The subject of this essay is the motif of the sieve, taking as its starting point the enigmatic portraits of Elizabeth I, Queen of England and Ireland (1533-1603), and looking back to Roman stories of the Vestal virgins. The sieve exhibits a wide range of meanings that extend across art history, philosophy, anthropology, psychoanalysis, and gender studies. About Sieves and Sieving provides an interdisciplinary perspective on the sieve from four angles of approach: motif, symbol, technique, and paradigm. It also explores the longue durée of the sieve as a symbolic-technical object of use, looking at examples from Jewish folklore, Berber culture, and ancient Egypt. An epilogue by Ellen Harlizius-Klück describes the digital aspects of the sieve and its relation to prime numbers. Or as the Mother Goose rhyme says: A riddle, a riddle, as I suppose, A hundred eyes and never a nose! Book jacket.