86 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [pun 44 
who saw it, pronounced it to be of a different dialect.” The real 
evidence, therefore, is limited to the fact that the vocabulary was 
obtained from Indians living in the region formerly embraced in the 
Guetare territory. It is deemed safest, however, to include the 
idiom for the present in the Talamancan group. 
Although it is difficult at this late day to mark the boundaries of 
the Guetare territory as they existed at the time of the Spanish con- 
quest, the area in a general sense is readily determined from historical 
and other data. 
Oviedo (lib. 29, cap. 21) says— 
Los Giietares son mucha gente, é viven en¢ima de las sierras del puerto de La Herra- 
dura, é se extienden por la costa deste golpho [Nicoya] al Poniente de la banda del 
Norte hasta el confin de los Chorotegas. 
According to this statement, the territory of the tribe reached the 
Pacific coast and extended along it toward the northwest to Punta 
Arenas or Rio Barranca, the limit, as stated above, of the southern 
extension of the Orotina, or ‘‘Chorotegas’’ as Oviedo terms them. As 
the tribe extended back into the sierras behind Herradura bay, their 
territory must have embraced the Sierras de Turrubales, as stated 
by Fernandez (1: 34, note f). 
Peralta (1: 768-769) mentions several provinces which, he says, 
were peopled by the Indians of this tribe, as follows: 
Garabito, Catapa, Tice, and Boto (Voto), comprehending the territory south of 
Lake Nicaragua and San Juan river to its confluence with the Rio Sarapiqui (south) 
to the mountains of Barba. Including the valley of Coyoche between the rivers 
Barranca and Grande; Abra (or Curriravo, Curridabat) and Tayopan; Accerri and 
Pacaca. Guarco, between the rivers Taras and Toyogres. Turriarba (or Turrialba) 
and Cooc (or Cot). The aborigines of these provinces were Guetares. 
This includes the Boto, or Voto, Indians in the Guetare group, who, 
Peralta says (1: 401), were situated on the right margin of the Desa- 
guadero (San Juan) between the Frio, Pocosol, and Sarapiqui rivers. 
Adding the province of Suerre, as he does in the extract given above, 
would make the San Juan river from its mouth up to the Rio Frio the 
northern boundary of the Guetare territory. As the mountains of 
Barba are in the district of Heredia and those of Turrialba are along 
the northern boundary of the district of Cartago, this description 
applies to a wide strip extending from the San Juan river on the 
north and the Caribbean sea on the northeast, to the Pacific ocean 
on the south, the coast line on the south reaching from Barranca 
river at the northwest probably to, or nearly to, the Rio Grande de 
Terraba on the southeast. 
Fernandez (1: 587), quoting from Licenciado Cavallon, seems to 
include the district of Cartago in the Guetare territory. In regard 
to the seat of the Voto tribe or subtribe, he says (1: 64, note e): 
Boto or Voto includes the Indians who occupied the southern cordillera of Costa 
Rica from the river of Barva up to the Rio de Orosf, called Sierra de Tilaran. The 
name is preserved in that of the Volcano de los Votos or de Puas. 
