The metate (kowasila, C) is rare (plate XXXV, figs. 4 and 5), and probably borrowed from the neighboring tribes to the east or southeast. There a special muller was used, but among the Miwok the side of a small cobblestone pestle served. When so used it was called hoku (C). The metate may be of recent intrusion, since aged Central Miwok informants denied its presence and no account of food preparation makes any mention of its use, except that published by Holmes.⁷⁸ Metates were among the auriferous gravel finds,⁷⁹ so that as early as 1860 they had already been introduced among the Miwok, possibly by Indian miners from east of the Sierra Nevada.

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⁷⁸1902, 172, pl. 11.
⁷⁹Holmes, 1901, pl. 3.

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