"Peculiar People: Plaque Figurines from Wah-sut (South Abydos)"

AIA - San Diego 2019 , 2019

Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 72, 2023

Clay figurines represent one of the ideal object categories for tracing the profile of their makers since they preserve traces of the maker’s gestures. The scope of the article is to reconstruct the different manufacturing steps of clay figurines, assess the complexity of the shaping sequences and study fingerprints to trace the profile of people who produced such artefacts in the ancient village of Lahun (Egypt, MBA II, c. 1800–1700 BC). The high number of production chains revealed that, despite an apparent roughness, clay figurine production was characterised by high stylistic and technological variability, indicating several levels of skill possessed by their producers. On this basis, Lahun clay figurines were not an extemporary or standardised product. A neat division can be established between anthropomorphic figurines and those representing animals, which show a lower degree of complexity and an attempt not to define clear shapes. Most of the figurines were revealed to be mainly shaped by adults, while children contributed in a marginal way to their production. However, the presence of sub-adult fingerprints on some of the clay figurines indicates that children were active agents producing material culture and integrating part of the adult production process through cooperation and/or playing.

Style and Society in the Prehistory of West Asia. Essays in Honour of Olivier P. Nieuwenhuyse , 2023

This paper discusses a small group of figurines found in the Early Pottery Neolithic levels of Operation III at Tell Sabi Abyad in Syria. This group of 18 objects forms a unique group within the larger corpus of figurines discovered at the site. Their most salient feature is the presence of round appliqués, often with fingernail impressions, placed on the bases of these objects. A brief discussion of the figurines from the site will be followed by object biographies of the 18 figurines, focussing on their production, use and deposition. Finally, I will reflect on the nature of these figurines in relation to Olivier Nieuwenhuyse’s research on appliqués on pottery and whether we might interpret the appliqués on pottery and figurines as similar phenomena.

Predynastic clay figurines, especially the ones representing bovines, have often been considered to be ritual in nature and purpose (most recently and prominently by David Anderson, in the context of his excavations at el-Mahâsna). However, previous studies did not take into account the fact that differentiated archaeological contexts (settlements, children’s tombs and adult tombs) matched differentiated typologies of the figurines and were therefore likely to bear testimony to differentiated practices. Through a re-examination of the precise archaeological context data from the el-Mahâsna settlement, a new hypothesis is proposed for differentiating those uses and understanding their relation to the difference in the shape of these figurines. The author suggests that differences in morphology and typology actually echo differences in uses, some of them being specifically made for funerary contexts while others could be children toys.

P.Ciafardoni, D. Giannessi ( eds.) From the Treasures of Syria. Essays on Art and Archaeology in Honour of Stefania Mazzoni, Leiden , 2015

Clay Figurines in Context: Miniatures as Crucibles of Nile Valley Societies in the Second Millennium BC (Egypt and Nubia), 2022

Arabian Archaeology and Epigraphy, 2004

Levant, 2010

Female plaque figurines are the dominant type of anthropomorphic clay figurines in the Southern Levant of the Late Bronze Age. Unfortunately, there is no updated catalogue. The close study of fragments (the vast majority of the corpus) and of basic aspects (such as production modes, techniques, patterns of use/disposal) is at times overshadowed by the heated debate about the interpretation -the religious significance -of these figurines. We publish two newly excavated fragments of a unique type of plaque figurine, limited in distribution to northern Palestine. Unlike other plaque figurines, it is moulded on both sides. We present a detailed list and a study of the type and suggest that it is not double-moulded, as assumed by all former scholars, but produced by the double use of single moulds (hence, 'twice moulded'). Indeed, this does not tell us whether such figurines are goddess/es, mortal worshippers or something else. Trying to answer this question before the basic data is collected and analysed is likely to end in speculation. Is it Anat, Astarte, Asherah or perhaps Ashdoda? Readers are welcome to use their imagination.