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medio.

(a loanword from Spanish)

Headword: 
medio.
Principal English Translation: 

a half; a half real or tomin; coin; money; monetary value; also seen as an adjective (see attestations)

Orthographic Variants: 
melio, media
Lockhart’s Nahuatl as Written: 

melio = medio
The usual substitution for d is t, but in the medial position we sometimes see l instead. This explains melio for medio. (119)

adjective. half of anything, usually preceding a Spanish loanword and making a set phrase with it

coin, monetary value, half a real or tomin

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), 225.

Attestations from sources in English: 

atle çe melio çe cacahuatl, ic quicnelia in iyolia = With not one coin of little value, with not one cacao bean, does he favor his soul.
Bartolomé de Alva, A Guide to Confession Large and Small in the Mexican Language, 1634, eds. Barry D. Sell and John Frederick Schwaller, with Lu Ann Homza (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1999), 121.

The form "melio," based on medio and meaning half a real, occurs several times (along with standard "medio"), for at first Spanish [d] in medial position was sometimes replaced by [l].
Here in This Year: Seventeenth-Century Nahuatl Annals of the Tlaxcala-Puebla Valley, ed. and transl. Camilla Townsend, with an essay by James Lockhart (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2010), 53.

mocahuatiuh memeliotzintzin = half a real each is to be delivered (Santa Bárbara Mixcoac, City of Toluca, 1671)
Caterina Pizzigoni, ed., Testaments of Toluca (Stanford: Stanford University Press and UCLA Latin American Center Publications, 2007), 53.

motemacaz huentzintli memeliotzitzin = An offering of half a real each is to be given. (Santa Bárbara Xolalpan, Valley of Toluca, 1701)
Caterina Pizzigoni, ed., Testaments of Toluca (Stanford: Stanford University Press and UCLA Latin American Center Publications, 2007), 65.

çoquichiuhqui in itequiuh melio (and again the same other times, once among many melios a medio) (Coyoacan, circa 1550)
Beyond the Codices, eds. Arthur J.O. Anderson, Frances Berdan, and James Lockhart (Los Angeles: UCLA Latin American Center, 1976), Doc. 25.

yn axcan maximoteilhuilli yn timerino maxiccaquilti yn motlahuilanal maximotecalpanhuilli yn nican ticmocahuilia yn meliotzin. = Now you, the merino, tell the people; inform those who depend on you; go from house to house, you who turn in the money.(Anales de Juan Bautista, 1582, f. 35v)
Ezequiel G. Stear, Nahua Horizons: Writing, Persuasion, and Futurities in Colonial Mexico (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2025), 132, citing Anales de Juan Bautista, 1582, f. 35v.

chicuenpexo inpa chiquace tomi ipa melio (Coyoacan, circa 1550)
Beyond the Codices, eds. Arthur J.O. Anderson, Frances Berdan, and James Lockhart (Los Angeles: UCLA Latin American Center, 1976), Doc. 25.

medio, mo, medio (money) (Chiucnauhapan, Coyoacan, 1608)
Frances Karttunen and James Lockhart, Nahuatl in the Middle Years: Language Contact Phenomena in Texts of the Colonial Period, Linguistics 85 (Los Angeles, University of California Publications, 1976), Doc. 3.

media ahneca oc çecpa techcuillia (Cuernavaca, circa 1610)
Frances Karttunen and James Lockhart, Nahuatl in the Middle Years: Language Contact Phenomena in Texts of the Colonial Period, Linguistics 85 (Los Angeles, University of California Publications, 1976), Doc. 4.

opohuali ocastolli anecas yhuan media (Huejotla, 1634)
Frances Karttunen and James Lockhart, Nahuatl in the Middle Years: Language Contact Phenomena in Texts of the Colonial Period, Linguistics 85 (Los Angeles, University of California Publications, 1976), Doc. 7.

yn ipartetzin y nohirmanatzin quimomaquilis medianegan senbradoran (Centlalpan, Chalco, 1736)
Frances Karttunen and James Lockhart, Nahuatl in the Middle Years: Language Contact Phenomena in Texts of the Colonial Period, Linguistics 85 (Los Angeles, University of California Publications, 1976), Doc. 10.

Attestations from sources in Spanish: 

atle çe melio çe cacahuatl, ic quicnelia in iyolia = no dá a su alma ni vna blanca ni vn marauedi
Bartolomé de Alva, A Guide to Confession Large and Small in the Mexican Language, 1634, eds. Barry D. Sell and John Frederick Schwaller, with Lu Ann Homza (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1999), 120–121.

quichayauh memeliotzintzin teopan calteco = Esparció monedas de a medio real a las puertas del templo. (Tlaxcala, 1662–1692)
Juan Buenaventura Zapata y Mendoza, Historia cronológica de la Noble Ciudad de Tlaxcala, transcripción paleográfica, traducción, presentación y notas por Luis Reyes García y Andrea Martínez Baracs (Tlaxcala y México: Universidad Autónoma de Tlaxcala, Secretaría de Extensión Universitaria y Difusión Cultural, y Centro de Investigaciones y Estudios Superiores en Antropología Social, 1995), 620–621.

memedio nictlalitiuh = doy de limosna a medio a cada una (Toluca, 1621)
Vidas y bienes olvidados: Testamentos en náhuatl y castellano del siglo XVII, vol. 3, Teresa Rojas Rabiela, et al, eds. (México: CIESAS, 2002), 132–133.

ycuiliuhtica yn ipan ce ojas yhuan media yn itech amatl = está escrito en una hoja y media en el papel (Xochimilco, 1588)
Vidas y bienes olvidados: Testamentos indígenas novohispanos, vol. 2, Testamentos en náhuatl y castellano del siglo XVI, eds., Teresa Rojas Rabiela, Elsa Leticia Rea López, Constantino Medina Lima (Mexico: Consejo Nacional de Ciencias Tecnología, 1999), 286–287.

themes: 
Markets, Commerce, Economy