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Books > Arts & Architecture > History of art / art & design styles > BC to 500 CE, Ancient & classical world
A survey of how the Aegean peoples expressed themselves during a period of some 5000 years after the end of the Bronze Age (circa 1100 BC), and before the rise of Greek art. Work produced in the ambience of the palaces of Crete (including the palace of Minos at Knossos) and of Mycenae on the mainland is fully described and illustrated. For purposes of clarity the arts are considered by function and material rather than by geographical region or chronological period; but the main political upheavals affecting them are kept in mind. Little wall-painting has survived, and the so-called minor arts are examined for the light they thow on it, as well as to assess artistic development in the Aegean as a whole.
Scattered throughout their coastal homelands, the remains of impressive artworks produced by the Moche of northern Peru survive. These works include ceremonial centers extensively decorated with murals, as well as elaborate and sophisticated ceramic vessels, textiles, and metalwork, that serve to visually represent an ancient American culture that developed a complex, systematized pictorial code used to communicate narratives, sets of ideas, and ideological constructs. In this study, Margaret Jackson analyzes Moche ceremonial architecture and ceramics to propose the workings of a widely understood visual language. Using an interdisciplinary approach that incorporates archaeology and linguistics with art history and studies of visual culture, Jackson looks at the symbolism of Moche art as a form of communication, the social mechanisms that produced it, and how it served to maintain the Moche social fabric.
This historic 1933 publication documents the important collection of Egyptian, Greek and Italian pottery assembled in the early years of what is now the Kelsey Museum of Archaeology. This collection, brought together in part for teaching purposes, contains a wide range of classic pottery types and is illustrative of the development of pottery over time in these Mediterranean cultures.
A detailed study of Neolithic rock paintings in southern France, the majority of which lie to the east of the Rhone. Hameau discusses the theoretical and methodological aspects of studying schematic figures and motifs before presenting a large inventory of sites where each is described in terms of its location and situation, and in terms of the art found there. His final analysis of the art, the association between figures, animals and motifs, and the use of space, convince him that there was a set of precise rules followed by those who created the art. French text, short English summary.
"Clarke teaches us to think about how this art was understood and felt by those who lived with it in their daily lives and he speculates that it might even reflect what the Romans actually did. This is the first genuinely contextual and theoretically informed study we have of a vast panoply of classical art about sex. It will be an illuminating book for classicists, historians, and anybody else who finds lovemaking interesting."--Thomas Laqueur, author of "Making Sex "There are few scholars as able to take on this material, as well versed in theories of sexuality, and as comfortable dealing with both heterosexual and homoerotic content as Clarke. The topic is timely and the execution is professional."--Natalie Kampen, Barnard College "This book should attract not only classicists, but also scholars of sexuality in any field. Clarke succeeds both in introducing little-known material and in defamiliarizing the familiar examples of erotic art."--Anthony Corbeill, University of Kansas ""Looking at Lovemaking proves that the ancients were very different from you and me--that they saw sex not primarily as procreation and never as sin but rather as sport, art, and pleasure, an activity full of humor, tenderness and above all variety. John R. Clarke, by looking at Roman artifacts from several centuries destined to be used by different social classes, reveals that the erotic "visual record is far more varied, open-minded and playful than are "written moral strictures, which were narrowly formulated by the elite and for the elite. This book is at once discreet and bold--discreetly respectful of nuance and context, boldly clear in drawing the widest possible conclusions about themalleability of human behavior. Clarke has, with meticulous scholarship and a fresh approach, vindicated Foucault's revolutionary claims for the social construction of sexuality."--Edmund White, author of "The Beautiful Room is Empty
This text aims to overturn the frequent dismissal of Roman art as 'mosaics and uninspiring copies of Greek sculpture'. In place of the usual historical outline approach, this book looks at the subject by genre and considers the attitudes of Romans themselves to art. Drawing on literary sources as well as illustrations from many parts of the Roman world, this survey of Roman art to the time of Constantine considers what Romans hoped to achieve and how far they were successful.
