atzitzicuilotl.

Ā-TZITZICUILO-TL, Black-necked Stilt (Himantopus mexicanus) [FC: 28 Atzitzicujlotl]: “It is round-backed. The bill is long and pointed, needle-like,… very pointed, black. The legs are … very long, … like stilts, broom-like, slender. Its dwelling place is [the province of] Anahuac. It is white-breasted… heavily fleshed, fat, greasy….” Martin del Campo identified this bird as the Northern Phalarope (now known as the Red-necked Phalarope, Phalaropus lobatus); Friedman et al. suggested it was more likely the Sanderling (Calidris alba). Neither of these options matches the details in the slightest, as both are small migratory shorebirds. By contrast, the Black-necked Stilt is a close match and is known to nest throughout Central Mexico to 2500 meters elevation (Howell & Webb).
Fr. Bernardino ]de Sahagún, Florentine Codex: General History of the Things of New Spain; Book 11 – Earthly Things, no. 14, Part XII, 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, 1963); Rafael Martín del Campo, “Ensayo de interpretación del Libro Undecimo de la Historia General de las Cosas de Nueva España de Fray Bernardino de Sahagún – 11 Las Aves (1),” Anales del Instituto de Biología Tomo XI, Núm. 1 (México, D.F., 1940); Steven N. G. Howell and Sophie Webb. A Guide to the Birds of Mexico and Northern Central America (Oxford University Press, Oxford, New York, Tokyo, 1995); and, with quotation selections, synthesis, and analysis here also appearing in E. S. Hunn, "The Aztec Fascination with Birds: Deciphering Sixteenth-Century Sources," unpublished manuscript, 2022, cited here with permission.

For an image of an atzitzicuilotl, see the Florentine Codex, Book 11, f. 27v.
Available at Digital Florentine Codex/Códice Florentino Digital, edited by Kim N. Richter and Alicia Maria Houtrouw, "Book 11: Earthly Things", fol. 27v, Getty Research Institute, 2023. https://florentinecodex.getty.edu/en/book/11/folio/27v/images/0 Accessed 16 October 2025.