CIRCA 1ST-2ND CENTURY A.D.

In Greek mythology Leda was the wife of Tyndareus, King of Sparta. Zeus falls in love with the beautiful queen and in order to have his way with her he transforms into a swan which is being chased by an eagle. The queen gives shelter to the swan on her lap, using her tunic to shield it from the eagle. Later on that same day she lays two eggs from which her children are born: Clytemnestra, future wife of Agamemnon, the beautiful Helen of Troy, and the Dioscuri Castor and Pollux.

The story was an extremely popular motif in the classical world - from gems to terracottas, life size marbles and mosaics, and in various different amorous postures; standing, crouching, reclining, grasping, kissing and stroking. For similar depictions of Leda standing with her back to the viewer, drapery around her lower body, arm raised and looking back towards the swan which is pulling her drapery away with its beak, see a column capital in the British Museum, Inv. no.: 1907.1 - 18.2 (Arachne Database no. 11148), a third century mosaic from the sanctuary of Aphrodite, Paphos, now in the Cyprus Museum (G. Camporeale, 'Leda', LIMC VI, , p. 236, no. 42), and a Coptic relief in the Ashmolean (LIMC, no. 52 op. cit.). The spherical object she holds aloft in her hand, both here and on the capital, and that both attendants hold on the Ashmolean relief, must represent the eggs she gives birth to.