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Discovery of the oldest phallic representation in Eurasia

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A study on the discovery of the oldest phallic representation - a pendant made and worn in Mongolia 42,000 years ago - has just been published by an international team including researchers from the University of Bordeaux in the Nature Scientific Reports journal.

Photo : Pendant in the abstract form of a phallus discovered at the Tolbor-21 archaeological site
Pendant in the abstract form of a phallus discovered at the Tolbor-21 archaeological site

This study has been published in Nature Scientic Report by an international team involving the University of Bordeaux, the CNRS, the Collège de France, and research institutions in Mongolia, the United States, the United Kingdom, Italy, Germany, Russia and Japan.

This discovery shows the emergence of gendered representations in a region and at a time when Homo sapiens probably encountered Denisovans and Neanderthals. These contacts undoubtedly changed their perception of themselves, which was materialised through symbolic innovations.

Figurative representations in art first appeared around 50,000 years ago in Europe, Africa and South-East Asia. Considered an advanced form of symbolic behaviour, they were only produced in our lineage.

The object of adornment interpreted as a phallic representation was discovered in an Upper Palaeolithic archaeological layer dated to around 42,000 years ago, at the Tolbor-21 archaeological site in Mongolia.

Mineralogical analysis indicates that the pendant was made from graphite, a soft, black mineral that was not present in the immediate environment of the site. Microscopic and rugosimetric analyses indicate that the pendant has a complex functional history and was introduced during use on the site.

The modifications to the pendant in order to represent a phallus are fairly straightforward. The most striking features are a short groove representing the external urethral meatus and another groove for the balanopreputial fold.

Simplified representations bordering on abstraction are common in prehistoric archives, and figurations of models are often reduced to their most salient and recognisable attributes. The features seen on the Tolbor-21 pendant - a groove in the middle section of the object and a short, deep groove at one end - are among the most striking characteristics used to identify phallic representations in various regional and chronological contexts. The process of codifying this symbol is based on stylistic conventions that are known and understood within groups.

The Tolbor-21 discovery predates the oldest known anthropomorphic gendered representation. It attests to the fact that hunter-gatherer communities used sexual anatomical attributes as symbols very early on following their dispersal across Central Asia. The pendant was made during a period that coincides with estimates of the age of genetic mixing events between Homo sapiens, Neanderthals and Denisovans, and in a region where such encounters are plausible.

These encounters most likely changed the way these different hominins perceived themselves and led, at least in the case of Homo sapiens, to new ways of adorning the body.

Bibliographic references

Rigaud S, Rybin EP, Khatsenovich AM, Queffelec A, Paine CH, Gunchinsuren B, Talamo S, Marchenko DV, Bolorbat T, Odsuren D, Gillam JC, Izuho M, Fedorchenko AY, Odgerel D, Shelepaev R, Hublin JJ, Zwyns N.
Symbolic innovation at the onset of the Upper Paleolithic in Eurasia shown by the personal ornaments from Tolbor-21 (Mongolia). Sci Rep. 2023 Jun 12;13(1):9545. doi: 10.1038/s41598-023-36140-1. PMID: 37308668; PMCID: PMC10261033.

Scientific contact

  • Solange Rigaud

    Prehistory to Present Time: Culture, Environment, Anthropology laboratory (PACEA - CNRS / University of Bordeaux)

    solange.rigaud%40cnrs.fr