours into the gaping maw of the monstrous earth deity, Tlaltecuhtli, lying as a shallow band beneath them. Above and below the scene are two dates. Identify them. Using the correlation table on p. 16, determine the year of the inauguration in our calendar. Who are the rulers? In whose reign did the event fall?

The Dedication Stone of the Great Temple of Tenochtitlan.

Chapter 6

The Origins of Nahuatl Writing: The Teotihua Script While it would be true to say that the precise origins of the writing system used by the Aztecs are lost in time, we do have a number of clues that give us a reasonable trail to follow. The Aztecs themselves traced their civilization far back to Teotihuacan, the famed “City of the Gods” on the eastern shore of the Valley of Mexico, not far from the marshy islands that much later saw the rise of their own capital, Mexico Tenochtitlan. Teotihuacan, Mesoamerica’s first experiment in urban design and cosmopolitan culture, grew to be a metropolis of global proportions in the early centuries of the 1st millennium AD, one that, like its Aztec successor, dwarfed most cities of its time, not only in Mesoamerica but also around the world.

The glyphs of Teotihuacan It is indeed in Teotihuacan that we see the first clear evidence for what would develop into the graphic communication system used to such creative advantage by the Aztecs and their neighbors more than a millennium later. This evidence for what I have dubbed Teotihua writing was unearthed in concentrated form at two sites (Fig. 6.1) in the ancient city: in the elite compound of Techinantitla just to the east of the so-called Pyramid of the Moon, and in the aptly named Plaza de los Glifos slightly southwest of the Ciudadela, the great compound that appears to have been the administrative hub of the city.

6.1. Teotihuacan in the Classic period (with the sites of Techinantitla and the Plaza de los Glifos at La Ventilla circled).

The Techinantitla compound was subjected to grievous looting and damage in the 20th century, with its murals savagely cut up into blocks that were then smuggled out of the country. In more recent years the surviving pieces, most of them long part of the Wagner Collection of San Francisco but since repatriated, have been painstakingly compared with each other and with extant remains at Techinantitla, so that their original relative positioning can now be reconstructed with some degree of confidence (Fig. 6.2).

6.2. Serpent mural 1, Techinantitla.

In Teotihua times, four plumed serpents undulated around the compound’s brightly painted walls. Below them a series of floral elements that have been variously interpreted as blossoming plants, shrubs, or trees can be seen with their roots exposed and with colorful items placed at their base. These items greatly resemble compound hieroglyphs from the Aztec period and, given that the elements making up the compounds have no obvious natural relationship to each other or to the trees that bear them, they are surely to be understood as the constituents of a writing system rather than as objects physically stacked in front of the trees. Parallels with other hieroglyphic systems around the world reinforce this impression. A very different context is presented by the Plaza de los Glifos. Here the hieroglyphs are not vertically arranged around a central point (the viewer in the room) but set into the floor of a courtyard facing the stairs to a palacelike building. Whereas the glyphs at Techinantitla sport vibrant colors, those in the Plaza de los Glifos are left in outline. Their arrangement is interesting. Each is set within its own frame, much like a tabulation or even the boxes in an Advent calendar (Fig. 6.3).

6.3. The framed arrangement of signs in the Plaza de los Glifos, with Glyphs 2 and 3 highlighted in red in the top corner.

There has been a fair amount of discussion in academic circles about the purpose of the sign groups at both sites. In the case of Techinantitla, the trees with glyphs surrounding a central space are reminiscent of the named hills and trees that border Central Mexican maps of communities. These are the landmarks that define the territoriality of the āltepētl, an incorporated community and its settlement. It is possible that the glyphic trees of Techinantitla represent the communities that border on Teotihuacan, or on the immediate city quarter. This is, in effect, a view from the inside looking out. In the Plaza de los Glifos, on the other hand, we seem to have a view from the outside looking in. It would appear to have been an assembly area for representatives from communities beyond the city, or at least beyond its immediate quarter. Each of the framed areas holds sufficient space for an individual standing or sitting before the palace stairway. The front row is much tighter than the rows behind it, and must have had a special significance. In the top right-hand corner outside of the framed areas and beside the staircase is a glyph representing the Teotihua ancestor of the Aztec storm

god, Tlaloc. This deity appears to have been the patron of the city, or at least of its royal family. His image is emblazoned on the shield of the Teotihua royal who in the late 4th century was placed on the throne of Tikal, one of the most powerful centers in the Maya lowlands of Yucatan.

The flexed-arm cant in Central Mexican writing The first two frames of the front row, right after the image of the deity, contain compound glyphs consisting of two elements each. In Frame 1 (Fig. 6.4a) we have a flexed arm with the fletched end of an arrow protruding from an armband, with no trace of the rest of the arrow emerging from the other side of the arm. Frame 2 (Fig. 6.4b) has the same arrow element protruding vertically from the top of a skull. In each case, the arrow element seems juxtaposed to the body part, rather than part of an actual arrow that had been fired into the arm or skull. The incongruence between arrow and body part strongly suggests that one or both of the compound elements in each frame is phonetic in nature. The rebus illustrations in our Sunday newspapers have similarly incongruent elements that are equally, and rightly, suggestive of phoneticism (see pp. 127–29 for a more detailed discussion of this phenomenon).

6.4. Glyphs a) 2 and b) 3 in the Plaza de los Glifos, La Ventilla.

The arm element in the compound glyph of Frame 2 recalls the similarly flexed arm glyph of Aztec times that is prominent in the names of lakeshore towns in the Valley of Mexico that begin with Acol- (Fig. 6.5). Characteristically adorned with the WATER sign, here a phonetic element read a, the arm sign has always been understood as a logogram, ACOL(LI), representing Nahuatl àcolli, “shoulder,” but this is not an accurate analysis. In reality, we are dealing with a category of sign that has never received attention in comparative studies of writing: cants, a term derived from

heraldry, which is actually a sub-field of iconography. In a writing system, cants are pseudo-logographic signs that are created solely to serve a phonetic purpose. If it was difficult to find a logogram for something lacking a physical shape, one could create a logogram for a word with the same or a similar pronunciation that designated a concrete item in the Aztec world.

6.5. a) Acolman (“Where the Curve of the Water Extends”); b) Acolhuacan (“Where There Is a Curve in the Water [that is, the Shoreline]”) Tetzcoco (Codex Mendoza, f. 3v).

Let’s say we are in the process of developing a hieroglyphic system for English. For words like “I,” “or,” and “and,” we might be hard-pressed to come up with a good logographic design. After all, how do you depict an “I,” an “or,” or an “and”? We could, of course, take the same tack as Anatolian writing in the 2nd millennium BC and have an individual pointing at himself for “I,” but a viable alternative would be to create a sign for EYE, if we did not already have one, in order to use it for its pronunciation as a convenient and (in context) easily recognizable sign for “I.” In this way, logograms could be fashioned for items that were not yet part of the sign inventory because they had not previously been part of the subject matter in inscriptions. Thus, to continue with our putative English example, we could create OAR for or, and ANT for and. The Central Mexican SHOULDER sign, supposedly for Nahuatl àcolli, “shoulder,” is a good example of such a pseudo-logogram. Since shoulders are rarely, if ever, a topic of discussion in inscriptions and other elite texts, their presence in a series of place names should strike us as a little odd, to put it mildly. Fortunately, we have precise information on the pronunciation of the names in question, and this forces us to rule out any semantic connection to shoulders. The Acol- in such names as Acolman, Acolhuacan, Acolnahuac, and so forth (Fig. 6.6) is recorded in Horacio Carochi’s brilliant grammar of the Nahuatl language, published in 1645, as Ācōl-.

There is no short vowel or glottal stop in the first syllable, nor a short vowel in the second, so we are clearly not dealing with the term for “shoulder.” Quite fittingly for lakeshore towns and cities, however, this sequence is a transparent compound of ā-, “water,” and cōl-, “bend, curve,” and refers to the curve of the lakeshore. The SHOULDER sign was simply designed to provide an alternative to the more prosaic logogram of a curvy stream (Fig. 6.7a), just as a bear (German Bär) symbol or cant can stand for the unrelated, but phonetically similar, name Berlin (Fig. 6.7b). The Spanish city of León has a lion (Spanish león) and the Italian city of Turin (Torino) a bull (Italian toro, or even torino, “little bull”), although neither animal term is related to the place name.

6.6. Aztec towns with names beginning with Acol- (and reduplicated Acocol-) in the Valley of Mexico.

6.7. a) Acocolco, a variant of Acolco (Codex Mendoza, f. 28r); b) a milestone in Göttingen, Germany, recording the number of kilometers to the capital, Berlin.

Cants are not merely the stuff of heraldry. Instances can be detected not only in Europe but also in other regions of the world—indeed, wherever hieroglyphic writing evolved. In the oracle-bone inscriptions of China’s Shang dynasty, dating back as early as the late 2nd millennium BC, a strikingly parallel case is found. The Shang sign inventory has a series of logograms based on the human figure. One of them, a sign depicting a stick figure with markings just below the armpits (Fig. 6.8a), has been taken, logically enough, to represent Shang *G(r) Ak, “armpit” (with the preceding asterisk indicating a reconstructed form), but this is curious because armpits are not normally a subject of divination, which typically has more to do with such mundane concerns as predicting an auspicious day for a military campaign or the gender of an as yet unborn royal baby. It is, in fact, a cant. Since there was no easy way to depict the word *G(r)Ak, “also, too,” a sign was created for the homophonous term for “armpit.” Since this cant became restricted to a single word, it became a logogram (for “also”) in its own right, albeit one with a value unrelated in meaning to its form. Thus, the standard evolutionary scheme in which logograms are invented first, then at a later stage phonograms, is here turned on its head.

6.8. a) The Shang ARMPIT sign, a pseudo-logographic cant for the homophonous word meaning “also”; b) the Aztec SHOULDER sign, a cant for the homophonous word meaning “curve of the water [i.e. shoreline].”

In Aztec hieroglyphics we could say the same and regard the SHOULDER sign as a logogram with the value ACOL(LI), “curve of the water [i.e. shoreline],” since that is the only attested function of the sign. However, the extremely flexible manner in which phonetic values were extracted from the pronunciation of logograms makes this unnecessary. It is best to view the sign as an early example of the disyllabograms that abound in Nahuatl writing (see pp. 135–36). Thus, we should err on the side of caution, given the limited corpus of hieroglyphic texts, and transliterate it as acol, rather than ACOL(LI).

Tracing Nahuatl back in time The implications of the much older Teotihua sign are clear. Since it is only in the Nahuatl language that the pronunciation of the SHOULDER sign resembles the intended term for “curve of the water [shoreline],” the language behind the hieroglyphs can only be Nahuatl. In no other language would the punning (or, rather, canting) work. From the occurrence of the SHOULDER glyph more than a thousand years earlier at Teotihuacan we can extrapolate that the language behind the naming was also a form of Nahuatl, albeit an ancestor of the dialect spoken by the Aztecs. Scholars have been divided on the question as to the point at which Nahuatl, a Uto-Aztecan language that was carried by its speakers down into Mesoamerica from the

northwest, can be detected in the south. For a long time, from the colonial period down to the mid-20th century, the impressive and vast ruins of the pyramid city of Teotihuacan were identified with Tollan, the capital of the Toltecs, a Nahuatl-speaking people who immediately preceded the Aztecs in Central Mexico. This was based above all on the profound influence of the early 17th-century writings of Fernando de Alva Ixtlilxochitl, a historian from Teotihuacan of mixed Spanish and royal Nahua descent, who describes his hometown as having been the primary city of the Toltec state. It was not until archaeological work began at the far less imposing site of Tula, Hidalgo, that the evidence began to be reassessed. In the early 1940s, Mexican historian Wigberto Jiménez Moreno took a fresh look at Aztec historical and religious traditions, paying special attention to the geographical description of Tollan in the 16th-century Aztec encyclopedia compiled under the direction of Spanish friar Bernardino de Sahagún. By correlating place names and landmarks around Tollan with those surrounding the actual site of Tula he was able to demonstrate that Tula, rather than Teotihuacan, must have been the capital of the Toltec state of Postclassic times. What has been largely overlooked in the debate is the fact that the term tōltēcatl has multiple associations in Nahuatl and can refer to different things in different contexts. It can refer to a political group, as in our “Toltec,” and it can describe an artisan, a skilled craftsman, or even an accomplished artist. Just as Tōllān in Nahuatl texts is a term for a metropolis or center of high culture, applied variously to Teotihuacan, to Cholollan (modern Cholula, home to the largest pyramid in the world, dating back to Teotihuacan times), and to Xicocotitlan, the present-day Tula, so too was tōltēcatl an apt descriptor for the culture and society of both Postclassic Tula and its political predecessor, Classic-period Teotihuacan. As I have argued elsewhere, the Tollan of Ixtlilxochitl and the Tollan of Aztec annals are two separate entities, the former referring indeed to the Teotihuacan of Classic times and the latter naming the pre-Aztec capital, famed for its association with the semi-mythical ruler Quetzalcoatl. There is some degree of confusion in the sources, precisely because Tollan, like Rome, can refer to different periods and even different sites, but the basic distinction is clear enough. Although Aztec sources tell us that the Toltecs were Nahua (that is, Nahuatl-speaking), how can we corroborate this? And how can we know which Toltecs they are referring to? Since we have no pre-Aztec

manuscripts with hieroglyphic texts that could answer these questions once and for all, we have to look elsewhere. It is not in Central Mexico but in the Maya Lowlands far to the southeast that we find one crucial piece to fit in the puzzle. In the Codex Dresden, one of four surviving Prehispanic manuscripts from the region, an extensive series of hieroglyphic texts in Yucatec, a Maya language, accompany complementary information in the form of iconographic images and notation that together provide considerable data on the religion and religious practices of the period. In a section of the codex devoted to the foreign gods representing the phases of the Venus year, the Toltec-period deities of the planet are depicted in Central Mexican fashion and named in Maya hieroglyphic captions. The name of one such deity is written syllabically as ta-wi-si-ka-la (Fig. 6.9), a transparent attempt at adapting and abbreviating the cumbersome Nahuatl name Tlāhuizcalpantēcuhtli (“Lord over the Rosy Light of Dawn”). This was the name of a Postclassic god of the Morning Star—our traditional sobriquet for Venus at dawn. The attire of the deity confirms the identification. The syllabically written names of the other Venus gods are just as familiar to us as Nahuatl, so there is a clear case for ascribing these to the influence of Toltec-period groups on the Maya world, groups led by individuals whose names are recognizable in colonial-period traditions as Nahuatl in origin.

