Teotihuacan Ocelot

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Teotihuacan Ocelot

Teotihuacan Ocelot on display in the

British Museum

Material

Calcite onyx

Size

Height 16 cm, Length

33.5cm

Created

400-600 AD

Discovered

Teotihuacan, Mexico

Present

location

Registration

Am1926-22

The

Teotihuacan Ocelot

Teotihuacán Ocelot

is the name of an alabaster

sculpture of a

found at the ancient

site of Teotihuacan,

central

. Discovered in the late nineteenth century, it was purchased

by the

in 1926.

Description

[

]

This unique sculpture is an

in the form of a recumbent

Carved from a single piece of prestigious

, the figure reflects the

style and pattern of contemporary funerary masks and architecture

from Teotihuacan. The eyes would have once been inlaid with shells or

precious stones and the depression on the feline's back would have held the

temple offering - some have conjectured that this may have included human

removed for

Provenance

[

]

The feline figure was found by a labourer at the foot of the

in 1889. It was initially offered to the

but as they would not buy it, it was sold to an English traveller. The

sculpture was eventually bought by the British Museum in 1926, with support

from the Christy Fund. Only one other similar calcite statuette of a

has been unearthed at the site, which is now in the Mexican national

collection.

Bibliography

[

]

C. McEwan, Ancient Mexico in the British Museum (London, The British Museum Press, 1994)

C. Berlo (ed.), Art, ideology and the city of Teotihuacan: A Symposium at Dumbarton Oaks, 8 and 9 October 1988

(Washington, D.C., Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, 1992)

K. Berrin and E. Pasztory (eds.), Teotihuacan: Art from the city of the gods (Thames and Hudson, 1993)

E. Pasztory, Teotihuacan: an experiment in living (Norman, University of Oklahoma Press, 1997)

References

[

]

2015-10-18 at the

This page was last edited on 13 August 2023, at 13:38

(UTC)

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