Cleveland Museum of Art

Mirror with a Handle in the Form of a Herakles Knot

Date

c. 280–400 CE

Medium

silver

Culture

Byzantium, Syria(?), Byzantine period

Department

Medieval Art

Institution

Cleveland Museum of Art

This type of mirror was introduced throughout the Roman Empire by the 2nd century and remained popular into the 3rd and 4th centuries. Similar examples have been found in Germany and Britain. The handle is made of two thick pieces of silver wire, intertwined to form a Herakles knot--a knot so complex that only someone as strong as Herakles could break it. In antiquity, knots of various kinds were believed to provide protection from harm.

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