
What Was the Venus de Milo Doing with Her Arms? - showwebgl
http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2015/05/the_venus_de_milo_s_arms_3d_printing_the_ancient_sculpture_spinning_thread.html
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ubasu
According to the Wikipedia entry [1] and other pages mentioned in another
comment [2], the statue was found with a fragment of a left hand holding an
apple, and a right hand with a draped sash. This was taken to understand that
the statue represented the Judgement of Paris [3].

So apparently it is known what the hands held, which seems to make this
speculation unnecessary.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus_de_Milo](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus_de_Milo)
[2]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9474238](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9474238)
[3]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judgement_of_Paris](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judgement_of_Paris)

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Eleutheria
I'd like to know about the Winged Victory of Samothrace

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winged_Victory_of_Samothrace](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winged_Victory_of_Samothrace)

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gweinberg
I like the Spinal Tap answer. She was shooting up. Intravenous de Milo.

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bovermyer
Until we discover time travel, learn to understand alien cultures, and
universally mesh with the minds of artists, we'll never really know what the
Venus statue was intended to be.

Which is not to say that this scenario is impossible. Just that we are not
there yet.

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cortesoft
How is her spinning thread a 'provocative' theory?

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seszett
Presumably, because that was the occupation of prostitutes.

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return0
Isn't that a nonsensical theory too? Why would a godess who was also married
work as a prostitute?

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coldtea
She was goddess of love (in the sexual aspect of it) -- including having TONS
of extra-marital affairs in the mythology.

And it's not about what she would really do as an occupation in order to make
a buck, as if she was an actual person!

It's about the connection in people's minds that the goddess-of-(making)-love
is also a kind of "patron saint" of prostitution, and perhaps the artist
wanted to play with that image (if the theory in TFA holds).

Also have to know that prostitution itself wasn't a dirty, destitute, "crack-
whore" style affair at the time, but something seen as a service to society,
with some prostitutes more like columbines and geishas. Heck, they also had a
kind of prostitution in the temples, as a sacred thing.

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dTal
You probably mean "concubines".

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coldtea
Yeah.

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pcardh0
Pleasuring Jupiter.

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simonebrunozzi
You either say "the Venus of Milo" (English), or you say "Venere di Milo"
(Italian). "De" is Spanish and has nothing to do with its name.

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seszett
"De" is also French, the language of the place where this Venus is, and "Venus
de Milo" is simply the most common name used in English for referring to it.

If you really have to be pedantic, say _the Aphrodite of Milos_ , since this
is a Greek statue.

