Oedipus and the Sphinx

Oedipus and the Sphinx

The Lion as the central motif, with the Angel and the Wing and the Demon and the Monster in a secondary part. From The Met, open access.

The motifs the picture carries, filed by role. The marks on the picture itself come with the entry.

  1. 1The Lioncentral motif as it reads here: The Sphinx
  2. 2The Angel and the Wingsecondary motif
  3. 3The Demon and the Monstersecondary motif

The winged lion-bodied sphinx clings to Oedipus; by eye; the sphinx is a woman's head on a winged lion's body. By eye

Not yet decoded: the key and the sourced notes come with the entry. Until then the motifs above are tagged by eye and said so.

Record

Source
Rights
CC0. The Metropolitan Museum of Art's Open Access programme places its images and data of public-domain works in the public domain worldwide, for any use.
Restoration
None. A 725 by 1400 pixel web copy made from the source file; nothing retouched, nothing upscaled.
Series
Artist
Gustave Moreau, Paris, 1826 to 1898
Checked
the Metropolitan Museum of Art's own catalogue record, 4 September 2026: the rights, the maker, the date, the medium, accession 21.134.1. The title is theirs. Not seen in the gallery.
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One symbol a week, decoded.

This picture is free at full size from its source, linked above. What an address gets is the Sunday letter: one picture, one symbol marked on it, what it meant and who said so, and the master files of the decoded plates as they are verified. Leave any time.

Cite
Symbolica, “Oedipus and the Sphinx”, Gustave Moreau, 1864. thesymbolica.com/work/oedipus-and-the-sphinx/