Beauty of the Stone Age: “Paleolithic Venuses. Paleolithic Venus Religious History Compared to Modern Women

Perhaps this figurine, found in nature and requiring no modification, is one of the first portraits of women in the history of the Earth (Berekhat Ram, Golan Heights, Israel, 800-233 thousand BC, volcanic tuff, 3 cm, found in 1981).

Over time, figurines increasingly acquire feminine features. They are still far from the Upper Paleolithic masterpieces, but the path of development is already looming (800-232 thousand BC, Hebrew University, Jerusalem

“proto-veners” from the Gross Pampau locality, Germany, c. 0.5 million liters n.

Venus from Tan-Tan is an anthropomorphic quartzite figurine 580 mm long, discovered in 1999 by a German expedition in the floodplain of the Dra River south of the Moroccan city of Tan-Tan.
Together with Venus from Berehat Ram (known since 1981 from Palestinian materials), it is the oldest (500-300 thousand years) example of the "Paleolithic Venus" and, thus, perhaps the earliest monument of artistic creativity known to science.

The world's oldest figurine has been found in the Hohle Fels (Hollow Rocks) cave in southwestern Germany.

Only six centimeters high... Perhaps the most ancient female figurine known so far was presented at a press conference in Tübingen by German archaeologists who found it. She is about forty thousand years old. A small female figurine carved from mammoth tusk is one of the main archaeological sensations. recent years. Until now, during the excavations of settlements of the early Stone Age, only animal figurines have been found. "Swabian Venus", as it was called in Germany, was found in September last year south of Stuttgart, in a mountain range on the banks of one of the tributaries of the Danube. Several examinations carried out during this time confirmed the hopes of archaeologists: an unknown stone age master carved it 40 thousand years ago. That is, we are talking about the oldest sculptural image of a man known so far.

A cursory glance is enough to highlight the pronounced female physicality, the absence of a face and the complete inattention of the manufacturer to the study of the limbs in miniature Paleolithic figurines (Balzi Rossi, Italy, 25-20 thousand years BC, steatite, 6.1 cm,

The Vestonice Venus is a "Palaeolithic Venus" discovered in Moravia on July 13, 1925 and is currently on display at the Moravian Museum in Brno. It is the oldest ceramic figurine known to science. Height 11.1 cm, width 43 mm. Belongs to the Gravettian culture and dates variously - between 29,000 and 25,000 years. BC e.

Venus of Willendorf (German: Venus von Willendorf) is a small figurine of a female figure, discovered in one of the ancient burials near the town of Willendorf, in Austria, by archaeologist Josef Szombathy (German: Josef Szombathy) in 1908. It is currently kept in the Natural History Museum in Vienna.
The figurine, 11 cm high, is carved from oolitic limestone, which is not found in the area (which indicates the movements of the ancients) and tinted with red ocher. According to a 1990 estimate, the figurine was made approximately 22-24 thousand years before our era. Almost nothing is known either about the place, or about the method of manufacture, or about the cultural purpose of this figurine.

Zaraysk. Female figurine. 20 thousand BC Mammoth tusk. Dimensions: height - 16.6 cm; width at the shoulders - 4 cm, at the waist - 5.1 cm, at the hips - 5.5 cm; thickness at the shoulders - 3 cm, at the waist - 4.3 cm, at the hips - 4.4 cm. The ratio of the length of the body to the length of the legs is 8.6 / 7.6 cm.
Two female figurines carved from mammoth tusk, and whole line other art products of the Upper Paleolithic were found at the excavation site near Zaraisk (150 km from Moscow). As for the "Venuses", archaeologists have already found figurines of the Stone Age similar to them in a number of places from the Pyrenees to Siberia. And very similar to Zarayskie - in the village of Kostenki, Voronezh region and the village of Avdeevo, Kursk region, which speaks of cultural ties between these regions.
But there are still disputes among specialists regarding the cultural or religious purpose of the figurines.
It is curious that both figurines were carefully buried in special round pits, and from below under the figurines were placed fine sand and red ocher, and on top the ancient people covered the “Venus” with mammoth shoulder blades.

Neolithic Moravan Venus (22,800 years old) Moravani nad Vakh, Slovakia, mammoth bone, 7.7 cm. There is more information about the Neolithic, when agriculture began. It is assumed that people of the Linear Pottery culture came to the territory of Slovakia around 5000 BC. Remains of settlements, burial grounds (for example, in Nitra and Šturovo), remains of ceramics, votive gifts or cult objects, such as female figurines (“Paleolithic Venuses”) from Nitra Castle or Moravan nad Vahom, have been found.

Also known is Venus (pictured in the middle) from Savignano (Italy); the figurine is made of serpentine, its height is 22.5 centimeters.

pinnacle artistic skill is Venus from Lespug: it is carved from a mammoth bone, its height is 14.7 centimeters). Although her body has incredibly exaggerated features, it has a harmonious appearance and is made with great artistic taste. Her whole figure is symmetrical and forms a regular rhombus. A small head passes into a narrow chest, the body expands into strong sides and narrows again to barely outlined legs. Indeed, this is the work of a great master. In the Late Stone Age, an Aurignacian sculptor created what has come down to us as Venus from Lespug Cave, a Paleolithic female figure carved from mammoth tusk, found in 1922 in the upper Garonne River in France. This period covers 30-10 thousand years BC.

