Talk:Venus of Willendorf

Date of the discovery

A coxcomb has suppressed the date of the discovery of this statuette. Does that person think such information is irrelevant? The brief aside "akin to Gaia" has also been suppressed. May we be permitted any reference to Gaia in this context, even to deny any connection? Think of the reader. --Wetman 06:03, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The date is still in the first sentence, and Earth Mother redirects to Gaia (mythology), so perhaps the edit wasn't as bad as it initially looked. —No-One Jones ^(m) 06:19, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

User:Wetman is apparently going around and complaining about my edits (and removing some of them completely without trying to come to any improvement). The date was in fact already mentioned, and "akin to Gaia" is a horribly generalized and poor comparison, as the mythological Gaia bears no resemblence to this figurine. As far as the "coxcomb" bit goes, personally insulting other editors is a no-no in general, and probably something to avoid if for no other reason than to save face when it turns out the changes actually make sense. DreamGuy 18:05, Nov 24, 2004 (UTC)

"Others have raised the possibility that it was designed to be inserted vaginally, perhaps as a fertility charm, to become pregnant."

This bit needs a reference! The vaginal insertion really seems vandalism to me, as is. Giacomo

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"A possible purpose of this sculpture is far more mundane, indeed. In the paleolithic times, food would have been such a scarce commodity that any excess of weight in the human body would be looked upon with shock. This statue may merely be one artist's recording of such an extraordinary individual."

All we know for certain is that the food supply back then was sufficient (since we're around nowadays, duh), and we also have no idea whether humanity back then was as easily shockable about fat woman as modern society appears to be.

As for the Venus being an 'extraordinary individual' -- I am going to demonstrate to you that this is unlikley:

If you look at the Venus, she isn't that outrageous obsese, just looks like a normal fat woman who has a BMI of about 38 and big boobs of about JJ cup size (boobs are not fat tissue but mainly mammary glands and the size does not change dramatically with weight gain or loss either, but is more determined by genetics and nursing). That together with the raised vulva could possibly point towards it being connected with fertility. It could also be a yardstick to show women how fat they should be before winter starts, let's do some comparions and sums:

The venus looks a little fatter than me, but not by much. In fact, I very much look like the venus when nekkid, so, let's take me as a living example :) I'm 1.56m and weigh 90kg, and I'm 42 years old. My 'fat-free' weight is 58kg, so, I have 32kg extra on my ribs. I need about 2500 calories a day when I'm active. I have spare 32*7700 calories = 246400 calories, which is only 100 days supply if there is complete starvation, 200 days if I have enough stores to provide 1250 calories daily. 100 days is 3 month -- so, I could survive one winter if the supplies were lost (bears, other tribes etc). So, given this, one could claim that the Venus actually has the ideal figure for survival ;) Btw, if the Venus was nursing a babe or small toddler (highly likely back then) her calorie requirement would be far higher, and so, the estimate of 100 days is rather conservative.

Cinnamon

Ps.: The article is rather judgemental about what constitutes 'ugly' -- please let people decide for themselves if they think it is ugly or not! (I'm here because a customer ordered a pendant that looks like her, so, someone somewhere is still enjoying the art enough to order one at great expense from my studio, so don't knock it! :) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.45.218.135 (talk • contribs) 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Calling her Venus

This was not the name for the piece before it was found. Someone named it Venus simply because it is female.

NAME CHANGE

In all my art history classes my teachers insisted that modern scholars are careful to call this the "Woman of Willendorf", as the word "Venus" invites too many assumptions about this being a goddess, when in reality nobody knews exactly what it is. I suggest calling the article the "Woman of Willendorf" and having "Venus of Willendorf" redirect here. It's more accurate and contemporary.Rglong 02:04, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Feet

It looks like the feet were carved to insert into a wooden base. To have sat on some ancient mantlepiece. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.4.21.203 (talk) 22:56, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

Pregnant?

Reminds me of a pregnant woman with steatopygia. 24.36.78.185 (talk) 21:23, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

palaeoporn?

I like David Brin's suggestion in his novel Kil'n People that the Woman of Willensdorf was in fact pornography. Has anyone considered this seriously? Adambrowne666 (talk) 04:19, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

It's been analysed before this venus was found, art started out with depictions of male and female genitals (phalli and vulva) , art (creative depiction) is "what is on man's mind". from that knowledge it appears the natural follow up. I am quite sure it stands for the attractivity of woman in every aspect, eg this specific one, with the hairdress, shows the artist tended to look at local examples to shape these unified dedications to female properties. Also i think the figurine(s) may (all) represent masked actors in party's or ceremony's (Lion-human) even if the suggestion 'venusses' served a more daily use appears correct. i would guess they were worn by woman as fertility pendants, i think some are very worn in that way, It appears also possible they are associated with some (female) priest class at first, comp. eg malta temple's. where she is related to an institutional and powerfull religious complex. I am not sure but i think i remember one motivation to call them venus had to do with not so much the fact they are female(article), but that they betray an erotic characteristic, like venus in her pantheon.62.194.221.212 (talk) 13:56, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

Interesting, thanks - of course, as you suggest, there may have been little distinction between erotic art and religious icon. Adambrowne666 (talk) 21:28, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

Prehistoric Penthouse

I suggest that no woman would ever carve this as a self portrait. If a young woman wanted fertility they might very well be carving an attractive young man, not an obese woman. I believe this was carved by a man as a type of prehistoric Penthouse magazine. He was trying to create his ideal of a woman - young, pretty hair, submissive attitude, immense breasts, obese short stature and thick thighs. It could be prehistoric visualization; if he carved her and prayed to her, maybe she would select him. Joanlutz (talk) 07:00, 23 June 2009 (UTC)joanl

In tribal societies, being fat is a luxury. It demonstrates superior survival traits and socio-"economic" success - basically rich and high status in modern terms. Furthermore, a woman in a hunter-gatherer society needs significantly less strength, speed, and agility, since she is mostly tending the kids, not chasing dinner with a crude spear, and hence can afford to keep a high body weight. Add to that the rather dramatic increases in fertility in above-average BMIs with wide hips and pendulous breasts in general, but especially in communities with intermittent food supply, and this gal becomes "prehistoric perfect". So, yeah, chances are, someone or someones were fapping to this! Aadieu (talk) 11:29, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Negrito 'peppercorn hair'

It also reminds of an Onge woman (African) with the characteristic negrito "peppercorn hair". That is we can conclude saying that this figurine belong to Africa's continent.Davedawit (talk) 20:50, 15 September 2009 (UTC)