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nel.

Headword: 
nel.
Principal English Translation: 

in truth, truly (adverb); the truth, the true one (noun); to be diligent, careful

Orthographic Variants: 
amo nel
IPAspelling: 
nel
Alonso de Molina: 

nel. ser diligente y cuidadoso.
Alonso de Molina, Vocabulario en lengua castellana y mexicana y mexicana y castellana, 1571, part 2, Nahuatl to Spanish, f. 66v. col. 1. Thanks to Joe Campbell for providing the transcription.

Horacio Carochi / English: 

àmō nel = an interrogative much like mō and mō nel; is it not?
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), 446.

intlā nel = although
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.

nel = secondary particle, often in the world, etc.
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), 507.

Lockhart’s Nahuatl as Written: 

element in particle clusters derived from nelli, though it now rarely translates as true or truly. ca nel, because, since for, etc. mā nel, although. 226
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), 226.

Attestations from sources in English: 

cãpa nel niaz cãpa nipolhuitiuh = where truly, will I go? Where will I disappear to? (mid sixteenth century, Central Mexico)
Louise M. Burkhart, Before Guadalupe: The Virgin Mary in Early Colonial Nahuatl Literature, Institute for Mesoamerican Studies Monograph 13 (Albany: University at Albany, 2001), 121.

quen nel = What can be done? (central Mexico, sixteenth century)
Personal communication, James Lockhart, in sessions analyzing Huehuetlatolli.