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Codex Chapman

In enamacac (cualli)

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1. In enamacac (cualli)
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1. In enamacac (cualli)

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The Bad Sellers
The term Tlaueliloc means "Perverse, bad, a malicious or villainous person or rogue." Furthermore, the term Namacac refers to, "A seller" (Nahuatl Dictionary). In the Digital Florentine Codex, “The Bad Seller” is referred to as Tlaueliloc Tlaulnamacac.
The Bad Cape Seller
In Book 10, Folio 44v and 45r, The Bad Cape Seller is mentioned. Comparing the two separate translations, they both give a similar description of what a bad cape seller is like, and their methods of deceiving their buyers. However, the Spanish-to-English translation gives a slightly more detailed description as to how the bad cape seller creates their product and how the finished product turns out. For example, as part of the process of creating a bad cape, it is mentioned that the bad cape seller boils old capes in bleach to whiten them, leaving some of them full of holes. In the Nahuatl-to-English translation, the use of bleach to whiten used capes is not mentioned. Further more, in the Spanish-to-English translation, it ends with a small recap of what a good cape seller is. In the Nahuatl-to-English translation, when the description of the bad cape seller ends, it immediately transitions to describing a different kind of seller.
In Book 10, Folio 46r, there is another image of a cape seller, but it is displayed next to text describing how they deal their product, indicating the person in that image is a dealer, suggesting that there might be a second person involved in the business of selling capes.
This image displayed here is a depiction of a cape seller in the middle of creating their product. Located in Book 10, Folio 45r, this image isn’t displayed until The Bad Cape Seller is mentioned, potentially indicating that the person in the image is a bad cape seller. In the text, the process of how a bad cape seller is described, but through the actions of a man. This is seen in Book 10, Folio 45r in sentences like “…[F]or he knows how to freshen them up…” or, “…[H]e polishes them so well that they look as good as new…” (García Garagarza 2023). However, the person in the image is a woman. Visual elements like the skirt and hairstyle indicate her feminine characteristics. Only the skin of the cape seller is in color. Her hair, clothes, and work station are all left without color. The lack of color could represent the white finish the cape seller attempts to achieve before selling. However, there is a symbol drawn above her head, with specific details colored red and black. In the Digital Florentine Codex, keywords used to depict the image include xochitl, meaning “Flower”.
The symbol above the head of the cape seller is left out of the textual narrative. There isn’t anything in the translated text that explains the meaning behind this symbol. It is the only other thing in the image besides the cape seller’s skin that is in color. This object could be some sort of material she uses to gather dye for his product. We see in later images, like in Book 10, Folio 46r, a cape seller in the middle of making a deal. The red color reappears, but this time, it is on his product. It also bares the similar flower like shape depicted in the first image. This indicates that the symbol is a flower, used to decorate capes.
The Bad Seller of Maize Greens
Following the description of the seller of maize greens, In Book 10, Folio 47v, the bad seller of maize greens is brought to light. Deceptive and hard to work with, the bad seller mixes good grains of maize with “moldy, sour, and weevil-infested” maize that could be as old as 10 years. The bad seller lies to his consumers, praising the product by declaring it good and desirable to others.
The description of The Bad Seller of Maize Greens is very similar between the Spanish-to-English and Nahuatl-to-English translations. There are many parts of each translation that share similar wording, however, there are small differences, mainly in the order of how the description is structured. In the Spanish-to-English translation, it immediately begins with explaining how the bad seller operates their business, later mentioning how they deceive their buyers by lying to them about the quality of their product. In the Nahuatl-to-English translation, it starts by explaining how the bad seller is “uncooperative, a deceiver” and then is followed by the process of how they operate.
The image depicts a maize seller in the process of crafting their product. We see a woman sitting down on some sort of blanket on top of grass. Next to her is a bag which might be filled with maize. Since this image is displayed after the description of the bad maize greens seller, it is possible that this is a bad seller. The pot next to the seller may be the item used to mix the good and bad maize together.
One thing about this image that seems to be left out of the textual narrative is the object above the pot of maize. It looks almost like a tentacle or tail of an animal. However, looking at images later in Book 10, there are similar objects above different kids of sellers. These objects seem to be plants, but it is not mentioned which kind of plant they are.
Hairstyle of The Bad Seller of Maize Greens
Looking deeper into the image of The Seller of Maize Greens, there is a specific detail drawn into the hair of the seller. The hairstyle of this person is known as Axtlacuilli, which is a woman’s hairstyle. This detail is important to point out because in the text, there is no mention of this person being a woman. When describing the seller of maize greens, words like “He mixes,” “He throws in the infested,” “He tosses,” and more are used (Anderson & Dibble 1953–1982, Book 10: The People, fol. 47v).

