Description
The Greek Cycladic Islands, in the southwestern Aegean Sea, were settled during the late sixth millennium B.C. by peoples whose origin has not been established. The islands are rich in marble and obsidian, and between about 4500 and 2200 B.C. the inhabitants began to produce marble vessels and, especially, human figures. These objects represent the first flowering of marble sculpture in Greece. Little is known about the function and meaning of the figural sculptures, commonly discovered in graves. The figures are predominantly representations of women, abstractly geometrical in form, and were originally articulated with color to indicate details such as eyes, hair, a headdress, or a tattoo. The Museum’s Cycladic Head reproduces an original marble head (ca. 2700-2500 B.C.) of the early Spedos type-a classification that takes its name from a site in southern Naxos. Figures of this type are often roundly modeled with broad heads tilting upward.
