cactimani. | Nahuatl Dictionary

Headword:

cactimani.

Principal English Translation:

for silence to reign, for a place to be abandoned
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), 212.

IPAspelling:

kɑktimɑni

Alonso de Molina:

cactimani. casa desamparada que no se habita o hazer bonanza y buen tiempo, o auer silencio vn poco de tiempo, o estar la ciudad assolada de repente y destruyda.
Alonso de Molina, Vocabulario en lengua castellana y mexicana y mexicana y castellana, 1571, part 2, Nahuatl to Spanish, f. 11r. col. 1. Thanks to Joe Campbell for providing the transcription.

Frances Karttunen:

CACTIMAN(I) for there to be silence, stillness, absence of activity; for the weather to be fair / casa desamparada que no se habita, o hacer bonanza y buen tiempo, o haber silencio un poco de tiempo, o estar la ciudad asolada de repente y destruída (M) The initial element of this construction is restricted in occurrence. M has in cactiuetzi ‘to fall quiet,’ and T has CACTI ‘to moderate.’ See CACTI, MAN(I).
Frances Karttunen, An Analytical Dictionary of Nahuatl (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1992), 20.

Lockhart’s Nahuatl as Written:

Probably related to an old intransitive form of cahua, plus -ti-, mani. The root cac- is found only in constructions with auxiliary verbs. A form that looks like cacti in the Tetelcingo dictionary is the equivalent of cactiuh. Cactimani is not attested in any other tense than the present, but presumably it would be the same as any other -timani auxiliary.
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), 212.

themes:

Weather, Climate