VENUS PALEOLITHIC Limestone figurine (center). Height -10.2 cm. Kostenki-1, the second residential complex. Age of the site: 22-23 thousand years. Two figurines made of mammoth tusk. Height -11.4 cm (left) and 9.0 cm (right). Kostenki-1, the first residential complex. Age of the site: 21-23 thousand years.

Kastinsk, Kostenyok, Kostenki... The name of a village on the Don River, 40 kilometers south of Voronezh. Sculptural figurines of naked women, nicknamed by archaeologists all over the world "Paleolithic Venuses", appeared on the territory of Europe 20-27 thousand years ago. For the first time, a fragment of such a figurine was discovered by archaeologists in 1894 in the town of Brassempouy in France. Then they began to be found at other Paleolithic sites in Europe, including ten well-preserved statuettes - in Kostenki-1, made of limestone and mammoth tusk.

Whom could these figurines with their hypertrophied volumes of the chest, abdomen and hips represent? Many assumptions have been made by our famous archaeologists. Some believed that these figurines were symbols of fertility and the unification of the family, others saw in them the attributes of hunting magic, others saw the mistresses of the forces of nature and even “superhuman female beings”

Not only the whole figurine, but also its sexually significant part could well satisfy a Paleolithic man (Kostenki, Russia, 23 thousand years BC, marl, 13.5 cm

They are commonly referred to as the Maltese Venuses. One of the striking features of the megalithic culture is the abundance of figurines and statues depicting stylized women. There are also images of men, as well as, let's say, people of unclear gender, but female figures clearly predominate. By the way, there are strange figurines in which you can change heads. In short, all these finds together allow at the moment to attribute the culture to a clearly matriarchal type with the cult of worship of the goddess (goddesses), the cult of fertility and abundance (the statuettes of women clearly show that they were not yet familiar with weight loss systems, and men were kept in a reasonable prosperity).

The largest of them has a height of about a meter, symbolizing, apparently, the mother goddess. As a rule, they are dated in the range of 3000 - 2500 BC. The buildings had a frankly cult purpose and have peculiar "altars", niches, stone tables, doorways, podiums and stairs.

"Paleolithic Venuses": the oldest works of art

Since the dawn of civilization, a special place in people's lives has been played by art, which in ancient times had a ritual character. Many are familiar with the so-called "Paleolithic Venuses" - figurines of the Upper Paleolithic era, depicting obese or pregnant women. The most significant of these findings will be discussed below.

Prehistoric figurines of women, which scientists called the general concept of "Paleolithic Venuses", were found mainly in Europe, but the range of such finds extended to most Eurasia up to Lake Baikal in Eastern Siberia.

Most of the Western European finds belong to the Gravettian culture dating back to 28-21 millennium BC. e., but figurines were found that belonged to the earlier Aurignacian culture (33-19 millennium BC).

Such ancient works of art include Venus from Hole Fels, discovered in a cave of the same name near the German city of Schelklingen. This is the oldest of the "Paleolithic Venuses" known to science, its age is determined between 35 and 40 thousand years. This figurine is recognized oldest work figurative art. Venus of Swabia, as this figurine is also called, is made of woolly mammoth tusk and represents the figure of an obese woman with a bright accent on her breasts and vulva. The figurine was preserved without some fragments, however, from the surviving part, it is clear to scientists that it was used as a pendant.

In our time, more than a hundred "Paleolithic Venuses" are known, which are made of soft rocks of stone, bones, tusks, and even molded from clay using firing. The size of such figurines varies from 4 to 25 cm. Sometimes such “Venuses” were also found in the form of bas-reliefs (Venus of Lossel).

One of the first "Paleolithic Venuses" found was Venus Brassempuiska, or "Hooded Lady". She was discovered near the French village of Brassempouy in 1892. Only a fragment depicting a woman's face remained from the statuette. This image is considered one of the earliest realistic images. human face generally.

In 1908, another famous "Paleolithic Venus" called the Venus of Willendorf was found in the Danube Valley in Austria. The figurine, 11 cm high, was carved from oolitic limestone. This material is not found in this area, and this is talking about the movements of ancient people. The figurine is tinted with red ocher and dates back to about 24-22 millennium BC. e. Venus of Willendorf is also made in an exaggerated manner, has a clearly defined navel, genitals and breasts, on which hands are folded.

The oldest ceramic figurine known to science is the Vestonice Venus, found in Moravia (Czech Republic) in 1925. Its age is dated within 29-25 millennium BC. e. It is noteworthy that during the tomographic study of the figurine, an ancient imprint of a child's hand, left before firing, was found on it.

The cultural significance of these figurines may never be known, as in the case of other prehistoric artifacts, scientists operate on only a small amount of facts in an attempt to interpret their meaning. Archaeologists suggest that the "Paleolithic Venuses" could be talismans, amulets and amulets, symbols of fertility and the ability of women to give viable offspring. Such figurines were rarely found in burials, most often they were found at the sites of ancient settlements.

VENUS: IN SEARCH OF THE ESSENCE

Every thing that has appeared in the world of people is immediately endowed with two attributes - a name and some, it happens, very far from the truth, designation of its essence. Paleolithic figurines of naked women were no exception to this rule.

