Daedalic Pendant with Potnia Theron (Mistress of Animals) (650–600 BCE): Art, History and Details

Daedalic Pendant with Potnia Theron (Mistress of Animals) (650–600 BCE) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

This pendant shows the goddess Potnia Theron, the “mistress of the animals,” a deity sometimes associated with the Greek goddess Artemis. The goddess stands in a frontal pose with upswept wings, one curving above each shoulder. Each of her fists closes around the leash of a rearing feline. This piece is one of two nearly identical pendants in the collection (1999.88 and 2001.157) that were probably originally from the same necklace.

Object facts

• Title: Daedalic Pendant with Potnia Theron (Mistress of Animals)
• Date: 650–600 BCE
• Culture: Eastern Greece, Rhodian
• Type: Metalwork
• Technique: gold and glass
• Dimensions: Overall: 3 x 2 cm (1 3/16 x 13/16 in.)
• Collection: GR - Greek
• Department: Greek and Roman Art
• Accession number: 1999.88

A detail from the museum

The small loops at the bottom of the pendants probably held chains attached to pomegranate-shaped beads.

Collection credit

John L. Severance Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Bennett, Michael, "Mistress of the Animals", Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland Art: The Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine. Vol. 40 no. 02, February 2000

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.