LOT 1710

Large Stone Age Animal Idol Group

NEOLITHIC PERIOD, CIRCA 6TH-4TH MILLENNIUM B.P. OR LATER

3 5/8 - 4 5/8 in. (1.59 kg total, 9.3-11.7 cm including stand).

Comprising bird and quadruped figures carved in the round with rounded profile; each mounted on a custom-made stand. [3, No Reserve]

From a collection acquired on the UK art market from various auction houses and collections mostly before 2000.
From an important Cambridgeshire estate; thence by descent.

Accompanied by an academic report by Dr Raffaele D’Amato.
This lot has been checked against the Interpol Database of stolen works of art and is accompanied by search certificate number no.12338-224208.
This lot is accompanied by an illustrated lot declaration signed by the Head of the Antiquities Department, Dr Raffaele D’Amato.

Cf. Morris, D., The Art of Ancient Cyprus, Oxford, 1985, fig. 342, p.212, for a similar idol; Various, Idoles, au commencement était l’image – 22 Novembre 1990 – 28 Février 1991, Paris, 1990, fig.11, for a Neolithic sculpture in similar style; Nanoglou, S., ‘Representation of Humans and Animals in Greece and the Balkans during the Earlier Neolithic’ in Cambridge Archaeological Journal, 18, 2008, pp. 1-13, fig.3, nos.2-7, and fig. 6, for similar; also see Caldwell, Duncan, ‘The Use of Animals in Birth Protection Rituals and Possible Uses of Stone Figurines from the Central Sahel’ in African Arts, UCLA, 2015 Winter issue, vol.48, no.4, Nov., pp.14-25, fig.3, letters A, D, F.

Most scholars consider these as symbols of the fertility cult and as evidence of early agricultural organisation of the earliest human society. The Stone Age people may have considered figures such as these to represent animals with their life-giving powers.