As for the name, the word "Venus" stuck to the first figurine discovered. The Marquis de Vibret, who found this figurine in 1864 in Logerie Bass (dep. Dordogne, France), contrasting his find with the Hellenistic "Venus the Chaste", called the bone figurine he discovered "Venus Shameless".

Discovery of the Marquis de Vibre
initiated a new trend historical science –
the study of Paleolithic female figurines
(Logerie Bass, France, dep. Dordogne, 13 thousand years BC,
mammoth tusk, 8.0 cm).

For the time being, until the time when the find was the only one, the word "venus" was the name of this particular figurine. However, from the beginning of the 20th century, when a number of similar finds were already at the disposal of researchers, all female Paleolithic figurines began to be called Venuses, and already without an unflattering epithet.

The name, reflecting the eye-catching eroticism of the female image, turned out to be very successful. It has taken root. Moreover, it was precisely in this way - sexually accentuated - that the researchers of that time imagined the prehistoric ideal of female beauty. Let's not forget that the beginning of the 20th century was the time of the rise of Freudianism.

Venuses, as you well know, reader, are called Paleolithic female figurines today. I think we will not object to such a name. It satisfies us quite well.

Giving the figures a name was a relatively simple matter. It turned out to be much more difficult to look into the essence of the phenomenon, or, in other words, to understand why our distant ancestors made such peculiar images of women two decades ago. On this account, over a century and a half, a certain number of points of view, one way or another, differing from one another, have been formed. Let's combine them into several groups and take a critical look. But first, let's note the characteristic features of the figurines themselves. And let's do it in the form of questions. Moreover, in the future, we will definitely have to answer questions regarding the appearance of Venuses. After all, the appearance of the venuses is probably related to their purpose, and finding out the purpose of the figurines is our key task.

So, abstracting from episodic particulars, we review a very solid set of figurines discovered over a century and a half. Do you have questions, reader?

For example, I wonder why the figures are so small? Why do they not exceed the size of a palm? Don't you think that miniature figurines are easy to carry?

Why are the handles of Paleolithic venuses more like thin ropes, and the legs, devoid of feet, resemble some kind of stumps? Such figures cannot be installed in a vertical position. So they weren't meant to stand?

Why don't ancient figurines have faces? Maybe it didn't matter? Or maybe for some reason it was impossible to portray the face?

Finally, why do statuette makers display female attributes? Why are the breasts and buttocks hypertrophied? Why do some figurines have expressive genitals?

In Willendorf Venus exhaustively expressive
all four features of the ancient sculptural
images of a woman (Willendorf, Lower Austria,
23 thousand years BC, limestone with traces of ocher, 11.1 cm).

As you can see, dear reader, Venus has many interesting features. Keep them in mind when considering versions that try to explain the purpose of the statuettes (I will leave room for your thoughts in my critical review).

By the way, we have already met with one of the versions. As I noted, many researchers of the early 20th century saw in the Paleolithic Venuses the embodiment of the aesthetic ideal of the distant past, a kind of beauty standard of the Paleolithic era. Indeed, why shouldn't our prehistoric ancestors, weighed down by a still significant burden of the animal worldview, see beauty in an emphatically erotic nature? This point of view seems quite plausible.

But we must reject it. Why? I will name two reasons.

The first is that simply admiring, simply obtaining aesthetic satisfaction could not and did not exist at that time far from us. In deep primitiveness, the spiritual and the practical did not exist separately. They were closely intertwined, moreover, soldered to each other. Aesthetic feeling, art, ideal perception of the world, theoretical assessment of being are separated from the consumer, practical, gross materialistic only with the transition to a class society or, which is more familiar to the ear of an archaeologist, with the transition to the era of civilization.

Paleolithic figurines, due to their “location” in history, could not be objects of aesthetic satisfaction, could not be works of art designed to evoke aesthetic feelings. The use of venus had to be inscribed in the circle of the immediate needs of being. In a primitive - communist - society, female figurines were supposed to serve the implementation of some social function. By virtue of the nature of the collectivist system, they could in no case be tied by ownership to an individual person, they had to be in the public domain and, of course, be used in collective action. Finally, the venus had to be an object of a well-defined practical application. What? Such a question could not be raised by the adherents of the considered point of view. To stage it, it was necessary to go beyond the ordinary, ahistorical view of the past, it was necessary to understand that history, especially its period, which is essentially opposite to the current one, cannot be measured with its own - modern - meter. Unfortunately, the approach to history, in which aesthetics, art, or any other modern spiritual and ideological phenomena are automatically transferred to the past, is extremely tenacious and almost dominant.

The same group should include the views of our contemporaries, who see - a century later - in frank Paleolithic Venuses the same prehistoric "Playboy". Here, too, there is a transfer of the inactive erotic perception, which is quite natural today, into the distant past. I repeat, Venuses could not but be inscribed in some practical activities people, in some ritual that has developed on objective grounds.

A good illustration of the approach that emphasizes the aesthetics of erotica is the repeatedly shown on TV BBC film "Sex before our era." You may remember these shots, reader.

On the screen in the glow of the fire appears the profile of a hairy cave master, who has just made another erotic toy. He carefully holds it in his hands. The primitive esthete looks at his product with delight and lust...

Nothing to say, juicy and quite naturalistic. Only here is the trouble, the historical truth in this episode is twice turned inside out. Along with primitive aesthetics, we cannot accept the personality, or rather, the gender of the master. This is the second reason why we should reject the view that female figurines embodied the aesthetic, erotic ideal of primitiveness.

