MAYA INDIANS OF YUCATAN AND BEITISH HONDURAS 



71 



tio-or, 2 birds, 5 small beads, 2 malachates, 4 net sinkers, and the 

 ceremonial bar sho\Mi in figure 21, c; all in rough pottery. About 

 5 feet from the northern edge of the mound Were fomid human bones, 

 representing a smgle interment, seemingly of a male of middle age. 

 The skull and long bones, which were very brittle, though they 

 hardened on being exposed to the air for a day, were gotten out only 

 in fragments. The molar and premolar teeth are heavily coated 

 with tartar but are not greatly worn doMTi at the cro\^Tl; the incisors, 

 on the other hand, are very much worn and in life must have 

 been nearly level with the gum. Marked attrition of the incisors 

 seems to be present in nearly all the teeth of individuals past 

 middle life found in sepulchral mounds throughout this area, which 



0ID 



d ^9 



Fig. 21.— Objects found in Mound No. 5. 



is rather remarkable, as the staple diet of the ancient inhabitants 

 must have been nearly identical with that of the Indians of the 

 present day; that is, maize ground to a fine paste on a stone metate, 

 which of necessity contains a good deal of grit from the metate, so 

 much so that the modern Maya say that an old man eats two rub- 

 bing stones and six rubbers during his life. This gritty nistamal 

 wears do^vn the back teeth of the modern Maya almost to the gum, 

 but does not materially affect the front teeth; yet it is the latter, 

 not the former, which we find affected in maxillae from the moimds. 

 One of the molar teeth from this burial has had a triangular piece 

 removed from its crown (fig 21, f). Along one edge of the gap left 

 the tooth is carious. 