It is too often forgotten that every Assyrian “historical” inscription functioned in a very specific context. This context influenced its content and the way in which it was perceived by ancient viewers and readers. Russell’s goal is to address the reconstruction of the context of these inscriptions in order to elucidate their original impact. In the past, the palace inscriptions, including Assyrian palace inscriptions, have been published in composite editions with little or no reference to the provenience of the individual exemplars; in addition, the original excavation reports often were more interested in the content of the inscriptions than in their locations. To achieve the objective of placing these inscriptions in their original contexts and thereby provide a base for further study of them, and stimulated by two seasons of renewed excavations at Nineveh during which he studied many inscriptions in situ, Russell returned to the British Museum and Layard’s original, handwritten notes from the 19th century excavations at Nineveh—the goal being to catalogue fully and as completely as possible the individual inscriptions and their locations. The results of Russell’s labors are here published, including the first publication of several shorter inscriptions. The book is lavishly illustrated, both with museum photos and with photos by the author of many of the inscriptions in situ. The book will no doubt be the basis of all further study of the relationship between inscription and context in the palaces of the Assyrian kings.
Alexander the Great changed the face of the ancient world. During
his life and after his death, his image in works of art exerted an
unprecedented influence-on marbles, bronzes, ivories, frescoes,
mosaics, coins, medals, even painted pottery and reliefware.
Alexander's physiognomy became the most famous in history. But can
we really know what meaning lies behind these images?
The complete wall decorations of 3 Theban tombs (No. 77, No. 175 and No. 249) are here published for the first time. The graves at Thebes in Egypt, belonged to a master builder of the Amon temple in the time of Thutmosis IV, a purveyor of sweets in Amenophis III's temple of the dead, and a man in the business of scented oils. To date, only individual scenes from these tombs have been published, but here the reader is presented with the decorations in their entirety, including black and white photographs and line drawings, together with transcriptions and translations of all of the related texts.
This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book. ++++ The below data was compiled from various identification fields in the bibliographic record of this title. This data is provided as an additional tool in helping to ensure edition identification: ++++ Die Sculpturen Des Vaticanischen Museums, Im Auftrage Und Unter Mitwirkung Des Kaiserlich Deutschen Archaologischen Instituts(romische Abteilung): Belvedere. Sala Degli Animali. Galleria Delle Statue. Sala De' Busti. Gabinetto Delle Maschere. Loggia Scoperta. Text Und 83 Tafeln; Volume 2 Of Die Sculpturen Des Vaticanischen Museums, Im Auftrage Und Unter Mitwirkung Des Kaiserlich Deutschen Archaologischen Instituts; Georg Lippold; Die Skulpturen Des Vaticanischen Museums; Deutsches Archaologisches Institut. Romische Abteilung Walther Amelung, Georg Lippold, Vatican. Museo vaticano, Vatican City. Direzione generale dei monumenti, musei e gallerie pontificie, Deutsches Archaologisches Institut. Romische Abteilung G. Reimer, 1908 Sculpture
This monumental work provides a comprehensive analytical history of the Hellenistic, Roman, Byzantine, Umayyad, and Early Abbasid mosaics in the Holy Land, spanning the second century b.c.e. to the eighth century c.e. Previous general studies of the Holy Land mosaics have focused on specific collections; in Mosaics of Faith, Rina Talgam sets out to demonstrate how mosaic art constructed cultural, religious, and ethnic identities in eras that shaped the visual expressions of three monotheistic religions. Her examination of the mosaics in a pivotal area of the eastern Mediterranean sharpens and refines our understanding of the region’s societies and their ideologies, institutions, and liturgies. Covering almost one thousand years of mosaic production, Mosaics of Faith offers an unprecedented view of the evolution of floor decorations from the Hellenistic to the Roman periods, in the transition from Roman to Early Byzantine art, and in the persistence of Byzantine traditions under Umayyad rule. More than other corpora of ancient mosaics, those from the Holy Land have generated greater awareness of the intricate visual exchanges between paganism, Judaism, Samaritanism, Christianity, and Islam. Talgam examines the mosaics’ formal qualities in conjunction with the religious and cultural contexts within which they were produced and with which they had a profound, multidimensional dialogue.
Designed to be a useful travel companion, this book's descriptions and interpretative analyses help show the monuments in a new way, through an understanding of the historical, artistic and political events that contributed to their creation. Through the text and the illustrations we get to know the gods and heroes who were worshipped on the Acropolis, the leaders who envisaged the major projects, the artists who brought them to fruition, as well as the innovative ideas they applied, and the Athenian citizens who admired and enjoyed these achievements. 95 colour illustrations. French language edition. Also available in English, Greek, Russian, Spanish and German.
