Metate
Encyclopedia
A metate is a mortar
Mortar and pestle
A mortar and pestle is a tool used to crush, grind, and mix solid substances . The pestle is a heavy bat-shaped object, the end of which is used for crushing and grinding. The mortar is a bowl, typically made of hard wood, ceramic or stone...

, a ground stone
Ground stone
In archaeology, ground stone is a category of stone tool formed by the grinding of a coarse-grained tool stone, either purposely or incidentally. Ground stone tools are usually made of basalt, rhyolite, granite, or other macrocrystalline igneous stones whose coarse structure makes them ideal for...

 tool used for processing grain
GRAIN
GRAIN is a small international non-profit organisation that works to support small farmers and social movements in their struggles for community-controlled and biodiversity-based food systems. Our support takes the form of independent research and analysis, networking at local, regional and...

 and seed
Seed
A seed is a small embryonic plant enclosed in a covering called the seed coat, usually with some stored food. It is the product of the ripened ovule of gymnosperm and angiosperm plants which occurs after fertilization and some growth within the mother plant...

s. In traditional Mesoamerica
Mesoamerica
Mesoamerica is a region and culture area in the Americas, extending approximately from central Mexico to Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica, within which a number of pre-Columbian societies flourished before the Spanish colonization of the Americas in the 15th and...

n culture, metates were typically used by women who would grind calcified maize
Maize
Maize known in many English-speaking countries as corn or mielie/mealie, is a grain domesticated by indigenous peoples in Mesoamerica in prehistoric times. The leafy stalk produces ears which contain seeds called kernels. Though technically a grain, maize kernels are used in cooking as a vegetable...

 and other organic materials during food preparation (e.g., making tortilla
Tortilla
In Mexico and Central America, a tortilla is a type of thin, unleavened flat bread, made from finely ground maize...

s). Similar artifacts are found all over the world, including China.

Formation and morphology

While varying in specific morphology, metates adhere to a common shape. They typically consist of large stones with a smooth depression or bowl worn into the upper surface. The bowl is formed by the continual and long-term grinding of materials using a smooth hand-held stone (known as a mano). This action consists of a horizontal
Horizontal plane
In geometry, physics, astronomy, geography, and related sciences, a plane is said to be horizontal at a given point if it is perpendicular to the gradient of the gravity field at that point— in other words, if apparent gravity makes a plumb bob hang perpendicular to the plane at that point.In...

 grinding motion that differs from the vertical
Vertical direction
In astronomy, geography, geometry and related sciences and contexts, a direction passing by a given point is said to be vertical if it is locally aligned with the gradient of the gravity field, i.e., with the direction of the gravitational force at that point...

 crushing motion used in a mortar and pestle
Mortar and pestle
A mortar and pestle is a tool used to crush, grind, and mix solid substances . The pestle is a heavy bat-shaped object, the end of which is used for crushing and grinding. The mortar is a bowl, typically made of hard wood, ceramic or stone...

. The depth of the bowl varies, though they are typically not deeper than those of a mortar; deeper metate bowls indicate either a longer period of use or greater degree of activity (i.e., economic specialization).

Another type of metate, called a grinding slab
Grinding slab
thumb|250px|Stone slab in east-central California used to grind acorns.In archaeology, a grinding slab is a ground stone artifact generally used to grind plant materials into usable size, though some slabs were used to shape other ground stone artifacts...

, may also be found among boulder
Boulder
In geology, a boulder is a rock with grain size of usually no less than 256 mm diameter. While a boulder may be small enough to move or roll manually, others are extremely massive....

 or exposed bedrock
Bedrock
In stratigraphy, bedrock is the native consolidated rock underlying the surface of a terrestrial planet, usually the Earth. Above the bedrock is usually an area of broken and weathered unconsolidated rock in the basal subsoil...

 outcroppings. The upper face of the stone is used for grinding materials, such as acorns that results in the smoothing of the stone's face and the creation of pocked dimples (see image).

