metate

American  

[muh-tah-tee, me-tah-te] / məˈtɑ ti, mɛˈtɑ tɛ /

noun

• metates
  plural

1. a flat stone that has a shallow depression in the upper surface for holding maize or other grains to be ground with a mano.

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• metates
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of metate

1825–35, < Mexican Spanish < Nahuatl metlatl

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Example Sentences

See Examples For:

metate metates

The woman's mother had buried her molcajete, metate, comal, and cazuelas in a hole in the ground and fled.

From Salon ● Feb. 23, 2023

Each of the seating areas has a bench shaped like a metate and a brand that marks the cattle of that region.

From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 2, 2021

Now and then she flicked bits of cinnamon onto the pocked ashen surface of the metate.

From New York Times ● Nov. 11, 2021

An original mano and metate, a pair of stones used for grinding, lay on the dirt floor of one room.

From Slate ● Jun. 12, 2015

Rubbing stones used with a coarse metate for shucking and cracking corn.

From Illustrated Catalogue of the Collections Obtained from the Pueblos of Zuñi, New Mexico, and Wolpi, Arizona, in 1881 Third Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1881-82, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1884, pages 511-594 by James Stevenson

The metates also display many puzzling pseudo-glyphs on them that have yet to be studied and deciphered.

From National Geographic

Some archaeologists believe the metates may have been used not just as thrones, but also as seats for carrying the bundled and decorated bodies of the dead to their final resting place.

From National Geographic

Ditto, or rubbing-stone, used in connection with fine metates for for grinding corn meal.

From Illustrated Catalogue of the Collections Obtained from the Pueblos of Zuñi, New Mexico, and Wolpi, Arizona, in 1881 Third Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1881-82, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1884, pages 511-594 by James Stevenson

As women stoop over the metates grinding the meal, men sing good cheer from the door.

From Through Our Unknown Southwest by Agnes C. (Agnes Christina) Laut

In the rear of the cave were three well-constructed grinding bins, their metates still in place.

From Mesa Verde National Park, Colorado by United States. Dept. of the Interior

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