Chapter 3. In the beginning: Exploring integrity of anthropomorphic images in prehistoric Europe

The main aim of this paper is to offer an updated overview of the origin of human selfrepresentation. Anthropomorphic figurines are indeed one of the most discussed expressions of the symbolic imaginary of Homo sapiens. If we exclude the African Makapansgat pebble, a 3-million-year-old pebble with a pattern of lines on the surface that looks like a face, that was picked up by Australopithecus africanus, and the 400,000 year-old African Acheulian ‘proto-figurine’ from Tan-Tan, humans began to represent themselves intentionally only during the Upper Paleolithic, carving stone and bone, and only occasionally using clay. Certainly, clay anthropomorphic figurines are one of the most significant components of the ‘Neolithic package’ of the European first farmers. In the last decades, many interesting interpretative hypotheses and ideas have been offered regarding their essential meaning and function. Recently, some authors underlined the frequent fragmentary condition of the Neolithic figurines, hypothesising ritual and symbolic breakage. However, observing in detail the way human body representations were shaped, constructed, used, and discarded, we may try to infer the ultimate significance of prehistoric statuettes offering clues and ideas for interpreting similar post-prehistoric phenomena.