Sculpture on the Southern portal in the Church of Saint-Pierre, Aulnay, Charente, France, built in the XII century. The scene shows a raw of humanized animals, represented as if they formed a dancing parade, with a probable reference to masked dances in which participants personified various animals.
Medieval art has, in this case, drawn on a very ancient repertoire of images of animals described in human postures and attitudes, which can be traced back to a remote past. Indeed, already in the Sumerian period can be found examples of this kind, including (as a curious detail) the motif of the donkey playing a lyre.


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