Head of a Woman Holding a Sistrum
Unknown Artist
150 BCE–50 CE
Medium
marble
Dimensions
17.7 × 20 × 11.2 cm
Classification
Sculpture
Department
Greek and Roman Art
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund
Accession Number
1929.980
About this artwork
This head of a woman was likely originally part of a stele or grave marker. The woman sits in partial profile holding a sistrum close to her head, possibly making music. A sistrum is a type of rattle that originated in ancient Egypt and spread to the Greek world. (View a sistrum in the collection here: 1920.1990.) The sistrum likely signaled to ancient viewers that the woman on the grave marker was a worshiper of the Egyptian goddess Isis, whose cult spread throughout the Mediterranean after Ale...