For the past 300 years, a statue of a bloody Jesus right before his crucifixion sat in a small Mexican town.
But researchers from the National Institute of Anthropology and History recently uncovered the wooden statue's long-kept morbid secret- its teeth are human.
The teeth, which are remarkably in good condition, were discovered inside the Christ of Patience when it was moved from the parish of San Bartolo Cuautlalpan to undergo restoration at the NIAH. An X-ray revealed the eerie sight.
"It's the first time human teeth have been found in a sculpture," Fanny Unikel, a restorer at the NIAH who first saw the teeth, said according to the BBC.
The Christ of Patience, believed to date back to the 17th or 18th century, depicts a seated Jesus covered in blood and scars with a wig on his head and a pained expression. While this may be the first time teeth were discovered in a religious statue, it is not unusual for body parts to end up on church relics.
Unikel said people used to donate body parts to show gratitude to the church. Parishioners have donated clothing and their own hair to make wigs for saints.
"We have to remember that these people were very, very religious," Unikel told Live Science. "They believed absolutely that there was a life after death and this was important for them."
Statue makers traditionally used animal bones and horns to construct the teeth and nails, according to the BBC. But the Christ of Patience is no ordinary statue.
"The statue is a very convincing depiction, so naturally, if someone could lay hands on this kind of teeth, he would use them," Unikel said.
Where the teeth actually came from remains a complete mystery. They could have come from people who were living or dead, Live Science reported. But the original owner or owners will prove hard to determine because there are no available records detailing the statue.
