Head of a woman or priestess,

ca. 600 BCE

This clay head was broken from a statue that stood in a sanctuary at Idalion, on the island of Cyprus. Discovered in the nineteenth century, it was published in Paris in 1908. The sculpture served as a votive offering, a tangible prayer to a deity—probably Aphrodite, whose worship was widespread on Cyprus, where she was associated with the Semitic goddess Ishtar/Astarte. The veiled woman, possibly a priestess, wears a beaded choker, ear ornaments, and a garlanded diadem, on which traces of paint survive. With a round face and formidable nose, she represents a feminine ideal familiar from contemporary Near Eastern art.