tlapatl.

Headword: 
tlapatl.
Principal English Translation: 

a hallucinogenic substance
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), 238.

the substance may come from a flower; see the tlapatl hieroglyph, which is a flower
Visual Lexicon of Aztec Hieroglyphs, ed., Stephanie Wood (Eugene, Ore.: Wired Humanities Projects, 2020–present. https://aztecglyphs.wired-humanities.org/content/tlapatl-mh638r.

IPAspelling: 
tɬɑːpɑːtɬ
Frances Karttunen: 

TLĀPĀ-TL intoxicating plant, also used medicinally / yerba … que comidas trastornan la cabeza … se toman por pulque y vino (C), quiebra-platos, planta medicinal especie de estramonio (R), huevo de perro (X) [(4)Cf.60v,116v,121r, (1)Rp.146, (3)Xp.93]. This is conventionally paired with MĪXĪ-TL, another intoxicating plant, the whole phrase referring to inebriation.
Frances Karttunen, An Analytical Dictionary of Nahuatl (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1992), 290.

Lockhart’s Nahuatl as Written: 

used in a pair with mīxītl in connection with drunkenness. 238

Attestations from sources in English: 

The Florentine Codex, Book 11, shows a flowering plant as tlapatl.
Sahagún, Bernardino de, Antonio Valeriano, Alonso Vegerano, Martín Jacobita, Pedro de San Buenaventura, Diego de Grado, Bonifacio Maximiliano, Mateo Severino, et al. Historia general de las cosas de Nueva España (Florentine Codex), Ms. Mediceo Palatino 218–20, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Florence, MiBACT, 1577. Available at Digital Florentine Codex/Códice Florentino Digital, edited by Kim N. Richter, Alicia Maria Houtrouw, Kevin Terraciano, Jeanette Peterson, Diana Magaloni, and Lisa Sousa, bk. 11, fol. 130r. Los Angeles: Getty Research Institute, 2023. https://florentinecodex.getty.edu/en/book/11/folio/130r/images/eb553a52-.... Accessed 16 November 2025. See also f. 130v, where the tzitzintlapatl is discussed an pictured. It is much like the tlapatl, but the bud is spiny.

tlapatl (noun) = the castor-oil plant; the phrase mixitl tlapatl means stupor, intoxication
Daniel Garrison Brinton, Ancient Nahuatl Poetry: Containing the Nahuatl Text of XXVII Ancient Mexican Poems (1877), 165.

Attestations from sources in Spanish: 

Ca huel tehuatl molhuil, momacehual mochihuaz in mixitl, in tlapatl, in octli, in nanacatl; in tiquiz, in ticcuaz, inic tihuetziz, inic timotlapololtiz inic aocmo ticmatiz = Tu don, tu merecimiento se harán nube, tlápatl, pulque, hongo; los beberás, los comerás, y por consiguiente caerás, tú mismo te perderás aunque no lo sepas (centro de México, s. XVI)
Josefina García Quintana, "Exhortación de un padre a su hijo; texto recogido por Andrés de Olmos," Estudios de Cultura Náhuatl 11 (1974), 176–177.

in moqueztlatzinia, in macopiloa, in tocuilehua, in tzatzi, in oyoa; in yuhqui mixitl, in yuhqui tlapatl, in yuhqui uctli, nanacatl in oquic, in oquicua, in aocmo quimati = [y que] como si hubiera bebido o comido la yerba que embriaga, el tlápatl, el pulque, el hongo, ya no entiende (centro de México, s. XVI)
Josefina García Quintana, "Exhortación de un padre a su hijo; texto recogido por Andrés de Olmos," Estudios de Cultura Náhuatl 11 (1974), 154–155.

themes: 
Alcohol, Hallucinogens
Plants, Trees, Flora