6.9. The Venus god Tlahuizcalpantecuhtli in Maya guise. His Nahuatl name is the first glyph block (compound glyph) in the second row of Maya hieroglyphs. The individual elements of the block, written downwards in two tight columns, spell out ta-wi-si-ka-la (Codex Dresden, p. 51).

Now, if Nahuatl is definitely present in Mexico during the Toltec period —generally speaking, the Early Postclassic—how much further back, if at all, can it be traced in the region? Here, too, enticing evidence comes first from the Maya Lowlands. In the late 4th century, half a millennium before the Toltec-period incursions, armies from Teotihuacan’s expanding empire invaded southern Yucatan. The king of the powerful city-state of Tikal fell on the day in the year 378 that the new ruler “arrived.” This new ruler was none other than the son of the king of Teotihuacan. Inscriptions of the time from Tikal record names, phrases, and even passages of text in at least one non-Maya language. A number of these names and elite terms have already been identified, albeit tentatively, as Nahuatl. Although still controversial, it now looks increasingly clear that the Nahuatl language is attested in the Classic period, at least from the 4th century on, in a context that associates

it with Teotihuacan. This does not mean that it was the only or even the original elite language of the Teotihua state, and it is indeed plausible that Otomi, an Oto-Pamean language unrelated to Nahuatl that was spoken at least from Postclassic times on in the Valley of Mexico, played an important role in the Classic period as well. The crucial issue for us is whether we can discern evidence for a particular language in the compound glyphs of Teotihuacan itself.

Phoneticism at Teotihuacan In order to discern which language lay behind the Teotihua glyphs we need to find instances of phoneticism—clear-cut cases of signs being used for their pronunciation in such a way as to expose the underlying language. There are two kinds of evidence to look for: (1) a sequence of phonetic signs that only makes sense in a particular language, preferably one already known to have been spoken at some point in the general area; and/or (2) logograms (depicting identifiable items) being used for their pronunciation in a context that only makes sense in a specific language. An example of (1) would be ta-wi-si-ka-la for Tlahuizcalpantecuhtli. In Yucatec the sequence is pure gibberish, but not in Nahuatl. For (2) we have the use of the Shang ARMPIT sign not for “armpit” but for an entirely unrelated word, “also” or “too,” the homophonous *G(r)Ak of reconstructed Old Chinese. If we are lucky, we can find instances of each kind, thus bolstering our argument. To see if this is possible, we need to re-examine the glyphs at Techinantitla and the Plaza de los Glifos. Let’s return to the curious ARROW element in Glyphs 2 and 3 at the Plaza de los Glifos (Fig. 6.4). The incongruous juxtaposition of a vertically aligned fletched arrow atop an arm and of the same atop a skull is difficult to explain as combinations of logograms standing for the items we see. We must suspect that one or more elements in each compound glyph is serving a phonetic function, with its phonetic value derived from its logographic one. Given the repetition of the ARROW element in each of the first two compounds in the Plaza de los

Glifos, it would be worth considering it as a candidate for the phonetic element. Does Nahuatl supply us with a viable analogy? In Aztec writing the ARROW sign depicts a pointed reed shaft with fletching (Fig. 6.10). This multivalent sign can be read variously as ACA(TL)2, “reed, arrow,” MI(TL), “arrow, dart,” or TLACOCH(TLI/IN), “javelin.” The REED sign ACA(TL)(1), on the other hand, stands only for Nahuatl ācatl, “reed, arrow.” A very common technique is to combine the ARROW and REED elements as ACA(TL)2ACA(TL) (Fig. 6.11). This is a logogram with a semantic indicator appended. Sometimes only the fletched section of the sign is visible, as in the Codex Mendoza, where the place name Acapan (“In the Reeds”) is written in an exceedingly complex manner: ACA2ACAACA3APANpan

(Fig. 6.11a). The upper left-hand element is ACA(TL)ACA(TL)2; the lower left-hand element is apan, from the logogram APAN(TLI), “waterway”; at the base we see a horizontally aligned reed shaft without fletching, ACA(TL)3; and finally at the right we see a banner, Nahuatl pānitl, as a phonetic indicator for the syllable pan. It would seem that an over-zealous Aztec scribe had a little too much spare time on his or her hands!

6.10. The scheme of relationships between the Nahuatl terms for REED and ARROW and their glyphic counterparts.

6.11. ARROW and REED elements combined in the place glyphs for a) Acapan (“In the Reeds”) and b) Acatlicpac (“Above the Reeds”; Codex Mendoza 20r, 23r).

It is interesting that the pronunciation of the Aztec ARROW logogram, ACA(TL)2, is similar to that of the SHOULDER sign, the disyllabic phonogram acol. Now, we know that when a phonetic value is derived from a logogram, one frequently extracts the initial syllable and drops the rest. This is called the acrophonic principle. It is not a hard-and-fast rule but simply a strong tendency among writing systems around the world. If we were to apply the principle here, we could extract ac2 from the pronunciation of the logogram. This would harmonize well with the initial part of acol, yielding a written sequence ac2acol. The purpose of adding ac2 to acol would be to reinforce the value acol, especially if the SHOULDER sign could be read in more than one way—for example, as “arm.” The Aztec acol sign is very similar to the ARM alternate of the HAND sign, which has the logographic value MA2 “hunt, catch” (Fig. 6.12), but is distinguished from it by a projecting bone at the shoulder. To underscore the distinction, it almost always takes a as a phonetic indicator when read acol: thus, aacol. What if the flexed arm at Teotihuacan also had these values, distinguished only by a phonetic indicator? In that case, Glyph 2 in the Plaza de los Glifos would have to be read ac2acol.

6.12. Glyphs for the towns of a) Michmaloyan (“Where Fish Are Caught”), written MICH-MA2., and b) Cacalomacan (“Where One Catches Crows”), written CACALO-MA2. (Codex Mendoza, f. 31r, 33r).

An argument can already be made for Nahuatl on the basis of the occurrence of what appears to be the ancestral form of the SHOULDER glyph in both Techinantitla and the Plaza de los Glifos in contexts suggesting place names. If the analogy of Aztec naming practice in the Valley of Mexico holds here, this sign should refer to the lakeshore. This is, however, only possible if the Teotihua term for “watery curve” or the like resembled the term for “shoulder” or “arm,” as we know it does in Nahuatl. It should be noted that the compound glyph containing the sign in question is the most prominent in the sequence of possible place-name compounds embedded in trees at Techinantitla, occurring more often than any other. In the Plaza de los Glifos the compound glyph containing it is again the most prominent, occurring in first place after the image of Tlaloc. What place could it be referring to? The solution that springs to mind is close at hand. Not far to the south of the Plaza de los Glifos is the town of Acolman, the name of which (Ācōlmān) means “Where the Curve of the Water Extends.” In the Aztec period this important town was the capital of the province of Acolhuacan and its tax commissioner, named after the town, was known as the ācōlmēcatl (Fig. 6.13a). A sign for the Teotihua ancestor of this office may be found in one of the four headdressed glyphs from Teotihuacan in which a flexed arm can be seen (Fig. 6.13b).

6.13. a) The sign for the ācōlmēcatl, written aacol., the tax commissioner of Acolhuacan (Codex Mendoza, f. 21v); b) the headdressed glyph for one of four senior officials in Teotihuacan.

The skull sign of Glyph 3 in the Plaza de los Glifos is very similar to its Aztec descendant (Fig. 6.14), which has the primary values MIQUIZ(TLI), “death,” and MIQU(I). “die.” If the accompanying ARROW element has similar values to those it had in Aztec times, it stands not for the value ac2 but rather for its primary phonetic value, mi, derived from the logogram MI(TL), “arrow, dart.” This would yield a reading miMIQUIZ. in the Aztec period. The significance of this lies in the fact that the Plaza de los Glifos is located in the quarter of Teotihuacan known as Miquiztlan in the Aztec period. Just as Glyphs 2 and 3 are adjacent to each other in the Plaza de los Glifos, so too are Acolman and Miquiztlan in the Teotihuacan Valley.

6.14. The scheme of relationships between elements in Teotihua compound Glyphs 2 and 3 in the Plaza de los Glifos and their probable Aztec counterparts.

The murals of Techinantitla have even more to offer. There the flexed ARM element, the Teotihua counterpart to the Aztec SHOULDER element, is

layered between a reed-like plant in the background and a heart in the foreground (Fig. 6.15). This time it is not ac2 from ACA(TL)2 but ac from ACA(TL) that is used as a phonetic indicator for the initial section of acol. We seem, however, also to have a phonetic indicator for the final section. “Heart” in Nahuatl has the root yōl-. We encounter very similar forms in Lowland Maya languages such as Yucatec (ol, yol, “heart, center, spirit”; cf. also ol, “ball,” from Nahuatl ōl-, “rubber, ball”) and Ch’ol (’ojl, “half, center”), and in the Classic Maya of hieroglyphic texts (oOLla), quite possibly as a loan from Nahuatl after the so-called entrada (or Teotihua “incursion”) of 378. Intensive contact between the Teotihua and Maya elites around this time is likely to have given impetus to the development of writing in Central Mexico in a process called stimulus diffusion—it was not a system of writing that diffused to the Teotihua from the Maya and other peoples in Southern Mesoamerica, such as the nearby Zapotecs of Monte Albán, but the idea of writing. The product of this influence was a writing system with a much more flexible structure than the Maya had: syllable signs were not bound to a strict V (that is, vowel, like a) and CV (consonant + vowel, like mi) structure but could also take the shapes VC (like ac) and CVC (like pan), and even be disyllabic (like acol). The occasional occurrence in Mid- to Late Classic Maya writing of VC and CVC syllabograms would seem to derive from this new Central Mexican practice, one that continued on down to the Aztec period and beyond—a case of the student influencing the teacher, just as Rome, after conquering Greece, absorbed elements of Greek culture, only for Greece to return the compliment at a later point.

6.15. A compound of HEART, ARM, and REED elements at Techinantitla: a) and b) acacolol; c) acacolol•ma.

The HEART element at Techinantitla appears, then, to be a phonetic indicator with the value ol. This is an instance of a hysterophonic value—a phonetic value derived, not acrophonically from the initial section of a word base or logogram, but hysterophonically from its final section. Examples of this of Aztec date are pil from HUIPIL(LI), “blouse,” az from PIAZ(TLI), “water pipe,” and hua3 from IZHUA(TL), “leaf.” One instance of the HEART-ARM-REED compound (Fig. 6.15c) has an unusual feature—the hand (this time left-facing) at the end of the arm is turned up at an unnatural angle. This is repeated on the Aztec-period Stone of Tizocic (often referred to as the “Tizoc Stone,” using the Spanish form of the ruler’s name; Fig. 6.16a), in the Matrícula de Tributos, and in the related Codex Mendoza (Fig. 6.16b) as a characteristic of the place glyph for the prominent town of Acolman, the tax center for the province of Acolhuacan. In all these attestations it adds the value ma(n) to the primary value of the SHOULDER glyph, acol. I have dubbed such instances in which a sign—or part of a sign—is read a second time, but with a different value, graphic syllepsis (see Chapter 4, pp. 136–41). When the Aztec HAND element is used on its own as a phonogram, it has as a rule an upright orientation, as we saw in Fig. 3.28. Given the fact that Acolman is a town neighboring Teotihuacan, it is likely that the compound glyph at Techinantitla also refers to this town. If so, we would have a Teotihua spelling, acacolol•ma, that is ancestral to the Aztec one, aacol•man.

6.16. The glyph for Acolman with its characteristic upturned hand: a) on the Stone of Tizocic; b) in the Codex Mendoza, written aacol•man—CONQUERED (f. 3v).

The hieroglyphic name of Teotihuacan To the Aztecs the ruined city of Teotihuacan was literally “Where (-cān) One Becomes a Deity (teōtihua).” The city was a religious center to which pilgrims from all over Central Mexico flocked. It was where the fifth sun, the present world age, began. There is no reason to believe that Teotihuacan was always so called. In a Maya inscription from Tikal in the Classic period, contemporaneous with Teotihuacan at its height, the Central Mexican city is referred to as 5-no-WITZ (“5 Great Mountain(s)”), perhaps a reference to Cerro Gordo, the massive mountain right behind the Pyramid of the Moon at Teotihuacan and at the head of the Miccaotli, the Street of the Dead. The earliest name known for it in the 16th century was Hueitepetl (“Great Mountain”). The function of the numeral in the Maya designation is unclear. At Teotihuacan itself a prominent motif in elite buildings such as the Palace of the Jaguars and the Tetitla complex is the so-called disembodied hand (Fig. 6.17). This motif takes the form of a hand adorned with a bejeweled wristband, so it is more accurately described as a disembodied braceleted hand.

