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Maker(s):Unknown
Culture:Greek, Cycladic
Title:Folded Arm Figure
Date Made:2700 BC or modern forgery
Type:Sculpture
Materials:marble
Measurements:Overall: 23 1/8 in x 5 3/16 in x 2 in; 58.7 cm x 13.2 cm x 5.1 cm
Accession Number:  AC 1972.118
Credit Line:Gift of Mr. and Mrs. A.M. Adler
Museum Collection:  Mead Art Museum at Amherst College
1972-118.jpg

Label Text:
Relatively little is known about the people who inhabited the Aegean Sea’s Cycladic Islands during the Greek Bronze Age. The islanders’ buildings, pottery, metalwork, tombs, and sculpture provide the primary evidence for their lost culture, which did not include a writing system.

Folded-armed figurines, such as this one (which probably dates to the second Early Cycladic period, ca. 2800–ca. 2300 BCE), are the best-known Cycladic artifacts. Scholars dispute the function of these simple, flat statues of nude women carved from indigenous white marble, primarily found in graves. They may have served as funerary goods, cult statues, status symbols, or even toys.

Art collectors have long admired the figurines’ spare, elegant forms, a taste that has had regrettable consequences. Marketplace demand for figurines fuels an illegal trade that has separated countless statues from the important archaeological evidence of their original locations.

Tags:
figures; abstract; standing; sculpture

Link to share this object record:
https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=AC+1972.118

Research on objects in the collections, including provenance, is ongoing and may be incomplete. If you have additional information or would like to learn more about a particular object, please email fc-museums-web@fivecolleges.edu.

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