214 



A STUDY OF CHIRIQUIAN ANTIQUITIES. 



of the flat bars at the top and bottom. This idol may have graced a shrine 

 instead of being a personal ornament. The ring for suspension is not worn ; on 

 the other hand, the bottom of the lower bar is worn more than the top of the 

 upper one ; as if the weight of the figure had rested there. The very weight 

 of the piece would militate against its being suspended as a neck ornament. 



An alligator-god not so large as the foregoing and without the elaborate setting 

 is in the British Museum (Cat. No. 4536). It is entered as a " monstrous standing 

 figure with horned head, one horn partly broken off, the other horn terminating 

 in a serpent-like head. At the back of the neck is a loop. Height 3 1 /,, inches ; 

 width 3 inches ; weight 303 dwts. 7 gr." This figure stands in the same atti- 

 tude as the Yale specimen, but the feet do not rest on a flattened bar and 

 nothing is held in the hands. The so-called horns project laterally in the same 

 plane as the half-extended arms and end in inverted alligator heads each with 



wide-open jaws, the upper one being recurved. 

 An eye, a short nuchal crest and a tooth leave 

 no doubt as to the identity of these heads. 



Bollaert * illustrates another example of this deity 

 which is not so large as either of the foregoing, 

 but has features common to both (fig. 365). It 

 stands on the inverted body of an alligator, which 

 in turn is supported by the customary horizontal bar 

 at the base, the points of contact being the spines on 

 the back of the alligator, whose head is recognized 

 by an eye, upturned snout and open mouth with 

 teeth. The attitude of this alligator-god is the same 

 as in the foregoing examples, resembling more the 

 British Museum specimen in the head and head- 

 dress, as well as in the fact that nothing is held in 

 the hands. The snout ends in two upturned points. 

 Instead of horns, there are two highly conventional- 

 ized inverted alligators, their coiled tails being 



attached to the sides of the head, and their heads resting on the shoulders of 

 the alligator-god. Bollaert, as well as a subsequent writer, who copied his il- 

 lustration, failed to detect the alligator motive in these ornamental and presum- 

 ably symbolic features. Bollaert described the specimen as " An idol of 

 hideous and obscene conception, with legs and arms extended : the head flat, 

 having a fan-like crown at the back, a wide open mouth, and a hooked nose." 

 There is a fine specimen of the alligator-god (fig. 366) in the Heye collection. 

 The head resembles that of the example in the British Museum, while the flat- 

 tened bar at the head and the feet suggest the Yale specimen, as do also the 

 four attached stylistic heads of the alligator ; these heads however are exactly 

 reversed in position. 



In the Keith collection are two splendid alligator-gods from the Huacal de los 

 Reyes, Rio General, near Terraba, which fact seems to indicate that the domain 



Fig. 365. Image of " pure gold " rep- 

 resenting the alligator-god. (After 

 Holmes.) 



1 Op. cit, 32, 



