Fired clay figurines (ceramic)
Cerámica cocida (figurillas de terracota)
- Date
- c. 29 ka · confidence high
- Place
- Dolí Vestonice, Moravia, Czech Republic
- Credited to
- Homo sapiens (Gravettian-Pavlovian)
- Field
- Matter & energy
What it is
Thousands of fragments of figurines made of loess mixed with ground bone, fired in kilns at 500–800 °C, including the Venus of Dolí Vestonice. The first synthetic material created by firing.
No vessels were made: utilitarian pottery emerges independently in East Asia (Xianrendong).
What it led to
- The discovery that fire irreversibly transforms clay
- Temperature-controlled kilns: pyrotechnic technology
- Intentional thermal-shock ritual (fragmentation) as a ceremonial act
- A path towards ceramic vessels 10,000 years later
Built on
- Figurative ivory sculpturec. 40 ka
- Earth oven and clay-lined hearthsc. 32 ka
- Earth oven and clay-lined hearths
- Figurative ivory sculpture
Made possible
- Pottery vessels (Xianrendong)c. 20 ka
- Pottery vessels (Xianrendong)