The Archaeology Museum

Even though Mascota, is a small town, it has an excellent museum which is located right around the corner from where we are staying and housed in a former mansion. We thought that today, Sunday, would be a good day to learn more about the history of this area.

We were greeted by a lady who went scurrying off to get us a booklet in English that explained all the displays. It was great having the booklet as the displays, written in Spanish, included numerous photographs, petroglyphs, contents of tombs and more than 600 archaeological pieces dating from 800 BC to 300 AD!

The exhibits are the result of excavations in the region, some of them supported by the National Geographic Society and led by the American researcher Joseph B. Mountjoy. The archaeological digs were conducted in an almost thousand-year-old cemetery called "The Swamp" - a place that has a great cultural value in the area and believed to be a lake more than 2,000 years ago. Some of the artifacts were also from the sites "El Embocadero "and" Coamajales. "

We especially liked a petroglyph with a game board carved into the rock called Patolli. Apparently, it was played like snakes and ladders. There were game boards for long games or shorter games. The game involves throwing dice and moving four pieces around the board, any of which can be “killed” if an opponent’s piece lands in the same space. Ancient patolli players, it seems, would bet blankets, jewelry or even their homes on the outcome of the game.

We weren’t allowed to take photos in a few of the rooms but the ones that we did take are sufficient.

Lunch
Walk along river and suspension bridge
8km in total
Dinner at Navidad restaurantRead more