Of all quaint ideas in amulet making and naming, none is stranger than that of employing for this purpose artificial eyes from Peruvian mummies. Originally eyes of the giant cuttlefish (_loligo gigas_), they were used by the ancient Peruvians to replace the natural eyes of the dead because these substitutes were more durable. Of course the rather grewsome source whence these mummy-eye amulets were secured, bringing them measurably in touch with a sort of necromancy, made them all the more sought after by the superstitious natives. An example from a mummy found at Cuzco, Peru, was exhibited by the writer in the Folk-Lore Collection at the Columbian Exhibition in Chicago in 1893.[619] A strange animal figure from the Pueblo Bonito ruins, rudely carved out of stone and having a band composed of pieces of turquoise set about the neck, was undoubtedly an amulet. Two depressions in the stone where the eyes should be indicate that these were of inlaid turquoise. In spite of the imperfect form of this object, it gives evidence in some of its details to the skill of the native artist who executed it, especially in the care he has taken to protect the soft stone from the attrition of the cord used for its suspension, a piece of bird-bone having been introduced into the perforation near the neck, and the ends of the hole countersunk and filled with gum into which a piece of turquoise was set; one of these caps still remains in place. Frog forms, entirely of turquoise, also appear in Pueblo Bonito, several tadpoles and frogs of this material having been found in the burialroom explored by Mr. Pepper. Sometimes the form is barely indicated by the protuberant eyes and a slight incising which marks the place of the neck.[620] [Illustration: TURQUOISE INCRUSTED OBJECTS, PROBABLY AMULETS, FOUND AT PUEBLO BONITO, NEW MEXICO The work of ancient Indian dwellers in this region. From George H. Pepper, American Anthropologist, vol. vii, Pl. xvii. 1. Turquoise incrusted bone. 2. Jet frog with turquoise eyes. 3. Jet plaque with turquoise setting. ] The Pueblo Bonito ruins in New Mexico have furnished some very effective examples of turquoise inlaying by the Indians of an earlier time who dwelt in this region. The symbolic forms, the precious material used for the inlays, and the labor and skill expended in the execution of certain of these works, indicate that they must have been regarded as amulets. Perhaps the finest inlaying-work is shown in the turquoise decoration of a fragment of bone of peculiar shape, having alternate bands of jet with a chevron-decoration of interlaced triangular pieces of jet and turquoise. Another of these jet and turquoise amulets is a frog, the body being of jet and the protruding eyes of turquoise; about the creature’s neck runs a band of turquoise mosaic. Still another of these relics is a square plaque of jet with an inlaid turquoise at each of the four corners; two of these inlays have fallen out.[621]