[Footnote 2: J. King Merritt: “Report on the huacals or ancient graveyards of Chiriqui.” Bulletin of the American Ethnological Society, 1860.]
[Footnote 3: Bollaert: Antiquarian Researches in New Granada. London, 1860.]
[Footnote 4: A. De Zeltner: Notes sur les sépultures indiennes de département de Chiriqui.]
At the present time this district is inhabited chiefly by Indians and natives of mixed, blood, who follow grazing and agriculture to a limited extent, but subsist largely upon the natural products of the country. These peoples are generally thought to have no knowledge or trustworthy tradition of the ancient inhabitants and are said to care nothing for the curious cemeteries among which they dwell, except as a source of revenue. Mr. A. L. Pinart states, however, that certain tribes on both sides of the continental divide have traditions pointing toward the ancient grave builders as their ancestors. There is probably no valid reason for assigning the remains of this region to a very high antiquity. The highest stage of culture here may have been either earlier or later than the period of highest civilization in Mexico and South America or contemporaneous with it. There is really no reason for supposing that the tribes who built these graves were not in possession of the country, or parts of it, at the time of the conquest. As to the affinities of the ancient middle isthmian tribes with the peoples north and south of them we can learn nothing positive from the evidences of their art. So far as the art of pottery has come within my observation, it appears to indicate a somewhat closer relationship with the ancient Costa Rican peoples than with those of continental South America; yet, in their burial customs, in the lack of enduring houses and temples, and in their use of gold, they were like the ancient peoples of middle and southern New Granada.[5]
The relics preserved in our museums would seem to indicate one principal period of occupation or culture only; but there has been no intelligent study of the contents of the soil in sections exposed in modern excavations, the exclusive aim of collectors having generally been to secure either gold or showy cabinet specimens. The relics of very primitive periods, if such are represented, have naturally passed unnoticed. Mr. McNiel mentions the occurrence of pottery in the soil in which the graves were dug, but, regarding it as identical with that contained in the graves, he neglected to preserve specimens.