Sarah Baartman Memorial

Sarah Baartman, also spelt Sara, sometimes in the diminutive form Saartje, or Saartjie, and Bartman, Bartmann, was the name of a Khoekhoe woman who was exhibited as a freak show attraction in 19th-century Europe under the name Hottentot Venus, a name which was later attributed to at least one other woman similarly exhibited. The term "Hottentot" was the colonial-era term for the indigenous Khoekoe people of the southwestern area of Africa. The women were exhibited for their steatopygic body type uncommon in Western Europe which not only was perceived as a curiosity at that time, but became subject of scientific interest, albeit of racist bias frequently, as well as of erotic projection. However, it has been suggested by anthropologists that this body type was once more widespread in humans, based on carvings of idealised female forms dating to the Paleolithic era collectively known as Venus figurines, also referred to as Steatopygian Venuses.