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Pair of Liturgical Fans (Rhipidia)
Not on view
Deacons waved pairs of rhipidia to protect the bread and wine during the Eucharist. They came to symbolize the six-winged seraphim thought to be present during the service. As demonstrated by these fans, iconography originating in the early Byzantine period persisted into the Islamic era.
Each fan is surrounded by a quotation, written in Greek using Coptic letters, from the Eucharistic prayer of Saint Gregory. A later inscription, "The holy Philotheos," likely refers to the patron of the church that owned the rhipidia. Each fan is decorated with beasts in the book of Revelation: the heads of an ox and a lion on one and the heads of an eagle and an angel on the other. Each creature has six wings like seraphim. The decoration and the inscription reflect the symbolic role of the rhipidia in the liturgy.
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