Interpreting Ancient Figurines

Context, Comparison, and Prehistoric Art

Richard G. Lesure (University of California, Los Angeles)

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English

Cambridge University Press
21 February 2011

History of art: pre-history; Prehistoric archaeology

This book examines ancient figurines from several world areas to address recurring challenges in the interpretation of prehistoric art. Sometimes figurines from one context are perceived to resemble those from another. Richard G. Lesure asks whether such resemblances play a role in our interpretations. Early interpreters seized on the idea that figurines were recurringly female and constructed the fanciful myth of a primordial Neolithic Goddess. Contemporary practice instead rejects interpretive leaps across contexts. Dr Lesure offers a middle path: a new framework for assessing the relevance of particular comparisons. He develops the argument in case studies that consider figurines from Paleolithic Europe, the Neolithic Near East and Formative Mesoamerica.

By: Richard G. Lesure (University of California Los Angeles)
Imprint: Cambridge University Press
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions: Height: 262mm, Width: 185mm, Spine: 18mm
Weight: 760g
ISBN: 9780521197458
ISBN 10: 0521197457
Pages: 260
Publication Date: 21 February 2011
Audience: Professional and scholarly , Undergraduate
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Introduction; 1. The travails - and continued relevance - of universalist explanation; 2. Comparison and context; 3. The questions we ask of images; 4. A cross-cultural explanation for female figurines?; 5. Mesoamerican figurines and the contextualist appeal to universal truths; 6. Figurines, goddesses, and the texture of long-term structures in the Near East; 7. On figurines, femaleness, and comparison.

Richard G. Lesure is an Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of California, Los Angeles. He conducts archaeological fieldwork in Mexico and has authored papers on prehistoric figurines in Current Anthropology and the Cambridge Archaeological Journal. His most recent book is Settlement and Subsistence in Early Formative Soconusco.