Ceremonial metates of Costa Rica

Carved, volcanic-stone
Volcanic rock
Volcanic rock is a rock formed from magma erupted from a volcano. In other words, it is an igneous rock of volcanic origin...

 ceremonial metates represent one of the most unusual and complex traditions of pre-Columbian
Pre-Columbian
The pre-Columbian era incorporates all period subdivisions in the history and prehistory of the Americas before the appearance of significant European influences on the American continents, spanning the time of the original settlement in the Upper Paleolithic period to European colonization during...

 artifact
Artifact (archaeology)
An artifact or artefact is "something made or given shape by man, such as a tool or a work of art, esp an object of archaeological interest"...

s from Costa Rica
Costa Rica
Costa Rica , officially the Republic of Costa Rica is a multilingual, multiethnic and multicultural country in Central America, bordered by Nicaragua to the north, Panama to the southeast, the Pacific Ocean to the west and the Caribbean Sea to the east....

. They come in many different forms, and morphological variation corresponds to different regions and time periods. They can be rectangular, circular
Circle
A circle is a simple shape of Euclidean geometry consisting of those points in a plane that are a given distance from a given point, the centre. The distance between any of the points and the centre is called the radius....

, flat, or curved. They may or may not have rims and between three and four legs. Some exhibit use-wear while others show no signs of wear and appear to have been made specifically for use as burial goods
Grave goods
Grave goods, in archaeology and anthropology, are the items buried along with the body.They are usually personal possessions, supplies to smooth the deceased's journey into the afterlife or offerings to the gods. Grave goods are a type of votive deposit...

. Some examples characterized as metate might have actually been a type of throne for sitting on – not a metate at all.

Some examples are known as effigy
Effigy
An effigy is a representation of a person, especially in the form of sculpture or some other three-dimensional form.The term is usually associated with full-length figures of a deceased person depicted in stone or wood on church monuments. These most often lie supine with hands together in prayer,...

-headed metate, which feature an animal
Animal
Animals are a major group of multicellular, eukaryotic organisms of the kingdom Animalia or Metazoa. Their body plan eventually becomes fixed as they develop, although some undergo a process of metamorphosis later on in their life. Most animals are motile, meaning they can move spontaneously and...

’s head at one end, with the metate itself making up the body of the creature. Animals typically depicted are jaguar
Jaguar
The jaguar is a big cat, a feline in the Panthera genus, and is the only Panthera species found in the Americas. The jaguar is the third-largest feline after the tiger and the lion, and the largest in the Western Hemisphere. The jaguar's present range extends from Southern United States and Mexico...

, crocodile
Crocodile
A crocodile is any species belonging to the family Crocodylidae . The term can also be used more loosely to include all extant members of the order Crocodilia: i.e...

 or bird
Bird
Birds are feathered, winged, bipedal, endothermic , egg-laying, vertebrate animals. Around 10,000 living species and 188 families makes them the most speciose class of tetrapod vertebrates. They inhabit ecosystems across the globe, from the Arctic to the Antarctic. Extant birds range in size from...

s. The most complex type of ceremonial metate is the class referred to as “flying-panel” metate. This style comes from the Atlantic watershed
Geography of Costa Rica
Costa Rica is located on the Central American Isthmus, surrounding the point 10° north of the equator and 84° west of the prime meridian. It borders both the Caribbean Sea and the North Pacific Ocean , with a total of 1,228 km of coastline .Costa Rica shares a border with Nicaragua...

 region, including the City of Guayabo
Guayabo
Guayabo de Turrialba is an archeological site located in Turrialba, Costa Rica. The site is of great archeological and cultural importance even though only a very small portion of the city has been uncovered and studied. The monument covers 540 acres and is located on the forested southern slope...

 and represents a high level of craftsmanship and complexity. Carved from a single piece of stone, these metate typically contain multiple figures, both underneath the plate and on the legs. Trophy heads, birds, jaguar, monkey and saurian figures are the most common themes. The “flying panel” metate is believed to be the precursor to free standing sculptural figures more common later in the Atlantic watershed region.

Temporal and regional variation

The earliest traditions of stone sculpture in Costa Rica, including ceremonial metate, began in late Period IV (A.D. 1-500). Metate from the Nicoya/Guanacaste region have longitudinally curved and rimless plates. Those from the Atlantic-Watershed have a plate that is horizontally flat and rimmed. Both are associated with mortuary goods, suggesting differential social status existed within these communities. The three main types of Costa Rican stone sculpture at this time– tripod-metate, mace heads and jade
Costa Rican Jade Tradition
Jadeite is presumed one of the most precious materials of Pre-Columbian Costa Rica. It, along with other similar looking greenstones were cherished and worked for years...

 “axe-god” pendants – peaked and declined in use during Period V (A.D. 500-1000).