This wording is not exclusive to one translation, as it appears in both the Spanish-to-English and Nahuatl-to-English translations. The text is generally describing the kind of seller, not the specific image displayed in the Digital Florentine Codex.
The Bad Meat Seller
The text describing the bad meat seller is in Book 10, Folio 59r. However, the image of this merchant is in Book 10, Folio 58v. The image is displayed at the bottom of the page, so the description of the seller carries onto the next page.
The Spanish-to-English translation describes The Bad Meat Seller as “one who is not honest in this trade.” Furthermore, it details what makes them a bad seller; selling spoiled meat and deceiving their customers. Additionally, it gives an example of something they would do; lie about inedible meat being edible. In the translation, it mentions that one who is not honest in this trade claims dog meat is edible. In the Nahuatl-to-English translation, the bad seller is labeled as a “Bad meat seller.” The wording behind the process of how they deceive their buyers is nearly identical to the Spanish-to-English translation. The main difference between the two translations is the inclusion of the terms “Bruised,” “Discolored,” and “Revolting.” These terms are used to describe qualities of the meat, or rather lack thereof.

Within this image, there are two men beside each end of a table with meat on top. The man on the right is carrying a knife or a different cutting instrument to chop up the meat (In Nahuatl, this tool is called a Tlateconi). The man on the left side of the table is not described in the Digital Florentine Codex. If the man on the right is not the meat seller, but the butcher, then it is possible that the man on the left is the one who sells the meat, making him the meat seller. If he isn’t the meat seller, then he most likely is a buyer looking to purchase meat. Additionally, on the table, there are two pieces of meat placed on a balance scale. The piece of meat on the right side of the scale is lower than the piece on the left, indicating that it is the biggest and heaviest option out of the two.
Works Cited
Available at Digital Florentine Codex/Códice Florentino Digital, edited by Kim N. Richter and Alicia Maria Houtrouw, "Book 10: The People", fol. 45r, (García Garagarza 2023) spanish translation Getty Research Institute, 2023. https://florentinecodex.getty.edu/en/book/10/folio/45r?spTexts=&nhTexts= Accessed 5 May 2024.
Available at Digital Florentine Codex/Códice Florentino Digital, edited by Kim N. Richter and Alicia Maria Houtrouw, "Book 10: The People", fol. 47v, (Anderson & Dibble 1953–1982) nahuatl translation Getty Research Institute, 2023. https://florentinecodex.getty.edu/en/book/10/folio/47v?spTexts=&nhTexts= Accessed 5 May 2024.
"namacac" Nahuatl Dictionary. https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/namacac
"tlahueliloc" Nahuatl Dictionary. https://nahuatl.wired-humanities.org/content/tlahueliloc
Commodities and (Being) Good: Nahua Traders and Merchants. The primary function of this page is to describe how certain vocations worked in relation to Nahua trade and how they practiced trading and merchandizing. This will also briefly touch on how each good works and what their function was. The Floretine Codex offers an incredible amount of information and each passage within Book 10 usually pertains, for the most part, of how a specific form of trade worked within the society. There were many different sources of trade for Nahuatl pochteca, as they were primarily responsible for dispensing various different commodities and goods. Living in the pochteca social class meant a variety of things, but for this page, the primary products that will be focused on within this page are going to be meat products, agricultural products, and how they functioned with society – including the Nahuatl ideas on what makes a good vocation practitioner and what doesn’t. This also includes the specific traders’ specializations and vocations, and how they made a living within Nahuatl society.

General Merchant Definition
For the Nahuatl peoples, they had an entire class of merchants named pochteca, and they sold a variety of goods. What makes it more interesting is that the Florentine Codex not only describes the trade, but the moral means of trade as well. To be specific, in Book 10: The People, the Spanish translation goes as follows:

“The merchant is often a haggler, and he knows how to earn a profit and how to loan with interest, how to make deals with buyers, and how to multiply his wealth.” (Garcia Garagarza 2023).

What is also interesting, in interest of studying not only Nahuatl forms of trade, but also their culture. To be specific, in the documents that describe merchants, vocations, and trade, there is also a good iteration and a bad variant. Following the description of a merchant, the Spanish to English translation describes the two variants:

“A good merchant takes his wares abroad, away from his land, and sells them for a moderate price, each item according to its value, just as it is, not cheating anyone with them but always fearing god. A god merchant is stingy and tight, a cheater, a talker, and arrogant; one who overprices things, a big speculator; a thief, a liar, and one whose bad conscience lurks behind everything he has and spends. And all his earnings are ill-gotten; and he is a smooth talker when making a sell. And he praises what he is selling so much that he easily swindles the buyers.” (Garcia Garagarza 2023).

This implies that within Nahuatl society, there was an emphasis on practicing what would be contemporarily called ethical capitalism. No matter what merchandise was being sold, there was a right way to do so, and what was considered honorable. This not only presents a new perspective onto how Nahuatl society functioned, and how some of the practices they implemented in their day could possibly synergize with modern conflicts and issues.

But before fixating on historical themes, the primary purpose of this paper is to document the various trade vocations worked in Nahuatl society and how this produce was traded around the empire.

Cacao Traders
Agriculture traders typically specialized in a singular product and were usually responsible for that good’s export and trade. For example, in the Florentine Codex, there is an instance in which the Cacao pod, an integral part of Nahuatl economy, traders are described and how they function (both morally and immorally). One of the most important products for the Nahuatl empire (especially once the Spanish arrived) was Cacao seeds:

“The one who trades cacao often has a great quantity of it, and he also has fields of cacao; and he takes it abroad to sell it, or he buys it wholesale to sell in single lots. A good trader of this merchandise sells seeds that are fat, firm, and selected. He separates each one when he sells them; he keeps the ones that are fat and solid in one place (…)” (Garcia Garagarza 2023).

