THE NAKED WOMAN (VENUS) WITH BICEPHALIC HEAD IN THE PALEOLITHIC SCULPTURE

Museum of the Origins of Man

A NAKED WOMAN (VENUS) WITH BICEPHALIC HEAD IN PALEOLITHIC SCULPTURE

Fig. 8.7) Anthropomorphic bicephalic stone sculpture (drawing)representing a very small "Venus" with a bicephalic head. Regarding this sculpture, together with another bicephalic small sculpture of which you can also see the drawing, and a small pierced feline "mask",2.3 cm wide, we suspect that they are fakes from the 1800s (opinion of P. Gaietto).
The reasons for this opinion are as follows:
1) The three little sculptures are in a type of stone that is not from the area, while all the other Venuses of the Jullien Collection are made from local materials.
2) At that time it was thought that Grimaldi Man, whose skeletal remains had been found, was a "Negroid", and these three small sculptures share similarities with central African wooden sculptures.
3) They are so small that they look like jewels for ladies; the small mask, even, has the same eyes as cats in fashion illustrations in vogue towards the end of the 19th century.
4) The three small sculptures are totally nonexistent in the typology of sculptures of the Upper Paleolithic.
This is only a suspicion of P. Gaietto. We recommend that you see the sculptures; all the other Venuses of the Jullien Collection are beautiful and important. The three "suspicious" sculptures are beautiful but, if they are indeed fakes, whoever made them had a lively imagination and good cultural knowledge, as he/she infused them with a stylistic mixture of Paleolithic art and recent African art.
Height of the bicephalic Venus: 1.08 inch.
Origin: Caves of Balzi Rossi, Grimaldi, Imperia, Italy. Cultural attribution: Upper Paleolithic.
Dating: from 28,000 to 22,000 years ago.

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