Roman_-_Hand_of_Sabazius_-_Walters_542453.jpg
Summary
Hand of Sabazius ( ) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Artist | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
Title |
Hand of Sabazius
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Description |
English:
Many religions were syncretistic, meaning that as they grew and came into contact with other religions, they adopted new beliefs and modified their practices to reflect their changing environment. Both Greek and Roman religious beliefs were deeply influenced by the so-called mystery religions of the East, including the Egyptian cult of Isis, which revealed beliefs and practices to the initiated that remained unexplained, or mysterious, to the uninitiated. Most popular Roman cults had associations with these mystery religions and included the prospect of an afterlife.
Sabazius was an eastern god of fertility and vegetation, who in Roman times was worshiped in association with other deities, particularly Dionysus (or Bacchus, as he was generally known to the Romans). His cult inspired a series of votive images of hands, the fingers of which form the gesture of benediction still familiar in Christian practice. Missing from this example is the small figure of Sabazius himself, who was typically seated in the palm of the hand above the ram's head. Around him are his major cult symbols, including a snake, a lizard, and the heads of a lion, a ram, and a bull. On the tip of the thumb is the pinecone of Dionysus. The opening in the wrist, shaped like a temple, had a hinged door that revealed an unknown, lost object, perhaps a reclining mother and child, as seen in other examples.
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Date |
3
rd
century
date QS:P571,+250-00-00T00:00:00Z/7
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Medium |
bronze
medium QS:P186,Q34095
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Dimensions |
height: 21 cm (8.2 in); width: 11 cm (4.3 in); depth: 8.4 cm (3.3 in)
dimensions QS:P2048,21U174728
dimensions QS:P2049,11U174728
dimensions QS:P5524,8.4U174728
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Collection |
institution QS:P195,Q210081
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Accession number |
54.2453
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Place of creation | Rome, Italy | |||||||||||||||||||||||
Object history |
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Exhibition history | World of Wonder. The Walters Art Gallery, Baltimore. 1971-1972. In Search of Ancient Treasure: 40 Years of Collecting. The Walters Art Gallery, Baltimore. 1978. | |||||||||||||||||||||||
Credit line | Museum purchase, 1961 | |||||||||||||||||||||||
Source | Walters Art Museum : Home page Info about artwork | |||||||||||||||||||||||
Permission
( Reusing this file ) |
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Licensing
This file was provided to Wikimedia Commons by the
Walters Art Museum
as part of a
cooperation project
. All artworks in the photographs are in
public domain
due to age. The photographs of two-dimensional objects are also in the public domain. Photographs of three-dimensional objects and all descriptions have been released under the
Creative Commons
Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License
and the
GNU Free Documentation License
.
In the case of the text descriptions, copyright restrictions only apply to longer descriptions which cross the
threshold of originality
.
العربيَّة | English | français | italiano | македонски | русский | sicilianu | +/− |
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