been reproduced and played. This instrument is astonishing in at least two respects. First, it is the only stringed instrument known in the Americas prior to the introduction of European musical instruments. Second, when played, it produces a sound virtually identical to a jaguar's growl. A sample of this sound is available at the Princeton Art Museum website. Jaguars and Teotihuacan In the city-state of Teotihuacan jaguar bones have been found in caches of precious or significant objects, including obsidian and greenstone, in both the Pyramid of the Sun and the Pyramid of the Moon. These caches were placed in the pyramids as they were being built, likely as part of a ceremony to dedicate the pyramids. Analysis of the animal bones has shown that while some of the jaguars had been wild shortly before burial, many had lived in captivity for a long time prior to being placed in the dedicatory cache. Jaguars and the Olmecs The Olmec civilization was first defined as a distinctive art style at the turn of the nineteenth century. The various sculpture, figurines, and celts from what now is recognized as the Olmec heartland on the southern Gulf Coast, reveal that these people knew their jungle companions well and incorporated them into their mythology. In the surviving Olmec archaeological record, jaguars are rarely portrayed naturalistically, but rather with a combination of feline and human characteristics. These feline anthropomorphic figures may range from a human figure with slight jaguar characteristics to depictions of figures in the so-called transformative pose, kneeling with hands on knees, to figures that are nearly completely feline. One of the most prominent, distinctive, and enigmatic Olmec designs to appear in the archaeological record has been the "were-jaguar". Seen not only in figurines, the motif also may be found carved into jade "votive axes" and celts, engraved onto various portable figurines of jade, and depicted on several "altars", such as those at La Venta. Were-jaguar babies are often held by a stoic, seated adult male. The were-jaguar figure is characterized by a distinctive down-turned mouth with fleshy lips, almond-shaped eyes, and a cleft head similar – it is said – to that of the male jaguar which has a cleft running vertically the length of its head. It is not known what the were-jaguar represented to the Olmec, and it may well have represented different things at different times. Other instances of