Mexican archaeologists discovered a nearly 2,000-year-old
sculpture of a jaguar in the Izapa archaeological zone, the
National Anthropology and History Institute, or INAH, said in a
communique. The one-ton piece – which measures 1.38 meters (53
inches) long by 87 centimeters (34 inches) high and 52
centimeters (20.5 inches) wide – “is only engraved on one of its
sides with the form of a jaguar, with the front and back paws
flexed as if it were lying down,” the director of the INAH
Center in the southern state of Chiapas, Emiliano Gallaga, said.
Izapa, which is located about 12 kilometers (7.5 miles) from the
border with Guatemala, was an important civic religious center
built some 2,500 years ago by a pre-Mayan culture. The jaguar
sculpture appears to be only partially completed because the
other faces of the stone are blank, indicating that it was
possibly in the process of being carved when work was halted on
it, Gallaga said. He said that the piece not only adds to the
sculptural heritage of Izapa, but als