6.17. The braceleted hand gushing jade and water, a probable metaphor for blood, in a mural in Tetitla, Room 14.

Interestingly, a barrio of Teotihuacan bears the name Maquixco (from Classical Nahuatl Māquīzco, “At the Bracelet”), and just to the north lies another settlement with this name, Maquixco el Alto. This might well have been the primary name of Teotihuacan in the Classic period. In the 1563 testament of Quetzalmamalitzin, lord of Teotihuacan, one of the two most senior noble witnesses is called Maquiztecatzintli (“He of Maquiztlan, the Place of the Bracelet”). Of four Teotihuacan-period fragments depicting probable titles of high officials below elaborate headdresses, one might represent the ancestor of the ācōlmēcatl, the tax commissioner of the Aztec province of Acolhuacan that included Teotihuacan (Fig. 6.13b). So a title such as māquīztēcatl may well have survived the centuries between the fall of Teotihuacan and the rise of the Aztec state. The prominence of the braceleted hand in the murals of Teotihuacan suggests that it was the original place glyph for the city. The Nahuatl term māquīztli, “bracelet,” derives from mā-, “hand,” and quīza, “come out, emerge.” These in turn go back to Proto-Nahuatl *maa- and *kiisa—forms that, apart from their spelling, are identical to their Aztec-period descendants. In Fig. 6.17, jade+water, a probable metaphor for blood (Classical Nahuatl ez-, from Proto-Nahuatl *ïs-) gushes from the hand as a phonetic indicator disguised as symbolism. The combination of the two elements would be transliterated in Classical Nahuatl as MAQUIZez., very close to the Proto-Nahuatl for the same. The composition of the bracelet term relates well to the composition of what is probably an elaborated version of the place glyph on a fragment of a fresco from Tetitla (Fig. 6.18). Two paths radiate from a braceleted hand in

a fan-like arrangement. This appears to be another iconographically enhanced rendition of the name Maquizco or Maquiztlan: in terms of Classical Nahuatl, this would be MAQUIZquiz., with the radiating paths as a phonetic indicator for the braceleted hand—strictly speaking, the indicator is semantically related to the logogram, but it is unlikely that the etymology would have been apparent to the Teotihua. The Proto-Nahuatl reconstruction would be very similar to this: the logogram would have had a value based on *maa- + *kiisa- for “bracelet” and the paths would represent a phonetic indicator with the redundant value *kiisa-, “come/go out, emerge.”

6.18. The braceleted hand with diverging paths as a phonetic indicator. The colors are hypothetical.

The coyote as a vehicle of phoneticism In the iconography of Teotihuacan the coyote is an eloquent symbol. It sings, dresses impeccably, and craves sacrificial hearts. Its body is adorned in one instance (Fig. 6.19a) with a sumptuous headdress of quetzal feathers and a necklace of jade beads, but one item functions not as dress but as an identifying feature that parallels a phonetic indicator in writing—a perforated shell on its flank. In the Aztec period it was commonplace to write the logogram COYO(TL), for coyō-, “coyote,” with a blank disk on its flank representing a hole (Fig. 6.19b), a phonetic indicator with the value coyo from Nahuatl coyoc-, “hole,” coyōnqui, “perforated.” The shell at Teotihuacan seems to play a similar role: Uto-Aztecan *koyo, “shell,” is no

longer present in Nahuatl but is attested in Yaqui koóyo, “shell,” and Guarijio ko’oyó, “shell,” so it is reasonable to suspect that Proto-Nahuatl also had a reflex of the term.

6.19. The coyote as symbol and sign: a) at Teotihuacan with a shell; b) in an Aztec manuscript with a blank disk depicting a hole (Codex Mendoza, f. 47r).

The evidence suggests that Nahuatl in its proto-form was either the language behind the glyphs and iconographic symbolism at Teotihuacan or was at least one of its elite languages. There would appear to have been an unbroken tradition of Nahuatl writing from, at the latest, 4th-century Teotihuacan down to the end of the early colonial period in the early 17th century. Moreover, phonetic practices and even certain focal points of phoneticism in Aztec times, such as the disyllabogram acol, can be securely traced back to the 4th century.

Chapter 7

Writing in Tongues: How Aztec Hieroglyphs Came to Record Spanish In the previous chapter we descended far into the Mesoamerican past and traced the origins of Central Mexican writing to the palace complexes of Teotihuacan. In this chapter we shall now go forward in time and explore what became of the system after the fall of Tenochtitlan and in the face of an unrelenting and withering Spanish political and cultural onslaught. But first, let’s examine how the techniques developed by Aztec scribes for dealing with foreign words and names stood them in good stead by the time Cortés stepped ashore in 1519. By the mid-15th century, Aztec emperors were increasingly leading armies beyond the Valley of Mexico into regions in which languages unrelated to Nahuatl were predominant. In order to record the names of conquered towns in the hieroglyphic system for historical and taxation purposes, the first strategy was to see if a town already had a Nahuatl name. Because of long-standing trade relations spanning the length and breadth of Mesoamerica, it was not unusual for a town and its population to have acquired a Nahuatl name in addition to its indigenous one. Sometimes, this was simply a translation of the native term. This was a common practice throughout Mesoamerica. We have already seen one example of this in the close relationship between the Nahuatl and Otomi names for the Aztec capital (see Chapter 5, p. 146). Nevertheless, in the majority of instances there is no exact equivalence between the meaning of a foreign (that is, non-Nahuatl) name and its Aztec counterpart. Nahuatl-speaking scribes following in the train of Aztec armies (and of Spanish-led troops after the fall of Tenochtitlan) bestowed Nahuatl names and glyphs on towns in a variety of ways. If the primary name of a town was not translated literally or approximately, a secondary name or the name of an important subdivision of the town (such as where Aztec troops or merchants were

quartered) might be chosen for the purpose. However, the reason for the discrepancy is often lost in the mists of time. Sometimes, the literal translation of a place name must have created unforeseen difficulties for the scribe, or for the central authority responsible for the registration of provincial names. A case in point is the town known today as Tlaxiaco in the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca. The present-day form of the name goes back to a 16th-century Nahuatl original. In the Codex Mendoza the town is named as “Tlachquiyauhco,” which is usually translated—albeit somewhat bizarrely!—as “In the Rain of the Ballcourt” (Figs 7.1a, b). This is a classic instance of deriving an etymology from the composition of a hieroglyph, on the assumption that the latter is a literal rendition of the meaning of the name it records. If we look closely at the glyph, we can see the outline of a ballcourt from a bird’s-eye perspective. The two donut-like shapes are the rings through which the ball was to be propelled. Superimposed incongruously on the four quadrants of the court are raindrops. The problem is the general assumption that there is a direct link between these components of the glyph and its actual meaning. If we just look at the form of the Nahuatl name as given in the Mendoza, an alternative analysis presents itself. While tlach- can only mean “ballcourt,” quiyauh- can mean either “rain” or “entrance, gateway.” It is surely the latter that is intended here. This would give us a meaning “At the Entrance to the Ballcourt,” an entirely reasonable name for a settlement. However, that’s not the end of the story. A look at a Mixtec glyph (Fig. 7.1c) for the same town will fail to reveal a relationship between it and its Aztec counterpart. Instead, we see a face peering out of a temple that is adorned with eyes representing stars in the firmament. Sticks are crossed (ndìsi) in front of the face (nuù, “face, eye”), which accords well with the form and tones of the Mixtec name for the town, which is Ndìsinuù (present-day Ndìjin Nuù). However, this grammatically opaque name is traditionally translated as “Clearly Sees/Seen” or “Good View,” as if it were pronounced Ndisìnuù (Ndijìn Nuù), a construction that, as linguist Michael Dürr informs me, might be rendered more exactly as “[Town/It Is] Visible to the Face/Eye” if an initial ñuu, “town,” or caa, ca-, “it is,” has been dropped. A shift in tone from ndisì (today’s ndijìn), “visible,” to resemble ndìsi (ndìjin), “crossed,” is feasible if the name has been abbreviated in such a manner.

7.1. a, b) The Aztec glyph for ancient Tlaxiaco (Codex Mendoza, f. 16r, 45r); c) the Mixtec glyph for Tlaxiaco (Codex Bodley).

At first glance, we would have to conclude that there is nothing to link the Mixtec and Aztec names but, as it turns out, this is not the case. On folio 66r of his Mixtec grammar of 1593, Antonio de los Reyes lists the Nahuatl name of the town not as Tlachquiyauhco but as “Tlachiaco.” One could be forgiven for thinking that the latter is nothing more than a corruption of the name given in the Mendoza—we certainly have many such examples in 16th-century sources. However, the name as recorded by Reyes actually makes sense as a Nahuatl word, without the need for any editing, but not as a place name, as Mixtec specialist Maarten Jansen first conjectured. It is actually a verb, tlachi(y)aco, meaning “comes/came in order to view.” This is clearly a reasonable match for the Mixtec semantics, but there is one problem with it—no Nahuatl place name can be formed in this manner. So what happened? The simplest solution is to reconstruct a scenario in which a Nahuatl interpreter asked a Mixtec informant what Ndisinuu meant. The answer was a literal one—Tlachiaco. An Aztec scribe recorded it, and in this form it reached the capital, where provincial records were kept and standardized. Realizing that a verb was unacceptable as a place name, despite the surface resemblance of final -co, “come/came with the intention of” to the relational postposition -co, “at,” a tax official altered the form into one that made sense as a town’s name: Tlachquiyauhco. And from this comes the Aztec glyph, written TLACH•quiyauh., with the phonetic RAIN element quiyauh standing for the like-sounding term for “entrance.” As the Aztec Empire expanded, the need to design glyphs for foreign names without ready Nahuatl equivalents became more acute. Phoneticism

gradually increased to meet this need, especially when the underlying name was not translated but merely adapted in pronunciation. This is particularly common in the Gulf Coast provinces, where Totonac and Huaxtec were spoken. Here, names frequently retained their native forms without translation, with a consequent effect on the choice of Aztec glyphs. Phoneticism was becoming more and more prominent in the reign of the last Prehispanic emperor, Motecuhzoma II. With the arrival of the Spaniards in 1519 a new challenge arose, and not just a political and military one. Spanish names, and later Spanish titles, required hieroglyphs to render them. Since translating Spanish names and terms was not an option, phoneticism was the tool of choice for the Nahuatl scribe. As time wore on, familiarity with the European style of writing began to have an impact on the indigenous system. As we have already seen in the case of the late 16th-century glyphic rendition of the Nahuatl personal name Tepalecoc (see Chapter 4, pp. 128–29), the practice of fitting glyphic elements together in an aesthetic compound sometimes gave way to a loose linear or columnar arrangement that imitated sequential Spanish writing. In writing Spanish names glyphically, the scribe skillfully deployed his arsenal of both (mono)syllabograms and disyllabograms, developing new phonetic signs as circumstances required. This is indicated by the fact that the same name may be recorded in different ways by different scribes, and that a number of signs may be unique to a specific scribe. Due to the limited nature of the surviving corpus, it is, unfortunately, no longer possible to ascertain with any degree of reliability which of the rarest signs were actually part of the shared inventory and which were the creation of a particular scribe for his or her own needs in the early colonial period. Nevertheless, here as well the general Aztec rule holds true that any logogram could function in a given context as a phonogram. This flexibility was an intrinsic part of the system. Spanish forenames and surnames are recorded in hieroglyphic form for Spaniards and Christianized Nahua nobility alike. One useful technique for Christian forenames, which were taken from the names of saints, was to adopt a saint’s attribute or symbol as a Nahuatl glyph. In the Codex Osuna (Fig. 7.2) the Christian names of the four quarters of the city of Mexico are recorded as glyphs tethered to the classifier MAN, here standing for the householders resident in each quarter. San Juan Moyotlan is represented by

a poisoned chalice with a devilish dragon emerging from it, the attribute of St. John the Evangelist. The sign for San Pablo Teopan is the sword of St. Paul. Santa María Cuepopan is represented by a crown, the attribute of Mary as queen of heaven. Finally, San Sebastián Atzacualco takes an arrow as its glyph, the attribute of the martyred St. Sebastian. With the exception of Mary’s crown, all of these also occur as the signs for individuals named after the saint in question.

7.2. The colonial-period glyphs for the four quarters of Mexico Tenochtitlan, above the city’s tēcpancalli or palace (Codex Osuna, f.38r).

For the female name María an existing Aztec hieroglyph was simply extended in use. A twisted rope, the logogram for the verb MALIN(A), “twist,” already represented the Aztec name Malin (“Twisted”). After the Spanish Conquest, the indigenous name became Christianized as Marina, an Italian name uncommon in the Spanish world. From MALIN comes in turn a disyllabogram, mali(n), which serves as the standard way of writing María in Aztec documents. In Manuscrit Mexicain 72 of France’s Bibliothèque Nationale (Fig. 7.3), we find a doña María living in Ecatepec and named in the Aztec system as mali. Like her brother Dionisio, her name glyph has a bird (or rather a bird’s head) perched on top of it. In her case, this is the abbreviated form ton. of the Spanish courtesy title doña. As we have seen before (Chapter 4, p. 133), the BIRD sign TOTO(TL) was commonly used in

its phonetic function for the syllable to, the nasalized variant reading of which is ton. In her brother’s case, the BIRD element above an eye is as much part of his title as of his name—in both instances read as ton. Dionisio, pronounced tonixo in Nahuatl, is written ton-ix. (with phonetic ix from IX, “eye”).

