A companion volume to James Hall’s perennial seller Dictionary of Subjects and Symbols in Art, which deals with the subject of Christian and Western art, the present volume includes the art of Egypt, the ancient Near East, Christian and classical Europe, India and the Far East. Hall explores the language of symbols in art, showing how paintings, drawings, and sculpture express many shades of meaning from simple, everyday hopes and fears to the profoundest philosophical and religious aspirations. The book explains and interprets symbols from many cultures, and over 600 illustrations clarify and complement the text.
[...]... a symbol of a god of agriculture, Ningirsu, and was bringer of rain (see PLOUGH) Eagle and snake in combat, symbolizing the conflict of sky- and earth-gods, was also of Sumerian origin It entered Greek and Hindu myth in various contexts: Greek vase painting depicts the sky-god ZEUS/JUPITER (to whom the eagle was sacred) attacking a serpentine monster, Typhon, with a thunderbolt.27 In Indian art GARUDA,... Euphrates/Tigris, Indus and Huang-Ho From the beginning each had some kind of representational art, much of it consisting of religious symbols that reflected very varied forms of worship The diffusion of their cultures came about in several ways: invading armies who brought their gods with them; growth of trade (which first brought China into contact with the West) and the accompanying exchange of coinage, a rich and. .. ancestress of the imperial family, and features widely in the rites of Shintoism Since a mirror can reveal the innermost soul of the living and the dead, it is therefore an attribute of Emma-O, the Judge of the Dead (see YAMA) Mirrors, often of Chinese origin, have been found in many Japanese tombs In Christian art a 'flawless mirror', speculum sine macula* is an attribute of the VIRGIN MARY of the Immaculate... in Egypt only from the Ptolemaic period In India the swastika was known to the Indus Valley peoples and was subsequently associated with VISHNU and SHIVA It is seen in the sculpture of Jain temples, dating from 2nd-lst cents, BC, and is an attribute of Suparshva, one of the twenty-four founding teachers of the sect In China the swastika (wan) was originally a Taoist emblem and may be seen in the hand... universe based on negative and positive principles, yin and yang, which pervade all things The words originally meant the contrasting shaded and sunlit slopes of mountain or valley Yin is female, the earth, darkness, the moon, passivity; yang is male, heaven, light, the sun, the active principle in nature, etc Tin and yang feature in two of the oldest Chinese classics, the / Ching (Book of Changes, c 10th... symbol of Longevity and an attribute of Shou Hsing, the Taoist god of long life, one of the GODS OF HAPPINESS and of his Japanese counterpart Fuku-roku-jiu; also of HSI WANG MU, Queen Mother of the West It is the messenger of the gods and carries the tablets of human fate (sometimes a scroll, or twig) to earth It is seen thus, typically on Ming ceramics [v] It bears the souls of the dead to heaven in Chinese... is present at the weighing of souls (see SCALES) She has a crocodile's head, the forepart of a lion and rear of a hippopotamus She devours the heart of the deceased if it is found wanting in the scales The crocodile was also the embodiment of SETH, and was accordingly destroyed in effigy in certain rites of Osiris and Horus In Christian art a crocodile or dragon is the attribute of St Theodore, whose... Wealth, as 'deer' and 'official salary' are homophones in Chinese The deer is sacred to the Kasuga sect of Shinto, which had its origins in primitive agricultural deities dwelling on Mt Kasuga, and is the gods' messenger Many of them roam wild in the grounds of the Kasuga shrine Deer are prominent in Kasuga art [Hi], saddled and sometimes carrying the tutelary deity of the sect, Kasuga Myojin An alternative... contraction of the name Jesus in Greek Other forms are IHC and IC It is widely seen in the decoration of Greek and Latin churches, on tombs [ix: Roncevaux, 13th cent.], vestments and in heraldry It is the attribute of Bernardino of Siena, of Ansanus when inscribed on a heart, and of the Society of Jesus Labarum Roman military standard emblazoned with the chirho monogram by Constantine the Great It is a combination... attribute of Vigilance personified; of Lust and Gluttony (SEVEN DEADLY SINS) It is a courageous fighter and is an attribute of the six-headed Hindu war-god KARTTIKEYA, and Skanda, son of SHIVA In the Chinese CALENDAR it is the tenth of twelve Terrestrial Branches It represents the male principle, yang Cockcrow drives away the spirit of the night, and a white cock placed on a coffin keeps demons at bay A painting . alt="" ILLUSTRATED DICTIONARY OF SYMBOLS IN EASTERN AND WESTERN ART ALSO BY JAMES HALL Dictionary of Subjects and Symbols in Art JAMES HALL Illustrated. HarperCollins Publishers. ILLUSTRATED DICTIONARY OF SYMBOLS IN EASTERN AND WESTERN ART. Copyright © 1994 by James Hall. All rights reserved. Printed in