Bahía culture originated in what is now the Manabí Province on the Pacific Coast, and spread to Bahía de Caráquez and to the Andean foothills. Their ceramic tradition is one of the first found north of the Andes.
Chirije, a seaport, was a major Bahía archaeological site discovered by Emilio Estrada in the 1950s. Merchants traded finished goods and Spondylus princeps or red spiny oyster shells south to Chile and north as far as Mexico in exchange for precious materials such as copper and gold