7.3. The siblings Dionisio at left and María of Ecatepec at bottom right (Ms. Mexicain 72).

The Codex Teocaltitlan (Fig. 7.4a) goes a step further. Again the BIRD element renders the initial part of the title doña, but this time we have an additional element, WATER, below it. If BIRD only had the phonetic value to, the sequence would read to-a, which is hardly a good match for doña. However, BIRD’s secondary value, ton, gives us a close Nahuatl rendition of the Spanish title: ton-a. Sometimes, a phonetic indicator helps to remind the reader of the correct value of a new sign derived from a Christian symbol. Thus, the logogram for Juan in the Codex Teocaltitlan (Fig. 7.4b) is written XIHUANan, in which the WATER element A(TL), phonetically a(n) or al, is read with its nasalized value as a phonetic indicator. This value cannot have been a simple a because a phonetic indicator, or a sequence of such, always points to the reading of a sign’s initial or final section, not to its medial section. It is comparatively rare for Juan to be written out phonetically, as in the Codex Tlatelolco, where we see the future saint Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin gesturing skywards. His compounded name glyph (Fig. 7.4c) is read from the top down as xiuh-an [ti-]e-co. As mentioned in Chapter 4 (pp. 91–92), a syllable sign ti is conspicuously absent in manuscripts from the first half of the 16th century. This characteristic abbreviation of the name Diego to a mere .e-co is seen once again in the Codex Tlatelolco in the name sequence

of an indigenous governor of Tlatelolco, don Diego de Mendoza Imayauhtzin Huitznahuatlailotlac (Fig. 7.5a). Read in boustrophedon (oxploughing) fashion from the right downwards, then upwards on the left, we have ton-[ti-]e-co te-[men-]toza for don Diego de Mendoza. While there is no surprise in the fact that ti is missing, it may seem a little odd that the AGAVE sign ME(TL), which has the phonetic values me and men, has been omitted. After all, it does occur elsewhere (Fig. 7.5b). There is certainly enough room between the STONE element te and the GOPHER element toza above it, yet for some reason the AGAVE sign was left out. A scribal whim? Perhaps. Nevertheless, as we have seen before, it is not all that unusual to encounter Aztec abbreviations in which the initial syllable of a name is dropped, provided sufficient context remains to identify the missing section.

7.4. a) The glyphic version of doña María, written downward from left to right as ton-a mali WOMAN (Codex Teocaltitlan, f. 19r); b) Juan, written XIHUANan MAN (Codex Teocaltitlan, f. 5r); c) behind Juan Diego, who is pointing to where he saw the Virgin of Guadalupe, we see xiuh-an [ti-]e-co (Codex Tlatelolco).

7.5. a) The Spanish title and names of don Diego de Mendoza Imayauhtzin Huitznahuatlailotlac (Codex Tlatelolco); b) MIC men-toza ‘[viceroy] Mendoza died’ (Codex Aubin, f. 48v).

Although it would have presented no difficulty to an Aztec scribe to record Imayauhtzin’s Nahuatl name and his title (Huitznahuatlailotlac) glyphically, it is his Spanish names and title that were deemed more relevant to the purpose of the Codex Tlatelolco. Emphasizing the acceptance of Spanish social and religious norms was a good way to defend or enhance one’s standing before colonial authorities, especially when documenting one’s property rights or drawing up a petition as a plaintiff. Furthermore, what were seen as heathen naming practices were fast disappearing as the last pre-conquest generations died away. For a time, indigenous nobility attempted a balance in which the original Aztec-period name was appended to a sequence of Spanish names as a kind of surname. Thus, Imayauhtzin became don Diego de Mendoza Austria Moctezuma Imayauhtzin Huitznahuatlailotlac! Recording all this in hieroglyphs was, to say the least, rather impractical, so a choice clearly had to be made. The flexibility of the Nahuatl writing system stood the scribe in good stead in the first decades of the colonial period. Names such as Ana, Esteban, Luis, Francisco, and Antón/Antonio were easily rendered (Fig. 7.6). Ana became anaa. The disyllabogram ana, derived from the logogram AN2(A), “grasp,” was reinforced by the WATER element a. Esteban became izta-pan, with phonograms derived from IZTA(TL), “salt,” and PAN(ITL), “banner.” Luis was transformed into olo-ix (from OLO(TL), “corncob,” and IX(TLI), “eye”). Francisco was abbreviated hysterophonically to .cici-co (the reduplicated value of ci from CIL(IN), “seashell,” plus co from COM(ITL), “jug”). The same combination, but with the reading .ci-co, was also used for the surname Orozco. And finally, Antón/Antonio could be represented by a straightforward an-ton (a combination of the WATER and BIRD elements that we know so well).

7.6. Aztec glyphs for the Christian names: a) Ana; b) Esteban; c) Luis; d) Francisco; and e) Antón (Codex Aubin, f. 52v, 49r, 53v, 56v, 58v).

Back in Chapter 3 we encountered the double-feather glyph with its original logographic values MAL(LI), “captive,” and MAL(TIN), “captives.” In the early colonial period the singular value of this glyph, MAL(LI), does service as a phonogram for the Spanish title marqués (Fig. 7.7a) and for the surname Manrique (pronounced maliquè in Nahuatl, as hinted at by the spelling “Marique”; Fig. 7.7b), while the plural value, MALTIN, became equated phonetically with the Christian name Martín. The death of Martín Cano is recorded in the Codex Aubin in a four-glyph sentence consisting of a LEG element resting against a building, a mummy bundle, a double-feather glyph, and a V-shaped MOUTH sign read can3, from CAM(ATL), CAN “mouth, opening” (Fig. 7.7c). The sequence runs downwards at the left, but the name compound at the right is to be read upwards:

7.7. The double-feather device as a phonetic element in the rendition of Spanish names and titles: a) mal for marqués; b) mal or malli for Ma(n)rique; and c) maltin-can3 for Martín Cano (Codex Aubin, f. 53v, 68r, 55r).

maltin-can3

“At the Audiencia Martín Cano died.” .(I)CXI.-HOUSE MIC

The hieroglyphic sentence refers to the royal Audiencia, the high court of colonial New Spain, which, according to the codex, collapsed in 1566, killing Cano. Although the alphabetic Nahuatl text beside the glyphs uses the Spanish term for the building, the LEG element (I)CXI(TL) to its left names it in Nahuatl as the Tlacxitlan (“At the Foot of Things”), here abbreviated to .(I)CXI. The Tlacxitlan was the high court of the Aztec state. Two more buildings are named hieroglyphically in the Codex Aubin (Fig. 7.8a). These are, from the top, the hospital and sacristy of San José in the city of Mexico. The hospital is labeled in abbreviation as ix., which seems a little off the mark phonetically, given the fact that the Spanish word for “hospital” is spelled out in the accompanying alphabetic text as

“ospital.” However, a variant of this word in the 16th century was espital, the first syllable of which could be represented well in Nahuatl glyphs as ix. So the glyphic rendition turns out to be quite accurate after all. The interesting thing is the discrepancy between the alphabetic and glyphic texts, which suggests that different scribes with different preferences wrote each.

7.8. a) ix. and .quil-ix. for “hospital” and “sacristy”; b) quil-ix. naming Cristóbal de Guzmán Cece(patic)tzin (Codex Aubin, f. 50r, 50v).

As for the second structure, we recognize the EYE element again, but this time there’s a leafy green stalk sprouting from it. This is the phonogram quil, derived from the logogram QUIL(ITL), “greens.” Together, they give us .quil-ix., the middle section (cris) of the Spanish word sacristía, “sacristy” (and of sacristán, “sacristan”), in Nahuatl pronunciation. On the very next page of the Codex Aubin the compound appears anew (Fig. 7.8b), this time recording for the year 1557 the accession of don Cristóbal de Guzmán Cece(patic)tzin to the once-mighty throne of Tenochtitlan. Here, quil-ix. represents the Nahuatl form of the initial section (again cris) of the Christian name Cristóbal. Sometimes, a Spanish surname is treated as if it were a Nahuatl sentence-name. A case in point is the name of a colonial official, variously written Ceynos or Za(h)inos, with no obvious etymology. In the Codex Osuna (Fig 7.9a) it is rendered as a compound glyph consisting of a thorny maguey leaf with a thin spike converging at the right on its spiny tip. Together, these elements appear to constitute the logogram TZAPINI(A), representing the Nahuatl verb tzapīnia, “prick with a thorn.” However, in the context of the Spanish surname it is actually a derived disyllabogram,

tzapin, which serves here as a rough approximation of the first two syllables of Zahinos. As we have seen, names of Spanish individuals and colonial buildings are usually written phonetically. However, there are occasional exceptions, such as the case presented by the glyph for Ana Díaz (Fig. 7.9b). The name Díaz has no transparent meaning in Spanish, so it cannot readily be translated into Nahuatl. The scribe, in a stroke of genius (or perhaps just acting on an innocent assumption), interpreted the name as if it were the Spanish numeral diez, “ten,” equivalent to Nahuatl màtlactli, and applied the appropriate glyph to it—ten small circles in two sets of five. The alphabetic gloss reflects this false equivalence: the name has undergone hypercorrection from “diaz” to “diez”! Incidentally, the coin below the gloss has nothing to do with the name.

7.9. Spanish surnames in glyphic interpretation: a) Zahinos (Codex Osuna, f. 26v); b) Díaz (Codex Teocaltitlan, f. 21r).

Terms for items of European origin, both natural and cultural, were sometimes adopted as, or incorporated into, names for indigenous persons. Such terms were either (1) assimilated Spanish words or (2) Nahuatl neologisms (that is, newly coined words using native morphemes). In both cases, glyphs were adopted, adapted, or created as needed. An example of (1) is the glyph for Juan Camisa (“Shirt”; Fig. 7.10a), which depicts a Spanish-style shirt; for (2) we have the name glyph of Agustín Cuanaca (“Rooster,” literally “Head Flesh”; Fig. 7.10b), which, aptly enough, depicts a rooster’s head with its distinctive crest comb.

7.10. a) The colonial glyph for a name based on the loanword camixà, “shirt”; b) the glyph for the neologism cuānaca, “rooster, chicken” (Matrícula de Huexotzinco, f. 713r, 650v).

I will round off our survey of foreign names and terms in Nahuatl glyphic guise with another logosyllabic example, this time of a typical colonial title. The factor was a treasury official responsible for business affairs. The Codex Tepetlaoztoc, a petition to the crown by the indigenous nobility of the town of Tepetlaoztoc, documents the reign of terror the population suffered at the hands of Spanish officials. Worst of these was Gonzalo de Salazar, the factor. In Fig. 7.11 we observe him mistreating nobles, grabbing one by the hair and arm, while the other lies bloody and beaten at his feet. The hieroglyph naming the first as Tehuetzquiti (“He’s Made People Laugh”) is a jester’s mask, the logogram for HUETZQUITI(A), “make laugh,” here read .HUETZQUITI. The second is named Nezahualcoyotl (“Coyote of the Fast”), the glyph for which is a merger of fasting bands, nezahualli, with the ears of a coyote (coyōtl): NEZAHUAL•COYOTL. Salazar’s title is written in a more complex manner. The glyphic elements are, from the top right, a banner (pān-), rushes (tōl-), and four beans used as dice in the game of patōlli. The banner and rushes are phonetic indicators for the dice, a disyllabogram, the entire reading being papatoltol. This is an exact match for the Nahuatl pronunciation of factor, which the alphabetic gloss “fator” hints at.

7.11. The Spanish title factor written syllabically (Codex Tepetlaoztoc, f. 27v).

Despite the unyielding and devastating oppression of Spanish rule, Nahuatl writing was able to hold its own beside the Spanish alphabet until the fourth quarter of the 16th century, after which the death of the last scribes trained in the indigenous system closed the final chapter on a magnificently colorful and creative hieroglyphic tradition.

A Final Challenge Now that you’ve made your way through the various chapters, you should have a pretty good idea of the creative and innovative way the Nahuatl system of writing used by the Aztecs and their neighbors works. It’s time for a little challenge. At first glance, the following compound glyphs will seem self-explanatory when compared with the names of the city-states they represent. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to ascertain why things are not quite as they seem. 1. This town is referred to variously in alphabetic sources as Iztactlalocan (“Where the White Tlaloc Is”) and Iztactlallocan (“Where There Is a Lot of White Land”). Which form and meaning is the appropriate one depends on

the accuracy of the spelling. Since the letters l and ll are often confused in texts, it is difficult to know which meaning is intended. What does the glyphic spelling suggest? I might add that the storm god Tlaloc, whose head we see here, comes in different colors. Tlaloc par excellence is blue, but there are three other manifestations, one of which is white.

2. Another seemingly straightforward case is presented by the sign for Quiyauhteopan, which should mean “Rain-Temple Precinct,” as the glyph suggests. Which element corresponds to which segment in the name? Why is the generally accepted meaning unlikely? To be able to answer this question, take a close look at the place names throughout the book. What is a constant feature that would be missing here if the accepted translation is correct? If you know some Nahuatl you can go a little deeper into the issue, but even without knowledge of the language you should be able to solve this.

While pondering these matters, keep in mind that neither a glyph nor an alphabetic spelling necessarily reflects the actual meaning of the name or word it represents.

