Tsitsimat

Highland Popoluca

Etymology

Borrowed from a Nahuan language; cf. Classical Nahuatl tzitzimitl (a kind of female demon that descends from the sky to eat people during solar eclipses), Mecayapan Nahuatl tzitzimiꞌ (“devil, Satan”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /t͡siˈt͡simat/

Proper noun

Tsitsimat

1. a mythological being like a witch with a single central breast
   • 1947, Fermín Gutiérrez, Ben Elson, “The Homshuk: A Sierra Popoluca Text”, in Tlalocan: A Journal of Source Materials on the Native Cultures of Mexico, volume II, number 3, pages 193–214:

     1. ȼiˌȼimat¹ tuum ˌčoomo ˀitʸ-ˌˀidʸʌk² kooȼʌkˌhoom.

     An old woman named Tsitsimat lived in the mountains.

References

• Elson, Benjamin F., Gutiérrez G., Donaciano (1999) Diccionario popoluca de la Sierra, Veracruz (Serie de vocabularios y diccionarios indígenas “Mariano Silva y Aceves”; 41)‎^[1] (in Spanish), Instituto Lingüístico de Verano, A.C., →ISBN, page 111