156 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 92 



divisions, in their earlier and in their simpler manifestations, share 

 certain traits which apparently persisted later in the Bay Islands. 



The nonceramic culture of the Maya, aside from temples, sculptures, 

 and stelae, has been little stressed. Just as ceramics were for so long 

 overshadowed by stelae, so now the simpler artifacts are in danger of 

 being overshadowed by ceramics. Any deep understanding of Maya 

 culture must result from a correlation of all these factors. A brief 

 sketch of small, nonceramic artifacts from the same sites that were 

 mentioned in regard to pottery may give a sample for comparative 

 purposes. At Copan Morley deals almost entirely with dating, Vail- 

 lant almost entirely with ceramics. Gordon concentrates mainly on 

 buildings and excavation, but mentions the occurrence of obsidian 

 spear jDoints, disks of obsidian, a beautiful stone chisel, small stone 

 axes, obsidian knives, arrow points, jadeite disk beads, and jade inlays 

 in human teeth. In tomb 2 occurred cut shell ornaments, pottery 

 whistles, bone needles, and two beautifully carved peccary skulls, and 

 in tomb 3 a horse's tooth (perhaps carried in by rodents) and jadeite 

 ornaments. Under stelae 3 (Middle Period, date 9.IT.0.0.0) occurred 

 four small jadeite ornaments, very well cut and polished, each piece 

 with a longitudinal hole for suspension. At least one of these, now 

 in the Peabody Museum at Harvard, rather closely resembles certain 

 of the turbanned figures (pi. 11, d, e, f) from Bay Island offertories. 

 Tomb II at Copan contained several elongated oval knives of chipped 

 white flint, of similar shape but even finer workmanship than the best 

 from the Bay Islands (pi. 16, fig. 2, a, b). The metates from Copan 

 in the Peabody Museum are of a plain rectangular type, often of 

 lava, and the mullers are either of the roller pestle or the flat rectangular 

 type. Maudslay collected a small green stone " death's head " with a 

 hollow perforated back, and, in a cylindrical votive jar, found numer- 

 ous shell figurines similar to those of stone that Eric Thompson 

 obtained with Holmul V pottery in the Cayo district. Maudslay also 

 figures (vol. i, pis. 21, 22) jade and diopside beads, elaborate stone 

 faces, jade buttons (pi. J2,- d, g), and a green jade ear spool (like 

 pi. 17, h in material and shape). This list is not complete as regards 

 published material from Copan, let alone collections not yet reported 

 on, but gives a sample for comparative purposes. 



From southern British Honduras, in small Maya sites of different 

 periods, Eric Thompson reports many votive caches consisting of 

 vases containing offerings placed under altars and in temple mounds. 

 Two simple but excellent small jade heads came from such caches 

 (Thompson, 193 1, pi. 32, 1-4) ; one of these is very lifelike and has 

 a hollow back with holes for suspending other ornaments (like pi. 



