Principal English Translation:
to infect people, to infect someone with a contagious illness; or, for a stain to bleed through a piece of paper or a piece of clothing (see Molina)
Alonso de Molina:
maua. nite. (pret. onitemauh.) inficionar, o pegar enfermedad contagiosa a otro
maua qui. (pret. oquimauh.) cundir o traspasar la mancha el papel o la ropa
Alonso de Molina, Vocabulario en lengua castellana y mexicana y mexicana y castellana, 1571, part 2, Nahuatl to Spanish, f. 54r. col. 1. Thanks to Joe Campbell for providing the transcription.
maua qui. pret. oquimauh
cundir o traspasar la mancha el papel o la ropa
Alonso de Molina, Vocabulario en lengua castellana y mexicana y mexicana y castellana, 1571, part 2, Nahuatl to Spanish, f. 54r. col. 1. Thanks to Joe Campbell for providing the transcription.
Frances Karttunen:
MĀHU(A) vrefl,vt for illness to spread; to infect someone, to spread contagion to others / se contagia, infecta (T), inficionar o pegar enfermedad contagiosa a otra (M) MĀHUALŌ nonact. MĀHU(A)
Frances Karttunen, An Analytical Dictionary of Nahuatl (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1992), 132.
Attestations from sources in English:
to drench, soak through
Robert Haskett and Stephanie Wood's notes from Nahuatl sessions with James Lockhart and subsequent research.
Attestations from sources in Spanish:
momahuazque = pueden salir conflictos
Vidas y bienes olvidados: Testamentos indígenas novohispanos, vol. 1, Testamentos en castellano del siglo XVI y en náhuatl y castellano de Ocotelulco de los siglos XVI y XVII, eds. Teresa Rojas Rabiela, Elsa Leticia Rea López, y Constantino Medina Lima (Mexico: CIESAS, 1999), 254-255.