Tanagra figurine

Female figurine of the "Tanagra" type. She wears a chiton and a himation which muffles her hands. Her body is slightly turned to the right. "Tanagra" type figurines were thus named because hundreds of them were discovered in the cemeteries of Tanagra in Boeotia, Greece, in the 19th century. They date to the Hellenistic period, from the second half of the 4th to the end of the 3rd c. BC. For a long time, they were considered as the exclusive products of Boeotian workshops. Nowadays, it is known that they were mass-produced all over the Hellenistic world and that Attica was the real cradle of the style. "Tanagra" figurines were made in moulds. There were many different types of standing and seated females, holding fans or musical instruments, wearing hats, masks or wreaths, and even dancing figured. As a rule, they were brightly coloured. Despite the fact that most of them were found in graves, their use as decorative statuettes in houses is well attested.