Dancing Nymph Tapestries

Dancing Nymph - Vintage Illustration

Vintage Nymph Dancing

Dancing Nymph (Nymphe Danseuse) 1895, by Walter Crane. An elegantly dressed woman, holding cymbals, dances against a floral background.

Vintage illustration by Walter Crane

Vintage illustration by Walter Crane

The dancing maenad with her tambourine, a classic image straight out of Greek mythology, or a modern-day music festival ? One can't help but wonder: is she truly communing with the divine, or just trying to impress the neighbors ? In ancient Greece, maenads were followers of Dionysus, the god of wine, ecstasy, and all things merry. They were known for their wild and frenzied rituals, dancing and singing in ecstatic revelry. And of course, no Dionysian party would be complete without a tambourine to keep the beat...

2 Roman women are dancing. One of them holds a tambourine. Inspired by a painting on a wall of the house of Diomedes on the road from Pompeii to Herculaneum

A roman dancer from a wall painting of the Villa of Diomedes in Pompeii, Italy

A wall painting from the Villa of Diomedes, an ancient Roman villa located outside the walls of Pompeii on the Via dei Sepolcri to Herculaneum. This drawing was done when the Villa was excavated between 1771 and 1774. The original has been poorly preserved.

Vintage illustration by Otto Henry Bacher

Vintage illustration by Walter Crane

In Greek mythology, maenads were the female followers and worshipers of Dionysus and the most significant members of its retinue. I created this design out of a 4th Century BC red figure Greek vase from Etruria.