Mirror Back with Great Goddess
An important female deity commands the watery scene on the back of this mirror. The face, bordered by ear ornaments and partially hidden by a nose ornament, appears beneath a huge headdress with the fringed eyes and curled proboscis of an abstract butterfly. The deity rests on a shell-studded water band and two adoring humans offer flowers or incense in a bag. Mirrors served as costume ornaments and perhaps were used in rituals to divine the unknown.
Credit: James Albert and Mary Gardiner Ford Memorial Fund
400-550 CE
Slate, pigment; other side originally inlaid with polished pyrite mirror
20.1 x 0.2cm
1989.65
Image and text: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2024
Where you'll find this
The Cleveland Museum of Art
Permanent collection