Pregnant Woman

Taken from the book "The Museums of Israel" by L.Y Rahamani.

Pregnant Woman (sixth to fifth centuries BC) Achzib.

Height 0.22 m.

Terra cotta (IM)

This very fine and sensitive representation of a seated pregnant woman is one of many mould-made Phoenician figurines, appearing wherever this industrious people had its cities and colonies, all along the Mediterranean shore. Their mixed style is expressed here by an Egyptian head-dress worn by a local woman. It seems likely that such figurines also had some magical function, perhaps ensuring fecundity, or easing labour in child-birth. It is, however, curious to find them fairly often in tombs, where personal belongings, food and drink, are witnesses to the belief in some form of life in the netherworld.