There's an interesting paper in the Cambridge Archaeological Journal this year, a catalog of fired clay figurines from the Neolithic site of Çatalhöyük in Turkey. If you know a little bit about the figurines at Çatalhöyük, your impression is that fat ladies or "mother goddesses" predominate and are cultic in nature. Like this one, that was so neatly reconstructed in the Second Life version of the site.
Yet this comprehensive study of the figurines recovered so far--there are over 1,400--reveal male figurines, animal figurines, body part figurines, geometric shapes, clay balls; in fact there are so many different kinds of figurines that researchers found themselves defining the term so they could forge ahead. And the objects are found not in shrines or temple-y kinds of places, but in house fill and in exterior middens.
So, based on the recovery locations of the objects, the researchers believe the figurines were not so much "cult objects", but rather, working parts of daily life. Worth a peek for sure.
Meskell, Lynn, Carolyn Nakamura, Rachel King, and Shahina Farid 2008 Figured lifeworlds and depositional practices at Catalhoyuk. Cambridge Archaeological Journal 18:139-161.
Catalhoyuk Figurine at the Ankara Museum, Turkey. Photo by Roweromaniak
Comments
Maybe some of them were dolls or toys??
The toys and dolls hypothesis isn’t popular because of the contexts in which the figurines are often found. However, the uses and symbolic meaning of the figurines was likely varied.