GANX] MAYA INDIANS OF YXJCATAlSr AND BRITISH HONDURAS 



135 



from small rubble to blocks weighing 30 to 40 pounds. Similar 

 mounds are found elsewhere and are apparently merely heaps of 

 stones, which have been picked up on the surface of the fields, as, un- 

 like other mounds, they contain no clay, limestone, or marl dust, mor- 

 tar, or other binding material and 

 no trace of burials or any object 

 of human construction. 



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1 4*^^] 



Mound No. 39 



Mound No. 39 was situated on 

 Wild Cane Cay, a small island off 

 the southern coast of British Hon- 

 duras. The island seems to have 

 been built up with stone and other 

 material brought from the main- 

 land and to have been used as 

 a burial place. Several small 

 mounds are scattered over the face 

 of the island; unfortunately most 

 of them had been dug down for the 

 sake of the stone they contamed 

 and the objects from the graves 

 lost or given away. Those which 

 could be traced consisted chiefly 

 of copper ornaments, as rmgs, gor- 

 gets, and studs. Mound No. 39, 

 the only one whose contents were 

 ascertained with any degree of ac- 

 curacy, was a small circular mound 

 10 feet high, built of sand and 

 blocks of reef stone ; near the ground 

 level, about the center of the 

 mound, a single human interment 

 was found, the bones of which were in an advanced state of decay; 

 mingled with these were: (a) A round rod earthenware pot, con- 

 taming a few small circular beads made from conch shell and five 

 or six medium-sized, imused obsidian knives, (b) A second some- 

 what larger pot, of the same shape and material, which contamed 

 the upper part of the femur of a deer, on which is incised the design 

 sho^^Tl in figure 82. This is neatly executed in shallow lines; 

 the upper part evidently represents a tiger, or the skin of that 

 animal, and is separated by a platted design from the lower, wliich 

 may be intended as a representation of the God Itzamna. With 



Fig. 82.— Design incised on femiir of deer found 

 in Mound No. 39. 



