622 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1909. 
The territory of the Indians lies chiefly in the mountains of Bocas 
del Toro, Veraguas, and Chiriqui, and on the Caribbean coast of 
Darien extending into the interior; also along the Pacific coast from 
the Gulf of San Miguel to Colombia, and on certain branches of the 
Chucunaque and Tuyra. Very little about the Indians has been 
recorded since the accounts of the early colonists given by the old 
historians, Herara, Andagoya, Gomara, Las Casas, Oviedo, Peter 
Martyr, etc., who confused the names greatly, and who usually spoke 
of a tribe by the name of its chief, which frequently happened to be 
that of the largest settlement of the vicinity. as well. Much in- 
formation has been obtained from the buccaneers, chief among them 
Wafer, whose book, with the above-mentioned historians, forms the 
basis of the material given by Bancroft and other authorities. In 
the middle of the nineteenth century an interest was awakened in 
Colombia by men like Acosta, who gives, from personal observation, 
some data of the Darien Indians, though his chief work was on the 
Chibchas of the plains of Bogota and Tunja. Acosta affirms that 
‘the most valuable knowledge concerning the Indians is hidden away 
in the libraries of Sevilla and in the Academia de Historia de Mad- 
rid, which, of necessity, though, must treat chiefly of the natives as 
the Spaniards first found them. When Acosta visited the coast of 
Darien he found no remaining words preserved from the time of 
the conquest except the proper noun “Careta.” Another Colom- 
bian, Restrepo. some years later was sent on an expedition into 
Darien and made some very interesting notes on the customs of the 
Indians. It is to M. Pinart, however, a Frenchman and trained 
student, that most of the valuable contributions to the subject are 
due, as he traveled extensively through the country about the year 
1880, collecting data, and the result of this work is the foundation 
of practically all the recent knowledge we have of the aborigines, 
though the French and American engineers have added much also 
by way of stray notes, etc., to the store of information. The preface 
of Pinart’s “ Colleccion de Linguistica y Ethnografia Americanas,” 
written in 1882, is interesting as showing his reasons for taking up 
the work. 
Considering the Indians in the western half of the Isthmus, we find 
two distinct stocks, the Doracho-Changuina and the Guaymies. The 
former, now almost extinct, as pure bloods, spread over parts of 
Chiriqui and Bocas, inhabiting chiefly the Cordillera which cross 
the Costa Rican border and the valleys of the Rio Tilorio and the. 
Changuina-Aula. To them is attributed the megalithic monument 
at Mesa (35). They were noted potters and their elaborately painted 
vessels indicate some artistic ability. The Dorachos were held to 
be bold warriors and were usually at war with their neighbors. They 
were described as being much lighter in color than the other tribes. 
