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Concept
Jaguars in Mesoamerican cultures
Summary
The representation of jaguars in Mesoamerican cultures has a long history, with iconographic examples dating back to at least the mid-Formative period of Mesoamerican chronology.
The jaguar (Panthera onca) is an animal with a prominent association and appearance in the cultures and belief systems of pre-Columbian Mesoamerican societies in the New World, similar to the lion (Panthera leo) and tiger (Panthera tigris) in the Old World. Quick, agile, and powerful enough to take down the largest prey in the jungle, the jaguar is the biggest felid in Central or South America, and one of the most efficient and aggressive predators. Endowed with a spotted coat and well-adapted for the jungle, hunting either in the trees or water, making it one of the few felines tolerant of water, the jaguar was, and remains, revered among the Indigenous Americans who live in its range.
All major Mesoamerican civilizations prominently featured a jaguar god, and for many, such as the Olmec, the jaguar was an important part of religious practice. For those who resided in or near the tropical jungle, the jaguar was well known and became incorporated into the lives of the inhabitants. The jaguar's formidable size, reputation as a predator, and its evolved capacities to survive in the jungle made it an animal to be revered. The Olmec and the Maya witnessed this animal's habits, adopting the jaguar as an authoritative and martial symbol, and incorporated the animal into their mythology. The jaguar stands today, as it did in the past, as an important symbol in the lives of those who coexist with this felid.
Maya jaguar gods
Integration of the jaguar into the sacred and secular realms of the Maya peoples is proven in the archaeological record. The Maya, whose territory spanned the Yucatán Peninsula all the way to the Pacific coast of Guatemala, was a literate society who left documentation of their lives (mostly the lives of the aristocracy) and belief system in the form of books and bas-relief sculpture on temples, stelae, and pottery.
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