Where to Go from Here

There’s no better place to start learning about ancient Mesoamerica than the two classics first authored by the late Michael Coe, Mexico and The Maya, which are now updated at regular intervals by leading scholars in the field. With regard to Aztec civilization, the best all-around introduction with many quotes from Nahuatl literature is still Jacques Soustelle’s Daily Life of the Aztecs on the Eve of the Spanish Conquest, written in the mid-20th century by a connoisseur of Nahuatl studies, whose erudition and love for his chosen subject shines through on every page. In many points of analysis, such as on the sociopolitical organization of the state, it has been superseded by more recent work, such as by Michael E. Smith (2012), who provides a wealth of cutting-edge data and valuable insights from the perspective of archaeology and anthropology. For an important new introduction to Aztec history, and an engaging view of the Aztec world, see Camilla Townsend’s Fifth Sun (2019). An overview of the phenomenon of writing and its relationship to iconography and notation can be found in Whittaker (2011). For a brilliant, pathbreaking assessment of the role of iconography within the Aztec graphic communication system see Katarzyna Mikulska (2015). A masterful study of the juxtaposition of writing, iconography and notation on a single monument can be consulted in an article on the Dedication Stone of the Great Temple of Tenochtitlan by Emily Umberger (2002). Supplement 5 of the Handbook of Middle American Indians (Bricker 1992) furnishes well-documented introductions to Mesoamerican writing systems by leading specialists, including an excellent one by Hanns J. Prem on Aztec writing that illustrates the advances achieved since the pioneering work by Charles Dibble (1971), published in an earlier volume of the same handbook series, and by Henry B. Nicholson (1973). Articles in a special

2008 edition of the journal PARI by Alfonso Lacadena and Marc Zender bring a Mayanist perspective to bear on the question of the structure of the Aztec syllabary. For a detailed response to this from the perspective of Nahuatl studies, see Whittaker (2009). More recent articles on the Nahuatl hieroglyphic system with particular attention to various aspects of Aztec writing presented in this book are Whittaker (2018a, 2018b). Joseph M. A. Aubin’s (1849) study of signs in codices of the Tepetlaoztoc region is an indispensable cornerstone for research into the flexibility of the Nahuatl syllabary. Likewise, Nowotny’s (1959) analysis of hieroglyphs in the Codex Mendoza laid the foundation for future studies. Mexican codices of the 16th century are veritable goldmines of data on hieroglyphs embedded in an iconographic framework. Some of these have been published in breathtakingly beautiful facsimile editions. Of these, the most important for the study of writing in the Aztec period is the exceedingly rare, three-volume study of the Codex Mendoza by James Cooper Clark (1938), most copies of which were destroyed in the Blitz over London in 1940. Fortunately, a similarly ambitious four-volume edition has appeared in recent years that builds magnificently on its predecessor (Berdan and Anawalt 1992; also available in an abbreviated 1997 edition). There is even a free bilingual app available at www.codicemendoza.inah.gob.mx (last accessed 3 October 2020) that was produced jointly by the Bodleian Library of Oxford, which houses the original manuscript, and Mexico’s Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia. Another work from the first half of the century, the Codex Xolotl, was first published by Dibble (1951) with a commentary that drew on the historical accounts of the early colonial-period historian Fernando de Alva Ixtlilxochitl, who owned and studied the codex, relying on it as his primary source. Marc Thouvenot’s 1987 doctoral thesis, a significant milestone in examining the glyphs of the Xolotl, is now available online at http://thouvenotmarc.com/textos/codice_xolotl.html (last accessed 3 October 2020). New facsimiles, together with commentaries on the codex, are in preparation by Benjamin Johnson and myself, and by Jerome Offner. From the second half of the 16th century come a variety of important codices and other hieroglyphic-iconographic manuscripts that have been published over the last few decades with valuable commentaries, including the Codex Osuna (Cortés Alonso 1973); the Matrícula de Huexotzinco

(Prem 1974); the Lienzo de Tlaxcala, which can be consulted in an online edition by Byron Hamann at http://www.mesolore.org/viewer/view/2/Lienzo-de-Tlaxcala (last accessed 3 October 2020); the Codex Telleriano-Remensis (Quiñones Keber 1995); the Codex Tepetlaoztoc (Valle 1995); the Codices Santa María Asunción (Williams and Harvey 1997) and Vergara (Williams and Hicks 2011); the Tira de Tepechpan and the Codex Mexicanus (Diel 2008, 2019); and the Codices Boturini, Aubin, and Azcatitlan (Rajagopalan 2019). Last but not least, there is an online edition of the entire Codex Florentinus at https://www.wdl.org/en/item/10096/ (last accessed 3 October 2020) in the World Digital Library, the extensive Nahuatl text of which has been edited and translated into English (Anderson and Dibble 2012). Boone and Urton’s (2011) volume on “Their Way of Writing” is a thought-provoking collection of articles on the graphic communication systems of the Andean region and Mesoamerica, including Teotihuacan. Further studies of Teotihua writing are Taube (2000); King and Gómez (2004); Nielsen and Helmke (2011); and Whittaker (2012a). Berrin (1988) documents the Techinantitla murals with their glyphic sequences. For the expansion of Nahuatl writing to accommodate Spanish names and terms, see Galarza (1967); Bueno Bravo (2016); Batalla Rosado (2015); and Whittaker (2012b).

Select Bibliography Anderson, Arthur J. O. and Charles A. Dibble (eds). Florentine Codex: General history of the things of New Spain. Bernardino de Sahagún. 13 volumes. First published 1950–1982. Salt Lake City 2012. Aubin, Joseph M. A. Mémoire sur la peinture didactique et l’écriture figurative des anciens Mexicains. Paris 1849. Batalla Rosado, Juan José. “Análisis de elementos gráficos de contenido occidental en los glifos de los códices coloniales del centro de México: el caso de los antropónimos castellanos.” Revista Española de Antropología Americana 45 (1): 193–209. 2015. Berdan, Frances F. and Patricia R. Anawalt (eds). The Codex Mendoza. Berkeley and London 1992. Berrin, Kathleen (ed.). Feathered serpents and flowering trees: Reconstructing the murals of Teotihuacan. San Francisco 1988. Boone, Elizabeth and Gary Urton. Their way of writing: Scripts, signs and pictographies. Cambridge, MA 2011. Bricker, Victoria R. (ed.). Handbook of Middle American Indians, Supplement 5, Epigraphy. Austin 1992. Bueno Bravo, Isabel. “Los glifos del folio 44 del códice Telleriano-Remensis ¿Cargos o antropónimos?” in Batalla Rosado, Juan José and Miguel Á. Ruz (eds), Códices del centro de México. Análisis comparativos y estudios individuales I, 58–83. Mexico City 2016. Cabrera Castro, Rubén. “Figuras glíficas de La Ventilla, Teotihuacan.” Arqueología 15: 27–40. 2017. Coe, Michael D. and Stephen Houston. The Maya. 9th edition. London and New York 2015. Coe, Michael D., Javier Urcid, and Rex Koontz. Mexico: From the Olmecs to the Aztecs. 8th edition. London and New York 2019. Cooper Clark, James (ed.). Codex Mendoza, the Mexican manuscript known as the Collection of Mendoza and preserved in the Bodleian Library, Oxford. London 1938. Cortés Alonso, Vicenta (ed.). Pintura del gobernador, alcaldes y regidores de México: “Códice Osuna.” Madrid 1973. Dibble, Charles A. Códice Xolotl. 2 volumes. Mexico City 1951. ——. “Writing in Central Mexico,” in Ekholm, Gordon F. and Ignacio Bernal (eds), Handbook of Middle American Indians, Volume 10, Archaeology of Northern Mesoamerica, Part 1, 322–32. Austin 1971. Diel, Lori Boornazian. The Tira de Tepechpan: Negotiating place under Aztec and Spanish rule. Austin 2008. ——. The Codex Mexicanus. A guide to life in late sixteenth-century New Spain. Austin 2019. Galarza, Joaquín. “Prénoms et noms de lieu exprimés par des glyphes et des attributs chrétiens dans les manuscrits pictographiques mexicains.” Journal de la Société des Américanistes 56: 533–83. Paris 1967. Jansen, Maarten. The Mixtec Pictorial Manuscripts. Leiden 2010. King, Timothy and Sergio Gómez Chávez. “Avances en el desciframiento de la escritura jeroglífica de Teotihuacán,” in Ruiz Gallut, María Elena and Arturo Pascual Soto (eds), La Costa del Golfo en tiempos teotihuacanos: Propuestas y perspectivas. Memoria de la Segunda Mesa Redonda de Teotihuacán, 201–44. Mexico 2004. Lacadena, Alfonso. “Regional scribal traditions: Methodological implications for the decipherment of Nahuatl writing.” The PARI Journal 8: 1–22. 2008.

Mikulska, Katarzyna. Tejiendo destinos: un acercamiento al sistema de comunicación gráfica en los códices adivinatorios. Zinacantepec/Warsaw 2015. Nicholson, Henry B. “Phoneticism in the late pre-Hispanic Central Mexican writing system,” in Benson, Elizabeth P. (ed.), Mesoamerican Writing Systems: A Conference at Dumbarton Oaks, October 30th and 31st, 1971, 1–46. Washington 1973. Nielsen, Jesper and Christophe Helmke. “Reinterpreting the Plaza de los Glifos, La Ventilla.” Ancient Mesoamerica 22: 345–70. 2011. Nowotny, Karl A. “Die Hieroglyphen des Codex Mendoza: Der Bau einer mittelamerikanischen Wortschrift.” in Bierhenke, Wolfgang et al. (eds), Amerikanische Miszellen, 97–113. Hamburg 1959. Prem, Hanns J. Matrícula de Huexotzinco. Graz 1974. Quiñones Keber, Eloise (ed.). Codex Telleriano-Remensis: Ritual, Divination, and History in a Pictorial Aztec Manuscript. Austin 1995. Rajagopalan, Angela Herren. Portraying the Aztec Past: The Codices Boturini, Azcatitlan, and Aubin. Austin 2019. Smith, Michael E. The Aztecs. 3rd edition. Malden, MA and Oxford 2012. Soustelle, Jacques. Daily Life of the Aztecs. First published in English in 1962. New York 2002. Taube, Karl. “The Writing System of Ancient Teotihuacan.” Ancient America 1: 1–56. 2000. Tibón, Gutierre. Historia del nombre y de la fundación de México. 1st electronic edition. Mexico City 2017. Townsend, Camilla. Fifth Sun: A New History of the Aztecs. Oxford 2019. Umberger, Emily. “Notions of Aztec History: The Case of the Great Temple Dedication.” RES: Anthropology and Aesthetics 42: 86–108. 2002. Valle, Perla (ed.). Códice de Tepetlaóztoc (códice Kingsborough), Estado de México. 2 volumes. Toluca 1995. Whittaker, Gordon. “The principles of Nahuatl writing.” Göttinger Beiträge zur Sprachwissenschaft 16: 47–81. 2009. ——. “Writing systems,” in Hogan, Patrick Colm (ed.), The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the Language Sciences, 935–39. Cambridge 2011. ——. “The names of Teotihuacan.” Mexicon 34: 55–58. 2012a. ——. “Nahuatl hieroglyphic writing and the Beinecke Map,” in Miller, Mary E. and Barbara E. Mundy (eds), Painting a Map of Sixteenth-Century Mexico City: Land, Writing, and Native Rule, 137–57. New Haven 2012b. ——. “Aztec hieroglyphics: A name-based writing system.” Language & History 61: 60–76. 2018a. ——. “Aztec hieroglyphic writing: A comparative perspective,” in Ferrara, Silvia and Miguel Valério (eds), Paths into Script Formation in the Ancient Mediterranean, 173–88. Rome 2018b. Williams, Barbara J. and H. R. Harvey (eds). The Códice de Santa María Asunción: Facsimile and Commentary: Households and Lands in Sixteenth-Century Tepetlaoztoc. Salt Lake City 1997. Williams, Barbara J. and Frederic Hicks (eds). El Códice Vergara: Edición facsimilar con comentario: Pintura indígena de casas, campos y organización social de Tepetlaoztoc a mediados del siglo XVI. Mexico City 2011. Zender, Marc. “One hundred and fifty years of Nahuatl decipherment.” The PARI Journal 8: 24–37. 2008.

Key to the Exercises Chapter 1 The correspondences are: (1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8)

“Where There’s a Tall Temple” “By the Armadillo Excrement” “At Grass Hill” “At the Cliff” “In the Stalks” “At the Redbird Waters” “By the Humpbacked Hills” “Home of the Eagles”

Glyph c (Teocalhueiyacan) Glyph g (Ayotochcuitlatlan) Glyph a (Zacatepec) Glyph h (Tepexic) Glyph b (Tlacopan) Glyph f (Quecholac) Glyph d (Tepotzotlan) Glyph e (Cuauhtinchan)

All glyphs except f (Quecholac) have been integrated to some degree into the landscape.

Chapter 2 1. The sign on the right is an incense bag, read (CEN)XIQUIPILLI, “8,000.” Since it is a single one followed by bamboo staves, the reading for both is CENXIQUIPILLI OTLATL. To the left of the bamboo is the glyph TLACOCH(TLI), “spear.” This modifies the reading to CENXIQUIPILLI TLACOCHOTLATL, “8,000 staves of bamboo for spears.” 2. The items and amounts are: a) ONTECPANTLI COYOLLI, “40 (2 × 20) jingle bells”; b) NAUHTECPANTLI TEPOZTLI “80 (4 × 20) ax(heads)”; c) CENTECPANTLI (XICALLI) TECOZAHUITL, “20 (bowls of) yellow earth”; d) MACUILTECPANTLI (TECOMATL) CUAUHNECUHTLI/CUAUHNEUCTLI,

“100 (jars of) wild honey”; e) MACUILLI XIQUIPILLI NOCHEZTLI, “5 bags of cochineal”; and f) CENTZONTLI CUACHTLI, CHICHICUEEMATL, “400 bundles of cloth, each 8 mātl long.” 3. The glosses for Acacitli and Ocelopan have been accidentally swapped. Metzineuh’s name has been written incorrectly with an initial T on the analogy of Tenoch, who is seated in front of him. The elements depicting water,

a banner and a foot or leg correspond to A-, -pan, and Xo- respectively in the names.

