tapalcatl.

Headword: 
tapalcatl.
Principal English Translation: 

a potsherd, a piece of broken tile (see Molina and Karttunen)

IPAspelling: 
tɑpɑlkɑtɬ
Alonso de Molina: 

tapalcatl. caxco de vasija de barro quebrada, o teja quebrada.
Alonso de Molina, Vocabulario en lengua castellana y mexicana y mexicana y castellana, 1571, part 2, Nahuatl to Spanish, f. 91r. col. 1. Thanks to Joe Campbell for providing the transcription.

Frances Karttunen: 

TAPALCA-TL pl: -MEH potsherd, broken tile / casco de vasija de barro quebrada, o teja quebrada (M) [(1)Tp.224,(1)Zp.212]. In the compound ITZTAPAL-LI 'paving stone' this occurs without final CA.
Frances Karttunen, An Analytical Dictionary of Nahuatl (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1992), 215.

Attestations from sources in English: 

cujx cenca aia ticmocaqujtia cujx nelli mach tlalli, tapalcatl ticololoa = dost thou perchance not yet take much heed? Dost thou perchance pile up earth, potsherds? (central Mexico, sixteenth century)
Fr. Bernardino de Sahagún, Florentine Codex: General History of the Things of New Spain; Book 6 -- Rhetoric and Moral Philosophy, No. 14, Part 7, 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, 1961), 94.

ca qujoalnotza ca qujoaltzatzilia in tonan, in tota in Mictlan tecutli: in coҫoltzintli, in quavic onoc in tlalli ijxco ca: in tlalli, yn tapalcatl = Verily our mother, our father, Mictlan tecutli, calleth, summoneth those in the cradle, those who rest on the cradle board, those on the surface of the ground, those who heap up the earth, the potsherds (central Mexico, sixteenth century)
Fr. Bernardino de Sahagún, Florentine Codex: General History of the Things of New Spain; Book 6 -- Rhetoric and Moral Philosophy, No. 14, Part 7, 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, 1961), 190.

themes: 
Ceramics, Pottery