The Venus of Lespugue is a

Venus figurine A Venus figurine is any Upper Palaeolithic statuette portraying a woman, usually carved in the round.Fagan, Brian M., Beck, Charlotte, "Venus Figurines", ''The Oxford Companion to Archaeology'', 1996, Oxford University Press, pp. 740–741 Most ...

, a

statue A statue is a free-standing sculpture in which the realistic, full-length figures of persons or animals are carved or cast in a durable material such as wood, metal or stone. Typical statues are life-sized or close to life-size; a sculpture t ...

tte of a nude female figure of the

Gravettian The Gravettian was an archaeological industry of the European Upper Paleolithic that succeeded the Aurignacian circa 33,000 years BP. It is archaeologically the last European culture many consider unified, and had mostly disappeared by 2 ...

, dated to between 26,000 and 24,000 years ago.

Discovery

It was discovered in 1922 in the Rideaux cave of

Lespugue Lespugue (; oc, Era Espuga) is a commune in the Haute-Garonne department in southwestern France. Population See also *Venus of Lespugue *Communes of the Haute-Garonne department The following is a list of the 586 communes of the French ...

(Haute-Garonne) in the foothills of the

Pyrenees The Pyrenees (; es, Pirineos ; french: Pyrénées ; ca, Pirineu ; eu, Pirinioak ; oc, Pirenèus ; an, Pirineus) is a mountain range straddling the border of France and Spain. It extends nearly from its union with the Cantabrian Mountains to ...

by René de Saint-Périer (1877-1950). Approximately 6 inches (150 mm) tall, it is carved from

tusk Tusks are elongated, continuously growing front teeth that protrude well beyond the mouth of certain mammal species. They are most commonly canine teeth, as with pigs and walruses, or, in the case of elephants, elongated incisors. Tusks share ...

ivory Ivory is a hard, white material from the tusks (traditionally from elephants) and teeth of animals, that consists mainly of dentine, one of the physical structures of teeth and tusks. The chemical structure of the teeth and tusks of mammals i ...

, and was damaged during excavation.

Features

Of all the

steatopygous Steatopygia is the state of having substantial levels of tissue on the buttocks and thighs. This build is not confined to the gluteal regions, but extends to the outside and front of the thighs, and tapers to the knee producing a curvilinear f ...

Venus figurines discovered from the upper Paleolithic, the Venus of Lespugue, if the reconstruction is sound, appears to display the most exaggerated female secondary sexual characteristics, especially the extremely large, pendulous breasts. According to textile expert

Elizabeth Wayland Barber Elizabeth Jane "Betchen" Wayland Barber (also E. J. W. Barber) is an American scholar and expert on archaeology, linguistics, textiles, and folk dance as well as Professor emerita of archaeology and linguistics at Occidental College. Early life W ...

,Elizabeth Wayland Barber, (1994) ''Women's Work: The First 20,000 Years: Women, Cloth, and Society in Early Times'', W. W. Norton and Company, pg. 44, ASIN 0393035060. the statue displays the earliest representation found of spun thread, as the carving shows a skirt hanging from below the hips, made of twisted fibers, frayed at the end.

Location

The Venus of Lespugue resides in France, at the

Musée de l'Homme The Musée de l'Homme (French, "Museum of Mankind" or "Museum of Humanity") is an anthropology museum in Paris, France. It was established in 1937 by Paul Rivet for the 1937 ''Exposition Internationale des Arts et Techniques dans la Vie Moderne ...

Notes

External links

Don Hitchcock (Don's Maps): "The Lespugue Venus is a 25 000 years old ivory figurine of a nude female figure"
*https://web.archive.org/web/20040413133422/http://www.arthistory.sbc.edu/imageswomen/lespugue.html {{Venus figurines

Haute-Garonne Archaeological discoveries in France Ivory works of art Prehistoric art in France Gravettian