Object name: Plaster cast of sphinx / Media available: image / Accession number: Acc.153 - Hearst Museum Portal Search Results

Start Over Object name Plaster cast of sphinx Media available image Accession number Acc.153

Hearst Museum object titled Plaster cast of sphinx, accession number 21-213, described as Cast of double-faced sphinx. Twice. Its decorative use, perhaps, as a lid handle made its execution with a double front advantageous. Early art was accustomed to creatures with two bodies or faces. These representations are without mysterious meaning. They derive from the primitive draughtman’s instinct for featuring both sides of his subject, fish, bird, quadruped or man. From an early Greek bronze figure found and preserved at Olympia, Greece. Olympia IV Plate 48. Friederichs-Wolters 368.