Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A member of any of various Indian peoples of central Mexico, including the Aztecs.
  • noun The Uto-Aztecan language of the Nahuatl.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • proper noun The polysynthetic Aztecan language spoken by an indigenous people of Mexico.
  • proper noun A group of people indigenous to the Central Mexico region spanning multiple tribal groups including the Aztecs.
  • proper noun US politics All persons descended from pre-Columbian inhabitants of the Western hemisphere.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a member of any of various Indian peoples of central Mexico
  • noun the Uto-Aztecan language spoken by the Nahuatl

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Spanish náhuatl, from Nahuatl, that which pleases the ear, from nahua-, audible, intelligent, clear.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Spanish, from Nahuatl nahuatl, nahuatlatolli ("the clear or understandable language").

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word Nahuatl.

Examples

  • = We do find, however, in the Nahuatl language, which is the proper name of the Aztecan, a number of derivatives from the same root, _na_, among them this very word, _Nahuatl_, all of them containing the idea

    Nagualism A Study in Native American Folk-lore and History Daniel Garrison Brinton 1868

  • Itzli is "obsidian" in Nahuatl and tlan means "place," so this island is the "Place of Obsidian," and here excavations have revealed layers of debris several meters deep, proving that the island was in continuous use as a huge obsidian workshop for 2,000 years, going back to the very foundation of the great Teuchitlán Nation and stretching right up to the arrival of the Spaniards.

    Obsidian in Mexico: gift of the gods 2009

  • Itzli is "obsidian" in Nahuatl and tlan means "place," so this island is the "Place of Obsidian," and here excavations have revealed layers of debris several meters deep, proving that the island was in continuous use as a huge obsidian workshop for 2,000 years, going back to the very foundation of the great Teuchitlán Nation and stretching right up to the arrival of the Spaniards.

    Obsidian in Mexico: gift of the gods 2009

  • The city's name means "In the Palace of the Flowers" in Nahuatl - although here under the sun, one's mind may wander to the loser of a ball game, or a blood-crazed priest with his knife ... flowers don't enter into it.

    Busting ghosts at Xochicalco, Morelos: A UNESCO World Heritage Site 2009

  • The city's name means "In the Palace of the Flowers" in Nahuatl - although here under the sun, one's mind may wander to the loser of a ball game, or a blood-crazed priest with his knife ... flowers don't enter into it.

    Busting ghosts at Xochicalco, Morelos: A UNESCO World Heritage Site 2009

  • In another related Internet article, this same writer simply summarized the Anderson and Dibble English translation of Chapter Two of Book Seven of Sahagun's Florentine Codex in Nahuatl without any indication that this was being done.

    Aztec symbolism: part two 2008

  • Fray Bernardino de Sahagún (1499 - 1590) provides us with both illustrations and a written account in Nahuatl given by his Aztec informants.

    The Temascal: Traditional Sweat Bath 2008

  • Therefore, for reasons given above, the Aztec song-poems in Nahuatl could have been fairly accurately transmitted from the oral to the written tradition, albeit backed up by codices, memorization in the Calmecac, and the nature of the poems themselves.

    Reinventing the Aztecs - part three Mexican history 2008

  • Therefore, for reasons given above, the Aztec song-poems in Nahuatl could have been fairly accurately transmitted from the oral to the written tradition, albeit backed up by codices, memorization in the Calmecac, and the nature of the poems themselves.

    Reinventing the Aztecs - part three Mexican history 2008

  • Fray Bernardino de Sahagún (1499 - 1590) provides us with both illustrations and a written account in Nahuatl given by his Aztec informants.

    The Temascal: Traditional Sweat Bath 2008

  • It was people called Nahuas (NAH-was), speakers of the Nahuatl (NAH-wat) language and other closely related tongues, who travelled south in waves in the 10th through the 13th centuries.

    For the wanderers who became the Aztecs history was a chorus of voices – Camilla Townsend | Aeon Essays Camilla Townsend 2023

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.