PLace-names in mexico-TenochTiTLan • 153and they only owe for the cost of manufacture, and the
Spanish judge, who proclaims whether the debt has been
absolved or not.
This work of 1553–1554 shows us, then, that distinct
ways of writing coexisted on the pages of documents pro-
duced within the city and would seem to confirm the idea
of an emergent bilingual empire created within New Spain.
But this document reveals a distinction not just between
the Nahuatl and the alphabetic writing used, in this case, to
write Spanish but also within the signs themselves, where
different orders of signs refer to the same (assumed) entity.
We see this on folios 3v and 5v, which show two versions of
the name of the parcialidad San Juan Moyotlan. At the top
of folio 3v, and enlarged in the inset, we find the Nahuatl
name “Moyotlan,” represented here in iconic script, a mos-
quito (moyotl) with a net (matlatl) attached above it (fig-
ure 7.6). The net may reduplicate the initial m sound or
may register a part of the name not included in the alpha-
betic rendering. When used in this context, “Moyo tlan”
identifies the parcialidad affiliation of the fishermen and
hunters from Moyotlan who have delivered fish and birds.
At the top left of folio 5v (figure 7.8), we encounter Moyo-
tlan named again, but here it is the chalice of Saint John the
Baptist marking it; Saint John, as we know, was one of two
patron saints of this parcialidad. And we see the name not
connected to the producers, but instead connected to the
unpaid goods received by the gobernador. In other words,
while it is Moyotlan named on both of these pages, there
are two ways of writing the name, one by rendering the
Nahuatl name in iconic script, the other by rendering the
saint’s name with a symbol of the saint’s attribute.
Could these names of what we assume is one place,
when expressed differently, be pointing to the existence
of two entities? Because these two renderings, on the
surface naming the same place, in fact reflect two distinct
concepts: “Moyotlan” (in iconic script) as point of group
identification for fishermen and hunters and “Moyotlan”figuRe 7.8. Unknown creator, tribute from the parcialidades of San
Juan Moyotlan and San Pablo Teopan, Genaro García 30, fols. 5v–6r,
ca. 1553–1554. Nettie Lee Benson Latin American Collection, University
of Texas Libraries, University of Texas at Austin.