Through the 19th century, as archaeology started to emerge as a systematic discipline, plaster casting became a widely-adopted technique, newly applied by archaeologists to document and transmit discoveries from their expeditions. The Parthenon sculptures were some of the first to be cast. In the late 18th century and the first years of the 19th century, the French artist Fauvel and Lord Elgin's men conducted campaigns on the Athenian Acropolis. Both created casts of parts of the Parthenon sculptures that they did not remove and these were sent back to France and Britain where they were esteemed and displayed alongside other, original sections. Henceforth, casting was established as an essential archaeological tool and grew exponentially over the course of the century. Such casts are now not only fascinating historical objects but may also be considered time capsules, capturing the details of important ancient works when they were first moulded in centuries past. This book examines the role of 19th century casts as an archaeological resource and explores how their materiality and spread impacted the reception of the Parthenon sculptures and other Greek and Roman works. Investigation of their historical context is combined with analysis of new digital models of the Parthenon sculptures and their casts. Sensitive 3D imaging techniques allow investigation of the surface markings of the objects in exceptionally fine detail and enable quantitative comparative studies comparing the originals and the casts. The 19th century casts are found to be even more accurate, but also complex, than anticipated; through careful study of their multiple layers, we can retrieve surface information now lost from the originals through weathering and vandalism.
Designed to be a useful travel companion, this book's descriptions and interpretative analyses help show the monuments in a new way, through an understanding of the historical, artistic and political events that contributed to their creation. Through the text and the illustrations we get to know the gods and heroes who were worshipped on the Acropolis, the leaders who envisaged the major projects, the artists who brought them to fruition, as well as the innovative ideas they applied, and the Athenian citizens who admired and enjoyed these achievements. 95 colour illustrations.
Combining the studies of modern film, traditional narratology, and Roman art, this interdisciplinary work explores the complex and highly visual techniques of Tacitus' Annales. The volume opens with a discussion of current research in narratology, as applied to Roman historians. Narratology is a helpful and insightful tool, but is often inadequate to deal with specifically visual aspects of ancient narrative. In order to illuminate Tacitus' techniques, and to make them speak to modern readers, this book focuses on drawing and illustrating parallels between Tacitus' historiographical methods and modern film effects. Building on these premises, Waddell examines a wide array of Tacitus' visual narrative devices. Tacitean examples are discussed in light of their narrative effect and purpose in the Annales, as well as the ways in which they are similar to contemporary Roman art and modern film techniques, including focalization, alignment, use of the ambiguous gaze, temporal suggestion and quick-cutting. Through this approach the modern scholar gains a deeper understanding of the many ways in which Tacitus' Annales act upon the reader, and how his narrative technique helps to shape, guide, and deeply layer his history.
A statuette of Egyptian King Pepi formidably wielding a shepherd's crook stands in stark contrast to a fresco of an unassuming Orpheus-like youth gently hoisting a sheep around his shoulders. Both images, however, occupy an extensive tradition of shepherding motifs. In the transition from ancient Near Eastern depictions of the keeper of flocks as one holding great power to the more "pastoral" scenes of early Christian art, it might appear that connotations of rulership were divested from the image of the shepherd. The reality, however, presents a much more complex tapestry. The Good Shepherd: Image, Meaning, and Power traces the visual and textual depictions of the Good Shepherd motif from its early iterations as a potent symbol of kingship, through its reimagining in biblical figures, such as the shepherd-king David, and onward to the shepherds of Greco-Roman literature. Jennifer Awes Freeman reveals that the figure of the Good Shepherd never became humble or docile but always carried connotations of empire, divinity, and defensive violence even within varied sociopolitical contexts. The early Christian invocation of the Good Shepherd was not simply anti-imperial but relied on a complex set of associations that included king, priest, pastor, and sacrificial victim-even as it subverted those meanings in the figure of Jesus, both shepherd and sacrificial lamb. The concept of the Good Shepherd continued to prove useful for early medieval rulers, such as Charlemagne, but its imperial references waned in the later Middle Ages as it became more exclusively applied to church leaders. Drawing on a range of sources including literature, theological treatises, and political texts, as well as sculpture, mosaics, and manuscript illuminations, The Good Shepherd offers a significant contribution as the first comprehensive study of the long history of the Good Shepherd motif. It also engages the flexible and multivalent abilities of visual and textual symbols to convey multiple meanings in religious and political contexts.
