Footnotes

Provenance: Acquired from Keshishian, purchased for £34,200, 30th Jan 1995.

Literary sources:
Tiresias is a name generally applied to soothsayers in the mythological tales of Ancient Greece. Usually his foretellings are given in short maxims which are all correct even though they appear cryptic or indecipherable at first.

Often the name of Tiresias is attached to a specific mythical prophecy. It is used as a device to lend a personality to the generic role of the seer, usually in tragic stories. In the story of Narcissus, it is Tiresias who warns his mother, the naiad Liriope, that her son will thrive as long as he never knows himself. Like most oracles, Tiresius is hesitant to offer up everything he sees in his visions.

Bk III: 339-358 Echo sees Narcissus

''Famous throughout all the Aonian cities, Tiresias gave faultless answers to people who consulted him. Dusky Liriope, the Naiad, was the first to test the truth and the accuracy of his words, whom once the river-god Cephisus clasped in his winding streams, and took by force under the waves. This loveliest of nymphs gave birth at full term to a child whom, even then, one could fall in love with, called Narcissus. Being consulted as to whether the child would live a long life, to a ripe old age, the seer with prophetic vision replied 'If he ne'er know himself'.

For a long time the augur's pronouncement appeared empty words. But in the end it proved true: the outcome, and the cause of his death, and the strangeness of his passion.''

In B. Phillip's 'Tapestry,' (included with the lot) the cartoon of this tapestry is shown with the caption: 'Pastoral Tapestry, woven at Aubusson in France during the 18th century.' Aubusson weavers used coarse yarn to weave their popular verdures and pastoral scenes, which were often copies of those woven earlier in at the Gobelins and Beauvais.'

Literature: B. Phillips, 'Tapestry,' Phaidon, 1994, p110