Translation of Tzompantli

[David Wright]

>Any ideas about the etymology of this apellido?

Estimadísimo John:

In my Access database on the glosses and painted signs in the Huichapan
Codex, I have a hill sign with a Huastec (?) (nose with big perforation)
inside and a flag on top (f. 30r / p. 59). There's a clump of hair/400
grapheme next to it, but it's not clear if it's associated with the latter
toponymic sign or the smoking dead lord bundle in a jaguar skin-covered seat
which is adjacent to the toponym. The Otomi alphabetic text includes the
word Ama'bex[te Ant'oho] (/ama'bexte ant'oho/), "lugar de banderas, el
cerro" (reconstructed from an earlier appearance, in the text on the
previous page). (In case that vowel doesn't survive the trip through
cyberspace, it's the Latin o+e.) There's also a one-word gloss in Nahuatl:
"Çopantepec" (the first letter is a cedilla, in case it doesn't make it).
Considering the Otomi scribe's imperfect command of Nahuatl in other
glosses, I broke the Nahuatl gloss down three ways:

Çopantepec

(1) /zo:pa:nte:pec/
(2) /zo:pante:pec/
(3) /tzo:mpa:nte:pec/

(1) /zo:/ + (/pa:ntli/ - /tli/) + (te:petl/ - /tl/) + (/co/ - /o/)
(2) /zo:/ + /pan/ + (/te:petl/ - /tl/) + (/co/ - /o/)
(3) (/tzo:ntli/ - /tli/) (/n/ > /m/) + (/pa:n/ - /tli/) + (/te:petl/ - /tl/)
+ (/co/ - /o/)

(1) verbo: "perforarse/sangrarse" · sustantivo: "bandera/estandarte" ·
sustantivo: "cerro" · sufijo locativo: "dentro de/en/por/sobre"
(2) verbo: "perforarse/sangrarse" · posposición: "dentro
de/durante/en/por/sobre" · sustantivo: "cerro" · sufijo locativo: "dentro
de/en/por/sobre"
(3) sustantivo: pelo · sustantivo: "bandera" "estandarte" · sustantivo:
"cerro" · sufijo locativo: "dentro de/en/por/sobre"

(1) Zopantepec, "en el cerro de la bandera de la perforación sangrante"
(2) Zopantepec, "en el cerro del lugar de perforarse para sangrarse"
(3) Tzompantepec, "en el cerro de la bandera de pelo" [tzompantli también
significa "el colorín" y "el altar de cráneos", por lo que tzompantepec
podría traducirse también como "en el cerro de los colorines" y "en el cerro
del altar de cráneos"]

(Colorín or zompantle is Erythrina americana [or E. coralloides] "coral
tree" in English, with spectacular [and edible] red flowers at the ends of
its branches and bright red [and poisonous] seeds in pods which some use in
jewelry. The tree can be grown by planting a branch.)

Any of the latter translations could relate to the painted sign, considering
the use of cuasihomophonic morpheme switching in some of the graphic signs
of early colonial period painted manuscripts of central Mexico. Toponyms in
Otomi and Nahuatl usually (but not always) closely replicate each other
semantically (calques), but the Otomi gloss relates one way or another to
all three Nahuatl glosses.

I hope this is useful; it's all that I have on the word tzompantli. If
anybody sees any problems please let me know.

Paz,

David