The Chione convex mirror is composed of a silver gilt wood frame encrusted with layers of clear Venetian glass rods. Orbiting the frame is a halo of quartz spheres.
This mirror is about 7 inches in diameter. It is currently in my studio waiting to be shipped to one of my showrooms. If you are interested contact me directly.
Jewelry for walls.
Chione is the goddess/personification of snow and of winter in Greek myth; as the goddess of winter, she is often depicted accompanying the seasonal Horae; Thallo (Spring), Auxo (Summer), and Carpo (Autumn).
Chione is a daughter of Boreas, the god of the north wind, and Orithyia, the lady of mountain gales. Chione is the mother of Poseidon‘s son Eumolpus whom she threw into the ocean for fear of her father’s reaction; however, he is saved and raised by Poseidon.
She was originally a mortal princess, who was later deified as a goddess of cold mountain winds.
Boreas carrying off Oreithyia (“Mountain Gale”), Chione’s parents. This is a painting by Francesco Solimena; 1729.
The ancient Tower of the Winds in Athens. Boreas and his seven brothers are carved into the top portion.
Note on Boreas:
BOREAS was the purple-winged god of the north wind, one of the four seasonal Anemoi (Wind-Gods). He was also the god of winter who swept down from the cold mountains of Thrake (Thrace), chilling the air with his icy breath. Beyond his mountain home lay Hyperborea, a mythical land of eternal spring untouched by the god’s winds.
When Boreas sought a wife, he carried off Oreithyia (“Mountain Gale”), daughter of King Erekhtheus (Erechtheus) of Athens, who was playing with her companions in a riverside meadow. Their children included Khione (Chione), goddess of snow, and the Boreades, a pair of winged heroes.
Boreas and his brother-winds were often imagined as horse-shaped gods in form. An old Greek folk belief was that the winds Boreas and Zerphyros would sweep down upon the mares in early spring and fertilize them in the guise of wind-formed stallions. The horses born from these couplings were the swiftest and finest of their kind. The fabulous horses of Laomedon of Troy were said to have been sired in this way by Boreas upon the Trojan mares.
In Greek vase painting Boreas was depicted as a striding, winged god. Sometimes his hair and beard were spiked with ice. In mosaic art he often appears as a gust blowing head with bloated cheeks up among the clouds. This imagery carried over into post-Classical art, and is frequently found in old maps. Boreas’ name is simply the ancient Greek word for “north-wind” which was perhaps in turn derived from the Greek verb boraô meaning “to devour”.
Thank you Theoi Greek Mythology!
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