Plain-capped Starthroat, a bird, or White-eared Hummingbird (see Hunn, attestations)
ECA-HUĪTZIL-IN, Plain-capped Starthroat (Heliomaster constantii)/White-eared Hummingbird (Basilinna leucotis) [FC: 25 Hecavitzili] “It is small and long. Some are ashen, some black. The ashen ones have a black stripe across the eyes. Thus are they painted. And the black ones are painted on the face with white; they are striped across the eyes with a wind painting.” While not cited in the Florentine Codex, Martin del Campo suggested that Hecavitzili (ECA-HUĪTZIL-IN) might be “Phaeoptila sordida” (now Dusky Hummingbird, Cynanthus sordidus) or “Cyanolaemus clemenciae” females (now Blue-throated Hummingbird, Lampornis clemenciae). This last species is named for its resemblance to images of the wind god, EHĒCA-TL: Assuming the name is based on this resemblance, this particular hummingbird (or hummingbirds) is more likely to have been the Plain-capped Starthroat – the “ashen one… [with] a black stripe across the eyes” – and the White-eared Hummingbird (the “black ones painted on the face with white”). Both are common in the Central Mexican highlands. This same descriptive allusion to the Wind God is incorporated in the names of a species of duck (Hecatototl = ECA-TŌTŌ-TL) and a falcon (Hecatlhotli = ECA-TLOH-TLI). See also HUĪTZIL-IN “hummingbird.”