symbolism

The Owl of Minerva is an image of wisdom with a difficult question folded into it: when does understanding arrive? […]

Athena’s owl is both a religious association and a public image. On Athenian coinage, the goddess and bird become recognisable

A horse disappears. The neighbours call it a disaster. It returns with another horse, and they call it good fortune.

The fox wants the grapes before he judges them. That order is the small engine of the fable. A desire

An animal does not carry one fixed symbolic meaning wherever it appears. A wolf nursing a city’s founders, a fox

A rabbit on the Moon, a rabbit’s foot in a pocket and a rabbit carrying a watch are not three

An elephant-headed deity and an elephant in a queen’s dream do not express the same religious idea. They offer two

A serpent coiled around a medical staff and a serpent putting its tail into its mouth offer different arrangements of

The lion is readily made into an image of authority. A large body, a commanding stance and a place above