Tecuhtli, teuctli, tekwtli

[Michael Mccafferty]

I should have added that "teuctli" is composed of only *two* syllables:

/te:kw-/ + /-tli/, and, of course, the penultimate syllable is strong.

The pronunciation of this word and others noted by Dave is "exotic" for
speakers of European languages and require some practice to master.

Michael



On Thu, 29 Apr 2004 mmccaffe at indiana.edu wrote:

> Quoting David Wright <dcwright at PRODIGY.NET.MX>:
>
> > Dear Ian:
> >
> > Nice site. I think there are some phonetic problems with the four words
> > containing the morpheme tecuh(tli) ("Mictlantecuhtli", "Tlaltecuhtli" and
> > "Moctezuma"). The way the first two are spelled, as I (think I) understand
> > it, reflects one of the imprecisions of colonial Nahuatl othography. There's
> > really no /u/ in 16th century central Nahuatl except as an allophone of /o/,
> > but in "tecuhtli" this allophone is not represented. The digraphs "cu", "qu"
> > and "uc", when they appear in colonial texts, all represent a consonant, not
> > a syllable. This phoneme is a sort of /k/ pronounced with rounded lips, which
> > can be written phonetically as /kw/ (superscript w). Thus "tecuhtli" (also
> > spelled "teuctli" in many sources), is really /tekwtli/ (superscript w). The
> > "h" in "tecuhtli" adds to the confusion. It's probably there because the
> > digraphs "hu" and "uh" were used to write the semiconsonant /w/, which puts
> > the lips in the same position as /kw/, ignoring what's going on behind them.
>
> I haven't had the time yet to look at your site, but
> Dave has made some excellent points, Ian. The only thing I would add is vowel
> length. Since vowel length is phonemic in Nahuatl, Dave's phonemic /tekwtli/ is
> actually /te:kwtli/, where the digraphs /kw/ and /tl/ are actually unit
> phonemes (and thus in actual, "vigorous" linguistic transcription would each be
> represented by a single symbol, in the first case by a k with superscript w and
> in the second case by a Greek lambda.
>
> >
> > Solution? It would be less confusing to spell these words as Mictlanteuctli,
> > Tlalteuctli and Moteuczoma. These forms are found in colonial and modern
> > literature, so they don't break with the traditional orthography you use in
> > the other words. "Moctezuma" can be scrapped, both in the written and the
> > audio files, since it's not a Nahuatl word, just a loan from Nahuatl to
> > Castillian.
>
> All good points.
>
> Michael

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