"Terracotta from Northern Iran - Ural region (from the cryptic Museum label - for more see below) " (see related A) Hermitage Museum, Petersburg, Russia

This statuette is similar to others from the ancient capital Susa of the Elami region - the statuette shows a Babylonian influence which suggests that it is from the late period of the proto-Persian period of the Elami civilization located in SW of modern Iran. In view that this Pandora Word Box website has an emphasis on Medical Sciences, Humanities and Arts, it is pertinent to point out that similar statuettes emerged in the Cycladic (including Cyprus) region. The statuettes represent fertility (thus maternity) represented by goddesses such as Astarte, Ishtar, Inana, Rhea, and later as Cybele, Artemis and eventually Aphrodite, or Venus. The proneness of early representations to be obese gave rise their collective denomination as "steatopygous" to indicate "obese derriers" or buttocks - well known is a "steatopygous" statuette found in Wilendorf, Austria - indicative of the wide spread of a matriarchal mythology later metamorphosed apparently by the Dorian invasion to a male-centered mythology and eventually to legends populating components of current biblical religions.