The hardness and the eternal: petrification of human images and social contradiction
Channel: Recording Archaeology
Date: 2016-12-17

The formalization of human images as figurines can be seen as a relevant act of selfrepresentation, reflecting an idea of the human being and possibly of the sacred. In fact, as we may be experiencing even today, iconoclastic attitudes are important in allowing, or denying, space for peculiar representations, and the human one is a core problem in that sense. Anyway, when we can observe human representation to take place, we can easily recognize differences in materials implied, and in the size and context of the representation.

The quantitative analysis of the observable materials can suggest different attention was played in setting figurines in connection with concepts like durability and social transmission of messages. Anyway, other formation processes of the archaeological record are relevant, too: factors of preservation of different materials should bring more caution in evaluating presence/absence of less durable materials as used in the production of figurines and statues. The use of different materials can also underline different strategies of dissemination of information, of its personal use and of “democratization” of the impact of the underlying message. The case can be raised of contradictions in the social context of message transmission.
The theoretical situation and a model of analysis will be explained through cases involving a trans- Mediterranean perspective (i.e. both in Africa and in the Near East and in Mediterranean Europe), during the Neolithic and up to the Bronze Age.