Bone Finds

Among the numerous small finds from the excavations carried out in the years 1978/79 on the Münsterhügel in Basel (Switzerland), was an exceptionally well-made phallic bone pendant with a longitudinally-perforated crossbar.
Phallic pendants of this type belong to a Late Republican group, most of which have come from Spain and Italy while in Central Europe they are extremely rare. The Basel example originates from the late La Tène fill of a street gutter, and therefore together with the pendants from the shipwreck of Spargi in Italy and from the Ibero-Punic layer of La Alcudia at Elche in Spain confirms the Late Republican date of this group, which can be divided into four types.
Late Republican phallic bone pendants differ from the Imperial period phallic bone amulets not only by their form but also by the fact that the latter always have an erect phallus and that they are often combined with a fica.