Woman and Water Buffalo Rhyton
Practical reuse

Use this artwork.

Verified CC0

This record carries an explicit open-use marker in the source metadata. Download the publication copy or follow the museum record for its master image.

Download publication WebP Open museum master ↗
Rights signal
CC0
Publication file
690 × 893 px · WebP
Suggested credit
Woman and Water Buffalo Rhyton (500–700). Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund Rights: CC0. https://clevelandart.org/art/1964.96

Vault de Lupin makes the source signal legible; it does not provide legal advice or replace the institution’s current rights statement.

From the museum record

Recalling both Greek and Iranian traditions of head vases and rhyta (drinking horns), this unusual silver vessel combines the heads of a woman and a water buffalo. A filling hole on top and a pouring or drinking spout in front make clear its function. An inscription in Middle Persian on its back records its weight: probably 50 staters and three drachmae (close to its current weight of just over 700 grams, or about 1-1/2 pounds). The woman’s flat brow, straight nose, and widely set, heavy-lidded eyes—along with the sectarian mark in gold on her forehead—relate to art of the Indus River Valley and Hindu Kush regions of today’s Pakistan and Afghanistan. While we do not know for sure, numerous scholars have suggested that she may depict the Indian warrior goddess Durga, slayer of the buffalo demon.

Lupin’s visual index

This antique silver sculpture depicts a female face adorned with large earrings and a stylized bull's head.

Machine-assisted description · useful for discovery, not scholarship.
Continue looking

Nearby in the vault.

Woman and Water Buffalo Rhyton

Woman and Water Buffalo Rhyton

Your private shortlist

Saved works 0

Stored only in this browser. No account, tracking, or upload.

No works saved yet.

Use “Save work” on any catalogue card or artwork record to build a working collection.