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Details
LOT 0293
Stone Age Polished Goddess Idol
NEOLITHIC PERIOD, CIRCA 6TH-4TH MILLENNIUM B.C.
5 7/8 in. (6 1/2 in.) (635 grams, 15 cm (686 grams total, 16.5 cm including stand)).
With rounded profile, stub arms and head without facial detailing, vestigial legs; accompanied by a custom-made display stand. [No Reserve]
Provenance
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 a search certificate number no.12087-217184.
Literature
Cf. Morris, D., The Art of Ancient Cyprus, Oxford, 1985, figs.114-115, pp.120-121; for similar idols; also see the view of Caldwell, Duncan, The Use of Animals in Birth Protection Rituals and Possible Uses of Stone Figurines from the Central Sahel, 2015 winter issue, vol.48, no.4, Nov., pp.14-25.
Footnotes
Most scholars consider these as symbols of the cult of fertility and evidence of the existence of a matriarchal society as a form of organisation of the earliest human society. The people of the Stone Age may have considered figures such as this to represent women and mothers with their life-giving powers, or as depictions of the ancestors.
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