Minerva Being Worshipped by the Athenians as the Goddess of Wisdom and Military Strategy

From the Getty Museum record

Étienne Colaud’s illumination of the cult statue of the goddess Minerva at once conforms to the description provided by the author Boccaccio in the text and departs from it. Boccaccio tells of an idol erected in the temple in Athens that is helmeted, wearing a cuirass, and wielding a long lance and a crystal shield with the emblem of Medusa. The statue is described as also featuring an owl, but Étienne has here presented a dove, a bird with overt references to Christianity, where the dove often symbolized the Holy Spirit.