bronze adornment. goddess ?

hello. sorry for not putting this item in a specific category. bronze adornment that seems to have been fixed on a top corner of something. 30 centimeters or ~ 12" long. goddes of what ? Gin ?
TIA.

 

I know Medusa is supposed to have snakes instead of hair, but is there any reason you don't think that this might be a stylized Medusa.

 

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEKK!!!! Other than the fact that I'm not really fond of snakes, it IS rather nice......in YOUR house!!!!!!!! Maybe @Bronwen might have some thoughts???

OOOH, Cluttered, you popped in ahead while I was typing!!! Good thoughts!!!!!!!

 

two snakes only and the laurel wreath made me think rather in the direction of a Victory symbol or a female Asclepius of some sort.

 

I'm not sure whether there's a coherent image here or an outburst of art nouveau exuberance. Everyone is right about snakes & Medusa, of course, & it's not at all unusual for Medusa to be depicted as very beautiful. It would be unusual for Eve to be framed by 2 shakes. There's more going on, though. This looks meant to be quite a young woman. And Fid just added:

I don't recognize the plant but does not look like laurel to me. The gestalt I get with a young woman, a couple of serpents & what might be sheaves/bundles of something edible, is Persephone/Proserpina. Her mother Ceres/Demeter keeps a couple of serpents around, mainly as draught animals, and takes her chariot & a couple of torches to go looking for her abducted daughter.

Following Fid's good thought, the daughter of Asklepios, Hygieia, is a definite possibility, since herbs and a snake are among her attributes. The physician's staff with a single snake got conflated long ago with the beribboned caduceus of Hermes, the ribbons becoming 2 snakes.



The second figure is an allegorical one of Medicine; the serpent is coiled on her right arm & she is feeding it from a bowl.

Could be this was a decoration for the drug cabinet of a very upscale medical practice or apothecary.

 

Just a guess, Cleopatra with asps. Cleopatra was Ptolemaic, so Hellenistic Macedonian, not necessarily Egyptian.

 

and here another few you wouldn't like to see in your house; all bronze btw.

although the sword looks like it, it has nothing to do with
American Chopper. but then, I don't know what it might mean myself , most probably the guardian angel of a medieval city.

an easy one from the Grand Tour

and an anti-war one by the well-known French sculptor Émile FERNAND-DUBOIS (1869-1952).

 

Interesting discussion, all.

I just found this long blog post musing on snake symbolism in the ancient and post-ancient world. Also tries to connect it to today's world. I enjoyed reading it, although it may not help with identifying the original object posted here. http://theindigovat.blogspot.com/2017/05/the-return-of-snake.html

 

The serpent has been a symbol of wisdom across time & cultures. (And in some cultures the owl is the symbol of stupidity.) It seems to me to be a Christian distortion of the Eden story that demonizes the snake. Eve is persuaded to try the fruit of the Tree not of Knowledge, nor of Evil, but of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, a new perspective on things that destroys paradise. Suddenly, being naked is evil; ignorance of this concept was truly bliss. The first couple are expelled from the Garden before they can also eat fruit from the Tree of Eternal Life and become rivals.

This is obviously not the Rape of Persephone, it is Persephone's mother Demeter, searching for her daughter, encountering the nymph Arethusa, who is able to tell her what happened to the girl.



http://ovid.lib.virginia.edu/trans/Metamorph5.htm#479128841

http://www.beazley.ox.ac.uk/record/F6F30773-6A7F-4B16-9749-C0A7B2E52403