Cavemen Preferred Full-Figured Ladies

March 27, 2007 — Thin may be in now, but prehistoric men 15,000 years ago prefered full-figured gals, suggest dozens of flint figurines excavated from a Paleolithic hunting site in Poland.

Since almost identical depictions have been found elsewhere throughout Europe, the figurines indicate a shared artistic tradition existed even then.

The findings are published in the current issue of the journal Antiquity.

Co-author Romuald Schild explained that the artifacts offer "a cultural inventory" for the late Magdalenian era (18,000-10,000 years ago).

In the paper, Schild and colleagues Bodil Bratlund, Else Kolstrup and Jan Fiedorczuk describe the carvings as "stylized voluptuous female outlines" that "are cut out of flint flakes."

The same symbolic representations of women displayed in the artifacts extend across Europe, added Schild, a researcher in the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnology at the Polish Academy of Sciences.

Because the site, near the Polish village of Wilczyce, served as a late autumn/early winter hunting camp, it is likely men created the figurines when they were taking breaks from hunting arctic foxes, woolly rhinoceros and other game.

Most of the carvings show a slight curve in the breast area. Very exaggerated curves depict the buttocks, while tiny rounded tops served as heads. One figure's head was, at one point, polished and retouched.

Examination of the flint artifacts under high magnification revealed they were in "mint" condition with no signs of use as tools.

The book The Nature of Paleolithic Art by R. Dale Guthrie contains images of nearly identical renderings. It seems shapely women also inspired stone carvings and cave art, some of which date to 35,000 years ago.

Among the human depictions, "female images dominate and are nude, almost every one full-figured above and below," explained Guthrie, an emeritus professor in the Institute of Arctic Biology at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks.

Guthrie believes most of their creators were young men. He suggests it is not too difficult to theorize what was on their minds in their free time.

"Think of it, Paleolithic people must have been surrounded by a wealth of other available images," said Guthrie.

"For example, the (art subject) repetition could have involved: babies, butterflies, frogs, song birds, small mammals, flowers, beautiful clothes, battle scenes, shields, clan symbols and so on. These are absent or virtually unknown in Paleolithic art."

In addition to animal bones and the flint figurines, the researchers found hundreds of carefully perforated arctic fox teeth that had either been strung into a necklace or placed in a pouch before disposal of the animal's remains. The researchers believe the teeth may have had some kind of ritualistic, spiritual meaning.

The teeth and bones were found preserved in an ice wedge, where they had remained frozen in time until their recent discovery.