Artist: Liana Benarroch
Reference No.: 0611
Title: Hamsa (#7)
Medium: Coloured Markers on glossy paper
Dimensions: 25 x 34cm
Framed or unframed: Framed - wood frame with blue gloss finish
Price: £80


Artists Comments: The hamsa hand (Arabic) is an old and still popular good luck charm for protection from the envious or evil eye . The word hamsa mean "five" and refer to the digits on the hand. The hamsa hand appears both in a two-thumbed, bilaterally symmetrical form, as shown, and in a more natural form in which there is only one thumb. An alternative Islamic name for this charm is the Hand of Fatima, in reference to the daughter of Mohammed. An alternative Jewish name for it is the Hand of Miriam, in reference to the sister of Moses and Aaron. There is archaeological evidence to suggest that the downward-pointing protective hamsa hand predates both Judaism and Islam and that it refers to an ancient Middle Eastern goddess whose hand wards off the evil eye.