Chapter 3 1. Both glyphs share a mountain and a nose. The distinguishing elements are a beetle and a banner. The mountain is a semantic complement in each case, since it does not represent part of either name but adds to each semantically. The nose element, YACA(TL), is logographic in both compounds. In the case of Tlayacapan, the banner has the phonetic value pan. The beetle in the glyph for

Yacapichtlan is phonetic. On the basis of its logographic value, PINACA(TL), we can derive a probable phonetic value, pi(n), acrophonically. Transliterated, the compound for Yacapichtlan would be rendered as YACA-pi.-MOUNTAIN and the one for Tlayacapan as .YACA-pan-MOUNTAIN. Note that the first is abbreviated finally, the second initially. 2. The body-part element familiar to you already depicts two teeth, the phonetic value of which is tla(n), but la(n) following a value ending in l. This corresponds to the middle section of the name Mollanco. The initial part is either represented by the ball of rubber or by the pottery, or by both. If the vessel were a pot (cōmitl), as opposed to the shallow tripod vessel we see here, we would have a phonetic value co for the locative suffix. Since that’s not the case, we must assume that both elements represent part or all of the initial section of the name. If we assign a logographic value OL(LI) to the rubber ball, we can derive a phonetic value ol that will work well here. The tripod vessel can be assumed to be semantic, representing the sauce cooked in it. This gives us the value MOL(LI). Accordingly, the three transliterations would be: MOLol-lan., .ol-lan., and MOLol. In the first and third instances, the superscript ol identifies its function as a phonetic indicator for MOL. 3. The following equations can be made: Name element cal- “house” chicon- “seven” hueiya “be tall” petla- “mat” quiyauh- “rain” te- “stone, rock” tepe- “mountain” -(t)icpac “on, on top of” -titlan “next to, among” tlach- “ball court” -tlan “next to, by” tlil- “black” (xa)xal- “sand(s)” xiuh- “turquoise” yahual- “circle”

Glyphic element CAL (a house) CHICON (seven dots or disks) (dimensional modification of the referent) PETLA (a mat structure) QUIYAUH (rain drops) TE (an oval with diagonal wavy lines) TEPE (a mountain) (a house element placed on the referent) TLAN (teeth) TLACH (an H-shaped ball court from above) TLAN (teeth) TLIL (a blackened referent) XAL (an area covered with dots) XIUH (a large blue ring with four small ones) YAHUAL (a circle)

Names ending in -co/-c have been abbreviated, as have those ending in -(hua)can. The mountain element is not represented in the name Chiconquiyauhco and the house element has no equivalence in the names Teticpac and Xaxalpan, in which it is simply a placeholder for the referent of the postpositions -(t)icpac and -pan.

Chapter 4 The third saying—mīxtlàpachmana in tōnatiuh (“the sun is cast face-down”)—lies behind the hieroglyphic sequence. The eye element, read ix, is a phonetic indicator reinforcing the value mix for the clouds (derived from the logogram MIX) swirling around it. The teeth set in red gums are the phonetic element tla(n), here read tla. Hay is also phonetic, giving us pach. The grasping hand has the phonetic value ma2, while the woman’s head yields na(n), here na. Together they represent the verb mīxtlàpachmana, “be face-down, downturned, downcast.” The solar disk is a logogram,

TONATIUH, “sun.” Only in, here equivalent to our “the,” is left unwritten, which is normal in Nahuatl writing. In transliteration, the entire sequence would appear as: mixix-tla-pach-ma2-na TONATIUH. The saying refers to the death of a king, the passing of a wise person, or the downfall of a city-state.

Chapter 5 In the upper middle of the upper register is a day 7 Acatl. The lower register displays a framed date 8 Acatl. The frame tells us that this is a year date. Its rough equivalent in our calendar is 1487, which is attested elsewhere as the date of this event. The rulers are Tizocic (at left) and Ahuitzotl, his successor. The inauguration of the Great Temple took place a year after the death of Tizocic, who commissioned the building project, and thus in the reign of Ahuitzotl.

Chapter 7 1. Given the fact that the head of the storm god is visible here, it would be tempting to understand the place name as referring to him. However, there are two factors arguing against this identification. Firstly, if the name refers to the white manifestation of Tlaloc, why was the head painted blue? Second, why is the mountain white instead of the god? This suggests that the god’s head is merely a clever phonetic device in the glyph: a disyllabogram with the value tlaloc. The mountain, here a semantic complement, is white because it is intended to convey the fact that the land is white. Thus, Iztactlallocan is the probable name in question. 2. It is extremely likely that there was a temple precinct dedicated to the god of rain and storms in Quiyauhteopan. Nevertheless, this is not the meaning of the place name, despite the glyphic evidence. If you have browsed through the place names in this book, you may have noticed that they all end in a relational suffix, such as -co or -tlān. This is the rule, not the exception. The noun teōpan, “temple precinct, temple,” like tzompan, “skull rack,” is formed with the suffix -pan, but it has become a noun and is no longer a locative expression, so it requires a new relational suffix in order to form a place name. For that reason, we encounter the place names Teopantlan and Tzompanco (as in present-day Zumpango in the Valley of Mexico) and not Teopan and Tzompan. The choice of a temple, instead of a rain god, as the glyphic element in the place glyph is due to its phonetic identity. Furthermore, the head of the rain god would have been interpreted and read as Tlaloc. Quiyauhteopan means “In [the Place of] the Rain Deity” or “Above the Rain Deity,” since the latter lived in mountains.

Sources of Illustrations Frontispiece Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; 1.1 Base map courtesy of David Carballo; 1.2 Werner Forman Archive/Shutterstock; 1.3 Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, Mexico City; 1.5, 1.6 Saxon State Library, Dresden; 1.7a Trustees of the British Museum, London; 1.7b Corpus of Maya Hieroglyphic Inscriptions; 1.8a Trustees of the British Museum, London; 1.8b Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; 1.9 Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest; 1.12, 1.13, 1.15 Photo Bodleian Libraries, Oxford; 1.16, 1.17 Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; 1.18a, 1.18b Laurentian Library, Florence; 2.9, 2.14b, 2.17a, 2.17b, 2.24, 2.28, 3.4c, 3.5b, 3.5c, 3.10 Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; 3.11a, 3.11b, 3.11c Laurentian Library, Florence; 3.13a, 3.13b, 3.17a, 3.17b, 3.17c, 3.18, 3.19, 3.20a, 3.20b, 3.20c, 3.21a, 3.21b, 3.32b, 3.39, 3.40, 3.41a, 3.42, 3.43, 3.44, 3.45, 3.46, 3.47 Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; 4.1 Jean-Pierre Courau/Getty; 4.2, 4.4, 4.5, 4.8a, 4.10a, 4.10b, 4.11 Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; 5.2 © 2020 Tomás Filsinger based on L. González Aparicio, E. Calnek, B. Mundy; 5.3, 5.4, 5.5, 5.6 Royal Academy of History and Royal Palace of Madrid. Album/Alamy; 5.7a Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; 5.8, 5.9a Royal Academy of History and Royal Palace of Madrid. Album/Alamy; 5.9c Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; 5.10 National Museum of Anthropology, Mexico City; 5.11, 5.12 Royal Academy of History and Royal Palace of Madrid. Album/Alamy; 5.13a Dumbarton Oaks, Washington, D.C.; 5.13b Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; 5.14, 5.15 Royal Academy of History and Royal Palace of Madrid. Album/Alamy; 5.18a Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; 5.18b, 5.19, 5.20, 5.21 Laurentian Library, Florence; 5.22, 5.23, 5.25a Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; 5.25b Royal Academy of History and Royal Palace of Madrid. Album/Alamy; 5.26a Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; 5.26b, 5.27, 5.28, 5.29, 5.30, 5.31 Royal Academy of History and Royal Palace of Madrid. Album/Alamy; 5.33 Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; 5.34 Vatican Library, Rome. White Images/Scala, Florence; 5.35 Biblioteca Nacional de España, Madrid. M.C.Esteban/Iberfoto/Mary Evans; 6.1 National Geographic Society Cartographic Division; 6.2 Drawings by Gordon Whittaker, after Berrin 1988: Plates 1A–F; 6.3 Adapted by Gordon Whittaker from Cabrera Castro, Rubén, “Figuras glíficas de La Ventilla, Teotihuacan,” Arqueología 15 (1996): Fig. 8; 6.6 Base map courtesy of David Carballo; 6.7b Photo by Gordon Whittaker; 6.9 Saxon State Library, Dresden; 6.13b Drawing by Gordon Whittaker, after Berrin 1988: Fig. V.7; 6.15c Drawing by Gordon Whittaker, after Berrin 1988: Plates 1A–F, 3C, 7; 6.16a National Museum of Anthropology, Mexico City; 6.17 Drawing by Gordon Whittaker, after Laurette Séjourné (in Whittaker 2012a); 6.18 Drawing by Gordon Whittaker, after Laurette Séjourné (in Whittaker 2012a); 6.19a Drawing by Gordon Whittaker, after Berrin 1988, Fig. VI.27; 7.2 Biblioteca Nacional de España, Madrid. Album/Alamy; 7.3, 7.4a, 7.4b Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; 7.9a Biblioteca Nacional de España, Madrid; 7.9b, 7.10a, 7.10b Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; 7.11 British Museum, London. Album/Alamy

Index All page numbers refer to the 2021 print edition A abbreviations 15, 28, 30, 32, 38, 47, 48–49, 56, 66–67, 72–75, 81, 85–86, 98, 106, 111, 119, 121, 123, 130, 133, 138, 148, 150, 152–53, 156–59, 161–62, 165, 166–67, 183, 196, 199, 200–202, 209, 214 Acamapichtli 17, 36–37, 41–46, 66, 76, 114, 146–47 Acolhua 31, 98, 139, 160, 163–64 Acolhuacan 100, 131, 144, 159, 162, 167, 169, 172, 178–80, 187–88, 190–91 acrophonic 13, 141, 186, 190, 214 Ahuitzotl 17, 151–52 āhuiyani 48–49 Akkadian 57, 84, 124–25, 128 alternates 13, 67, 70, 86, 90, 93, 103, 133, 161, 187 àtlatl 37 Atlixco 19 Axayacatl 17, 149 Azcapotzalco 35, 37, 79, 119, 145–46, 148, 163–65, 168–71 Aztec, definition of 30–31 Aztlan 30 B biscripts 13, 73, 142 C Chichimec 30–31, 35, 113–14, 116, 118–19, 133, 159–60 Chimalpahin Cuauhtlehuanitzin, Domingo de San Antón Muñón 31, 112 Chimalpopoca 17, 147 Chinese 6, 11, 27, 48, 54, 56, 74–75, 103, 125, 137–38, 154, 181, 185 Cholollan 19, 40, 77, 120–21, 182 chronology 16–17 Classic 17 classifiers 13, 15, 34–35, 62–63, 66–67, 74–76, 78, 197; see also complements, semantic codices 20, 25 Colhua 30 Colhuacan 35, 37, 44–45, 99, 113–14, 118, 145, 168–69 complements phonetic 14, 47, 81, 125, 140 pseudo-semantic 94, 140 semantic 14, 15, 34–35, 66, 74–76, 78, 97, 106–107, 109, 214, 215 compounds, glyphic 9, 10, 14, 15, 28, 30, 32, 37, 45, 47, 56, 60, 69, 70–72, 74–75, 78–79, 81, 84–85, 87–90, 94, 96–97, 104–105, 107, 111, 114, 116–17, 119–20, 122, 123, 129, 132, 134, 136–37, 141,

143, 147–49, 151, 153, 157, 159, 162–63, 166–67, 169, 172, 176, 178, 180, 184–85, 187–90, 197, 200, 202–203, 207, 214 connectors 13, 15, 64–67, 78, 103, 107 Cortés, Fernando (Hernán) 17 Cuauhtemoc 17, 154 Cuitlahua 17, 153–54 D disyllabograms see phonograms E Egyptian 6, 9, 11, 24, 29, 32, 34, 53–54, 57, 68, 74, 87, 94, 125–26 elements 8–9, 13–14 epigraphy 13, 57 Epi-Olmec 18 G gentilics 13, 38–40, 76, 139–40 H hieroglyphics 13, 52–54 history, Aztec 17 Hittite 57 Huaxtec 196–97 Huexotzinco 19 Huitzilihuitl 17, 43–45, 147 Huitzilopochtli 32, 38, 63, 75, 80, 112, 146–47, 173 hysterophonic 13, 93, 99, 162, 189–90, 201 I iconography 8–11, 20–29, 34–37, 41, 46–49, 52, 58, 125, 208–210 indicator phonetic 14, 15, 47, 78–81, 89, 93, 97, 107, 109, 116, 130, 136, 139–41, 152, 156–57, 164, 169, 186–89, 192–93, 200, 206, 214, 215 semantic 14, 15, 78–79, 90, 94–95, 152, 185 indices 13, 15, 56 Itzcoatl 17, 148 Ixtlilxochitl, Fernando de Alva 98, 114–15, 119–21, 159–60, 182–83, 209 J Japanese 10, 54–57, 127, 134–35, 150 L La Ventilla see Plaza de los Glifos Linear scripts 128–29, 135 loanwords see titles and loanwords logograms 9, 13, 15, 28–30, 34, 47, 49, 53–56:A(TL), AL 48–49, 59, 67, 73, 88, 106, 116, 133, 149, 151–52, 167, 200; A2(TL) 105–106; ACA(TL) 16, 37, 59, 61, 63, 66, 85, 88, 95–96, 108–109, 111–12, 140, 146, 185–86, 188; ACA2(TL) 95–96, 185–86, 188; ACA3(TL) 186; ACI(C) 55, 97, 149–51; ACOL(LI) 178, 181; AHUACA(TL) 101; AHUITZO(TL) 151–52; ALTEPE(TL) 167; AMA(TL) 102; AN2(A) 104, 108–109, 201; APAN(TLI) 104–105, 186; ATZOYA(TL) 108–109; AZTAXEL(LI) 89; CAC(TLI) 92, 137; CACAHUA(TL) 63; CACALO(TL) 187; CACAMA(TL) 164; CAL(LI) 16, 59, 61, 85, 87–88, 123, 131, 133, 214; CAM(ATL), CAN 118, 138, 202; CE 60; CEMPOHUAL(LI) 63, 98; CHAN

