Paintings, Sculptures, Accessories, Motifs,

Architecture, and Furniture

PALEOLITHIC, MESOLITHIC,
NEOLITHIC, BRONZE AGE

 Pigments came from natural vegetation, blood, spit, etc.

Subjects were normally animals, such as bulls, bisons,
mammoths, ibexes, horses. Subjects may be symbolic to
the people at the time. They might have believed that the
power and/or qualities of the animals could be imbibed in
them.
Drawn in profile
May be considered accurate considering the technology
available at the time
If the animals have more legs than in reality, it is usually
that way to show movement

CAVE PAINTINGS IN
ALTAMIRA, SPAIN
- Discovered by Don
Marcelino Sanz de Sautuola
in 1879 with daughter Maria

GREAT HALL OF BULLS

- Lascaux, Dordogne, France
- Animals in cave paintings:
ourochs, bears, bisons, cows,
and a unicorn

 Two types of sculptures:

In-the-Round Taken out of the material used
Relief Still in the material used

VENUS OF WILLENDORF
- Found in Willendorf, Austria
- Sculpture in-the-round
- Limestone figurine, 4 1/4 high;
red ochre found preserved on
some parts
- Bulbous form; cluster of balllike shapes
- Symbolisms:
- Breasts: life-giving, nurturing
- Trunk area: pregnant
- Arms: small to emphasize
importance of breasts and
trunk area

VENUS OF LAUSSEL
- Found in Laussel, Dordogne
- Limestone figurine, 1 and
6 high; painted with red
ochre
- Symbolisms:
- Emphasized body parts to
symbolize fertility
- Bison horn = cornucopia =
abundance

VENUS OF
GALGENBERG
- Found in Galgenberg,
Austria
- Carved from serpentine

CLAY BISON AT TUC

DAUDOBERT
- Both a sculpture in-theround and a relief

 Architecture as shelter (natural or manufactured)

Caves
Rock shelters
Huts in the open
Lean-to shelters

Architecture as sanctuary (religious)

Ritual use transformed caves into religious architecture
Cave recesses were reserved for ceremonies of life and death
and afterlife
Paleolithic man buried his dead in caves and rock shelters laying
out the body with ornaments and tools for use in a life after
death

 TERRA AMATA
Near Nice
Oldest artificial structures
20 huts found, cove by the
beach
Oval in shape
8-15 M in length, 4-6M in
width
Materials:
Branches
Braced by ring of large
stones along its perimiter

Eventually, huts had exterior

sheathings of animal skins

 Pottery utilitarian in origin

Brought from inside caves to the outdoors on rocks
and vertical cliffs

 Important to stabilized living environment because

fired clay vessels were essential to cooking,
transporting, and sorting food
Decorated with geometric ornaments of borders,
chevrons, zigzags, and spirals

 According to CDEP:
Beehive
Trullo
Monoliths

According to UP:
Shelter
small individual houses of
timber and mud; near lakes
built houses on piles
multiple units of housing
wooden houses as long as 80
M accommodated by a
number of families or one
extended family;

HEARTH found in the

middle of the long central
place with a louver cut in the
roof overhead to admit light
and vent smoke

Megalithic Monuments
Menhirs, Stone Alignments or
Circles, Orthostat, Stone Row,
Taula, Trilithon

Tombs in Stone or Earth

Dolmen

Barrows:
Circular Type (Round Barrow
Long Barrow
Passage Graves

 Skara Brae
Prehistoric village
Located on small island off
the northern coast of
Scotland
Ten small stone houses linked
up by stone alleys
Stone furniture
Each house has a single room
with rounded corners
Roofs probably of animal
skins on whalebone rafters

 Catal Hoyuk
Turkey, Ancient Anatolia
Advanced artwork and
landscape painting
Interior walls of houses and
shrines had bright colored
decorative patterns, human
figures, animals
Storage Receptacles in wood,
stone, wicker, and pottery
Textile fragments and woven
floor mats
Furniture: Built-in reclining
couches, beds of plaster

 Menhir
A large, single upright
standing stone
Symbolism:
Menhir: Phallic symbol
Earth: Seen as female
Sign of Fertility

 Menhir
A large, single upright
standing stone
Symbolism:
Menhir: Phallic symbol
Earth: Seen as female
Sign of Fertility

Grand Menhir Bris

Brittany
Tallest (21M/67ft.)

 Stone Alignments/
Circles/Cromlechs
/Henges
Do not enclose space, but
define space
Stone Henge
Salisbury, England

 Stone Alignments/
Circles/Cromlechs
/Henges
Do not enclose space, but
define space
Stone Henge
Salisbury, England

Carnac Stone Alignments

3,000 + megaliths of local
granite line up for several
miles in 10-13 rows that run
east by northeast towards a
circle

 Stone Alignments/
Circles/Cromlechs
/Henges
Do not enclose space, but
define space
Neolithic Circle at
Callanish

 Tombs
Above-ground burial
chambers of large stone slabs
and covered with earth
Vertical slabs serve as walls
Horizontal slabs serve as the
top across the walls
Dolmen

 Tombs
Barrows:
Circular type (Round
Barrow) simplest type
where the mound covers a
single burial

 Tombs
Barrows:
Circular type (Round
Barrow) simplest type
where the mound covers a
single burial
Long Barrow

 Tombs
Barrows:
Passage Grave second
most common tomb type,
normally consisting of a
square, circular, or cruciform
chamber with a slabbed or
corbelled roof, accessed by a
long, straight passageway,
with the whole structure
covered by a circular mound
of earth

