On my journey to Crete and Greece, where I was filming content for the Sacred Drumming Academy online program, I scoured the museums in search of images of the women with the frame drum. I found some new and a few familiar photos of the women frame drummers - The Melissae of Ancient Greece.
I hope to live to see the day that a museum does a major retrospective on the frame drummers of the ancient world. There are undoubtedly countless more images cloistered away in the museum archives.
The subject of women with the Sacred Drum has yet to be recognized as holding much importance, but we know it does! One of the things I’m noticing this time around in looking at the images is how often the women drummers are clothed, and the men are naked. It is a great reversal, not sure exactly what that signifies yet, but I have to admit I love it!! But there’s more that might explain some of it - I’m also noticing a strong association with the deity (some would argue lesser godhead) Eros with the frame drum. He’s often either playing the drum himself (one of the very few depictions of males drumming, which is rare in the ancient world) or flying over the women drummers with his “glittering golden wings”...