Vetancurt manuscript title transcription

Susan Zakaib szakaib at gmail.com
Fri Apr 15 00:29:02 UTC 2011


Listeros,

A colleague at the John Carter Brown library has asked me for
assistance in transcribing the title of a Nahuatl manuscript held
there, by Agustín de Vetancurt. Like plenty of colonial-era
manuscripts, the letter spacing doesn't always correspond to the
actual word separation, which complicates the process of transcribing
it. Faded ink in some spots isn't helping, either. They don't need a
translation, just a proper transcription--but it still requires
determining what would actually make sense in Nahuatl. I'd very much
appreciate some input, especially on some parts I'm stuck on. Here's
my (attempted) transcription:

"NexcuitilMachiotl quimoteittitilia yn tonantzin Santa Yglesia ytechpa
tlatohua Çe tlâtlacohuani aic chipahualiztica Omoyolcuiti
Ocentelchihualoc Mictlan Oqui_motecpanilli Padre fray Agustin de
Betancurt San Francisco teyenoPiltzin; San Joseph Mexico motlapielia."

The parts I'm especially unsure about are the following:

"Çe tlâtlacohuani": Should this be all one word, or two? I separated
them into two because I figured "çe" refers to the word for "one," and
the compound form of that (as far as I know) is "cem," rather than
"ce" (and there is clearly no letter in between). But perhaps "ce"
means something else, here?

"Oqui_motecpanilli": By the looks of the manuscript, what I've
inserted as a blank space is probably either an n or just a smudge
that isn't actually a letter. I figure an n doesn't really belong
there, as it would presumably turn into an m, since it's in front of a
labial consonant. While it's possible that what looks like an n is
actually a squished m, I think it might make more sense if the object
is the singular "qui" rather than the plural "quim"; I figure the word
is "he arranged it," as in, Vetancurt arranged the following
manuscript (referring back to "nexcuitilmachiotl," "exemplary model,"
which I assume describes what follows). Does this sound right, that
this space probably doesn't contain any letter at all, or is it
possible that it's actually an n or an m?

"teyenoPiltzin": The first two letters are hard to make out, but I
think the first one is t, and the second one is either e, i, or
possibly o. I figure the latter half of this word(s) is pil(li) and
-tzin, but I have no idea what teye/tiye/toye could be, or whether any
of it should be attached to "piltzin." I'm stumped--any ideas?

Tlazcamati in advance, and apologies for a rather lengthy series of questions!

Saludos,
Susan
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