Sarah Siddons as the Tragic Muse paintings of Melpoméne, she is represented with a tragic mask and also often holds in her other hand a knife or club. In Greek mythology, she is the daughter of Zeus and Mnemosyne, who had eight other daughters, Melpoméne's sisters and the eight other muses are: Calliope, muse of epic poetry; Clio, muse of history; Euterpe, muse of flute playing; Terpsichore, muse of dancing; Erato, muse of erotic poetry; Thalia muse of comedy; Polyhymnia, muse of hymns; and Urania, muse of astronomy. Reynolds was inspired not only by Sarah Siddons' extreme talent to embody the tragic heroine in Macbeth, but
Triple Goddess (Neopaganism) (1948), took Harrison's idea of goddess-worshipping matriarchal early Europe and the imagery of three aspects, and related these to the Triple Goddess. Graves wrote extensively on the subject of the Triple Goddess who he saw as the Muse of all true poetry in both ancient and modern literature. He thought that her ancient worship underlay much of classical Greek myth although reflected there in a more or less distorted or incomplete form. As an example of an unusually complete survival of the "ancient triad" he cites from the classical source Pausanias the worship of Hera in three persons. Pausanias recorded