Mound No. 31 was situated close to the Rio Nuevo, about 16 miles from its mouth, in the northern part of British Honduras. It was a somewhat flattened mound, 15 feet in height, built of blocks of limestone, limestone dust, and earth. At a depth of 9 feet, the angle of a ruined building, formed by two walls averaging 2 feet high, intersecting at right angles, and built of squared blocks of limestone, was brought to light. The walls enclosed part of a floor of smooth, hard cement. Numbers of blocks of squared stone were found throughout the upper part of the mound, which had evidently at one time formed part of the ruined building. Resting on the cement floor, close to the wall, were found nine pottery vessels, covered with limestone dust. Five of these were of the type shown in figure [73], a, of dark-red, rather coarse pottery, 12 inches in diameter at the rim. One, pictured in figure [74], is the usual Maya chocolate pot, similar to the one already described (see fig. [24], g), except that the spout, instead of bending inward toward the vessel, passes directly upward parallel to its perpendicular axis, an arrangement which must have rendered it far easier to drink from the vessel or pour fluid out of it. The three other vessels found are illustrated in figures [73], b, c, and d; b is of polished chocolate-brown pottery, 3 inches in diameter by 5 inches in height; c is of thick red pottery, 3 inches high, with two small handles for suspension, one on each side; d is of coarse polished red ware, unusually thick and clumsy, 12 inches high by 8 inches in diameter. Each of these vessels contained a single small polished greenstone bead. No other objects were found associated with them, and there was no trace of human bones. Excavations were made in this mound to the ground level without results. The lower part of the mound was built of large blocks of limestone and rubble, held loosely together with friable mortar.
Mound No. 32
Fig. 75.—Pottery vessels found in Mound No. 32.
Mound No. 32 was situated quite close to No. 31, which it very closely resembled in both size and construction. At a depth of 9 feet the end of a small building constructed of squared blocks of limestone was brought to light. The walls were still standing to a height of 2 to 3 feet, and showed traces of a red stucco covering on their inner surfaces. The cement floor of the building and the platform upon which it stood could also be traced. Lying upon this floor were five pottery vessels and an unfinished flint celt. Two of these vessels were precisely similar to that shown in figure [73], a; one is a large, circular, shallow plaque, of rather thick reddish-brown pottery, in the center of which a small hole has been made, evidently with the object of rendering the plaque useless. The last two vessels are illustrated in figure [75], a, b. A is an unusually large vessel of very coarse, thick, red pottery, 18 inches high, which had probably been used to contain corn or some such dry material, as the pottery was too friable and soft for a cooking pot, or even to hold water. B is a small three-legged vase, 4 inches high, of coarse, unpainted pottery. Each of these five vessels, with the exception of the plaque, contained a single polished greenstone bead. The celt was roughly blocked out of yellowish flint. No objects except those above described were found with these vessels, nor were there any traces of human burial. Excavations were made in the mound to the ground level, and it was found to be composed below the platform upon which the building stood of a solid mass of rubble and limestone held together by loose, friable mortar. There are numerous groups of mounds of all sizes in the neighborhood, and judging by these, and by the potsherds and flint and obsidian chips which one finds strewn over the surface of the soil in great profusion, it must have been a densely populated region at one time. The two life-size human heads shown in figures [76] and [77] were found close to these two mounds in digging a posthole. Figure [76] represents a grotesque head cut from a solid block of crystalline limestone. Figure [77] is a mask, rather crudely cut from greenstone and unpolished. Both were buried in the marl and were unaccompanied by other objects.
Mound No. 33
