Giovanni Fontana is reputed to have had the original idea for this romantic piece. A maiden, held captive by a chain of flowers and a pair of doves at her feet.
Venus
was originally the Roman Goddess of Growth and the Beauty of Orderly Nature; subsequently,
Venus became identified with Aphrodite, Goddess of Love, The Belleek statue was taken from
a plaster cast found in Castle Caldwell and identified in 1934 by Brigadier Price as being
a copy of a fourth century BC Greek sculpture in the Louvre.
From Mrs. McElroy's Collection.
In Greek classical mythology Clytie was a water nymph who fell passionately in love with Apollo, god of the Sun. Apollo would rise in the east each morning and drive his fiery chariot across the sky westwards until in the evening he would disappear. Clytie would spend her days watching Apollo cross the sky but her love was unrequited; eventually the Gods took pity on her and turned her into a sunflower - hence the mythological explanation for sunflower heads which turn with the sun.