Large handless carved stone Neolithic Venus, Southern Europe, 7,000 BC-3,000 BC. Carved from hard stone this Venus statue, has relatively good proportions all over the body except for rudimental lower legs. The surface of the broken hands look similar to the other parts of the body, so we can presume that the fractures happened thousands years ago. Height: 167 mm; Width in the shoulders: 58 mm; Weight: 407.45 g; Moh’s hardness 4.5-5.0; Condition: the surface of the stone has natural erosions, in the shape of long lines or short dips or stars. All erosions are stable. Found: Southern Europe; Provenance: came from private collection of J. Cronier France, who died in 2018 REFERENCE: The European Neolithic is the period from the arrival of Neolithic (New Stone Age) technology and the associated population of Early European Farmers in Europe, c. 7000 BC (the approximate time of the first farming societies in Greece) until c. 2000–1700 BC (the beginning of Bronze Age Europe with the Nordic Bronze Age). The Neolithic overlaps the Mesolithic and Bronze Age periods in Europe as cultural changes moved from the southeast to northwest at about 1 km/year – this is called the Neolithic Expansion.[1] The duration of the Neolithic varies from place to place, its end marked by the introduction of bronze tools: in southeast Europe it is approximately 4,000 years (i.e. 7000 BC–3000 BC) while in parts of Northwest Europe it is just under 3,000 years (c. 4500 BC–1700 BC). In parts of Europe, notably the Balkans, the period after c. 5000 BC is known as the Chalcolithic (Copper Age) due to the invention of copper smelting and the prevalence of copper tools, weapons and other artifacts.