MYSTERY PHOTO: Flags adorn impressive, grand entrance

Here’s an important-looking place replete with three different flags.  But where is it?  Why might it have been in recent news?  Send your best guess to editor@charlestoncurrents.com. And don’t forget to include your name and the town in which you live.

Our most recent mystery, “Historic pensive marble statue,” shows the pensive “Winter” statue at Middleton Place near Charleston.   

Hats off to those who identified it:  George Graf of Palmyra, Va.; Daniel Prohaska of Moncks Corner; Frank Bouknight of Summerville; Marnie Huger of Richmond, Va.; Allan Peel of San Antonio, Texas; Jay Altman of Columbia; and Marian Greely and Jim Mcmahan, both of Charleston.

Prohaska said the statue is positioned in one of four corners of the Secret Gardens at Middleton Place.  

Peel added, “The statue shown in the mystery photo is one of four marble statues of goddesses that are located in the ‘Secret Garden’, so named because none of the azaleas that ring the gardens are visible until visitors actually enter the garden itself. This garden provides a number of teak benches to sit and relax in while peacefully contemplating the beautiful grounds, all the while admiring the goddesses that  represent the four seasons. There is no question that the Winter Goddess in the mystery photo is cold and shivering, as she tries to stay warm by wrapping herself tightly in a cloth shawl and headdress.”

Graf also shared: “But back in the 1700s, the famous French sculptor, Jean-Antoine Houdon, created a masterpiece work personifying the winter season as a girl looking down and clutching her frayed shawl with crossed arms in the cold.  It is on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It resembles the statue at Middleton Plantation, however the French Winter version has only a shawl and nothing else and was deemed somewhat erotic.  So maybe, that sculpture was used, but the Middleton version had a bit more clothing added, but nearly the same posture.

• Send us a mystery:  If you have a photo that you believe will stump readers, send it along (but make sure to tell us what it is because it may stump us too!)   Send it along to  editor@charlestoncurrents.com.