BELIZE: Maya communities living in coastal Belize more than 1,000 years ago manufactured large quantities of sea salt that they traded to inland settlements. A recent evaluation of wear patterns on stone tools from the Paynes Creek Salt Works indicates that the Maya may have produced and traded salted fish and meat as well. Researchers originally thought the tools were used for cutting wood, but striations on the blades are more consistent with cutting fish, chopping bones, and scraping animal hides.