residence, and they are represented as resting, standing, they represent rebirth to eternal life by divine adoption, a or in action. Birds, especially waterfowl, feature hoped-for assimilation and identification with Dionysos.27 prominently on the bronze objects from Iron Age Italy. Ducks, geese, and swans are among the most numerous What roles are played by the bird of 77.AO.85? Might the subjects of figured ambers found at sites in Greece, fowl act as an attribute, signify the location of the figure’s Etruria, and Latium.21 Long-necked and short-legged divine actions, or point to a specific activity? After all, the waterfowl may be the most frequent of all faunal bird is in action, in contrast to the static pose of the figures. Might the goose signify transit and rebirth28 or decoration in earliest Etruscan imagery, embellishing countless objects found in tombs. Images of female designate the figure as the Greek Artemis? It is perhaps divinities with waterfowl, usually in the schema of the not a native Italian divinity, such as the Etruscan Artumes goddess known asPotnia Theron, are found on bronzes, (or Artames or Aritimi), who “never became mistress of including vessels and ornaments, as early as the eighth the wild animals or even goddess of the hunt, as she had been in Greece.”29 century B.C. Early Etruscan sculptural images of divinities, male or The elaborate perforation system of the pendant, which female, defined by attributes are relatively rare, and it is when strung would have maintained the upright posture significant that among them are goddesses with birds, of the figures, strongly suggests that 77.AO.85 was mainly waterfowl and raptors. Among the sculptured suspended or worn or was attached to something before representations are the early-sixth-century bronze its ultimate burial. As a shining ornament, 77.AO.85 was a divinity with a horned bird from the Vulcian “Polledrara large, glittering jewel figured with potent imagery. As a Tomb,” or “Isis Tomb,” and a slightly later freestanding permanent amulet, it could have been considered as bronze statuette in Cortona with a large bird of prey theomorphic, one that would have offered its wearer, on (perhaps an eagle) perched on her head.22 The latter is earth, in the tomb, or in the afterworld, the protection of comparable to the Laconian (or possibly Tarentine) the deity represented. Both material and subjects were divinity that forms the handle of a bronze hydria of about the province of persons of elevated social rank, members 570 B.C. found at Grächwil, Switzerland.23 Female of the religious and political elite. In life, its owner could divinities with birds are to be found in Etruscan bucchero, have shown herself to be a votive of the divinity painted vases, and gold objects of adornment (namely represented: the combination of material and subject earrings, pendants, and plaques). Many are in the Potnia would have played a powerful danger-averting and Theronschema, and some are represented in the bird- protective role. In the tomb, 77.AO.85 might offer special atop-the-head pose.24 Divinities with birds (again both protection and even guidance to the deceased in the waterbirds and raptors) on contemporary Greek vases fraught voyage to the afterworld. (primarily Corinthian and Laconian) and on a series of NOTES ivory plaques from the Spartan sanctuary of Artemis Orthia include depictions of both schemata.25 An Etruscan mirror support of fifth-century date is a later relevant 1. See cat. no. 1, n. 31. example: it represents an old-fashioned kore figure 2. For a recent discussion of images of pursuit and abduction in wearing what appears to be a pointed hat with an Etruscan art and the possible ambiguities of meaning, see A. upturned rim.26 The join to the mirror is in the form of Carpino, Discs of Splendor: The Relief Mirrors of the Etruscans addorsed, upside-down swans. (Madison, WI, 2003), pp. 14–16, 19–21. Above are listed the images of female divinities with 3. For the identification of the bird, see Houlihan 1986, pp. 57–59. birds. With the possible exception of the lion- or hare- On the conventions of representing birds, see Ruuskanen 1992. wielding Mistresses of the Animals, no other divinities as Douglas Causey (pers. comm.) corroborates the identification of the image as that of a white-fronted goose. The bird “breeds in such are represented with birds or other animals. The parts of northern Europe and Asia and winters in parts of only other example of a kourotrophos with a bird known Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and North Africa” (Houlihan 1986, to me is a much later type of Etrusco-Latial terracotta p. 57). In ancient Egypt, the standard hieroglyphic sign for a votive statue from Satricum, of fourth-to-second-century goose is generally taken to represent this species. In captivity, date. In these terracottas the woman is seated, the child is they are sociable and peaceful birds and thus would have been in her lap, and a bird is standing in front. B. M. Fridh- excellent geese to domesticate, unlike some other species. Then Haneson posits that this and related multifigured, single- as now in Egypt, the white-fronted goose is a delicacy, and it mantled terracotta votives are Orphic-Dionysiac, and that appears that ancient Egyptians looked upon it as one of the Cat. no. 2 105