 Tombs
Barrows:
Gallery Grave
Axially arranged chambers
placed under elongated
mounds
Two parallel walls of stone
slabs were erected to form a
corridor and covered with a
line of capstones
No size difference between
the burial chamber itself and
the entrance passage
Bodies were buried along
the walls, which sometimes
converged toward one end
to form a V

 Taula
A straight standing stone
topped with another forming
a T shape

 Trilithon
Two parallel upright stones
with a horizontal stone
(called a lintel) placed on top

 2000 BCE 700 BCE

Second technological phase when metallurgy was
used to supplement and ultimately replace flint and
stone.
COPPER + TIN = BRONZE
Bronze Age Weapons: slender spearheads, swords,
knives

AROUND 3000 BC TO 636 AD)

1. URUK;
2. EARLY DYNASTIC (SUMERIAN);
3. AKKADIAN DYNASTY;
4. THIRD DYNASTY OF UR (NEO-SUMERIAN);
5. OLD BABYLONIAN;
6. KASSITES (MESOPOTAMIA);
7. HITTITES (ANATOLIA);
8. MIDDLE ELAMITE PERIOD (IRAN);
9. ASSYRIAN EMPIRE;
10. NEO-BABYLONIAN EMPIRE;
11. ACHAEMENID PERSIAN EMPIRE;
12. SASANIAN DYNASTY

 Sumerians inhabitants of lower Mesopotamia

(Greek: between the rivers Tigris and Euphrates)
Established city-states led by priest-kings
Valley between the rivers called the Fertile Crescent
Sumer wasnt a unified nation, but a group of
independent city-states often at war with one
another.

 Sumerian builders did not have access to stone

quarries and instead formed mud bricks for the
superstructures of their temples and other buildings.
Almost all of these structures have eroded over the
course of time

 Uruks White Temple

(Uruk, Modern Warka in
Iraq)
ca. 3200 3000 BCE
Built before the Egyptian
Pyramids and probably
dedicated to Anu (sky god)
Stands on top of a ziggurat
(high platform) 40 above
street level in the city center
and measures 61 x 16
Whitewashed walls
DONT KNOW HOW LEGIT THIS PICTURE IS

 Uruks White Temple

(Uruk, Modern Warka in
Iraq)
Corners are orientated to the
cardinal points of the
compass. One of the
conventions of temples at the
time.
Did not accommodate large
throngs of worshippers, but
only a select few (priests,
leading community members)
DONT KNOW HOW LEGIT THIS PICTURE IS

 Uruks White Temple

(Uruk, Modern Warka in
Iraq)

DONT KNOW HOW LEGIT THIS PICTURE IS

Had several chambers

Cella central hall set aside
fro the divinity and housed a
stepped altar
Uncertain if there was a roof
Temples were referred to as
waiting rooms, believing the
deity would descend from the
heavens to appear before the
priests in the cella

 Uruks White Temple

(Uruk, Modern Warka in
Iraq)
To go up the sloping sides,
one must go up a winding
staircase until the summit of
the platform, this is called the
bent-axis approach

DONT KNOW HOW LEGIT THIS PICTURE IS

Vases
Temple Statuettes
Steles
Burial Treasures
Seals

 Warka Vase (Uruk)

Ca. 3200 3000 BCE
Alabaster, 3 high
The first great work of
narrative relief sculpture
known
Found within the Inanna
temple complex
Depicts a religious festival in
honor of the goddess

 Warka Vase (Uruk)

Divided into three bands
called REGISTERS or FRIEZES
Figures stand on a ground line
UPPERBAND: female figure
with a tall horned headdress;
nude male figure
CENTRAL BAND: naked men
carrying baskets and jars with
produce (votive offering)
LOWER BAND: ewes, rams
in strict profile above crops
and a wavy line (water)

 Eshnunnas Perpetual
Worshippers
Ca. 2700 BCE
Approximately 2 6 high or
below 12 to 30
Soft gypsum inlaid with shell
and black limestone
Found buried beneath the
floor of a temple at Eshnunna
(modern Tell Asmar)

 Eshnunnas Perpetual
Worshippers
Represent mortals
Conventions:
Men: wore belts and fringed
skirts; had beards and
shoulder length hair
Women: wore long robes,
with right shoulder bare
Heads were tilted upward
Hands folded holding small
beakers Sumerians used in
religious rites

 Eshnunnas Perpetual
Worshippers
Several figurines bear
inscriptions with information
such as the name of the
donor and the god or even
specific prayers to the deity
on the owners behalf

 Eshnunnas Perpetual
Worshippers
Placed in the Sumerian
waiting room/temple
waiting for the divinity to
appear
VOTIVE FIGURES:
for offering constant prayers
to the gods on their donors
behalf
The open-eyed stares most
likely symbolized the eternal
wakefulness necessary to
fulfill their duty

 Carved stone slab erected

to commemorate a
historical event or to mark
a grave

 Stele of the Vultures

(Girsu, Syria; Modern
Telloh)

Ca. 2600 2500 BCE

Limestone fragment
Full stele is approx. 511 high
Theme: Warfare
Cuneiform inscriptions reveal
that it celebrates the victory
of Eannatum, the ensi,
probably ruler or king), of
Lagash over the neighboring
state of Umma

 Stele of the Vultures

(Girsu, Syria; Modern
Telloh)
There are reliefs on both sides.
A fragment shows vultures
carrying off severed heads and
arms of defeated enemy
soldiers
Another fragment shows the
giant figure of the local god
Ningirsu holding tiny enemies
in a net and beating one of
them on the head with a mace