87; CHAN2 87; CHAPOL(IN/TIN/ME) 85–86; CHICOM(E) 60, 123, 214; CHICUHNAHU(I)/CHIUCNAHU(I) 60; CHICUACE 60; CHICUEI 60, 111–12; CHIL(LI) 104; CHIMAL(LI) 70, 73, 147, 166; CHINAM2(ITL) 116; CHIYA(N) 115, 131, 133; CHOCHOL(LI) 121; CHOLO(A) 110, 121; CHOLOL 77, 120–21; CHOLOLTI(A) 121; CIHUA(TL) 66, 69–70; CIL(IN) 201; CIPAC(TLI) 59, 61; CITLAL(IN) 30, 171; COA(TL) 59, 61, 66, 73, 148; COANACOCH(TLI) 164; COCHO 161–62; (CO)COZ 94, 102; COL 35, 169; COM(ITL) 129, 133, 201; COTZ(TLI) 55; COYO(TL) 75, 163, (Teotihua) 193, 205; COZAUH(QUI) 155; COZCACUAUH(TLI) 59, 61, 78; COZCA(TL) 78; CUA 97; CUACUAUH 155–56; CUAUH, CUAHUITL 30, 76, 102–103, 107; CUAUH2(TLI/TIN) 32, 61, 66, 73, 86–90, 119, 154, 157; CUAUHNOCHTLI 90; CUAUHTECOMA(TL) 101; CUE(ITL) 47, 116–17, 164–65; CUETLAX(TLI) 169; CUETZPAL(IN) 59, 61; CUICA(C) 110; CUITLA(TL) 38, 77, 153–54; E(TL), YE(TL) 92, 129; ECA(TL), EECA(TL) 59, 61, 114– 15; ECO(C) 55; EHU(A)) 165; EHUA(C) 165; EI 60; EL(LI), ELLEL(LI) 47, 97; EPA(TL) 78; EPAZO(TL) 78; HUAUH(TLI) 92; HUAX(IN) 106; HUAX2(IN) 99; HUEHUE(TL) 119– 20; HUEI 71, 93–94, 112, 123, 134, 214; HUEITEOCAL(LI) 112; HUETZQUITI(A) 205; HUEXO(TL) 77, 88, 120; HUIPIL(LI) 190; HUITZ(TLI) 67; HUITZIL(IN) 45, 75, 101, 147; I(C) 139; ICAC(A) 55; ICHCA(TL) 101; ICHPOCH(TLI) 115; ICPA(TL) 108; ICPAC 108, 123, 214; ICXI(TL) 55, 202; IHUI(TL) 45, 94, 147; IHUINTI(C) 66, 158; IIYO(TL) 115; ILHUI(TL) 72, 98; ILHUICA(TL) 148–49; ILPI(A) 117; ITTA(C) 120; ITZ(TLI) 148; ITZCUIN(TLI) 59, 61; IX(TLI) 120, 157–58, 162, 171, 199, 201; IXACHI 99; IXCO 105; IXCUAMOL(LI) 93; IXTLAHUA(TL) 140; IZHUA(TL) 92, 190; IZTA(TL) 115, 201; IZTE(TL) 93; MA2 67, 104, 109–10, 187; MA(ITL) 103–105; MACUIL(LI) 60, 88; MAL(LI/TIN) 38, 76, 86, 202; MALIN(A) 198; MALINAL(LI) 59, 61; MAPICH(TLI) 37, 66, 146; MAQUIZ(TLI) (Teotihua) 192; MATL 64–65; MATLAC(TLI) 60; MATLACTLOMEI 60; MATLACTLOMOME 60; MATLACTLONCE 60; MATLAL 94; MATLA(TL) 169; MAXTL(ATL) 119–21; MAZA(TL) 59, 61; ME(TL) 9, 99, 132, 200; METZ(TLI) 55; METZ2(TLI) 72; MI(TL) 70, 131, 133, 185, 188; MIC(QUI/QUE), MIQUI 78–79, 96, 200; MICH(IN) 187; MIL(LI) 38, 77, 104, 140, 169; MIN(A) 148–49; MIQUIZ(TLI) 59, 61; MIX(TLI) 66, 97, 169; MIZQUI(TL) 38, 76; MOL(LI) 214; MOLOC(TLI) 153; MOMAMAL(I) 112; MONACAZQUETZ(A) 108; MOZOMA 153; NACAZ(TLI) 107; NAHUAC 103; NAHUAC2 67, 103; NAHUA(TL) 102; NAHUI 60; NEX(TLI) 102, 115; NEZAHUAL(LI) 162–63, 205; NOCH(TLI) 32, 111–12, 146, 167; O2(TLI) 100; OC(TLI) 66, 73, 115, 129, 158; OCELO(TL) 59, 61–62; OCO(TL) 104; OCUIL(IN) 73, 136; OL2 80, 155; OL(LI) 116, 214; OLIN 59, 61; OLO(TL) 201; OLOLO(A) 116; OME 60, 86; OQUICH(TLI) 67, 96; OTLA(TL) 102; OXI(TL) 67; OZOMA(TLI) 44, 59, 61; OZTO(TL) 104, 108; PALAI 134; PAN(ITL)/PAN(TLI) 62, 90, 100, 133, 201; PANO(C) 100; PETLA(TL) 116, 123, 214; PIAZ(TLI) 190; PIL(LI) 163; PINACA(TL) 214; PITZAHUAC 155–56; POC(TLI) 30, 95; POHUAL(LI) 63; POLO(A) 95, 104; POPOCA(C) 30, 147, 166; QUECHOL2(LI) 89; (QU)EHU(A) (see EHU(A)); QUEQUETZOL(LI) 55; QUETZAL(LI) 63; (QU)I(C) (see I(C)); QUIL(ITL) 203; (QUI)QUINATZ(A) 139; QUIYAUH, QUIYAHUITL 59, 61, 123, 214; TAMAZOL(LI) 168, 170–72; TAPACH(TLI) 63; TE(TL) 81, 96, 111–12, 123, 146, 161–62, 167, 214; TECOMA(TL) 97; TECPA(TL) 16, 59, 61; TECPAN 69–70, 79; TECPAN2 69–70; TECPANTLI 62; TECUH(TLI)/TEUC(TLI) 66, 79, 148–49, 152–53, 167; TEEZZO 151; TELOLO(TLI) 116; TEMAL(LI) 76, 89; TEMO(C) 154; TENAN, TENAMITL 35, 78, 104, 169; TEN(TLI) 106, 118, 129, 133; TEO(TL) 79; TEO2(TL) 79, 81, 156–57, 169; TEOCUITLA(TL) 140; TEOPAN 79; TEPE(TL) 34–35, 75–76, 85, 94, 102, 106, 123, 131, 133, 167, 214; (TE)TECUIN(I) 55; TETZCO(TLI) 159; TEXO(TLI) 95; TEZCA(TL) 73; (T)ICPAC see ICPAC; (T)IXCO see IXCO; TIZA(TL) 100, 151; TLACA(TL) 67, 96;

TLACA2 79, 81, 98, 156–57; TLACH(TLI) 123, 195–96, 214; TLACHIY(A), TLACHIX 120– 21; TLACOCH(IN/TLI) 136, 185; TLACO(TL) 156, 164–65; TLAL(LI) 119–20, 138–39, 155; TLAMAMAL(LI) 63; TLAN(TLI) 47, 131; TLATLA(C) 140; (TLA)TLACZA(C) 55; TLATEL(LI) 80, 155; TLATHUI(C) 98; (TLA)TLAUH(QUI) 94–95; TLATO(A) 66, 87, 157, 167; TLATZACUILLO(TL) 119; TLAUHQUECHOL(LI) 63; TLAXCAL(LI) 77, 120; TLEMAMAL(I) 112; TLE(TL) 166; TLIL(LI) 108–109, 123, 214; TLILXOCH(ITL) 162; TOCH(IN/TLI) 16, 59, 61, 85–86, 100, 169; TOCHTLACALAQUIL(LI) 118; TOC(TLI) 117; TOL(IN) 38–40, 120–21, 138; TON 95; TONA(C) 119, 169; TONAL(LI) 88; TONAL2(LI) 169; TONATIUH 79, 98, 156, 169, 215; TOTOL(IN) 104; TOTO(TL) 133, 165, 199; (TO)TOZ(TLI) 116–17; TOZA(N) 132; TZAPINI(A) 203; TZAPO(TL) 95; TZINCO 104; TZIN(TLI) 104; TZON(TLI) 62–63, 93; TZINITZCAN 63; XAL(LI) 115, 123, 155, 214; XAM(ITL) 133; XAYACA(TL) 149; XIC(TLI) 116; XIHUAN 199–200; XIUH, XIHUITL 111–12, 123, 137, 214; XIM(A) 110; XIQUIPIL(LI) 62–63; XIUHTOTO(TL) 63; XOCHI(TL)/XOCH(ITL) 38, 59, 61, 77, 88, 104, 169; XOCO(TL) 100; XO(TL) 55; XOXOUH(QUI) 94; YACA(TL) 106, 115; YAHUAL(LI) 123, 214; YAO(TL) 67, 103; YOHUAC 98; YOHUAL(LI) 98, 171; YOLLO(TL/TLI) 96; ZOL(IN) 95; ZOZOLOCA(C) 115 logosyllabic 13, 54, 124, 144, 151, 172, 205 M macrons 13, 58 manuscripts, hieroglyphic-iconographic: Codex Aubin 72–73, 109, 140–41, 200–203; Codex Bodley 195; Codex Cozcatzin 69–70, 137, 141, 158; Codex Dresden 23–24, 183–85; Codex FejérváryMayer 20; Codex Florentinus 7, 48, 93, 96–98, 132, 142, 155–57, 160; Codex Magliabechiano 59; Codex Mendoza 31–40 and passim; Codex Nuttall 24–25; Codex Osuna 166, 198, 203; Codex Telleriano-Remensis 25, 41–44, 46, 63–64, 67, 79–81, 97, 110–12, 117, 148–49, 151, 153, 158, 209; Codex Teocaltitlan 199, 204; Codex Tepetlaoztoc 95, 100, 107, 108–109, 133, 135, 205, 209; Codex Tlatelolco 89, 199–201; Codex Vaticanus A (Codex Rios) 38, 165–66; Codex Vergara 7, 88, 97, 114, 117, 128–29, 172, 209–10; Codex Xolotl 10, 75, 88, 97–99, 106, 109, 113–21, 133, 138–39, 155, 157, 160–61, 164, 209; Historia Tolteca-Chichimeca 87; Lienzo de Tlaxcala 27–29, 50–51, 87, 89, 209; Mapa Quinatzin 159; Matrícula de Huexotzinco 94, 204–205, 209; Matrícula de Tributos 20–21; Ms. Mexicain 72 199; Primeros Memoriales 146–54; Tira de Tepechpan 132 Maquixco 191–92 Maxtla 79, 119 Maya 6, 8–10, 20, 22–24, 48, 54, 89, 125–30, 135, 177, 183–84, 189, 191, 208 Mesopotamia 6, 10, 53–54, 74, 103, 125, 127, 134 Metztliapan 31, 35, 38, 76, 145–46 Mexica 31–32 and passim Mexico Tenochtitlan see Tenochtitlan Mexico Tlatelolco see Tlatelolco Mictlan 40 Mixtec 24–25, 195–96 monogram 27 monosyllabograms see phonograms Monte Albán 18, 21–22, 189 morpheme 13, 66, 69, 73, 117, 204 Motecuhzoma, Stone of 167–72 Motecuhzoma I Ilhuicamina Chalchiuhtlatonac 17, 71, 148–49 Motecuhzoma II (Xocoyotl) 17, 152–53 multivalent 13, 14, 28–29, 54, 97, 114, 185 Muñoz Camargo, Diego 31 Mycenaean see Linear scripts N Nahuatl 6–13 and passim

