The Venus figurines of Balzi Rossi (also: Venus figurines of Grimaldi, Venus figurines from the Balzi-Rossi-Caves) from the caves near Grimaldi di

Ventimiglia Ventimiglia (; lij, label= Intemelio, Ventemiglia , lij, label= Genoese, Vintimiggia; french: Vintimille ; oc, label= Provençal, Ventemilha ) is a resort town in the province of Imperia, Liguria, northern Italy. It is located southwest of ...

(Italy) are thirteen Paleolithic sculptures of the female body. Additionally, two small depictions of the human head were discovered at the same place. The age of these figurines cannot be determined because of missing

archaeological context This page is a glossary of archaeology, the study of the human past from material remains. A B C D E F ...

data. It is usually accepted that these figurines stem from the

Gravettian The Gravettian was 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 ...

, about 24,000 to 19,000 years old. Most of the sculptures consist of

steatite Soapstone (also known as steatite or soaprock) is a talc-schist, which is a type of metamorphic rock. It is composed largely of the magnesium rich mineral talc. It is produced by dynamothermal metamorphism and metasomatism, which occur in the ...

and are between 2.4 and 7.5 cm in height.Vgl. White & Bisson (1998), Imagerie féminine du Paléolithique: l'apport des nouvelles statuettes de Grimaldi according to the English translation by Don Hitchcock (Paleolithic female imagery: the contribution of the new Grimaldi figurines), http://donsmaps.com/grimaldivenus.html Between 1883 to 1895 the figurines were discovered by the antique dealer Louis Alexandre Jullien at the cave complex Balzi Rossi ("red cliffs") at the

Liguria it, Ligure , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = , demographics1_footnotes = , demographics1_title1 = , demographics1_info1 = , demographics1_title2 ...

n coast. Eight of these sculptures are housed in the museum

Saint-Germain-en-Laye Saint-Germain-en-Laye () is a commune in the Yvelines department in the Île-de-France in north-central France. It is located in the western suburbs of Paris, from the centre of Paris. Inhabitants are called ''Saint-Germanois'' or ''Saint-Ge ...

near Paris.

References

Literature

* Bisson, M.; Bolduc P. (1994). Previously undescribed Figurines from the Grimaldi Caves, Current Anthropology, 35 (4), S. 458–46

* Clark, P. et al. (2009). "The Last Glacial Maximum", American Association for the Advancement of Science, 7 August 2009, 325 (5941), S. 710 – 714. * Cohen, C. (2003). La femme des origines. Images de la femme dans la préhistoire occidentale, Paris, Belin-Herscher, 2003, 191 pages. * Delporte, H. (1979). L’image de la femme dans l’art préhistorique, Paris: Ed. Picard. * C. Giraudi, Margherita Mussi (1999). The Central and Southern Apennine (Italy) during OIS 3 and 2: the colonisation of a changing environment, ERAUL, 90, S. 118 – 129. * Mussi, M. (2002). Earliest Italy: an overview of the Italian Pateolithic and Mesolithic New York: Kluwer Academic, 2002. * White, R., Bisson, M. (1998). Imagerie féminine du Paléolithique : l'apport des nouvelles statuettes de Grimaldi, Gallia préhistoire. Tome 40, 1998. S. 95–132. * White, R. , 2002: Une nouvelle statuette phallo-féminine paléolithique: 'La venus des Milandes' (commune de Castelnaud-la-Chapelle, Dordogne), Paleo N° 14 Décembre 2002, S. 177 – 198.

External links

Don Hitchcock (Don's Maps): "Figurines of Balzi Rossi, the Grimaldi Caves venuses"
* http://www.historymuseum.ca/cmc/exhibitions/archeo/paleofig/pal03eng.shtml {{Venus figurines Balzi Rossi Archaeological discoveries in Italy Stone sculptures in Italy Gravettian 1880s archaeological discoveries 1890s archaeological discoveries

See also

References

Literature

External links