﻿134 FIELD AND FOREST. 



Chorotegas once held possession of the coast from Fonseca to Nicoya 

 Bay, but this line of occupation was broken in two places and a differ- 

 ent people obtruded themselves into the breaches, and, holding fast 

 their positions, divided the original settlement into three districts. 



The most ancient epoch and occupying the lowest stratum of burials 

 is indicated by a paucity of objects and the rudeness of their manufac- 

 ture. The wants of the people seem to have been restricted to some 

 means of bruising their maize, accomplished on a rough stone having 

 a deep circular cavity and may be called a mortar ; a roughly chipped 

 stone axe to cut wood and a stone celt for other cutting purpose or for 

 defense, earthenware vessels, for cooking or for holding food, rude in 

 shape, very thick and without ornament or glazing ; idols ot stone so 

 roughly chipped or sculptured and the features so obscure that one 

 hesitates in deciding as to the class to which it belongs ; pottery images, 

 chiefly of the human face, and supposed to have been parts of jars, 

 probably the handles. To these may be added beads formed of thick 

 pieces of marine shell and coarse beads of pottery for personal orna- 

 ments. 



The next highest stratum contains relics of a better class. The corn 

 grinder, in this instance, is a large stone tablet elevated on three, often 

 four feet, known as a metate. It is made of the cellular lava which 

 abounds in that country, and possesses a sharp cutting or grinding sur- 

 face, which is slightly curved, a flat rubber of the same material being 

 used upon it. The edges of the metate are chiselled into an orna- 

 mental border and the feet are made to represent some living object. 

 The celts and axes are more shapely and often polished. The pottery 

 is of various pattern and capacity and burnt harder. Here the shoe- 

 shaped vessels, Fig. i, make their first appearance. Their peculiar form 

 induced the Spaniards, at the conquest of the country, to bestow on the 

 island where they most abound, the name of Zapatero or Shoemaker, 

 island. They are made of clay, similar to that used for our ordinary 

 flower p.ot, are not much thicker, of the same color, and of all dimen- 

 sions, from the capacity of a gill measure to twenty or twenty-five 

 gallons. The larger sizes are used as urns or vases for funeral purposes, 

 as they will hold a body of a person of ordinary stature, if it be prop- 

 erly corded or trussed up. This is not however the mode of burial in 

 use among this people, since these vessels are found to contain only 

 the bones of the deceased person. The corpse was carried out to a 



