Tlamatini
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Tlamatini (plural tlamatinime) is a Nahuatl language word meaning "someone who knows something", generally translated as "wise man". The word is analyzable as derived from the transitive verb mati "to know" with the prefix tla- indicating an unspecified inanimate object translateable by "something" and the derivational suffix -ni meaning "a person who are characterized by ...": hence tla-mati-ni "a person who is characterized by knowing something" or more to the point "a knower".[citation needed]
The famous Nahuatl language translator and interpreter Miguel León-Portilla refers to the tlamatini as philosophers and they are the subject of his book Aztec Thought and Culture.[citation needed]
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[edit] References
- Boone, Elizabeth Hill (1998). "Pictorial Documents and Visual Thinking in Postconquest Mexico", in Elizabeth Hill Boone and Tom Cubbins (Eds.): Native Traditions in the Postconquest World, A Symposium at Dumbarton Oaks 2nd through 4th October 1992 (PDF Reprint), Washington D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, pp.149–199. ISBN 0-88402-239-0. OCLC 34354931.
- León-Portilla, Miguel (1963). Aztec Thought and Culture: A Study of the Ancient Náhuatl Mind, Jack Emory Davis (trans.), Civilization of the American Indian series, #67, Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. OCLC 181727.