^°No°68p^ PREHISTORY OF PANAMA VIEJO BIESE 25 



identical to those in my collection from the Hopewell North American 

 Indian site at Wakenda, Mo., that a photograph of the latter has been 

 included (pi. 9, a). This is distinguishable from the former only in 

 that it is composed of a very fine grade of light tan chert common to 

 Missouri. At the Hopewell site such objects are typical of the culture 

 and are believed to have been held with the flattened edge in the palm 

 and used as deer and buffalo hide scrapers. Many of the celts 

 common to Panama are found in patterns and, in many instances, 

 materials identical to those found . throughout the midwestern 

 United States. 



CELTS 



Ten celts were recovered from the site, and an additional specimen 

 was located in a private collection. They are all composed of various 

 grades of basaltic rhyolite, but differ greatly in shape and wUl be 

 described separately. 



Figure 6, b, shows a pear-shaped celt which has been broken off at 

 one corner. It is crudely polished at the distal end with a smooth 

 wedge-shaped blade, and a proximal end of rounded cross section has 

 been left rough. The specimen in the private collection is identical to 

 the above except for its larger size of an overall 8 inches. These celts 

 represent the most common type reported from Sitio Conte, and 

 Lothrop considers the incurved sides as representative of that culture. 

 A common variant of this type (unUlustrated) has straight sides and a 

 somewhat broader proximal end. Like the others, it is polished only 

 in the lower half. All are composed of a basalt having a beautiful 

 even pattern of whitish inclusions giving a "salt-and-pepper" appear- 

 ance. 



The object in figure 6, a, is apparently the proximal end of an oval 

 celt of a basaltic syenite, smooth but unpolished evenly throughout, 

 and perfectly symmetrical on both longitudinal axes. Lacking the 

 distal blade end, it is possible that this is an unused mealing stone or 

 similar object. 



In figure 7, a, b, are shown medium-sized celts of gray rhyolite 

 completely unlike the others and unreported from Panama. They 

 are blunt and only roughly shaped out like the earliest hand axes of 

 the European Paleolithic. It has been suggested to me that these are 

 prepared blanks which awaited further finishing. Since little is known 

 of the exact stages through which these celts were prepared, no definite 

 hypothesis can be given. It is known, however, that the very earliest 

 and the very latest Stone Age cultures produced similar celts: the 

 earliest when grinding techniques were not developed, and the latest 

 when availability of metals made the refinements of technique no 

 longer worth the amount of labor involved. On the other hand, it 



