Mother Goddess figurine. Hacılar; 5500 B.C. Museum of Anatolian Civilizations, Ankara, TR; picture from Akurgal, Ekrem; Anadolu Kültür Tarihi, TÜBİTAK Popüler Bilim Kitapları 67, Ankara, TR, July  2000, p. 7.

EROTIC IMAGERY ?
 

“The sculpture at Çatal Hüyük depicted the bonds between the mother and the untamed world through the juxtaposition of women and leopards, in which the birth-giving mother cradles the feline cubs or sits beside or on them. The prolific Neolithic art included erotic imagery of animal heads emerging from the vulva between the outspread legs of faceless human bodies with bulbous bellies and full breasts.

“For Hodder the painting and sculpture at Çatal Hüyük had direct parallels in the Iron Gate shrine of Lepenski Vir set high on the cliff overlooking the Danube River. Carbon 14 dating indicates that these sites in Asia and Europe were contemporary. The symbolism is ubiquitous from Palestine to Europe in the millenniums preceding the Black Sea flood.”