NO. I HONDURAS — STRONG, KIDDER, AND PAUL 69 



the polychrome sherd sample from excavation i is small, it is very 

 similar to the material from excavation 2. 



Playa de los Muertos culture material is abundant throughout an 

 average of 2 meters in the lower portion of excavation i (P 2-9 

 inclusive, fig. 16). Broken pottery comprises the bulk of the collec- 

 tion, since no complete vessels were recovered by us and other artifact 

 types were rare. This discovery of undisturbed refuse deposits entirely 

 pertaining to the old Playa de los Muertos culture is exceptionally 

 important. Not only does it give a representative and unselected 

 sample of the culture but it also permits the inclusion of burial ma- 

 terials obtained by Gordon and Popenoe as definitely pertaining to 

 the older horizon. Although Gordon in his brief published report 

 gives no data on relative depths and states that no observable strati- 

 fication occured (1898, p. 38), it is undoubtedly significant, that the 

 majority of complete vessels he illustrates (1898, pi. 7, a, b, c, d, 

 e, h, k, n, 0, p, q, r, s, u) are characteristic of the older Playa de los 

 Muertos culture. Furthermore, examination of his letters from the 

 field and the occasional depths he recorded in cataloging, now on file 

 in the Peabody Museum, indicates that all these complete vessels came 

 from the lowest portions of his Playa de los Muertos (Largartijo) 

 excavations. These undoubtedly were from burials of the old Playa 

 de los Muertos period. The old burials excavated by Mrs. Popenoe 

 are fully documented (Popenoe, 1934, pp. 65-79). All are from below 

 4 meters in depth and contain only Playa de los Muertos materials. 

 Since we found no entire vessels of the Playa de los Muertos culture, 

 we have included outline sketches of vessels obtained from graves 

 by Mrs. Popenoe (figs. 17, 18). Thus, each ware or ceramic subtype 

 of this culture, established on the basis of our potsherd collection, 

 can be illustrated in its complete form by a vessel from Mrs. Popenoe's 

 collection pertaining to the same Playa de los Muertos type or subtype 

 (also compare Mrs. Popenoe's illustrations, 1934, figs. 2, 6, 8, 11, 

 12, and 15). The final description of the Playa de los Muertos cul- 

 tural horizon must include a complete study of the abundant com- 

 parable Gordon and Popenoe materials, but this is not attempted here. 

 For present purposes we have grouped our 30-centimeter strati- 

 graphic levels of Playa de los Muertos culture material (fig. 16, P 2-9 

 inclusive) into two uneven divisions, an upper (P 2-4 inclusive), 

 and a lower (P 5-9 inclusive). The lower grouping of levels, which 

 we may call levels C (P 5-9), yielded almost twice as much material 

 as did the upper levels, here designated as B (P 2-4), owing to the 

 fact that level P 5 was unusually rich and overweighted whichever 

 half it was placed with. This discrepancy can be avoided later when 