The fact is that primitive men (namely, they are seen by all authors writing about Venus as manufacturers of figurines) in principle could not be producers of erotic products, as well as its consumers. AT primitive era erotica and sex were taken out of the genus, which at that time was everywhere the only form of human community (in the future we will come to grips with this side of the life of the primitive society and explain why sexual activity was excluded from the interaction of relatives). Consequently, erotic figurines could only be produced by women. But for whom? Not for my own use. After all, not female, but male eyes tend to “consume” female nudity. For whom, then, were the erotic figurines intended? There can be only one answer to this question: the figurines were intended for men of other tribal organizations.

Isn't such an assumption too bold? No, it seems quite appropriate and logical: the primitive genus was exogamous ( exogamy means external marriage ), men and women of the clan entered into sexual relations, respectively, with women and men of another clan organization ... But let's not get ahead of ourselves. Let's wait a while with the formation of our own hypothesis and return to the topic of the chapter.

I think that the first group of versions that try to explain the purpose of female Paleolithic figurines can hardly satisfy us. However, in saying so, I cannot but agree with the idea of ​​the sexual-erotic purpose of the figurines. It would be extremely unreasonable to deny the eroticism of Paleolithic products - just look at the expressive forms of female figurines. I reject only a primitive and ahistorical view of ancient erotica, and not the idea of ​​erotica (and sex) as such. We reserve it for further consideration. And now we will continue the review of points of view on the problem of interest to us.

In the second group, I will include versions according to which female figurines were a reflection of reality and were portraits of real women. No doubt, the source of any more or less plausible image can only be the real world, real things and people. But why were female portraits made? Maybe for sensual contemplation? No, the time of portraiture and the attitude to the portrait known to us has not yet come. Just like admiration and aesthetic satisfaction, a reverent and impractical attitude to the image arises only during the transition to the era of civilization. The separation of the ideal from the practical requires enough high level development. As in the consideration of the first group of versions, here we find the same disease - an assessment of the world that is essentially opposite to ours through modern paradigms.

Female figurines could not be portraits for another reason. Where have you seen, dear reader, portraits without a face? But with pronounced sexual attributes. The "portrait" versions, with their naive simplicity, involuntarily push us to think about the erotic purpose of "portraits" and their use by men.

Finally, the "portrait" versions do not answer the question: why were male images not replicated? Why were the hunters on whom the existence of the clan depended not honored to be immortalized in stone or ivory? Maybe because at that time men were relegated to the background? According to the popular point of view on matriarchy, the then society was characterized by such a sexual social inequality. But is it? I will express my view on matriarchy a little later.

Let's move on to the third group of versions. In this group, I propose to unite seemingly heterogeneous, but upon closer examination, they turn out to be related views. By the way, the versions of this group are the most common and, one might even say, legalized.

What are these versions? These are versions according to which Paleolithic venuses are images of the ancestors, patrons of the family, keepers of the hearth, the embodiment of the cult of fertility, a symbol of unity and family ties, the personification of prosperity, sculptures of priestesses, a receptacle for collective spirits and even statues of the mother goddess. Venus and venerable authors (from A. Beguin to A.P. Okladnikov, P.P. Efimenko, Z.A. Abramova, A.D. Stolyar, R.F. Its and many others) endow such qualities (often several at once) ), and - after them - young researchers, and history students [see, for example: Efimenko P.P. Primitive society. Essays on the history of the Paleolithic time. - Kyiv, 1953; Abramova Z.A. Images of a person in the Paleolithic art of Eurasia. - M.-L., 1966; her own: Animal and human Paleolithic art Europe. - St. Petersburg, 2005; Stolyar A.D. Origin visual arts. - M., 1985 (A.D. Stolyar even sees in venus some abstract generalized idea, the result of "understanding the phenomena of social life" and believes that female figurines "were addressed to social thought much more than to the feelings of the individual")] . In the same vein, female Paleolithic figurines are perceived by non-professionals - readers of books and articles, where one way or another the topic of interest to us is touched upon.

Maybe our assumption about the use of statuettes by men is wrong, and we should join the authoritative majority? No, let's not act so recklessly. First, let's think, look for flaws in the arguments of the representatives of the third group of versions. Scientific problems are solved not by the weight of the majority and the height of the syllable, but solely by the power of arguments and facts.

But before we take up the arguments, we should probably find what unites the ancestors, the patroness of the family, the keepers of the hearth and all the other figurants of the above list. "calculate" such common denominator is not difficult. They are the special role of women in primitive society and her (women) veneration.

And now - to the arguments. Adherents of the third group of versions see this special role and veneration of women as such. What are they derived from? Of course, from matriarchy, which is understood as a system in which a woman, being the central figure, towered over society, enjoyed special respect and even exercised power. However, such a matriarchy, to put it mildly, bears little resemblance to the system that existed throughout primitive stage human history. Rise above society or some of its members, praise of individuals, religious veneration, the development of abstract generalized ideas, comprehension of the phenomena of social life divorced from practice, and finally, power appears, at first still in an undeveloped, rudimentary form, only on the approaches to the class, political society. All this is a product of the division of labor and the division of society into various social groups.

