NO. 14 ARCHEOLOGY OF BAY ISLANDS, HONDURAS STRONG 1 55 



In Yucatan E. H. Thompson collected small, monochrome, model 

 pots from the chultunes of Labna that suggest Bay Island forms; and 

 from the cave of Loltini he figures incised fragments, rims, legs, and 

 handles similar to Bay Island monochrome sherds, both plain and 

 elaborate. The pottery of Holmul I type collected by Merwin is 

 mortuary in nature and perhaps too fine to be representative of the 

 ware generally. According to Vaillant, Holmul I pottery includes 

 bowls with round tetrapod supports, bowls with concave bottoms, 

 pot stands, spouted pot forms, and annular bases, and there is sparing 

 use of complicated design forms. The pot stand, he points out, is rare 

 or lacking in the valley of Mexico but is common in Costa Rica and 

 is apparently linked with the annular base. The pot stand of stone and 

 various forms of the annular base occur in the Bay Islands. In the 

 elaborate monochrome vases with designs like Uloa marble bowls the 

 annular base and concave bottom are combined. Some similarities in 

 form also exist between Bay Island monochrome tripod vessels and 

 Holmul tetrapods and tripods. In painted design there are some 

 resemblances between Holmul I and Bay Island Polychrome I in 

 regard to degree of isolation of patterns, conventionalization, and 

 combination of rectilinear and curvilinear motifs, but the forms of 

 these two wares are widely different. The tetrapod foot and the 

 spouted chocolate pot type, characteristic of Holmul I, are apparently 

 absent from Bay Island sites. Thus, although there appear to be no 

 correlations between early Holmul and any Bay Island ceramic types 

 as a whole, there are certain traits which they share in common. 



Vaillant states that Holmul I pottery generally does not resemble 

 subfloor ceramics from Uaxactun. Holmul I and Huaxtec ceramics 

 share the pot stand and annular base but are otherwise very different. 

 The Holmul pottery tradition, he concludes, was apparently originally 

 derived from the southeast and appears to be most closely connected 

 with early forms from Salvador. Although qualitatively Holmul I 

 might be considered on the " archaic " horizon, ethnologically it has 

 no connection with the early cultures of the Valley of Mexico. The 

 forms fit into a complex of shapes that are widely distributed through 

 Central and South America but are not so characteristic of the Valley 

 of Mexico. 



From the foregoing sketch it is obvious that any adequate ceramic 

 comparison must include a resume of the pottery of Salvador, of the 

 highlands of Guatemala, and of the Valley of Mexico, in addition to 

 that from other Maya sites, but this is far beyond our present scope. 

 All that can be suggested here is that certain of the Maya ceramic 



