User talk:Simon Burchell/Workpage

Xochitecatl WIP

Hi Simon Pardon for intruding: tecatl doesn't mean place. It means a person (often from a place). E.g. Tepoztecatl (metalperson) is the person from tepoztlan (metal place), aztecatl (aztec) means a person from aztlan, tlaxcaltecatl means a person from tlaxcala etc. Don't trust the nahuatl etymologies in most spanish language sources they are normally folk etymologies based on lacking knowledge about nahuatl grammar. There are exceptions of course- but especially INAH's nahuatl materials are bad. Otherwise your work in progress looks very promising. ·Maunus·ƛ· 14:35, 14 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Maunus! So Xochitecatl means the person of flowers? Could this be understood as plural i.e. the people of flowers, hence the "lineage of flowers" as mentioned in the INAH guide? Although my Nahuatl is practically non-existant, I always used to get confused with the name of Xochitécatl, for some reason I always used to think it was the name of a person - possibly because at the time I went there, I also went to Tepoztlan and was reading about the god Tepoztecatl... Simon Burchell (talk) 16:42, 14 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No it can't be plural that would be xochiteca(h). It is a very odd name for a place, it doesn't follow any of the normal rules of forming placenames in nahuatl - I doubt that the name was actually used in precolumbian times - it is probably a colonial invention.·Maunus·ƛ· 17:23, 14 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]