Sculpture "Man with a backpack"

The statuette is a schematic representation of a person in the form of a rod with a round cross-section, topped with a ornamented head and having longitudinal lines at the lower end, indicating legs. The spherical head has a clearly marked, rather narrow face. It has well visible eyes (eyebrows), flat straight nose, mouth and rounded chin. The face is framed by a bulging headdress. In the middle of the head (from the forehead to the back of the head) there is a clear line, a kind of “parting”. The wavy lines, fan-shapedly diverging from the face, converge at the back of the head, where along the “parting” go in two rows of rounded depressions (in the amount of 8-9). The body is devoid of detail, only the lower part of the abdomen and legs are marked by sharp lines. Excessively long sides of the triangle, meaning the lower abdomen, may have been formed by longitudinal cracks. The end of the joined legs is rounded. In profile, a noticeably weak protrusion of the hips, giving the impression that the figure is slightly tilted forward.

On the back, a fine engraving depicts a backpack



Manufacturing technique

A push-plane and a burin were used to shape the statutte. The face contour and hairstyle are made with a burin. The superciliary arches and the wings of the nose are carefully worked out. The statuette is characterized by a pointed chin. On the back of the head there is an elongated recess, ornamented at the edges with rounded recesses - here the burin worked as a reamer. On the back there is a subtriangular contour of the bag (two lines), the contour of it is visible to the right and above the belt. The same line also means a belt running across the back. The same burin transverse lines are made with a burin around the knees. Caviars are treated with a burin.


Use-wear traces

Use-wear traces are not found.


Storage location

The State Hermitage Museum

Inventory number

370/755

The Museum KAMIS

no

Size

(мм)
  General parameters of the item Head Body A lower part of thighs A lower part of thighs on the back Face part Womb
Length 96.05 20.40 46.33 34.56 32.70 14.74 13.07
Thickness   13.90 10.91

6.02(heels)

      
Width  

16.26

11.16

10.84(thighs)

7.37(heels)

 10.44   23.38

Material

reindeer antler

Dating

19-23 th years BP

Culture

Mal'ta-Buret' archaeological culture

The author of the excavations

Gerasimov M.M.
1929

Publications

Abramova Z.A. Izobrazhenie cheloveka v paleoliticheskom iskusstve Evrazii / AN SSSR. IA. - L.: Nauka, 1966, S. 195 tabl. VIII, 2

Abramova Z.A. Paleoliticheskoe iskusstvo na territorii SSSR // SAI, vyp. A 4-3. M,- L.: Izd-vo AN SSSR, 1963, S. 44, tabl. XLIV, 4 i XLVII, 9

Gerasimov M.M. Mal'ta. Paleoliticheskaya stoyanka (predvaritel'nye dannye): rezul'taty rabot 1928/29 g. – Irkutsk: Vlast' truda, 1931, S.20-21, tabl. 13 b