Europe is gripped in a late-summer heatwave, and the air is alive with the sounds of amorous insects. Which brought to mind this extraordinary gem now at the Getty, showing a grasshopper balancing on a blade of grass. The stone is a striking mottled jasper, with those golden splotches somehow evocative of sun-drenched days. The
Victory wings in here, her peplos pressed against her body with skirts fluttering in the wind. She is only 7.3 centimeters tall, but the amount of detail rendered in that hard, shiny chalcedony is staggering – a Roman inheritance in miniature of earlier monumental Nikai in Olympia, Samothrace and beyond. Chalcedony (and other hard, shiny
Some things get better with age, and if you enjoy the surface of this delectable little (3.7 x 3.3 cm) gem in Cleveland perhaps you’d agree Roman glass is one of them. Vessels and gems made in the cameo glass technique were in vogue only for about half a century beginning in Augustus’ reign. More
Is there any profile more lovely than that of Antinöos, that beautiful rustic beloved by Hadrian? I think not, and of the all the surviving portraits of him, this one in slightly translucent black chalcedony is by far my favorite. Born in Bithynia (the northern Black Sea coastline of Asia Minor), the comely youth caught
The most exciting treasure in the lavish Treasury of Aachen’s Cathedral is certainly the so-called Cross of Lothair. In the treasury museum, the Ottonian processional cross is most peculiarly displayed with the colorful principle side facing the wall (a nod to how the cross was oriented when carried into the church or more modern Germanic
I admit it: I don’t overly like Livia, the wife of Augustus, and a true political operator. I dislike her fashionable nodus hairstyle even more vehemently (I’ll save these gripes for another post…). That’s all besides the point here. This is a masterpiece in miniature (approximately 3 x 3 cm) and frankly a sort of
He’s gorgeous, he’s purple, and he is Alexander’s least favorite orator! But he’s my favorite: Demosthenes you ornery bastard! Roman culturally, and Greek by design, this enormous (1.9 cm) gem shows the glowering visage of Demosthenes. After strengthening his voice and polishing his diction by training with a mouthful of pebbles (have to try this),
‘Never been buried’ : perhaps the most romantic and captivating descriptor of any ancient artwork and never more than in the case of the so-called Vienna Cameo.The cameo is remarkable in every conceivable dimension, not the least of which is virtuoso technique in which it was carved. The large Indian onyx consists of at least
You might have seen this extraordinary engraved agate before. It was found late in the University of Cincinnati’s 2015 excavation season at Pylos (deep in the Peloponnese) in an intact Mycenaean grave (ca. 1450 B.C.) and the discovery made the front page of the New York Times. And rightly so! The other 1500 or so objects
It’s not every day that a eunuch rises from relative administrative obscurity to found a massively successful dynasty, but that is exactly what Philetairos managed.