In Greek mythology,  sirens were dangerous creatures who lured nearby sailors  to shipwreck on the rocky coast of their island by singing enchanting music. It was said the siren’s song could even charm the winds.

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Homer did not provide a physical description of the sirens which appear in his Odyssey, so their visual appearance was left to imagination. By the 7th century BC, sirens were depicted in art as human-headed birds and later they were represented as female figures with the legs of birds playing a variety of musical instruments, especially harps and lyres. By the fourth century AD, when pagan beliefs were overtaken by Christianity, belief in sirens was discouraged.

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In the Middle Ages, sirens reappeared as "mermaids”, sea girls with the body of a maiden but with scaly fishes' tails. In Dante’s Divine Comedy a pilgrim dreams of a female that is "stuttering, cross-eyed, and crooked on her feet, with stunted hands, and pallid in color." It is not until the pilgrim gazes upon her that “she is turned desirable and is revealed by herself to be a siren”.

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Circe warned Odysseus and his men to prepare for their encounter with the dangerously seductive sirens by stuffing their ears full of wax. But Odysseus yearned to hear the alluring mermaids’ song, so he commanded his men to bind him to the ship’s mast to ensure he could resist the tempting call to destruction. 

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In the limestone sculpture Siren's Serpent a Siren’s true nature is hinted by a dangerous serpent, alert and poised to inflict a deadly bite. 

 

L.N. Thibos, Sculptor

June, 2022

Limestone, 30” tall