Woman with Child. Cerrillo Blanco Sculptural Group (Porcuna, Jaén, Spain)

Three-dimensional female sculpture carved in white calcarenite stone. It is dated to the 5th century BC and belongs to the culture of the Iberians. It comes from the heroon of Cerrillo Blanco in the municipality of Porcuna, Jaén province, Spain.It is part of the group of sculptures that represents the ancestors of the lineage. It is not fully preserved as the head, part of the arms, hands and feet are missing, as well as some of the attached elements belonging possibly to a child figure (or a bird according to some scholars), the result of the violent destruction suffered by the Cerrillo Blanco Sculptural Group. It has a preserved height of 98 cm, a width of 36 cm and a thickness of 32 cm.The figure is standing with the left leg slightly forward. Her slender anatomy can be sensed through the dress, the hips and a burgeoning chest are slightly marked. All this indicates an adult woman's body in its fullness. She is dressed with great solemnity. The outfit is defined by a straight tunic with a V-neckline. She wears an ornament, perhaps a fibula, on the left side, which is partially hidden by the mantle that crosses obliquely over her chest. This crossed mantle appears to extend to the ankles, as there is no mark on the body that indicates its arrangement in three quarters. The outfit is completed by a long, open veil that falls over the shoulders and covers the ankles at the back. At the front, the two peaks of the veil extend over the body up to the thighs in a fairly symmetrical position.The scene could be contextualised in a space of public representation, either religious or social. The clothes denote an aristocratic social status, a woman who represents the prestige of the house, although the absence of the jewellery characteristic of Iberian ladies is attributed to the fact that the statue is from an early period in the culture of the Iberians, in which the archetype of a lady based on the display of wealth had yet to be set. The similarity in dress and posture with the figure of the man with the maniple, which is also part of this recognised group of ancestors, has led to the two images being understood as a couple, the founding ancestral couple of the lineage.At the height of the left knee are the remains of what could be the fingers or toes of a child's hand or foot. These elements, together with the find of part of a sculpture of a child, have allowed us to hypothesise the importance of the maternal image in these moments of the formation of the Iberian aristocracy.Cerrillo Blanco is an Iberian cemetery and sacred area located on a hill north of the present-day town of Porcuna, ancient Ipolka in Iberian times and Obulco in the Roman period. It is an area of memory and a long chronological sequence with intermediate breaks. It began with an initial phase in the Late Bronze Age and reached the peak of its development at the end of the 7th century BC with the construction of a collective tumulus. At the end of the 5th century BC, the tumulus was used as the hiding place for a large although extensively damaged sculptural group from a nearby heroon. The sculptures had been violently destroyed and their identifying features eliminated. They were buried in two ditches around the late 7th-century-BC tumulus. The collection consists of 1,400 fragments from sculpted figures of humans (warriors, mythical combats, ancestors, the divinity) and the animals that defined the territory and mythical space. Together they represent some of the basic principles of the southern Iberian societies’ heroic aristocratic worldview. In summary, the Cerrillo Blanco sculptural group expresses the power of a family lineage at the origin of the Iberian aristocracies of the Alto Guadalquivir.The Cerrillo Blanco sculptures are currently on display at the Jaén Iberian Museum. The Porcuna (Jaén) archaeological site can also be visited as a stop on the "Journey to the Time of the Iberians" cultural itinerary, which aims to focus attention on the important remains of the Iberian culture in the province of Jaén.References:Chapa, T. (2015): “Los escultores del Cerrillo Blanco de Porcuna”. En Ruiz A., Molinos M. (eds.): Jaén, tierra íbera. 40 años de investigación y transferencia. Universidad de Jaén, Jaén. 85-92.Olmos, R. (2002): "Los grupos escultóricos del Cerrillo Blanco de Porcuna (Jaén). Un ensayo de lectura iconográfica convergente". Archivo Español de Arqueología, 75: 107-122. Olmos, R. (2004): “Los príncipes esculpidos de Porcuna (Jaén): una aproximación de la naturaleza y de la historia”. Boletín del Instituto de Estudios Giennenses, 189: 19-46.Ruiz, A. y Molinos, M. (2015): "El conjunto escultórico de Cerrillo Blanco, Porcuna". En Ruiz, A. y Molinos, M. (eds.). Jaén, tierra íbera. 40 años de investigación y transferencia. Universidad de Jaén, Jaén. 67-84.Torrecillas, J. F. (1985): La necrópolis de época tartésica de Cerrillo Blanco. Instituto de Estudios Giennenses. Jaén.