Female Figurines of the Upper Paleolithic

Those depictions of the human female figure found in association with Upper

Paleolithic cultures commonly called “Venus figurines” are an extremely varied class of

artifacts. Hundreds of these figurines have been found across the Eurasian continent from

France to Siberia and have been dated to around 25,000 B.C.E. Generally the Venus

figurines are thought to be small, stone sculptures of nude women with pronounced sexual

characteristics who are either voluptuous or pregnant with no face, arms, or legs. Although

some of the figurines can be stereotyped this way, there are numerous overlooked examples

with drastically different features. The overwhelming variety and diversity among the

figurines themselves is reflected in the theories that have developed about them. Since the

late nineteenth century, the meaning and purpose of these Venus figurines have been

interpreted over and over again. Some of the theories directly reflect the biased thoughts of

their time, some are religious and symbolic, and still others have a narrowed scientific focus

and rely upon detailed technological analysis. The variety of both the figurines themselves

and their interpretations has been overlooked as an important part of understanding these

very old and widespread carvings of women.

Across the Eurasian landmass, hundreds of depictions of the human figure crafted

by the artisans of various Upper Paleolithic cultures -- especially the Gravettian -- have been

unearthed at sites spanning from the French Pyrenees to Lake Baikal in Siberia. This

extremely heterogeneous body of artifacts has remained a controversial subject in

anthropology since the discovery of the first few in the late nineteenth century. In addition

to the shear range of locales at which they have been found, the individual artifacts vary

widely in height, from three to forty centimeters or more. An assortment of raw materials

have been employed to create both portable and fixed images portraying not only the female

form, but also the male body, anthropomorphic characters, and androgynous people. Of the

figurines that render the female form, subject matter extends the full scope of womanhood,

with representations ranging from pre-pubescent girls to matronly women in various stages

of pregnancy to much older, post-menopausal women.

These images are often only briefly mentioned in texts, among an array of Upper

Paleolithic art images, and the a small selection of pieces that have come to be more or less

popularized limits the accurate study of their true origin and meaning. Commonly, although

inaccurately, known as “Venus figurines.” the female images comprise only a small portion

of early human art that developed during the period of the last Ice Age. With their initial

discovery, many by amateur archaeologists, these feminine representations sparked heated

debate that has yet to wane over their origin, use, and meaning. Much of the essential

information about many of the images will never be definite because so many of them were

uncovered by people before the development of methods for standardizing the

documentation of stratigraphic and spatial provenance. In recent years, though, there has

been a drive to focus more closely on these figurines with the aid of newly developed

analytical and dating techniques. Archaeologists are now looking at the original discovery of

individual figurines and studying the relationships between geographic location, raw material,

fabrication technique, morphological appearance, and style. New interpretations are being

developed for these figurines as a result of their treatment as separate entities rather than

simply a part of a single, homogeneous phenomenon.

The terms used in this paper refer to the earth’s last glacial period, the Pleistocene,

which extends from about 1.8 million years ago to about 10 thousand years ago. Known

also as the Stone Age and the Paleolithic, this period has been divided into Lower, Middle,

and Upper, the Lower and Middle Paleolithic being associated with Acheulean and

Mousterian tool industries, respectively. The figurines under scrutiny here date back to the

Upper Paleolithic, which spanned from about 30,000 to 10,000 years ago. This period can

generally be broken down further into five periods of overlapping industries: the

Chatelperronian, Aurignacian, Gravettian, Solutrean, and Magdalenian. Each

industry is defined by a specific tool-type; however, for the purposes of this paper, these will

not be outlined here. Although most of the carved representations on record are credited

to the Gravettian industry, a comparatively small number have been associated with the

other industries.

In any given collection of artifacts from the Upper Paleolithic, the majority is made

up tools and items related to subsistence. What the figurines represent most significantly is

the initial cognitive movement toward what we now call art. Ice Age art ranges in type and

style from cave paintings and rock-carvings to portable sculptures and figurines to decorate

tools and clothing items. Artifacts that fall into our modern category of Art are

commonplace in the excavations of Gravettian and Magdalenian industry sites all across

Europe and Asia. Most of the earliest art consists of the instantly recognizable portrayal of

animals, but some images are human representations and of these, most are wome

. Because the precise gender – or creature – depicted in many of the artifacts

remains unclear, I will be restricting this discussion, and my use of the general phrase

“Venus figurines,” to those which scholars are relatively certain – or generally concede – to

be female. Although the hundreds of female figurines that have been found since the 1890s

are by no means the identical – a point to be emphasized – important stylistic similarities

unite them as a group and provide points of comparison and contrast for discussion. For

the purposes of this paper, I will be excluding abstract images attributed to the Aurignacian

– those “so-called ‘vulvae’ and forms resembling an elongated ‘S’ or upside-down ‘P’”

– and those hundreds of fragments that are rough and undefined or too small

for one to ascertain what they originally represented. What I will refer to as “Venus

figurines” are those specimens classified with the most certainty as portrayals of the female

form, itself a controversial task.

According to Marcia-Anne Dobres, “most explanatory theories treat the Venus

figurines as a homogeneous class of data and collapse together more than 20,000 years of

varied productions” (. The question of their racial origin dominated

intellectual discourse about them from the time of their initial discovery in the 1890s, but by

the mid-twentieth century, questions of womanhood, fertility, and religion replaced the

earliest racial fixation. Interpretations of these Paleolithic images of women continue to

develop, with more recent emphasis shifting toward the study of individual figurines

separately, as opposed to as a group. With new tools and methods, researchers are trying to

combat the earliest generalizing stereotypes by investigating the relationship between an

individual figure and the location in which it was found (including its context within the site)

as well as the diverse raw materials, creation techniques, and styles implemented in its

manufacture .