Beautiful Claudia finishes up her drawing of the sea goddess. Claudia travels to Italy every year and on her last visit she fell in love with this life sized sculpture in the Vatican Museum. She noticed this recurring theme of women riding on the back of horses with fish tails. These other photos, she took in the National Museum of Rome. We have been setting up small groups of folds to mimic the sculpture so that she can still do her drawing from life. We've done a little research on these strange sea creatures:

"HIPPOKAMPOI (or Hippocamps) were the horses of the sea. They were depicted as composite creatures with the head and fore-parts of a horse and the serpentine tail of a fish. In mosaic art they were often covered with green scales and had fish-fin manes and appendages. The ancients believed they were the adult-form of the fish we call the "sea-horse". Hippokampoi were the mounts of Nereid nymphs and sea-gods, and Poseidon drove a chariot drawn by two or four of the beasts.

THE NEREIDES (or Nereids) were fifty Haliad Nymphs or goddesses of the sea. They were the patrons of sailors and fishermen, who came to the aid of men in distress, and goddesses who had in their care the sea's rich bounty. Individually they also represented various facets of the sea, from salty brine, to foam, sand, rocky shores, waves and currents, in addition to the various skills possessed by seamen.
The Nereides were depicted in ancient art as beautiful young maidens, sometimes riding on the back of dolphins, hippokampoi (fish-tailed horses) and other sea creatures."