names in glyphs days 59–61, 67, 72, 84, 98, 169, 215 deities 22, 24, 32, 65, 75, 79–80, 156, 169, 173, 177, 183, 215 persons: Acacitli 83; Acamapichtli 37, 66, 146–47, 186; Acatonal 88; Achitometl 9, 99, 113; Ahuexotl 83; Ahuitzotl 17, 151–52; Ana 201; Antón/Antonio 201; Aoctlacuani 97, 99; Apanecatl 73; Atototl 83; Atotoztli 45–46, 48–49, 67, 113–17; Axayacatl 148; Cacama 163–64; Calhua 88; Calton 95; Camisa 204–205; Cano 202; Ceynos see Za(h)inos; Chichimeca 133; Chichincatl 133; Chimalman 73; Chimalpopoca 148, 166; Chololteca 119–21; Citlalpopoca 28– 30; Coanacoch 163–64; Cocoztic 94; Cristóbal 203; Cuacuauhpitzahuac 155–56; Cuanaca 204– 205; Cuauhcoatl 73; Cuauhpan/Cuappan 83; Cuauhtemoc 154; Cuauhtlatoa 66, 86, 157; Cuauhtlatonac 119; Cuitlahua 153–54; Díaz 204; Diego 200; Esteban 201; Francisco 201; Huitzilihuitl 45, 148; Ilancueitl 41–42, 45–47, 113–17, 164–65; Ilhuicamina 148–49; Itzcoatl 148; Ixtlilxochitl 162; Juan 199–200; Luis 201; Mahuiz 117; Manrique 202; Martín 202; Matlalihuitl 94; Maxtla 119–21; Mendoza 132, 200–201; Metzineuh 83; Moquihuix 66, 70, 157–58; Motecuhzoma/Moteuczoma 152–53; Nezahualcoyotl 162–63, 205; Nezahualpilli 163; Ocelopan 83; Ome Cuauhtli 86; Orozco 201; Quinatzin 138–39, 159–60; Techotlala 160–62; Tehuetzquiti 205; Tenoch 83; Tecpancihuatl 69; Tepalecoc 128, 197; Tepoloatzin 95; Tetlepanquetza 164–65; Tezcacoa(ca)tl 73; Tizocic 149–51; Tlacateotl 79–81, 156–57; Tlacochin 135; Tlaltecatl 138–39; Tlalpanhuehuetl 119; Tlatzacuillotl 119; Tlaxcalteca 119–21; Tolteca 119–21, 138; Totoquihuaztli 164–65; Xiuhcactli 137; Xiuhcaque 83, 137; Xocoyol 83; Xomimitl 83; Yacazozoloca 113–19; Za(h)inos/Ceynos 203–204 places: Acamilixtlahuacan 139–40; Acapan 186; Acapolco 96; Acatepec 186; Acatla 108–109; Acatlicpac 186; Acatzinco 186; Acaxochitlan 186; Acocolco 180; Acolhuacan 159, 178; Acolman 168–69, 178–79, 187; Acolnahuac 68; Ahuacatlan 101; Ahuilizapan 168–70; Alhuexoyocan 88, 168–70; Amacoztitlan 102; Atenco 105–106; Atlan 69; Atlixco 19; Atotonilco 71; Atzoyatla 108–109; Ayotochcuitlatlan 50–51; Azcapotzalco 168–71; Cacalomacan 187; Calyahualco 123; Chalco 106, 168–69; Chiconquiyauhco 123; Chilapan 104; Chipiltepec 133; Cholollan 19, 77, 120–21; Cihuatecpan 69; Citlaltepec 29; Colhuacan 35, 113, 168–69; Coyocac 100; Coyohuacan 75; Cozamaloapan 136; Cozcacuauhtenanco 78–79; Cuahuitlixco 105; Cuauhhuacan 90; Cuauhnacaztlan 107; Cuauhnahuac 38, 76–77, 103; Cuauhnochtitlan 31–32; Cuauhquechollan 88–89; Cuauhtecomatlan 101; Cuauhtemallan 89–90; Cuauhtinchan 50–51, 87; Cuauhtitlan 102; Cuauhtlan 86; Cuetlaxtlan 168–69; Cuitlahuac 38, 76–77; Epazoyocan 78–79; Etlan 129; Huaxtepec 99; Huaxyacac 106–107; Huexotla 105; Huexotzinco 19, 77, 120–21; Huitzillan 101; Huitzilopochco 75; Huitznahuac 103; Huitztlan 67; Huixachtecatl 99; Huixachtitlan 99; Ichcatlan 101; Iliyocan 27–28; Iztactla(l)locan 207; Macuilxochic 88; Matixco 105; Matlatlan 168–69; Matlatzinco 168–69; Mazatlan 69, 96; Mexicatzinco 140; Mexico 140–41, 144–46; Miacatlan 186; Michmaloyan 187; Mictlan 78–79; Mitzinco 186; Mixtlan 69, 168–69; Mizquic 38, 76–77; Mollanco 122; Nextitlan 102; Ocoapan 104; Otlatitlan 102; Oxitlan 67; Oztoman 103–104; Oztonacazco 107; Oztoticpac 108; Petlacalco 123; Petlatlan 123; Quecholac 50–51; Quiyauhteopan 207; Tamazolapan 168–70; Tamazollan 168–70; Teciuhtlan 69; Tecpan 79; Tenanco 100; Tenantzinco 104; Tenanyocan 35, 168–69; Tenochtitlan 19, 32, 146, 166–67; Teocalhueiyacan 50–51; Teocuitlatlan 140; Teopantlan 79; Tepetitlan 102, 123; Tepetlhueiyacan 123; Tepexic 50–51; Tepeyacac 106, 109; Tepotzotlan 50–51; Tetellan 168–69; Teticpac 123; Tetzcoco 19, 159, 166–67, 178; Teuhzoltzapotlan 95; Texopan 95; Tizayocan 100–101; Tlachquiyauhco 195–96; Tlachyahualco 123; Tlacopan 19, 50–51, 164, 166–67; Tlalcozauhtitlan 155; Tlaltizapan 100–101; Tlatelolco 80, 154–55, 168, 171–72; Tlatlauhquitepec 94; Tlauhpan/Tlappan 95; Tlaxcallan 19, 77, 120– 21; Tlayacac 106, 108–109; Tlayacapan 122; Tlilhuacan 108–109; Tliliuhquitepec 19; Tliltepec 123; Tochpan 100, 168–69; Tochtlan 100, 168–69; Tollan 120–21; Tonatiuhco 79; Totolapan 104; Xaltelolco 28–29, 155; Xaltocan 155, 168–70; Xaxalpan 123; Xicco 116–17; Xiuhhuacan

123; Xiuhtepec 123; Xochimilcatzinco 104; Xochimilco 38, 76–77, 168–69; Xocoyocan 100– 101; Xoxouhtla 94; Yacapichtlan 122; Yaonahuac 67, 103; Yohuallan 29, 168, 171; Zacatepec 50–51 years 16–17, 32–34, 37, 41, 44, 59–61, 63, 66, 98, 111–12, 153, 173 notation 9–10, 20, 23–24, 52–53, 58, 125–26, 183, 208–10 numerals 23, 53, 58, 60, 62–65, 74, 191, 204 O Olmec 18 oracle-bones see Shang P phonograms 14, 47, 53, 58 (mono)syllabograms 130, 135, 197; a 9, 38, 49, 67, 91, 97–98, 108–109, 133–34, 139, 159, 161, 167, 169, 187–90, 199–201; ac (Teotihua) 188–90; ac2 (Teotihua) 187–88; al 88, 200; an2 108; az 190; ca 92; ca2 99, 118–19, 138; cac 10, 92, 100, 126; can 10, 108, 202; cax 10; ce 98; chal 106, 169; chi 9, 98, 133–34; cho 161–62; ci 134, 201; co 92, 100, 106–107, 128–29, 134, 136, 199–201; cuauh 90; cuauh2 89–90; cuauh3 90; e 92, 116, 128–29, 134, 199–200; el 47; ez 141, (Teotihua) 192; hua2 92, 109; hua3 92–93, 190; hua4 88; huauh 92; hui 99, 117–18; hui(t)z 117; i2 47, 116–17; ich 70–71; ihui2 158; il 47, 126, 134; ix 97, 134, 157–58, 169, 199, 201, 203, 214; lo 116; ma 9, 103–104, 117, (Teotihua) 189–90; mal 38, 76, 202; me 9, 132, 134, 141, 200; mi 9, 131, 133–34, (Teotihua) 188–89; mo 9; mo2 153; nan 100, 215; o2 100; oc 66, 73, 97, 128–29, 134, 158; ol 116, (Teotihua) 189–90, 214; pach 215; pal 10, 128–29, 134; pan 73, 100, 116, 186, 189, 201, 205, 214; pan2 100–101; pi 134, 214; pil 10, 133–34, 190; po 30, 95; pol 10, 95–96; pol2 95; qui 109, 138–39; quil 203; quiz (Teotihua) 192; te 81, 93, 100, 120, 149–51, 156–57, 161, 200; te2 93, 99, 118, 120, 128–29, 133–34, 138; tiz 149–51; tlac 157, 164; (t)lan 47, 67, 69, 86, 93–94, 97, 100–101, 108–109, 115–21, 123, 131, 134, 136, 165, 214– 15; (t)lan2 101–102; to 133–34, 165, 199, 201; to2 9, 99; to3 116–17; tol 206; toza 200; tzin 77, 92, 104, 120–21, 141; tzin2 95; xach 99; xan 133–34; xi 141; xiuh 137, 200; ye 92; yo2 100; zo 149–51; zo2 151–53 disyllabograms 10, 15, 126, 130, 135–36, 138, 140, 155, 181, 186, 189, 197–201, 203, 206, 215; acol 10, 67–68, 139, 159, 167, 169, 181, 186, (Teotihua) 187–90, 193; ahui 118; ahuil 168, 170; ana 201; apan 104–105, 168, 170; cochin 10, 136; coyo 100, (Teotihua) 193; ixtlauh 140; ihui2 66; ilhui 98; ixtlauh 140; izta 201; mali 198–99; malli 202; maltin 76, 86, 202; nahua 38, 67–68, 76, 103; ocuil 10, 73; olo 201; olo2 116; pala 134; patol 126, 205–206; quehua 165; quinatz 10, 138–39, 159–60; quiyauh 196–97; teca 10, 99, 138, ; temal 76; tequi 70–71; titlan 102; titlan2 102, 123, 214; tlaloc 215; (t)lapan 168, 171–72; tlatlan 140; (t)lilli 118; toca 155; toza 132, 134; tzapin 203; yocan 100–101, 108 trisyllabograms 136; cozama 136; mexica 140; xayaca 106 Plaza de los Glifos 175–78, 185–88 polyvalent see multivalent Postclassic 17 Preclassic 17 R rebus 127–29, 178; see also phonograms S Sahagún, Bernardino de 7, 48, 151, 182 Shang 125, 137–38, 181, 185 signs 8–11, 13–15, 20; see also hieroglyphics Spanish 8, 11, 29, 44, 47, 53–54, 57, 61–62, 73, 85–86, 88, 92, 102, 122, 125, 129, 132, 134, 148–50, 180, 197–206

stimulus diffusion 14, 172, 189 subscript numbers 13, 15, 56, 86; see also indices Sumerian 54–55, 57, 124–26, 130, 135, superscripts 15, 47, 78, 81, 87, 214 syllabograms see phonograms syllepsis, graphic 13, 15, 67, 80–81, 98, 106–107, 109, 136–41, 156– 58, 169, 190 T Taniquiecache see Monte Albán Techinantitla 174–77, 187–90 Tenochtitlan 17, 19 and passim Teotihuacan 10, 125, 174–93 Tepanec 17 Tetitla 191 Tetzcoco 19 Tezcatlipoca 88 Tezozomoc (of Azcapotzalco) 98 Tezozomoc, Hernando de Alvarado 170 titles and loanwords 10, 66–68, 73–74, 84, 87, 91, 191, 197, 200–201, 202, 205; ācatlīyacapanēcatl 66; ācōlmēcatl 191; ātēmpanēcatl 106; calpixqui 133; camixà 204–205; cemanāhuactlàtoāni 148; cihuācōātl 37, 66, 148; cuāuhnōchtli 90; cuāuhtlàtò 87, 157; don/doña (Span.) 199; espital 203; ezhuahuacatl 66; factor (Span.) 205; fray (Span.) 134; māquīztēcatl 191; marqués (Span.) 202; mixcōātl 66–67; mixcōātlaīlōtlac 66; sacristán 203; sacristía 203; san(to) (Span.) 134; tēcuhtli/tēuctli 67; tequīxquināhuacatl 66; tēzcacōācatl 66, 73; ticoyahuacatl 73–74; tlācatēcuhtli/tlācatēuctli 67; tlàtoāni 37; tocuiltēcatl 73–74; vicerey/visrey (Span.) 134 Tizocic, Stone of 167–72, 190 Tizocic Tlalchitonatiuh 17, 149–51 Tlacateotl 79 Tlacopan 19 Tlahuizcalpantecuhtli 183–84 Tlaloc 40, 63, 112, 173, 177, 187, 207, 215 Tlalocan 40 Tlatelolco 25, 31, 66, 70, 79–80, 86, 98, 133, 144–47, 154–59, 171, 200 Tlaxcallan 19 Tliliuhquitepec 19 Toltec 30, 35, 38–39, 113, 120–21, 138, 171, 182–83 Tonatiuh 80 Tonatiuhichan 40 topan 40 Totonac 196–97 toxiuhmolpilia 34 transcription 8, 14, 56–58, 68, 77 transliteration 13–14, 53, 56–58 broad 14, 58 narrow 14, 58 trisyllabograms see phonograms U Uto-Aztecan 160, 182, 193 V values 8, 13–15, 29–30 variants 13–14, 45, 61, 66, 70, 84–86, 90, 105, 114, 117, 120, 127, 136, 139, 157–60, 164–66, 180, 199, 203

X xōchiyāōyōtl 19, 40–41 Y Yaxchilan 24 Z Zapotec 6, 18, 35, 125, 189

ON THE COVER: City and town glyphs from the sixteenth-century Codex Mendoza, redrawn by Gordon Whittaker FRONTISPIECE: Detail from the Codex Telleriano-Remensis, f. 29v–30r; see Fig. 1.16. First published in the United Kingdom in 2021 by Thames & Hudson Ltd, 181A High Holborn, London WC1V 7QX ISBN 978-0-500-51872-4 Deciphering Aztec Hieroglyphs © 2021 Thames & Hudson Ltd, London Text by Gordon Whittaker Illustrations, unless otherwise specified on p. 216, © 2021 Gordon Whittaker This electronic version first published in the United Kingdom in 2021 by

Thames & Hudson Ltd, London To find out about all our publications, please visit www.thamesandhudson.com www.thamesandhudsonusa.com All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording or any other information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. eISBN 978-0-500-77634-6