XOCHI-TENACAL, literally, “flower beak, Keel-billed Toucan (Ramphastos sulphuratus) [FC: 22 Xochitenacal] “The forest is its abode, the forest is its home. It breeds especially there in Totonaca country {coastal central Veracruz} [and] in Cuextlan; it raises its young in the trees. It merely builds a bag-like nest for its young [and] suspends them [this describes an oropendola or cacique nest, not that of a toucan]. The bill is long, concave [a mistranslation of "tenalcaltic"]; rather, "boat-shaped bill, <ĀCAL-LI, "boat">, yellow…. For this reason, it is called xochitenacal: about its throat [and] neck [the feathers] are very yellow... flower yellow. And its head and body are dark, dark green. And its wings and its tail are tawny and black mingled with white. The Bill widens; it becomes ; it becomes yellow; there are marks as of hawk scratches [a significant detail]; [its colors] are mingled.” Martin del Campo identified this as the Emerald Toucanet (Aulacorhynchus prasinus). However, the description fits best with the Keel-billed Toucan, in particular, the detail about the scratch marks on the bill (cf., Howell & Webb: Plate 34:1).
Fr. Bernardino de Sahagún, Florentine Codex: General History of the Things of New Spain; Book 11 – Earthly Things, no. 14, Part XII, 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, 1963); Rafael Martín del Campo, “Ensayo de interpretación del Libro Undécimo de la Historia General de las Cosas de Nueva España de Fray Bernardino de Sahagún – 11 Las Aves (1),” Anales del Instituto de Biología Tomo XI, Núm. 1 (México, D.F., 1940); Steven N. G. Howell and Sophie Webb. A Guide to the Birds of Mexico and Northern Central America (Oxford University Press, Oxford, New York, Tokyo, 1995); and, with quotation selections, synthesis, and analysis here also appearing in E. S. Hunn, "The Aztec Fascination with Birds: Deciphering Sixteenth-Century Sources," unpublished manuscript, 2022, cited here with permission.