3 ms·

The article just mentions them as being pre-historic pinups. Curiously the romans left us lots of phaluses but I don’t remember venuses being prevalent. Great c

The article just mentions them as being pre-historic pinups. Curiously the romans left us lots of phaluses but I don’t remember venuses being prevalent. Great cocktail material

adrian_b 3y ago
The supposition of them being pinups implies that they were intended to be used by adults. Had they been dolls, they would have been intended to be used by children. The first supposition might be supported by the fact that carving any of these would have required much work, which might have not been justified for just making toys. On the other hand it is easier to imagine children playing with such small statues than a busy adult using them for any purpose. It is unlikely that the kind of dwellings that may have existed at that time included any part that could have been decorated with such figures. The article contains the supposition that they may have been used as some kind of home guardians, but the choice of a small feisty female figure does not seem very appropriate for such a role (instead of a more scary guardian). Perhaps they could have been owned by some shamans who used them in some rituals and they were small to be easily carried in their luggage, but being just toys for children seems an equally likely possibility.
- ptsneves 3y ago
  Not sure if you read the article but it mentions the dolls had preeminent vulvas and sexual attributes. I think that excludes the children usage supposition. The symbolic or humorous interpretation is much more plausible.
  - klyrs 3y ago
    The article also mentions a child's fingerprint surviving in a clay figurine. This comment section is pretty wild; the article is pretty clear that there is a lack of consensus and multiple competing theories, yet so many comments seem to pick a single theory and run with that in exclusion of others. Given that these figurines were being produced for over 10k years with a global distribution, I'm gonna go out on a limb and suggest that multiple mutually exclusive interpretations could have been true in different places and times. And, hell, Barbie. In the last 100 years, we have observed a doll in the form of an adult woman go from being successfully marketed to adult men, to being successfully marketed to young girls. Why would we assume these Venus figurines had a single purpose?
  - adrian_b 3y ago
    The fact that the body parts that identified the statues as females were emphasized is likely to have been much less erotic at a time when nudity was frequent and unlikely to be hidden from the others. Emphasizing the fertility in the statues is a reason to believe that they could have been intended for use in some rituals or as good-luck charms, but it certainly would not have been a reason to censor their use by children who would have been habitually exposed to nudity, unlike today.
    - neuromanser 3y ago
      Children were most probably routinely exposed not just to nudity but also sex.

The article just mentions them as being pre-historic pinups. Curiously the romans left us lots of phaluses but I don’t remember venuses being prevalent. Great cocktail material

adrian_b 3y ago

The supposition of them being pinups implies that they were intended to be used by adults. Had they been dolls, they would have been intended to be used by children. The first supposition might be supported by the fact that carving any of these would have required much work, which might have not been justified for just making toys. On the other hand it is easier to imagine children playing with such small statues than a busy adult using them for any purpose. It is unlikely that the kind of dwellings that may have existed at that time included any part that could have been decorated with such figures. The article contains the supposition that they may have been used as some kind of home guardians, but the choice of a small feisty female figure does not seem very appropriate for such a role (instead of a more scary guardian). Perhaps they could have been owned by some shamans who used them in some rituals and they were small to be easily carried in their luggage, but being just toys for children seems an equally likely possibility.

ptsneves 3y ago
Not sure if you read the article but it mentions the dolls had preeminent vulvas and sexual attributes. I think that excludes the children usage supposition. The symbolic or humorous interpretation is much more plausible.
- klyrs 3y ago
  The article also mentions a child's fingerprint surviving in a clay figurine. This comment section is pretty wild; the article is pretty clear that there is a lack of consensus and multiple competing theories, yet so many comments seem to pick a single theory and run with that in exclusion of others. Given that these figurines were being produced for over 10k years with a global distribution, I'm gonna go out on a limb and suggest that multiple mutually exclusive interpretations could have been true in different places and times. And, hell, Barbie. In the last 100 years, we have observed a doll in the form of an adult woman go from being successfully marketed to adult men, to being successfully marketed to young girls. Why would we assume these Venus figurines had a single purpose?
- adrian_b 3y ago
  The fact that the body parts that identified the statues as females were emphasized is likely to have been much less erotic at a time when nudity was frequent and unlikely to be hidden from the others. Emphasizing the fertility in the statues is a reason to believe that they could have been intended for use in some rituals or as good-luck charms, but it certainly would not have been a reason to censor their use by children who would have been habitually exposed to nudity, unlike today.
  - neuromanser 3y ago
    Children were most probably routinely exposed not just to nudity but also sex.