The Venus figurines of Mal’ta (also: Malta) are several

palaeolithic The Paleolithic or Palaeolithic ( years ago) ( ), also called the Old Stone Age (), is a period in human prehistory that is distinguished by the original development of stone tools, and which represents almost the entire period of human prehist ...

female figurines of the

Mal'ta–Buret' culture The Mal'ta–Buret' culture (also Maltinsko-buretskaya culture) is an archaeological culture of the Upper Paleolithic (generally dated to 24,000-23,000 BP but also sometimes to 15,000 BP). It is located roughly northwest of Lake Baikal, about ...

, found in

Siberia Siberia ( ; , ) is an extensive geographical region comprising all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has formed a part of the sovereign territory of Russia and its predecessor states ...

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

. They consist most often of ivory. Delporte writes of 29 figurines altogether. They are about 23,000 years old and stem from the

Gravettian The Gravettian is an archaeological industry of the European Upper Paleolithic that succeeded the Aurignacian circa 33,000 years BP. It is archaeologically the last European culture many consider unified, and had mostly disappeared by ...

. Most of these statuettes show stylized clothes. Quite often the face is depicted. They were discovered at Mal'ta, at the Angara River, near

Lake Baikal Lake Baikal is a rift lake and the deepest lake in the world. It is situated in southern Siberia, Russia between the Federal subjects of Russia, federal subjects of Irkutsk Oblast, Irkutsk Oblasts of Russia, Oblast to the northwest and the Repu ...

Irkutsk Oblast Irkutsk Oblast (; ) is a federal subjects of Russia, federal subject of Russia (an oblast), located in southeastern Siberia in the basins of the Angara River, Angara, Lena River, Lena, and Nizhnyaya Tunguska Rivers. The administrative center is ...

, Siberia by the archeologists Sergey Zamyatnin, Georgy Sosnovsky, and Mikhail Gerasimov. These figurines are on display at the

Hermitage Museum The State Hermitage Museum ( rus, Государственный Эрмитаж, r=Gosudarstvennyj Ermitaž, p=ɡəsʊˈdarstvʲɪn(ː)ɨj ɪrmʲɪˈtaʂ, links=no) is a museum of art and culture in Saint Petersburg, Russia, and holds the large ...

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the List of cities and towns in Russia by population, second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the Neva, River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland ...

Discovery

Around 30 female statuettes of varying shapes were discovered at Mal'ta, at the Angara River, and near

in Siberia. The wide variety of forms, combined with the realism of the sculptures and the lack of repetitiveness in detail, are definite signs of developed, albeit early, art. Until the Mal’ta find,

Venus figurines A Venus figurine is any Upper Palaeolithic statue portraying a woman, usually carved in the round.Fagan, Brian M., Beck, Charlotte, "Venus Figurines", beliefs '' The Oxford Companion to Archaeology'', 1996, Oxford University Press, pp. 740– ...

were previously found only in

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

. Carved from the tusk ivory of a

mammoth A mammoth is any species of the extinct elephantid genus ''Mammuthus.'' They lived from the late Miocene epoch (from around 6.2 million years ago) into the Holocene until about 4,000 years ago, with mammoth species at various times inhabi ...

, these images were typically highly stylized and often involved embellished and disproportionate characteristics (typically the breasts or buttocks).

Features

At first glance what is obvious is that the Mal'ta Venus figurines are of two types: full-figured women with exaggerated forms, and women with a thin, delicate form. Some of the figures are nude while others have etchings that seem to indicate fur or clothing. Conversely, unlike those found in Europe, some of the Venus figurines from Mal’ta were sculpted with faces. Most of the figurines were tapered at the bottom, and it is believed that this was done so they could have been stuck into the ground or placed upright some other way. Placed upright they could have symbolized the spirits of the dead, akin to "spirit dolls" used nearly world-wide, including Siberia, among contemporary people.

Style

The suggested similarity between Mal'ta and Upper Paleolithic civilizations of Western and Eastern Europe coincides with a long-held belief that the ancient people of Mal'ta were related to the Paleolithic societies of Europe. These similarities can be established by their tools, dwelling structures, and art. These commonalities draw into question the origin of Upper Paleolithic Siberian people, and whether the migrating peoples originated from Southeastern Asia or quite possibly from Europe. On the other hand, one can argue that as a group the Mal'ta Venus figures are rather different from the female figurines of Western and Central Europe. For example, none of the Siberian specimens indicates abdominal enlargement as main European examples do, and as breasts are often lacking, few offer clear enough evidence of gender to define them as female. More conclusively, nearly half of them show some facial details (flat nose, deep-set narrow eyes, and a mouth), something which is lacking on the so-called Venus figures of Europe. Many of them also appear to wear clothes, complete with hoods (clearly visible in the nearby Venus of Buret'), something European Venuses are lacking. The closest European site for Venus figurines would be Kostyonki, and research is being conducted to try to find connections with Mal'ta. File:Mal'ta burials, artifacts and statuettes.png, Mal'ta burials, artifacts and statuettes. File:Mal'ta statuette.jpg, Statuette with facial features. File:Mal'ta ivory figurine of a child in coverall (white background).jpg, Statuette with hooded, decorated, overall. File:Mal'ta ivory figurine of a teenager in coverall.jpg, Elongated figurine with hooded, decorated, overall and traces of paint. File:Mal’ta Collection (Hermitage, No. 370-748).jpg, Mal’ta Venus (Hermitage, No. 370-748). File:Mal'ta statuette 3D modelling.jpg, Mal'ta statuette 3D modelling

Literature

* * Delporte, Henri (1979). ''L’image de la femme dans l’art préhistorique.'' Paris. * Gerasimov, Michail M. (1964). ''The Paleolithic site of Malta: excavations of 1956–1958''. In E.N. Michael (ed.): ''The Archaeology and Geomorphology of Northern Asia''. No. 5, S. 3–32, Arctic Institute of North America, University of Toronto (Translations from Russian Sources). * Jelinek, Jan: ''Das grosse Bilderlexikon des Menschen in der Vorzeit''. Bertelsmann-Lexikon-Verlag, Gütersloh 1972. (Picture of Venus figurines from Malta: p. 315, 334, 377, 385, 393, 394.)

Notes and references

External links