tlemamali.

Headword: 
tlemamali.
Principal English Translation: 

to make fire with a hand drill made from a stick (see Molina)

IPAspelling: 
tɬemɑmɑli
Alonso de Molina: 

tlemamali. ni. (pret. onitlemamal.) sacar fuego con cierto instrumento de palo.
Alonso de Molina, Vocabulario en lengua castellana y mexicana y mexicana y castellana, 1571, part 2, Nahuatl to Spanish, f. 147r. col. 2. Thanks to Joe Campbell for providing the transcription.

Attestations from sources in English: 

tlemamali = to make fire with a hand drill
momamali = to be inaugurated, to be dedicated
Gordon Whittaker, Deciphering Aztec Hieroglyphs, 2021. 112.

Rubbing the hands together with the drill between the hands, to make the stick spin and cause friction--and therefore sparks and fire--on the board where the piece of wood rests, is supported by the description of how the xiuhzayolin (green fly) rubs its legs together. See the text in the Digital Florentine Codex, Book 11, f. 108v (SW)
Digital Florentine Codex/Códice Florentino Digital, edited by Kim N. Richter and Alicia Maria Houtrouw, "Book 11: Earthly Things", fol. 108v, Sahagún, Bernardino de. Florentine Codex: General History of the Things of New Spain. Transcribed and translated with notes by Arthur J. O. Anderson and Charles E. Dibble. 2nd rev. ed. Santa Fe, NM: School of American Research / University of Utah Press, 1950–82. Getty Research Institute, 2023. https://florentinecodex.getty.edu/en/book/11/folio/108v?spTexts=&nhTexts= Accessed 10 November 2025.

themes: 
Fire, Tobacco, Incense
Religion (Indigenous)
Time, Calendar, Frequency
Wood, wooden material