Stone sculpture was never popular again in the Nicoya/Guanacaste region, but in the Atlanic Watershed ( such as from Guayabo
Guayabo
Guayabo de Turrialba is an archeological site located in Turrialba, Costa Rica. The site is of great archeological and cultural importance even though only a very small portion of the city has been uncovered and studied. The monument covers 540 acres and is located on the forested southern slope...

) by Period VI (A.D. 1000-1500) freestanding figural sculpture and new forms of ceremonial metate came into use. These new metate types might be rectangular with four legs like the jaguar effigy-head examples or might be round in shape with a pedestal base. These latter types often have carved human heads (or just suggestive notches) around the rim implying a relationship with ritual trophy-head taking. This particular form of metate seems to have been influenced by the stone sculptures of the Panamanian site of Barriles.

At the site of Las Huacas, fifteen metates were excavated from sixteen graves. None of these metate had mano (grinding stones), suggesting that the carved metate as a mortuary object had a deeper symbolic meaning than just the processing of foodstuffs. The metate’s basic mechanical purpose is a platform on which (primarily) maize
Maize
Maize known in many English-speaking countries as corn or mielie/mealie, is a grain domesticated by indigenous peoples in Mesoamerica in prehistoric times. The leafy stalk produces ears which contain seeds called kernels. Though technically a grain, maize kernels are used in cooking as a vegetable...

 is ground into flour. This transformation of grain to flour has symbolic implications relating to life, death and rebirth. It is still not clear if maize was a main source of sustenance, and it is entirely possible that maize was reserved for making chicha
Chicha
For the musical genre, see Peruvian cumbiaChicha is a term used in some regions of Latin America for several varieties of fermented and non-fermented beverages, rather often to those derived from maize and similar non-alcoholic beverages...

 (beer), for use in ritual feasting activities. Given their role as a burial good, it seems that metate held a strong meaning for human life, death and the hope for a rebirth or transformation of some kind.

Iconography

The three most popular iconographic elements of ceremonial metate seem to be saurian, bird, and jaguar creatures. Monkeys are also not uncommon. A unique feature of ceremonial metate is the lack of human figures. Disembodied heads are the sole exception. While human figures become the main subject of the free standing sculptures depicting nude females or male warriors with trophy heads and bound male captives, these do not seem to have been depicted on metate. Flying-panel metates often have anthropomorphic figures, but these always have animal (often crocodile) heads.

In both the Nicoya and Atlantic-Watershed regions, metates often involve the use of saurian (Specifically crocodile, alligator, or caiman) imagery. It is thought that the saurian represents the surface of the earth, which relates to agricultural fertility. One of the oldest and most prominent themes in Chibcha art is that of the Crocodile god. Depicted as an anthropomorphic being with a crocodile head, he has been carved into fly-panel metates, sometimes shown standing on a double-headed saurian and other times a jaguar. As a symbol the double-headed Saurian has the longest use and distribution of any iconographic element in the Isthmo-Columbian area.

Costa Rica flying-panel metates date to the 1st and 7th centuries. However, certain features of the Crocodile god depicted on flying-panel metates show him with unnatural U-shaped elbows with long, narrow fingers, as seen on crocodile gods made in gold that date to the 10th-16th centuries. These stylistic forms make sense for use in the small gold ornaments made with the lost-wax technique, but seem strange for use in carved stone. Perhaps these metate date much later than previously thought, and were in fact inspired by the depictions in gold.

Birds with long, curving beaks that seem to represent vultures, toucans or maybe hummingbirds are another popular theme. First found in Costa Rica on Pavas and El Bosque phase pottery, these are a common element in Flying-panel metates, sometimes depicted with or pecking at human heads.

See also

  • Maya diet and subsistence
  • Agriculture in Mesoamerica
    Agriculture in Mesoamerica
    Agriculture in Mesoamerica dates to the Archaic period of Mesoamerican chronology . During this period, many of the hunter gatherer micro-bands in the region began to cultivate wild plants...

  • Category: Native American cuisine

External links

  • http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/ho/05/cac/hod_1986.200.htm
  • http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/ho/05/cac/hod_1979.206.429.htm
  • http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/ho/07/cac/hod_1978.412.94.htm
  • http://www.clevelandart.org/Explore/work.asp?searchText=1964%2E34
  • http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/kislak/images/kc0060s.jpg
  • http://www.CostaRicanArchaeology.com
The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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