Bonner, SMA – PDF, 93.
of the ground level, but is meant for a brace connecting the front feet of the chair and serving as a footrest. The woman's head is turned to her right, and her hair hangs loose over her left shoulder. Her hands grip the arms of the chair, and this position, taken in connection with the wide-open knees and the swollen abdomen, suggests the straining of parturition. The woman's loose hair is another indication that this interpretation is right, for a widespread popular superstition holds that a knot or band confining any part of the body is a hindrance to easy delivery. The design is encircled by the ouroboros, and outside this, round the rim, is the inscription αεηιουωθ ορωριφρασι οροριουθ. The second member is usually written αρωριφρασι(ς) or αρρωριφρασι(ς), and is found on several amulets with the type of Aphrodite duing her hair.63 The third normally accompanies all designs of this uterine class.
On the reverse, at the top, are the letters ΚΚΚ, which we have seen associated with colic amulets showing the type of Herakles with the lion (p. 63), and which were also cut on an amulet of the uterine class described above (B. M. 56364). Below them is a scarab beetle, and below it a symbol of the octopus form.
It is natural to interpret this stone as a birth amulet, and this view of it is strengthened, if not absolutely confirmed, by the form of the chair in which she sits. It is the δίφρος μαιωτικός, or accouchement chair, which Soranus mentions as required for the handling of obstetric cases, and which he describes at some length.64 It must be broad, and a large semicircular section is to be cut from the front part of the seat. The arms of the chair are to be provided with Π-shaped handles, so that the woman may brace herself by gripping them, and there must be a back to support her in the intervals of her pangs. The sides of the chair are to be covered in down to the ground, but back and front are left open for the convenience of the midwife and other helpers. If we make some allowance for the mediocre skill of the engraver, the chair on the London amulet answers Soranus' requirements fairly well. It is very broad and is provided with a back and arms, on the ends of which the sufferer's hands rest; and the circumstance that no part of the seat of the chair is to be seen despite the wide-open position of the woman's thighs can be explained by the removal of the semicircular section.65
Until quite recently the amulet just described seemed to be the only extant representation of the ancient birthchair; but in 1940 Guido Calza published a noteworthy terracotta relief which shows a parturient woman seated in such
63 For example, King, Gnostics, Pl. E 2; Southesk N 23.
64 Soranus, 2, 2, (ed. Ilberg); 2, 3. In the Cesnola collection of antiquities from Cyprus there is a small sculptured group “in careless Hellenistic style” representing a woman, who has just given birth to a child, supported from behind by a standing attendant. The mother reclines on a high couch, or perhaps a backless seat, which, however, shows no sign of having been made specially for a birthstool. See Myres, Handbook of the Cesnola Collection, pp. 188 f., No. 1226 (Cesnola's Descriptive Atlas, I, lxvi, 435).
65 Besides the passages in Soranus cited above cf. Antyllus ap. Orib. 10, 19, 2 (p. 425, ed. Bussemaker-Daremberg); also Hippocr. Mul. 2, 114 (p. 246, ed. Littré), Superf. 8 (pp. 480, 482). But the words in the last two passages might refer to an ordinary commode or closestool.
Cf. Dasen 2019, comm. ad Bonner, SMA 79–94