This much-anticipated publication of two major Lydian excavation sectors at Sardis is the first in-depth presentation of the architecture and associated pottery and other artifacts found in the houses of inhabitants of this legendary city. It traces continuous occupation outside the city walls from the Late Bronze Age to the middle of the sixth century BC, when the Persians under Cyrus the Great captured the capital city of King Croesus. This book represents a remarkable synthesis of a vast quantity of everyday materials into a vivid picture of daily life in early Sardis in the period when the Lydians were conquering most of western Turkey. The authors describe many small structures and a wealth of artifacts that collectively document the lives of ordinary Lydians, in what appear to be both domestic and craft contexts. Because the Lydians maintained cultural and economic contacts throughout the eastern Mediterranean and the Near East, scholars working in Greece, Anatolia, and the Near East will find this first presentation of Lydian pottery and other objects, as well as vernacular architecture, of great interest and value. The two-volume book discusses the chronology, history, and evidence of everyday life, and catalogues nearly 800 objects, illustrated by more than 300 color plates of photos and detailed drawings.
This beautifully illustrated volume presents new ways of thinking about the concept of "being Roman"--with a particular emphasis on the way people in the provinces and on the periphery of the empire reacted to the state of being a Roman subject. Accompanying an exhibition at the Yale University Art Gallery and the McMullen Museum of Art at Boston College, the book presents material that is both chronologically and geographically distant from imperial Rome, the better to characterize and understand local responses and identities within the provinces as they were expressed through material culture.
On museum visits, we pass by beautiful, well-preserved vases from ancient Greece - but how often do we understand what the images on them depict? In "Image and Myth", Luca Giuliani tells the stories behind the pictures, exploring how artists of antiquity had to determine which motifs or historical and mythic events to use to tell an underlying story while also keeping in mind the tastes and expectations of paying clients. Covering the range of Greek style and its growth between the early Archaic and Hellenistic periods, Giuliani describes the intellectual, social, and artistic contexts in which the images were created. He reveals that developments in Greek vase painting were driven as much by the times as they were by tradition - the better-known the story, the less leeway the artists had in interpreting it. As literary culture transformed from an oral tradition, in which stories were always in flux, to the stability of written texts, the images produced by artists eventually became nothing more than illustrations of canonical works. At once a work of cultural and art history, "Image and Myth" builds a new way of understanding the visual culture of ancient Greece.
For the first time, this important volume features nearly all of the ancient glass objects in the collection of the Princeton University Art Museum. Collected over the course of more than a century, the objects originate from locations across the eastern Mediterranean region. Taken together, the 509 ancient glass vessels and plaques provide a timeline of archaeological and cultural history from the middle of the second millennium B.C. to the rise of Islam in the 7th century. An introductory essay by award-winning scholar Anastassios Antonaras summarizes the history of Greek, Roman, and Byzantine glass, with a special emphasis on people—workers, artisans, owners, and vendors—and on the processes they used to create and decorate these artifacts. Conveniently arranged according to production technique, each entry in Fire and Sand features a color photograph, ink drawing, and detailed description. Distributed for the Princeton University Art Museum
In 2006, the collection of 224 antiquities assembled by Walter Kempner, M.D. was donated to the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University by Barbara Newborg, M.D. Ranging from the 3rd millennium to the 3rd century B.C.E., the collection includes Mediterranean antiquities such as Cycladic marble artifacts; Greek ceramics attributed to significant Athenian painters, including the Kleophrades Painter, the Athenian Painter, and the Matsch Painter; and carved amber likely from an Etruscan workshop. In "The Past Is Present," scholars and Duke University students present the collection, including many objects that have never been published before, and discuss its significance for art history, classics, museum studies, and archaeology. The introductory essay by Kimerly Rorschach, Director of the Nasher Museum, discusses the gift in the context of current issues surrounding the acquisition of antiquities and the aims of university museums. Contributors Publication of the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University
In Family Fictions in Roman Art, Natalie Kampen reveals the profoundly de-naturalized ways in which family could be represented in the interests of political power during the Roman Empire. Her study examines a group of splendid objects made over the course of six hundred years, from carved gems to triumphal arches to ivory plaques, and asks how and why artists and their elite patrons chose to depict family to speak of everything from gender to the nature of rulership, from social rank to relationship itself. In the process, artists found new and often strikingly odd ways to give form to families from conquered lands and provinces as well as from the Italian countryside and the court. The book s contribution is in its combination of close attention to the creativity of Roman art and interest in the visual language of social and political relationships in a great Empire.
