Necklace made of small perforated and decorated cylinders of mammoth ivory, Dolni Vestonice.
Photo: J. Jelinek, 'The Evolution of Man'
Necklace made of teeth from arctic foxes, Dolni Vestonice.
Photo: J. Jelinek, 'The Evolution of Man'
Necklace made of fossil (Tertiary) shells and teeth of the arctic fox, Dolni Vestonice.
Photo: J. Jelinek, 'The Evolution of Man'
Click on each of the photos above to see a more detailed version.
Photos: J Jelinek, 'The Evolution of Man'
Click on each of the photos above to see a more detailed version.
Photos: J Jelinek, 'The Evolution of Man'
From the book 'Plains of Passage' by Jean Auel, p510 ff:
S'Armuna reached inside her shirt and pulled out a small figure of a woman, perhaps four inches high. Both Ayla and Jondalar had seen many similar objects, usually carved out of ivory, bone, or wood. Jondalar had even seen a few that had been carefully and lovingly sculpted out of stone, using only stone tools.
......................
But this particular Mother figure was unique. S'Armuna gave the Munai to Jondalar. "Tell me what this is made of," she said.
Jondalar turned the small figure over in his hands, examining it carefully. It was endowed with pendulous breasts and wide hips, the arms were suggested only to the elbow, the legs tapered, and though a hairstyle was indicated, the face bore no markings. It was not much different in size or shape from many he had seen, but the material from which it was made was most unusual. The color was uniformly dark.
When he tried, he could make no indentation in it with his fingernail. It was not made of wood or bone or ivory or antler. It was as hard as stone, but smoothly formed, with no indication or marks of carving. It was not any stone he knew.
He looked up at S'Armuna with a puzzled expression. "I have never seen anything like this before," he said.
Jondalar gave the figure to Ayla, and a shiver went through her at the moment she touched it. I should have taken my fur parka when we went out, she said to herself, but she could not help feeling that it was more than the cold that had made her feel such a sharp chill.
"That munai began as the dust of the earth," the woman stated.
"Dust?" Ayla said. "But this is stone!"
"Yes, it is now. I turned it to stone."
"You turned it to stone? How can you turn dust to stone?" jondalar said, full of disbelief.
The woman smiled. "If I tell you, would it make you believe my
power?"
"If you can convince me," the man retorted.
"I will tell you, but I won't try to convince you. You will have to convince yourself. I started with hard, dry clay from the river's edge and pounded it to dusty earth. Then I mixed in water." S'Armuna paused for a moment, wondering if she should say anything more about the mixture. She decided against it for now. "When it was the right consistency, it was shaped. Fire and hot air turned it to stone," the shaman stated, watching to see how the two young strangers would react, whether they would show disdain or be impressed, whether they would doubt or believe her.
The man closed his eyes trying to recall something. "I remember hearing ... from a Losadunai man, I think ... something about Mother figures made of mud."
S'Armuna smiled. "Yes, you could say we make munai out of mud. Animals, too, when we have need to call upon their spirits, many kinds of animals, bears, lions, mammoths, rhinos, horses, whatever we want. But they are mud only while they are being shaped. A figure made of the dust of the earth mixed with water, even after it has hardened, will melt in water back to the mud from which it was formed, then turn to dust, but after it is brought to life by Her sacred flame, it is forever changed. Passing through the Mother's searing heat makes the figures as hard as stone. The living spirit of the fire makes them endure."
Ayla saw the fire of excitement in the woman's eyes, and it reminded her of Jondalar's excitement when he was first developing the spearthrower. She realized that S'Armuna was reliving the thrill of discovery, and it convinced her.
Comment:
I have done a bit of pottery, and the quality of this piece amazes me. It is a masterwork, given the stage pottery had reached at the time, when even very ordinary pots and jugs had not yet been made. It appears glazed, but it is possibly a 'self glaze' where the material of which the figurine is made creates its own glaze during the firing. Powdered bone was added to the clay, which may have had an effect. When you also take into consideration the kiln, which cannot have come close to the temperature reached in a modern earthenware kiln ( I read somewhere that the pieces were fired to about 1300 F, or 700 C) it is even more astounding.
Don
Four musical instruments made by the mammoth hunters at Dolni Vestonice. On the left are three transversely cut and smoothed hollow bones which are thought to be flutes, and on the right a pipe made from the toe bone of a reindeer.
Photo: K. Sklenar, 'Hunters of the Stone Age'
Stylised female figurine used as a pendant, height 8.6 cm, made from mammoth ivory.
Photo: J Jelinek, 'The Evolution of Man'
More than 2,000 shards of burnt clay, ceramic
figures and fragments have been found during
the excavations conducted in Dolni
Vestonice. The extant ceramic figures are
mostly zoomorphic: bear (7.5 cm), bear head
(4.7 cm), rhinoceros head (4.2 cm), lioness
head (4.5 cm), horse head (8 cm),
reindeer head (3.8 cm) and two miniature
mammoth figures.
Pottery head of a rhinoceros, Dolni Vestonice
Photo: J Jelinek, 'The Evolution of Man'
Pottery head of a lioness, showing a wound just above the ear, from Dolni Vestonice
Photo: J Jelinek, 'The Evolution of Man'
Flint tools from Dolni Vestonice
Photo: J Jelinek, 'The Evolution of Man'
Photo: G. Clark, 'The Stone Age Hunters'
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Photo: J Jelinek, 'The Evolution of Man'
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Attaroa's speaking staff
Stylised figure of a woman engraved on a mammoth tusk from Predmost, an area close to Dolni Vestonice. Height 15.5 cm
From the book 'Plains of Passage' by Jean Auel, p537:
The staff itself was quite unusual. It was not newly carved, that much was obvious. The color of the mammoth ivory had begun to turn creamy, and the area where it was usually held was gray and shiny, caused by the accumulated dirt and oils of the many hands that had held it. It had been used by many generations.
The design carved into the straightened tusk was a geometric abstraction of the Great Earth Mother, formed by concentric ovals to shape the pendulous breasts, rounded belly, and voluptuous thighs. The circle was the symbol for all, everything, the totality of the known and unknown worlds, and symbolized the Great Mother of All. The concentric circles, especially the way they were used to suggest the important motherly elements, reinforced the symbolism.
The head was an inverted triangle, with the point forming the chin, and the base, curved slightly into a domelike shape, at the top. The downward pointing triangle was the universal symbol for Woman; it was the outward shape of her generative organ and therefore also symbolized motherhood and the Great Mother of All. The area of the face contained a horizontal series of double parallel bars, joined by laterally incised lines going from the pointed chin up to the position of the eyes. The larger space between the top set of double horizontal lines and the rounded lines that paralleled the curved top was filled in with three sets of double lines that were perpendicular, joining where eyes would usually be.
But the geometric designs were not a face. Except that the inverted triangle was placed in the position of a head, the carved markings would not even have suggested a face. The awesome countenance of the Great Mother was too much for an ordinary human to behold. Her powers were so great that Her look alone could overwhelm. The abstract symbolism of the figure on Attaroa's Speaking Staff conveyed that sense of power with subtlety and elegance.
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