Piroska Racz

1 INTRODUCTION Thong-smoothers carved from various raw materials such as wood, antler, ribs, and horse metapodials, as well as the related ethnographic analogies, have been several times discussed in the specialist literature during the last century (e.g., Russell, 1990, p. 533; Semenov, 1947, 1964, pp. 189–191, fig. 190; Semenov & Korobkova, 1983, pp. 114–118, fig. 22).