THE ANIMAL HEADS WITH HUMAN BODY IN PALEOLITHIC SCULPTURE

Museum of the Origins of Man

ANIMAL HEADS WITH HUMAN BODY IN PALEOLITHIC SCULPTURE

The production of animal head with human body is subdivided in three phases:
- from 400,000 to 200,000 years (Acheulean and middle Clactoniano),
- from 200,000 to 40,000 years (recent Acheulean and Clactonian, and Mousterian),
- from 40,000 to 12,000 years (upper Paleolithic),
The typology of the sculptures is constituted from several types of artistic hybrids that represent a head of animal with human vertical body.
The more ancient sculpture of lower Paleolithic is in silex (Fig. 10,1). In upper Paleolithic (Aurignacian) there are also carved in ivory (Fig. 10.2); and in the Magdalenian also engraved on stone (Fig. 10.3).
This typology in the religion continues in Mesolithic, and in all the historical urban civilizations. We find the most great sculptures of this typology in Ancient Egypt and India.

clikka per ingrandire l'immagine

Fig. 10,1) Zooanthropomorphic lithic sculpture. It is an artistic hybrid man-animal, that represents a head of mammal with human vertical body.
(In Ancient Egypt Goddess Thueris had head of hyppopotamus and human vertical body with great belly; it was a popular divinity between the most ancient, much venerated from the pregnant womans) .
This small sculpture is in silex, and completely worked on all the surface.
Size: height cm. 6.5.
Origin: Rodi Garganico, Foggia, Italy.
Material culture: Clactonian or middle Acheulean.
Collection Museum of the Origins of Man.

Fig. 10.2) Zooanthropomorphic sculpture in mammoth ivory (Drawing). Artistic hybrid man-animal, that represents a head of lion with vertical human body. In Germany, it has been defined " lady lion ", probably for the head without mane, in how much the human body does not have attributes of feminine sex.
Size: height cm. 28, diameter cm. 6 approximately.
Origin: Hohlenstein-Stadel cave, Valley of the Lone, Baden-Wuerttemberg, Germany.
Material culture: upper Paleolithic (Aurignacian).
Absolute dating: 30.000 years ago.
Museum of Ulm, Germany.

Fig. 10.3) Zooanthropomorphic recording on pebble (Drawing). It represents a nude man with head of lion (the mane is not represented), and with look turned to the sky.
Size: height cm. 9.3.
Origin: Cave The Madeleine, Tursac, France.
Material culture: upper Paleolithic.
Musée des Antiquités Nationales Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Paris.

NEXT

Index

HOME PAGE