In the monolith, which is the primitive society both economically and socially, there is not and cannot be a special role for anyone, be it a man or a woman, there is no reverence and all other attributes of the class structure. If anyone rules and is honored in a primitive society, then this is just a custom and tradition, but by no means a person. Both men and women perform their functions there, not in the least deforming or infringing on the functions of the opposite sex. In a primitive society, a person can stand out from the environment of relatives only as a conductor of some function, for example, as a beater on a hunt, a scout for sources of food and materials, or as a coordinator of actions in an unfamiliar environment. But such a distinction makes him nothing more than an agent, if you like, a servant of custom, without turning other people into his servants and admirers. One and the same person can be “dedicated” for different areas of activity. Moreover, in the vast majority of cases, due to the specifics due to gender, it must be a man [see: Iskrin V.I. The dialectic of the sexes. – SPb., 2005]. Let him be called the leader. But this is not the leader of the Redskins of the period of military democracy from the novels of Fenimore Cooper, this is the leader of the primitive communist community. The primitive leader and the leader of pre-class and early class society are very different figures and different from one another. social phenomena. This is evidenced in some places by the surviving rudiments of the primitive social structure.

Thus, to appeal to matriarchy, into which the features of the political system are transferred, means to use poor-quality arguments. Whether this is done out of ignorance or with intent, we will not understand, reader.

What is matriarchy really? And did he even exist? Let us try to briefly answer these questions (in the future, the picture of the functioning of a non-political society will be supplemented).

The marriage of primitive society was group. Moreover, groups of men and women belonging to different tribal organizations entered into sexual relations. Their meetings were infrequent and short-lived. There was no question of any kind of acquaintance, courtship and other innovations of the period of civilization in such conditions. The result of such meetings, of course, were children. But people of ancient times did not yet know that the birth of children is associated with famous role men (however, even now ethnographers observe such a gap in knowledge among some peoples who are lagging behind in development). It is clear that the birth of children by women was not a secret. Children born to women remained in the family of mothers.

How could generations be compared under such conditions? On what line could kinship be counted? No need to explain that only maternal, feminine. This is precisely the essence of matriarchy (literally translated matriarchy means women power which is completely false and unscientific). Matriarchy, therefore, would be correctly called not a form of social organization, but, so to speak, a technical tool for counting kinship and drawing a line in the history of the clan. From such an order, from the method of counting generations, the special role and veneration of women in no way follows.

Against the idea of ​​exalting and honoring the primitive woman, I have one more argument in store. It turns out that the female figurines were not only carefully preserved, but, and this, however, concerns some of the discovered figurines, they were deliberately broken. Very authoritative archaeologists come to this conclusion. PER. Abramova, assuming that figurines were part of some ceremonies, notes that at the present level of knowledge, we cannot yet say why this happened. Perhaps we, dear reader, will be able to solve this riddle. Let's take note of this fact. However, let's not digress from the topic.

Perhaps this fragment of a female figurine
is the result of a deliberate blow to it
(Kostenki, Russia, Voronezh region, 22.7 thousand years BC, marl, 13.5 cm).

Are reverence and destruction of what is revered compatible? I think no. But if the smashing is a fact, and the veneration is the fruit of an imagination torn off from historical reality, what must we discard in order to get out of this collision? Fact or illusion? Of course, the last one.

The "theory" of reverence and the special role of women does not bring us any closer to finding out the truth. The truth is not always on the side of the majority. The views of the representatives of the third group, like those of the first two, also sin by transferring modern realities into the depths of history, during the reign of an order that is fundamentally opposite to the current one. As you can see, the disease we are facing has the character of an epidemic.

In conclusion, I will mention one more group of views. Representatives of the fourth group believe that naturalistic figurines were used in antiquity to teach girls, to initiate the younger generation into women's mysteries. Earnestly? I don't think so. For the question immediately arises: is not a real, living woman the best nature? And one more thing: why were no male figurines made to train future women, as well as future men? By the way, boys are not mentioned at all as trainees by representatives of this group. But these are nitpicks that lie on the surface.

It is much more important to ask: did training exist in that distant era as special kind activities? I must disappoint the doctors of ancient pedagogy. In a society that does not know the social division of labor, education, as well as education, was woven into the functioning of the social organism, was literally poured into the process of production of things and people and formed a single whole with it. In that distant time, life itself was a school and a teacher, and visual aids were people, their interaction, social labor and the results of such labor. Human activity branches out only in the era of transition to a class society. And only in such a - divided, class - society does education appear as a special branch of activity, with a whole arsenal of special means, including visual aids. So, in the absence of it, Venus has nothing to do with the special education of girls (and boys).

Teaching the Rising Generation the "Sacraments"
sexual properties and related visual aids
appear only with the transition to a class society
(Nizhny Novgorod province, Russia, Russians, fabric, 17.0 and 16.0 cm,
reconstruction, izg. N.Larionova).

Such are the views that existed in the past and are currently in circulation regarding the purpose of the Paleolithic Venuses.

You are probably tired of parsing these fruitless versions, dear reader. What to do, we had to drink the cup to the bottom. Starting work, it is necessary to represent the state of the issue taken for research. We have covered almost all views on the purpose of the Paleolithic figurines. And what? Among the various points of view, we do not find a single one that could serve as an aid to our work. Maybe it's even for the best. We start positive work, not being bound by any attitudes, stereotypes, so-called authoritative opinions and the need to check every step with the venereal literature.

