Meaning of claviform | Babel Free

Definitions

An image or symbol which is club-shaped, that is, larger at the tip than at the base.

Equivalents

Examples

“The claviform comprises a vertical line with a bulge at one side; but unlike the buttocks on the stylized females, the bulge is usually on the middle or the upper half of the 'sign⟳'! It has been suggested that the 'upper bulge' on a claviform instead represents breasts, but this is based on supposedly stylized statuettes from Dolni Vestonice and elsewhere, comprising a rod with two little lumps near the top, and thus on analogies with sites even further away in space and time from the claviforms.”

“In the early days of research⟳, the images were often read⟳ very literally, and this was certainly taken to extremes – the classic example, of course, is the ‘signs’ in Ice Age cave art which the first researchers assumed to represent⟳ actual objects, and gave them names accordingly – for example, ‘claviforms’ were thought to be clubs, ‘tectiforms’ were thought to be roofs or huts, and so forth [...].”

“There is also a faded red painting of a claviform (a thick curved line with a raised bump or point⟳ in the middle) that looks awfully similar to those found at a few other sites in northern Spain. A claviform from Altamira was dated using the uranium-series technique and is at least 35,000 years old.”

“In Niaux, claviforms played a special role in that respect⟳ because we also find⟳ them very far inside the cave near the end⟳ of the galleries. [...] The same structure⟳ is visible at the Salon Noir itself. There, a claviform and a parallel bar were made on the first panel to the right, at the entrance.”

CEFR level