Getty Museum

Statuette of a Young Woman

Date

about 350 B.C.

Medium

Limestone with polychromy

Culture

Cypriot

Department

Sculpture

Institution

Getty Museum

This elegantly dressed woman carries a small rabbit as a votive offering in her lowered left hand. Her head is modeled completely in the round, but her body is plank-like and detailed on the front only. The garment folds of her chiton and epiblema (shawl) do not continue onto the back of the figure. She wears an elaborate necklace of pomegranates with a central pendant of a lion's head, and round earrings with central bosses. A bracelet on her right wrist was joined to her body by a strut, now missing. Her hair is parted in the center and pulled back from her face into a conical shape wrapped in a sakkos (scarf or soft cap). Folds of the scarf are indicated on the back of the head and it is tied at the front with a rectangular knot. There are traces of red pigment on her clothing, hair, jewelry, and head wrap.Figures of female votaries wearing a sakkos and the Greek costume of chiton and mantle are common features of Cypriot sculpture during the fifth and fourth centuries B.C. Cypriot art often combined Greek, Phoenician, and native elements, reflecting Cyprus's position at a crossroads in the eastern Mediterranean. This sculpture was probably dedicated to a deity in a sanctuary. While many of these statuettes of adorned women are thought to depict votaries, the prominent use of the pomegranate in the necklace of the Getty’s figure associates it with Persephone.

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