But this is not the only benefit we can derive from a critical part of our work. Thanks to the mistakes of our predecessors, we now clearly see what not to do and how to act in order not to miss.

I will present my methodological guidelines as a summary of the chapter.

1. Having considered an almost complete set of views on the purpose of the Paleolithic Venuses, we, with all the differences in the existing interpretations, found something in common that connects them and at the same time makes them completely untenable. This is an inability to approach the past historically, a misunderstanding of the dialectics of social development, an involuntary desire to transfer modern realities (ethics, art, the rise of the individual over society, worship, religion, etc.) into a completely different world compared to ours. primitive man.

In no case should we approach history with today's standards.

2. In social science, a difference of opinion in the assessment of one event or phenomenon is not uncommon. This sad fate did not escape the question of the place of Venuses in primitive society. Where do the differences come from? If the problem under consideration does not affect anyone's interests, there are usually three sources of discrepancies - limited or flawed ideas about the socio-economic structure of the society under study, the inability or unwillingness to study the phenomenon chosen for analysis in the context of this structure, and the notorious "common sense", on verification turns out to be elementary subjectivism. All the troubles with finding out the purpose of Venus are connected with this trinity.

To solve the problem before us, we must have an adequate understanding of public relations and the way of life of the primitive society, proceed from these relations in your analysis, conduct an objective investigation, firmly adhering to the materialistic line.

And, I must say, in this chapter we have already done something in this direction. We drew attention to the fusion of the spiritual and practical in the worldview of primitive man, ascertained group marriage and exogamy of the clan, raised the question of a man in an egalitarian primitive society, and defined matriarchy as a tool for accounting for kinship.

In the future, the blanks made by us will be developed.

Finally, we began to develop the topic chosen for the study. Based on the essence of the primitive system, we have designated a series functional characteristics Paleolithic female figurines. This is, firstly, their involvement in the practice of being and the need to participate in any ritual, secondly, the focus of figurines on solving certain social problems, their belonging to the public domain and involvement in some kind of collective action, and thirdly , the obligation to make figurines by women of one clan for use by men of another clan organization.

3. If the object of study is not random and single and stands out with catchy features, then history needed it for something, and it is needed, most likely, for its intended purpose. Since Venuses are sexually expressive, we should take this clue and pay attention first of all to the order of interaction of the sexes in primitive society. Perhaps this step will lead us to the road leading to the solution of the problem we have set.

At the same time, we must consider the sphere of relations between the sexes in the closest connection with the whole complex of social relations.

4. In our critical examination of approaches to the Venusian problem, we managed with a minimum of arguments. It seems that this minimum was quite enough to recognize the current decisions as frivolous. All of these arguments were of a logical nature. Only once, and then in passing, did I refer to ethnographic data.

History is not something that has completely disappeared into time. The past leaves and remains, remains in the form of customs, traditions, remnants. The past lives in everyday life, customs and ideas of peoples.

We cannot fail to take advantage of the richest source of ethnographic knowledge (as well as knowledge of other sciences). And not only for the purpose of a better study of the phenomena of the distant past. Who knows, maybe the trace of the Venuses stretched through the millennia and in our days.

Female figurines made of stone and bone, faceless, but with emphasized signs of a feminine, giving birth nature, were very widespread in the Upper Paleolithic throughout Northern Eurasia. Almost certainly, they reflected the maternal womb of the earth reviving to furnace life. Vestonice "Venuses" are especially interesting because they are made of clay and fired. These are almost the first samples of terracotta in the history of mankind (25,500 lots ago).

Paleolithic "Venus" of the Aurignacian time:

a) from Willendorf, Austria. Height 11 cm. Limestone;

b) from Sapinnano, Italy. Height 22.5 cm. Serpentine;

in) from Lespuju, France. Height 14.7 cm. mammoth bone;

G) from Dolni Vestonice, Czech Republic. Terracotta

a massive horn in his hand, very reminiscent of cornucopias, but most likely this is a sign of the presence of the Bison God.

And it’s not that the Paleolithic artist simply couldn’t or didn’t want to depict feminine beauty. On several monuments, we can see that he did this perfectly in principle - an ivory head (Brassempui), a relief in the La Madeleine cave, discovered in 1952. But the figurines and images of "Venuses" by no means set out to glorify the perfection of female beauty.

The finds made in Ukraine by K. Polikarpovich clarify the meaning of the strange figurines. In the sanctuary on the Desna, in addition to skulls and tusks of a mammoth, in addition to howler monkeys, he also found a female figurine made of ivory of the Venus type. It used to be attached to something and was part of the mortuary sanctuary.

A pregnant woman at the feet of a deer.

Large ungulates, bison, mammoths, deer, bulls become in the Upper Paleolithic in an almost universal way heavenly god. They, the bearers of the male “family” principle, give life, which the “Mother Earth” accepts and bears in her womb. Was it not this thought that directed the chisel of the Upper Paleolithic master from Laugèrie-Basse when he worked on the image of a pregnant woman at the feet of a deer?

