it widens; one who widens or expands something (see Molina); also, the verb to withdraw or move away (see Karttunen)
Orthographic Variants:
tlapatlaua
Alonso de Molina:
tlapatlaua. el que ensancha alguna cosa. Alonso de Molina, Vocabulario en lengua castellana y mexicana y mexicana y castellana, 1571, part 2, Nahuatl to Spanish, f. 131r. col. 2. Thanks to Joe Campbell for providing the transcription.
Frances Karttunen:
to withdraw / se aleja ... se retira (Z) [(2)Zp.,8, 212] Frances Karttunen, An Analytical Dictionary of Nahuatl (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1992), 290.