There were also different types of cacao seeds as well, and, from the Spanish-to-English translation of Book 10, “each kind [was] sold separately; the ones from Tochtepec, the one from Anahuac, the ones from Cuauhtemala, the one from Coatulco, the ones from Xoloteco – whether they are whitish or ashen or red.” (Garcia Garagarza 2023).

This commodity also has a bad trader variant as well: “A bad trader sells fake [seeds], because he boils them and even toasts them so that they look good, and sometimes he soaks them in water so that they swell. And he makes them look ashen colored or tawny to deceive [people], because these are the best seeds. And he also has this way of counterfeiting them: to make the new seeds look fat, he will often toast them in hot ashes and then cover them with clay or with wet soil, so that the seeds that looked tiny will look fat and new. He has another kind of trick: he puts inside the seed husks a black dough or black wax that looks similar to their kernels. And sometimes, they shatter avocado pits, make them round and when they are thus rounded, they put them inside the empty seed husks.” (Garcia Garagarza 2023).

It seems that with every instance in which there is a good being described, it is shortly followed with a brief description on what makes an immoral version of that merchant. It is interesting because it displays a degree of cultural responsibility/honor, and how that may have affected the Nahuatl society as a whole.

Continuing on the subject of Cacao, the product was also used to make a frothy drink that was made from grinded pods. Specifically, in Book 10 of the Florentine Codex, the drink is described as such:

"The woman who sells cacao for drinking first grinds it in this way: first, she breaks or crushes the beans; second, they are crushed a little bit more; third and finally, they are finely crushed and then mixed with cooked and washed maize kernels. And once [the beans] have been crushed and mixed in this way, they pour water on them in a cup. If they add a little water to them, they make a beautiful cacao, and if [they add] a lot [to them], they do not produce foam. And the following things are carefully done and observed in order to prepare it well: that is, it is strained, and once it is strained, it is lifted up in order to pour it; and this is how the foam rises, and then it is put aside. And sometimes it becomes too thick. It is mixed with water after it is ground. And one who knows how to prepare it well sells a beautiful cacao, such that only the lords can drink it: soft, foamy, vermillion, red and pure, and not too thick. Sometimes they add aromatic spices to it and even bee honey, or else some water mixed with flowers. And cacao that is not good is too thick and has too much water, and so it does not produce foam but only some froth."  (Garcia Garagarza 2023).

While the Spanish-to-English does not distinguish who enjoys Xocolatl, the Nahuatl-to-English does. For the Nahuatl translation, it goes as such:

"She sells good, superior, potable [chocolate]: the privelage, the drink of nobles, of rulers - finely ground, soft, foamy, reddish, bitter; [with] chili water, with flowers, with uei nacaztli with teonacaztli, with vanilla, with mecaxochitl, with wild bee honey, with powdered aromatic flowers. Inferior choclate has maize flour and water; lime water; [it is] pale; the [froth] bubbles burst. [It is chocolate] with water added - Chontal water fit for water flies" (Garcia Garagarza 2023). . Comparing the two translations offers different points of information that reveals more about Nahuatl culture and trade; for example, the Spanish translation offers details yet no context, but the Nahuatl translation does.

Chile Trader
On the subject of Xocolatl, another ingredient that had a whole vocation/trade with it is chile. In the Spanish-to-English translation, a trader of chile is described as such: "The seller of chile, which is the pepper of this land, sells all the types of chile that are named here, such as the ones that are long or broad and ones that are not, big and tiny, green and dry, the summer season ones, and all the ones that grow from various stems. And they sell each kind separately, as well as those that are harvested after being affected by frost. A bad dealer in this trade sells the stinking, spoiled ones."  (Garcia Garagarza 2023).

It is interesting comparing the Nahuatl translation against the Spanish because not only does it contextualize Nahuatl culture, but it also provides more evocative language that aptly describes the important of vocational trade and how to practice it ethically.

Bean Seller
There is also the bean trader who, in the Spanish Translation, does as such: "The bean seller, if he is a good trader, sells each kind separately and prices them according to their fair value, without deceit. And the beans that he sells are those that are new, clean, fat, and not spoiled but whose condition is such that they can be stored like something precious in the chest or in the grain bin, such as yellow beans, red beans, white beans, the tiny ones, the ones that look as if speckled, the ones that have different colors, and the ones that are very fat and look like fava beans."

Again, comparing this against the Nahuatl translation tells much more, but instead of repeating the type of beans that make a good bean seller, what will be focused on is the Nahuatl version of a bad bean trader: "The bad bean seller never tells the truth; he always lies. He is a great liar, a congenital liar, a teller of falsehoods. He mixes the good, the precious with the spoiled, the infested beans." (Garcia Garagarza 2023).

The Nahuatl were very trade-oriented and most of the traders followed the same doctrine of practicing their trades ethically and honestly; almost as if it could be interpreted as a form of modern ethical capitalism.