Most likely, these "Venuses" were images of "Mother Earth", pregnant with the dead, who still have to be born again by eternal life. Perhaps the essence depicted in this way was the genus itself in its course from ancestors to descendants, the Great Mother, always producing life. In Ukraine, in Gagarin, seven such figurines were located along the walls of the Madeleine dugout. They stood in special niches. It certainly was an object of worship. For the guardian of the clan, individual "personal" signs are not important. She is forever pregnant with life the womb, the mother who feeds her milk forever. It is unlikely that the thoughts of the ancients rose to high abstractions, but if they buried their dead in the ground, then they believed in their resurrection, and if they did, they could not help but worship the Mother-Raw-Earth, which gives food, life and rebirth.

The hopes of the Cro-Magnons were not limited to the earth, they aspired with their souls to the heavenly God-Beast, the all-powerful giver of life. But from the experience of everyday life, they knew perfectly well that the seed of life must find the soil in which alone it can germinate. The seed of life gave the sky, the soil - the earth. The worship of Mother Earth, so natural among agricultural peoples, actually turns out to be older than agriculture, since the purpose of worship was for ancient man not the harvest of the earth, but the life of the age to come.

Mircea Eliade is very mistaken when, in the introduction to The Sacred and the Worldly, he asserts: “After all, it is obvious that the symbolism

and cults of Mother Earth, human fertility, ... the sacredness of Women, etc. were able to develop and form a widely ramified religious system only thanks to the discovery of agriculture. It is equally obvious that the pre-agrarian nomad society was not able to feel the sacredness of Mother Earth as deeply and with the same force. Differences in experience are the result of economic, social and cultural differences, in a word - History" 1 - "Obvious" is not yet true, the religious scholar should have known this better than others. The cults of the Mother Earth hunters of the Upper Paleolithic force us to assume that the religious is not always a product of the social and economic, but is sometimes their cause and premise.

For a better understanding of all the ambiguity of causes and effects in human culture, the figurines of “Venuses” from Dolnja Vestonice are especially interesting. Vestonice "Venuses" are made of clay and fired. These are almost the first samples of terracotta in the history of mankind (25,500 years ago). The ancient mystic must have tried to capture in the material itself the great idea of ​​the earth uniting with the heavenly fire to receive the heavenly seed. Maybe a lightning strike that melted the soil brought him to these images. At least twelve millennia separate these clay figurines of Mother Earth, specially fire-fired, from household ceramics that appeared in the early Neolithic.

Very characteristic and discovered in the late 1950s under the canopy of the rocky shelter of Angles-sur-l "Anglin (Angles-sur-1" Anglin, Vienne, France) is the scene of the Madeleine time. Three women, with clearly underlined signs of their gender, stand close to each other. One - with narrow girlish hips, the other - pregnant, the third - old, flabby. The first stands on the back of a bison, whose tail is raised and whose head is bowed, showing that it is depicted in the excitement of the rut. Doesn't this relief reflect the rhythm of life and emphasize that for the Cro-Magnon this life was not an accident, but a divine gift, a seed of God, which must be properly disposed of in order to gain eternity? Or maybe this is the first of a long series of images of the Great Goddess in her three images - an innocent girl, a mother and an old woman of death, images - so characteristic of later humanity? Death, withdrawal from life in this case turns out not to be a complete disappearance, but only a stage of being, followed by a new conception by a divine seed, a new birth.

1 M. Eliade. Sacred and mundane. M., 1994. S. 20-21 (with correction of mistakes made during translation).

complete disappearance, but only a stage of being, followed by a new conception by the divine seed, a new birth.

« Venus Paleolithic"- a generalizing concept for many prehistoric figurines of women with common features(many depicted obese or pregnant), dating from the Upper Paleolithic. Figurines are found mainly in Europe, but the range of finds extends far to the east up to the Malta site in the Irkutsk region, that is, to most of Eurasia: from the Pyrenees to Lake Baikal.

Most of the Western European finds belong to the Gravettian culture, but there are also earlier ones related to the Aurignacian culture, including "Venus from Hole Fels" (discovered in 2008 and dated at least 35 thousand years ago); and later, already belonging to the Madeleine culture.

These figurines are carved from bones, tusks, and soft stone (such as steatite, calcite, marl, or limestone). There are also figurines sculpted from clay and subjected to firing, which is one of the oldest examples of ceramics known to science. In general, by the beginning of the 21st century, more than a hundred "Venus" were known, most of which are relatively small in size - from 4 to 25 cm in height.

Discovery history

The first statuettes of the Upper Paleolithic era depicting women were discovered around 1864 by the Marquis de Vibraye in Logerie Bass (Dordogne department) in southwestern France. Vibre called his find “Venus impudique” (Venus impudique), thus contrasting it with the “Venus modest” (Venus Pudica) of the Hellenistic pattern, one example of which is the famous “Venus Medicean”. The statuette from Laugèrie-Basse belongs to the Madeleine culture. She is missing her head, arms, and legs, but has a clear incision made to represent the vaginal opening. Another discovered and recognized instance of such figurines was the Venus of Brassempuiska, found by Édouard Piette in 1894 in a cave dwelling on the territory of the town of the same name in France. Initially, the term "Venus" was not applied to her. Four years later, Salomon Reinach published a description of a whole group of steatite figurines from the Balzi Rossi caves. The famous Venus of Willendorf was found during excavations in 1908 in loess deposits in the Danube River Valley, Austria. Since then, hundreds of similar figurines have been found in the territory from the Pyrenees to Siberia. Scientists of the early 20th century engaged in the study primitive societies, considered them the embodiment of the prehistoric ideal of beauty and, therefore, gave them a common name in honor of the Roman goddess of beauty, Venus.

