tenamaste
English edit
Etymology edit
Noun edit
tenamaste (plural tenamastes)
- Any of the three stones traditionally used to elevate a comal above a fire in Mesoamerican cultures.
- 1987, Papers of the New World Archaeological Foundation, page 174:
- Tenamaste stones were used as pot rests or firedogs in a cooking fire.
- 2005, Pablo Valderrama Rouy, “The Totonac”, in Native Peoples of the Gulf Coast of Mexico, page 199:
- Also, at the foot of the tenamastes people bury coins, chiles, grains of corn, and a handful of beans to assure that the domestic food supply will never run out. [...] Contemporary Totonac usually construct a wooden box with legs that is filled with dirt on which the tenamastes are placed. The most sacred place in the main room is the home altar [...]
- For more quotations using this term, see Citations:tenamaste.
Translations edit
stone
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Anagrams edit
Spanish edit
Alternative forms edit
Etymology edit
Borrowed from Classical Nahuatl tenamaztli (“hearthstone, triplet”).
Pronunciation edit
Noun edit
tenamaste m (plural tenamastes)
- (Central America, Mexico) a hearthstone, any of the three stones traditionally used to elevate a comal above a fire
- (in the plural, Mexico) triplets
- Synonym: trillizos
References edit
- 2009, Carlos Montemayor et al., Diccionario del náhuatl en el español de México, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, page 123:
Further reading edit
- “tenamaste”, in Diccionario de la lengua española, Vigésima tercera edición, Real Academia Española, 2014