David Harris, courtesy Bible Lands Museum Jerusalem

A group of six standing figurines made of fired clay is part of a collection of nearly 200 ancient figures currently on view at the Bible Lands Museum in Jerusalem. The statuettes pictured all come from Syria and date to the third and second millennium B.C.E. Their elemental forms seem to express an eternal creative human urge. Were these objects idols? Toys? Works of art? No one knows.