Wohat Statues

"Lion, Rhino, Monkey, Tiger, and Giraffe...Guess the Crocodile hasn't arrived yet..."

- Indiana Jones, to himself

The Wohat Statues were a series of stone carvings of animals. They were believed to have been carved by the artist Wohat in the sixteenth century in the Ottoman Empire. By the 20th century, six statues still existed, and were on display in museums around the world. Several of the pieces contained clues to the location of Ali Bey's Palace, and served also as part of a puzzle key to unlock the palace door.

The six Wohat statues included:
 * Lion (circa 1512), displayed at the Barcelona History Museum
 * Crocodile, displayed at the New York Museum of History
 * Giraffe
 * Monkey
 * Rhinoceros
 * Tiger

In the late spring or early summer of 1931, René Belloq had hired Ali Bey-Faisal to steal the five statues depicting mammals from various museums around the world, as part of a plan to use them to find the location of Ali Bey's Invincible Ruby. In four days, Bey-Faisal and his henchmen managed to steal the Giraffe, Monkey, Rhino, and Tiger statues. Sensing an opportunity to secretly steal and pawn his museum's Crocodile statue, Ballantine Gruber planned a copycat crime to have the New York Museum of History robbed. Two thieves broke into his museum, grabbed the Crocodile and knocked out several of the guards, including Gruber.

Helping to investigate the theft of the crocodile, Marcus Brody brought Gruber to Indiana Jones at Marshall College, who had only previously ever seen the Lion in Barcelona. While Brody estimated that each statue could be worth up to thirty thousand dollars, Jones surmised that something larger was at stake. Reviewing his books, Jones pointed out that the statues might help find the mystical invicible ruby of Emir Ali Bey, whose closest confidant was Wohat. Meanwhile, Bey-Faisal and his men broke into the Barcelona History Museum and stole the Lion statue.

After a telegram announced that the Lion's theft, Jones flew to Barcelona, and examined the crime scene, running into Gruber, who claimed to be interested in partnering up after all, to help recover his stolen piece. The pair were accosted by Ali Bey-Faisal and his two henchmen, and Jones learned that Bey-Faisal had been hired by Belloq. Jones tailed Bey-Faisal to a Barcelona hotel, where Bey-Faisal met with Belloq. Jones broke into Belloq's room and found the five mammal statues. Examining them up close in a maintenance closet, Jones discovered that the undersides of the statues, when pieced together, formed a map of southeastern Kenya, a possible site for the ruby.

Taking the five mammals, Jones traveled to Kenya, and outside of Mombasa, he found the ruins of Ali Bey's Palace. Reaching a door, Jones translated some of the inscription to learn that an arrangement of mammals would open the door. Finding five slots, he arranged the animals in hopes of the door opening. After sixteen arrangements, Jones found that the correct order was Giraffe, Lion, Monkey, Tiger, Rhino, and the door opened. Bey-Faisal and his men stepped out of the jungle, relieved that Jones had solved the puzzle for them, and revealed that Jones' theft of the statues from Belloq had been a set-up. Gruber rescued Jones from Bey-Faisal and the two fled into the dark ruins, where they eventually discovered a box carved by Wohat that contained the invincible ruby, which Gruber tried to take at gunpoint.

Jones had realized that Bey-Faisal hadn't been behind the Crocodile theft since they were only interested in the mammalian statues, though Gruber had claimed that Bey-Faisal's men were the same men that had robbed him in New York, and confronted Gruber about it. Gruber eventually admitted to the theft and the Crocodile's sale on the black market, before his demise by grabbing the ruby.

The five mammal statues were likely destroyed when the palace collapsed after Gruber's vaporization.

Appearances

 * Indiana Jones Adventures: Volume 2: Curse of the Invincible Ruby