Medium: Watercolor. 10.5 X 13 inches.
The eighth of ten paintings for my M.F.A. thesis, An Illustrative Exploration of Birds of Prey in History and Culture.
In Egypt, the goddess Nekhbet was represented by a griffon vulture. Instead of being a symbol of death and decay, however, she
was a goddess of fertility. Vultures, when their backs were turned to the south or southeast, were seen to be fertilizing themselves,
as some believed all vultures were female and this was the way they reproduced.
The head of the griffon vulture appears on the Upper Crown of Egypt, and its wings were often used for the headdresses of high-ranking people.
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