In September 2008, archaeologists from the University of Tübingen discovered a 6 cm figurine of a woman made from mammoth tusk - "Venus from Hole Fels", dating back to at least 35 thousand BC. e. It is currently the oldest example of sculptures of this kind and figurative art in general (the origin of the much more ancient figurine of Venus from Tan-Tan is controversial, although it is estimated at 300-500 thousand years). The carved figurine was found in 6 fragments in the Hole-Fels cave, Germany, and represents a typical Paleolithic "Venus" with a pronouncedly large belly, widely spaced hips and large breasts.

Description

Most of the statuettes of the "Paleolithic Venuses" have common artistic characteristics. The most common are diamond-shaped figures, narrowed at the top (head) and bottom (legs), and wide in the middle (belly and hips). Some of them noticeably emphasize certain anatomical features. human body: abdomen, thighs, buttocks, breasts, vulva. Other parts of the body, on the other hand, are often neglected or absent, especially the arms and legs. The heads are also usually relatively small and lack detail.

In this regard, disputes arose regarding the legitimacy of using the term steatopygia, in relation to the "Paleolithic Venus". This question was first raised by Édouard Piette, who discovered the "Venus of Brassempui" and some other specimens in the Pyrenees. Some researchers consider these characteristics as real physiological traits, similar to those observed in representatives of the Khoisan peoples. South Africa. Other researchers dispute this view and explain them as a symbol of fertility and abundance. It should be noted that not all Paleolithic Venuses are obese and have exaggerated feminine features. Also, not all figurines are devoid of facial features. However, the appearance of statuettes, similar friend to each other in style and in certain proportions, allows us to talk about the formation of a single artistic canon: the chest and hips fit into a circle, and the whole image into a rhombus.

"Venus of Willendorf" and "Venus of Lossel" were, apparently, covered with red ocher. The meaning of this is not fully understood, but usually the use of ocher is associated with a religious or ritual act - perhaps symbolizing blood during menstruation or the birth of a child.

All the "Paleolithic Venuses" recognized by the majority belong to the Upper Paleolithic (mainly to the Gravettian and Solutrean cultures). At this time, figurines with obese figures predominate. In Madeleine culture, the forms become more graceful and with more detail.

Notable examples

title	age (thousand years)	place of discovery	material
Venus from Hole Fels	35-40	Swabian Alb, Germany	mammoth tusk
man-lion	32	Swabian Alb, Germany	mammoth tusk
Vestonica Venus	27-31	Moravia	ceramics
Venus of Willendorf	24-26	Austria	limestone
Venus of Lespug	23	Aquitaine, France	Ivory
Venus Malta	23	Irkutsk region, Russia	mammoth tusk
Venus Brassempuiska	22	Aquitaine, France	Ivory
Venera Kostenkovskaya	21-23	Voronezh region, Russia	mammoth tusk, limestone, marl
Venus Losselskaya	20	Dordogne, France	limestone

Venus, the artificial origin of which has not been proven

title	age (thousand years)	place of discovery	material
Venus from Tan-Tan	300-500	Morocco	quartzite
Venus from Berehat Rama	230	golan heights	tuff

Classification

Of several attempts to create a classification of Upper Paleolithic figurines, the least controversial is that proposed by Henri Delporte, based on a purely geographical principle. He distinguishes:

Interpretation

Many attempts to understand and interpret the meaning and use of statuettes are based on a small amount of evidence. As with other prehistoric artifacts, their cultural significance may never be known. However, archaeologists speculate that they may have been protective and good luck charms, fertility symbols, pornographic images, or even directly related to the Mother Goddess or other local deities. Female figurines, which are examples of Late Paleolithic portable art, do not appear to have had any practical subsistence use. For the most part, they were found on the sites of ancient settlements, both in open sites and in caves. Their use in burials is much less common.

At the site of the Late Paleolithic era near the village. Gagarino in the Lipetsk region, in an oval semi-dugout with a diameter of about 5 meters, 7 figurines of naked women were found, which are believed to have served as amulets-amulets. In the parking lot at Malta in the Baikal region, all the figurines were found on the left side of the dwellings. Most likely, these figurines were not hidden, but, on the contrary, were placed in a prominent place where everyone could see them (this is one of the factors that can explain their wide geographical distribution)

The noticeable corpulence of the figurines may be associated with a fertility cult. In times before agriculture and pastoralism, and in times of lack of access to abundant food supplies, being overweight could symbolize the desire for abundance, fertility, and security. However, these theories are not a scientifically indisputable fact and only the result of the speculative conclusions of scientists.

Recently found 2 very ancient stone objects (dating 500,000 - 200,000 years ago) are also interpreted by some researchers as an attempt to convey the image of women. One of them, "Venus from Berehat-Ram", was discovered on the Golan Heights, the second - "Venus from Tan-Tan" - in Morocco. The question of their origin is debatable: whether they were processed by man to give them a more anthropomorphic look, or whether they took this form due to purely natural factors.

Some scholars suggest that there is a direct connection between "Paleolithic Venuses" and later images of women in the Neolithic, and even the Bronze Age. However, these views do not have confirmation and are not consistent with the fact that such images are absent in the era