In early June 1902, John Peters, an American theologian, and Hermann Thiersch, a German classical scholar, were alerted to the discovery of two painted burial caves at Marisa/Beit Jibrin, less than 40 miles (62 km) by road southwest from Jerusalem. Tomb robbers had, a short time previously, forced their way into the burial chambers and caused damage to their fabric. Realising that these splendid tombs dated to about 200 BCE and the importance of their painted interiors, the two scholars immediately commissioned a leading Jerusalem photographer, Chalil Raad, to record them. This was fortunate, because the paintings on the soft limestone walls rapidly deteriorated and now can no longer be seen. Peters and Thiersch published a monograph on the painted tombs, illustrated with hand-drawn copies of the photographs, but the original plates have lain all these years in the archives of the Palestine Exploration Fund in London, unpublished. The paintings are unique in the Greek pictorial repertoire and are among the most important surviving examples of Ptolemaic art. The remarkable painted frieze extending along the two long sides of the main chamber of Tomb I depicts 22 different animal species, drawn from the wild fauna of the Levant, the Nile basin and the Horn of Africa - as well as a few mythical beasts. This animal frieze attests to the interest in exotic animals shown in the Hellenistic period. Other remarkable subjects represented in the Marisa paintings include Cerberus, the three-headed guard-dog of Hades, and a pair of elegant musicians in Greek dress. Timed to coincide with the centenary of the discovery of the painted tombs, a new study on the paintings has been produced by David Jacobson. This study appears as Annual VII of the Palestine Exploration Fund. It contains, for the first time, high quality reproductions of the photographic plates taken in 1902, which are held in the PEF collections. Reproduced with the photographs are the proofs of the coloured lithographs, which are superior in quality to the versions that were published. The inaccuracies and loss of delicate detail of the originals in the coloured lithographs used by Peters and Thiersch for their 1905 publication are clearly apparent. The accompanying text includes an analysis of all the paintings in the light of a century of scholarship and an assessment is made of their religious and cultural significance. Each of the animals in the frieze is compared with descriptions given by ancient writers, and a new interpretation is presented of the cycle as a whole. An appraisal is made of the overall contribution of the Marisa paintings to our knowledge of the art and culture of the Levant in the Ptolemaic period. Included with this new study is facsimile reprint of the original 1905 publication, now long out of print, and it includes superior copies of the coloured lithographs from that edition. This new publication also reproduces a very rare addenda section prepared by R.A.S. Macalister after inspecting the Marisa tombs in October of that year.
In the depths of the Kara Kum desert in Turkmenistan, one of the largest deserts in the world, Victor Sarianidi has excavated the country of Margush (Margiana). Its capital was the city of Gonur, which consisted of a unique ensemble of temples and palaces dating from the end of the third to the beginning of the second millennia BC. In addition to the capital city, Sarianidi excavated the Gonur necropolis, with almost 3000 tombs. This is the largest necropolis of the period to have been excavated in the Near East. Th e funeral gifts and personal adornments from the Gonur tombs have an amazing, unique beauty and are worthy of comparison with the fi nest examples of ancient oriental art from Mesopotamia, Asia Minor and the Aegean world. Research in this area has made it possible to conclude that the first monotheistic religion in the world, Zoroastrianism, originated in Margiana. Th is statement is supported by the finds that related to the funeral rituals and procedures observed in the Gonur necropolis. The Margiana culture proved to be so highly advanced that scholars increasingly hold the view that Bronze Age Central Asia was one of the main civilizations of ancient times, alongside Mesopotamia, Egypt, India and China. Th is book contains the results of the excavations, anthropological observations based on the skeletons found, and a large number and wide variety of finds.
Written by Scandinavian scholars, this book is a collection of essays on topics such as: The Importance of Etruscan Antiquity in Tuscan Renaissance Art; Orfeo Boselli and the Interpretation of the Antique; Michelangelo and Greek Sculpture; Polish Artists and the Emergence of Archaeology in Eighteenth-Century Rome; and Pirro Logorio and the Rediscovery of Antiquity. |
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