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Nahuatl Geographical Dictionaires

Introduction

The following is a list of geographical dictionaries and gazetteers to assist you in finding place names. Click on the country for which you wish to find available geographical resources. Most of these resources are found in the Family History Library Catalog.

One very helpful online resource for verifying and finding place names is places-in-t ​he-world.com ​. Here you can select a country of interest and search for place names or browse for place names alphabetically. Some of the listed geographical dictionaries are available online through HathiTrust.org ​. If available, simply click on the provided link.

How to Recognize Nahuatl Place Names

Nahuatl place names typically ended in a locative element indicating location: -tlan or -lan meant "(at) the place of," -co meant "in or at," and -pan meant "on or on top of." To describe a person as being from such a place, the locative was replaced with the ending -tecatl, meaning "inhabitant of." As Lockhart writes, "a citizen of Tlacallan was a tlacaltecatl."

Resources for Mexico

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