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epatl.

Headword: 
epatl.
Principal English Translation: 

skunk

IPAspelling: 
epɑtɬ
Alonso de Molina: 

epatl. cierto animalejo que hiede mucho.
Alonso de Molina, Vocabulario en lengua castellana y mexicana y mexicana y castellana, 1571, part 2, Nahuatl to Spanish, f. 29r. col. 1. Thanks to Joe Campbell for providing the transcription.

Frances Karttunen: 

EPA-TL pl: -MEH skunk / cierto animalejo que hiede mucho (M), zorrillo (T, Z, X)
Frances Karttunen, An Analytical Dictionary of Nahuatl (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1992), 78.

Attestations from sources in English: 

See an image that represents epatl in the Visual Lexicon of Aztec Hieroglyphs, ed. Stephanie Wood (Eugene, Ore.: Wired Humanities, 2020-present).

yn epatl yn aca ychan callaquia anoço vncan mopilhoatia motenevaya ye miquiz yn chane = When a skunk entered someone’s home or gave birth to its young there, it was said that soon the owner of the house would die.
Fray Bernardino de Sahagún, Primeros Memoriales, ed. Thelma D. Sullivan, et al. (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1997), 175.

themes: 
Animals, Bugs, Insects, Reptiles, Fish, etc.