figurine

In a remarkable discovery that bridges the ancient and modern understanding of human imagination, archaeologists have unearthed a 12,000-year-old clay figurine from northern Israel that represents the earliest known depiction of human-animal interaction. The tiny sculpture, measuring just 3.7 centimeters tall, portrays a woman crouched forward with a goose perched upon her back, offering an unprecedented window into the spiritual and symbolic world of Late Natufian peoples who lived along the shores of the Sea of Galilee at the end of the Paleolithic era. The figurine was discovered at Nahal Ein Gev II, a prehistoric village excavated by Dr. Laurent Davin and Professor Leore Grosman of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Institute of Archaeology. Published in the Proceedings of the