to take someone or something as something to hide behind
James Lockhart, Nahuatl as Written: Lessons in Older Written Nahuatl, with Copious Examples and Texts (Stanford: Stanford University Press and UCLA Latin American Studies, 2001), 240.
James Lockhart, Nahuatl as Written: Lessons in Older Written Nahuatl, with Copious Examples and Texts (Stanford: Stanford University Press and UCLA Latin American Studies, 2001), 240.
a stalk, or a cane of maize (see Molina and Karttunen); Molina says that it is a young plant that has not yet flowered, but the glyph for toctli in the Codex Mendoza does show a flower and ears of corn on the plant