ixtli. | Nahuatl Dictionary

Headword:

ixtli.

Principal English Translation:

face, eye; also, on the surface of, facing (see Molina, Karttunen, etc.)

Orthographic Variants:

IPAspelling:

iːʃtɬi

Alonso de Molina:

ixtli. la haz o la cara, o el ñudo dela caña.
Alonso de Molina, Vocabulario en lengua castellana y mexicana y mexicana y castellana, 1571, part 2, Nahuatl to Spanish, f. 48v. col. 1. Thanks to Joe Campbell for providing the transcription.

Frances Karttunen:

ĪX-TLI face, surface, eye, / la haz o la cara, o el nudo de la caña (M), faz, rostro, por ext. ojo (S).
Frances Karttunen, An Analytical Dictionary of Nahuatl (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1992), 121.

Horacio Carochi / English:

īxtli = face, surface, eye
Horacio Carochi, S.J., Grammar of the Mexican language with an explanation of its adverbs (1645), translated and edited with commentary by James Lockhart, UCLA Latin American Studies Volume 89 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, UCLA Latin American Center Publications, 2001), 504.

Lockhart’s Nahuatl as Written:

face; in compounds, sometimes refers to the eye, sometimes to the surface. -īx -yōllo, spirits, good or bad mood, etc. quēn mochīhua -īx -yōlo, to be worried. see also īxeh.
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), 222.

Attestations from sources in English:

See an image that represents ixtli in the Visual Lexicon of Aztec Hieroglyphs, ed. Stephanie Wood (Eugene, Ore.: Wired Humanities, 2020-present).

oquicuallique yn ixayac atlan chaneque = the fish had chewed at his face (central Mexico, 1612)
Annals of His Time: Don Domingo de San Antón Muñón Chimalpahin Quauhtlehuanitzin, James Lockhart, Susan Schroeder, and Doris Namala, eds. and transl. (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2006), 228–229.

teyxamiliztli = washing the faces (Central Mexico, 1552)
Fray Alonso de Molina, Nahua Confraternities in Early Colonial Mexico: The 1552 Nahuatl Ordinances of fray Alonso de Molina, OFM, ed. and trans., Barry D. Sell (Berkeley: Academy of American Franciscan History, 2002), 88–89.

çan iconecuitl ynic onmoxaxauh yn quimixteyayahualti = [H]e painted himself only with his child's excrement as he painted circles about his eyes. (central Mexico, early seventeenth century)
Codex Chimalpahin: Society and Politics in Mexico Tenochtitlan, Tlatelolco, Culhuacan, and Other Nahuatl Altepetl in Central Mexico; The Nahuatl and Spanish Annals and Accounts Collected and Recorded by don Domingo de San Antón Muñón Chimalpahin Quauhtlehuanitzin, eds. and transl. Arthur J. O. Anderson and Susan Schroeder (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1997), vol. 1, 82–83.

ystiCa ycalaquiyapa tonaltzintlin = facing west (San Pedro Tototepec, Toluca Valley, 1728)
Caterina Pizzigoni, ed., Testaments of Toluca (Stanford: Stanford University Press and UCLA Latin American Center Publications, 2007), 99.

mixquauhcalichiuhticac = a cage-like design is painted on his face
Fray Bernardino de Sahagún, Primeros Memoriales, ed. Thelma D. Sullivan, et al. (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1997), 100.

mixtlilmacaticac = his face is painted black
Fray Bernardino de Sahagún, Primeros Memoriales, ed. Thelma D. Sullivan, et al. (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1997), 101.

ixtli = eye, face (because īxtli related to the eyes and looking, it can extend to the face and facial expression)
Michel Launey, An Introduction to Classical Nahuatl, translated and adapted by Christopher MacKay (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 94.

tix = our face; tixco = in our face, in our eye; nixtlapoui (nixtlapohui) = I open my eye; anoço nixtomi = or I uncover my eye (central Mexico, sixteenth century)
Fr. Bernardino de Sahagún, Florentine Codex: General History of the Things of New Spain; Book 10 -- The People, No. 14, Part 11, eds. and transl. Arthur J. O. Anderson and Charles E. Dibble (Santa Fe and Salt Lake City: School of American Research and the University of Utah, 1961), 112.

ixicnoio = kind face;
ixiicnotzin = beloved face;
ixcococ = sad-faced;
mixtleiotia = face is inflamed with anger;
ixmauiziooa = face has honor;
ixpalani = face festers;
ixtliliui = face blackens;
ixtlatla = face burns;
ixipeui = face is skinned;
ixitlacaui = face is damaged;
quixuitequi = he strikes the face;
quixchicha = he spits on the face;
quixtepinia = he hits the face with his fist;
quixcomaca = he tells him his faults to his face;
quixtlatzinia = he slaps the face;
quixtilicҫa = he kicks the face;
ixtlauetzi = it falls in his eye;
ixco calaqui, in teuhtli = dust enters his eye;
ixco ca iztac = it is white in his eye;
q. n. nixtomi = that is to say, I uncover my eye;
nixtlamati = I am wise (central Mexico, sixteenth century)
Fr. Bernardino de Sahagún, Florentine Codex: General History of the Things of New Spain; Book 10 -- The People, No. 14, Part 11, eds. and transl. Arthur J. O. Anderson and Charles E. Dibble (Santa Fe and Salt Lake City: School of American Research and the University of Utah, 1961), 112.

Attestations from sources in Spanish:

in ixtli in yollotl = ojo/cara, corazón = una metáfora para decir 'ser humano' (s. XVI)
Katarzyna Mikulska, "Te hago bandera...Signos de banderas y sus significados en la expresión gráfica nahua," Los códices mesoamericanos: Registros de religión, política y sociedad, coord. Miguel Angel Ruz Barrio y Juan José Batalla (Zinacantepec, Estado de México: El Colegio Mexiquense, 2016), 86..

IDIEZ morfema:

īxtli.

IDIEZ traduc. inglés:

root of ĪXCO, ĪXTLAPĀNA and many other words. eye, face and by extension, surface.

IDIEZ def. náhuatl:

ĪXCO, ĪXTLAPĀNA huan miac tlahtolli iyollo. Macehualli, tecuani zo tlapiyalli ixtiyol zo ixxayac; tlamantli iixco [Mc. 48v; K. 121].

IDIEZ gramática:

tlat.

themes:

Anatomy