tlalconetl.

Headword: 
tlalconetl.
Principal English Translation: 

a name ("Tlalconetl," literally, "Child of the Earth"); also seen as a slug or a lizard

Attestations from sources in English: 

Combines: tlalli = land, Earth; and, conetl = child. (SW)

The Travaux et memoires de l'Institut d'ethnologie, Vol. 62 (1958), p. 218, translates tlalconetl as a type of lizard. Tlalconete or tlaconete became the loan from Nahuatl into Spanish and was used to refer to a slimy, repugnant creature that thrives in humid places. The Mejicanismos book by Santamaría notes that folklore held that the creature could get into the vagina of a virgin and only intercourse could get it out. [See: José G. Moreno de Alba, La lengua española en México (2015).]

See also: