19 November 2008 | The exhibition of female figurines, “Prehistoric Ladies from Macedonia,” opens today at the archaeological department of the “Iskra” Library in the town of Kochani in eastern Macedonia.

The exhibition includes 95 figurines of women dated between the sixth and the middle of the third millennium BC – from the Neolithic, the Eneolithic and the Bronze periods, the Vecher newspaper reported.

According to the exhibition’s description published by the Museum of Macedonia in Skopje, where it was on display in 2007, the original and hand-made figurines were discovered during archaeological excavations, always inside the houses. They were represented and venerated as idols, protectors of the home and the house. The prehistoric female sculptures possess symbols of fertility and beauty, and most of them are richly decorated with jewellery and hairstyles that serve as example of the everyday life of the prehistoric people.

There is hardly an excavated house from the Neolithic and the Eneolithic periods in which a female idol was not discovered, Irena Kolishtrkoska-Nasteva, the exhibition’s curator, told the Macedonian Arheoloshki Dnevnik website earlier this year, adding that the figurines testify for the fact that women were very respected in by these prehistoric societies.

The exhibition in Kochani is part of a larger project. In addition to the Museum of Macedonia, it was also shown in the Archaeological Museum of Zagreb in 2007. After Kochani, it will be presented to other institutions throughout the country.

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