Chapps

@chapps.bsky.social

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Former tech drone, living in L.A. I now create digital reconstructions of ancient Greek and Roman sculpture. No, really. 🏳️‍🌈 Flickr account (museum photos, mainly, free to use and high res): https://www.flickr.com/photos/125386285@N02/

A tall free-blown footed glass flask with astonishingly colorful iridescence. The body is bulbous, and it tapers up to a long, thin neck with a flaring mouth at the top. The foot is like a modern wine glass, a disk, but with a very short stem. The mottled colors range from lava oranges and reds, to canary yellow, bright green, azure blue, and dark blue.

Marble relief depicting a bearded older physician dressed as a Greek philosopher, his himation wrapped around his body and over one shoulder, seated on a folding stool and examining a naked child or slave (adult slaves were depicted as small) with a distended belly. A dedicatory inscription - which I'll link to in the next post - is at the bottom.

Roman, from Athens, Greece, 2nd century CE (during Roman rule).

British Museum

Pompeii’s newly uncovered Black Room, a 15 meter long, six meter wide banqueting triclinium (dining room), is decorated with Third Style fresco characters and subjects inspired by the Trojan War. Here we have large figures of a heroically nude god Apollo, wearing a laurel wreath on his head and leaning on his lyre. He has just punished the miserable-looking princess of Troy, Kassandra, with a curse, meaning that the prophesying powers that he gifted her with would never be believed (because she went back on her promise to give herself to him if he gave her those powers). She sits on the omphalos, the stone from Delphi - the seat of Apollo’s Pythia, the priestess who could prophesy the future.

Large silver decadrachm coin with the head of a female deity (more revealed in the next post in the thread), facing right, her curly hair floating about her, bound by an ampyx (wide headband) and a sakkos (hairnet). She also wears a necklace with round beads, perhaps pearls. Her head is surrounded by dolphins, and two inscriptions appear: in the upper right is the Greek word Syracosion, meaning 'of the people of Syracuse', and written on the dolphin under the woman's neck is written the name of the artist, Kimon.

This bronze mirror has a worn beaded border and a handle that terminates in a ram’s head. The part of the handle above the ram is modeled as a griffin. The disc is perforated with nine holes that seem to result from ten attempts at perforation; two indentations near the center of the disc may represent failed attempts at perforation. On the obverse, the top of the handle is decorated with a floral pattern. The reverse of the disc bears three figures standing before an Ionic façade. The central figure, who wears a peplos and helmet, is probably Athena (Etruscan Menrva); the other figures, a male and a female, are more difficult to identify. The male figure on the left, wearing a short tunic and boots, leans on a club that is similar to the one often carried by Herakles, but it is unusual for the hero to be shown clothed. The figure on the right is an unidentified woman wearing a peplos and Phrygian cap. A spiky garland borders the disc, and the mirror has been designated as an example of the Spiky Garland Group, named after this feature.

The disc of this mirror has been perforated in nine places, probably as a means of ensuring that the object would be useless to the living and could be permanently dedicated to the deceased.

Harvard Art Museums (1977.216.2311)

Objects used by men and women in households of status and wealth were deliberately marked for the tomb, ensuring that they could not be used by the living. Here, the Etruscan word śuthina (for the tomb), has been inscribed on the forehead of this vase's female head, which made certain that the vessel was destined for the tomb of the owner. The face is almost classical, but with eyes and hairstyle that look typically Etruscan. Her lips are slightly parted, and her hair's topknot is removable, enabling it to function as a vase for liquids (perhaps wine or olive oil for the afterlife).

Etruscan, Orvieto (Velzna) (?), found in Sovana (Soana) (?), ca. 225-175 BCE.

6 1/4 x 3 1/2 in. (16 x 9 cm)
3.1 lbs. (1415 g)

Musée du Louvre (MNC 706; Br 2949)

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Photographed at the exhibition 'The Etruscans: From the Heart of Ancient Italy' mounted at the Legion of Honor, San Francisco.

Photo of the actress Bebe Daniels wearing the brilliant 'octopus gown' (really a cape), designed by Clare West for Daniels' role as 'Satan Synne' in the 1921 movie, 'The Affairs of Anatol', directed by Cecil B. DeMille.

Post on X by someone named Nina Antonia, showing a black and white film still of an actress wearing a dramatic cape with a stylized black octopus with large 'pearl' beading. It says 'Actress Helen Bennett showing off her Cthulu Cape, its supposed to be a spider but looks as if it was designed by Lovecraft. Image Horst P Horst, 1939'.

Not surprisingly, everything in her post is wrong.

Fourth style fresco from the Room of the Cupids (triclinium) in the House of the Vettii in Pompeii, depicting a floating Dionysus-Bacchus and his wife, Ariadne. Both are mostly nude, save swirling garment that catch an unseen wind and plaster themselves to their bodies. The god of wine carries his traditional thyrsus. Both are sent against a vibrant (cinnabar mix?) wall with an illusory painted inset frame.

ca. 1st century CE, before 79 CE.

Fresco from the Villa of Cicero (Villa di Cicerone) near the Herculaneum Gate in Pompeii, depicting a cymbalistria, an ecstatic maenad dancing and playing cymbals as part of the worship of Dionysus-Bacchus. Her filmy garments swirl about her body in an unseen wind. Several of these ‘floating’ maenads, along with centaurs, satyrs, and other figures were incorporated into the black frescoed walls of the villa’s triclinium (dining room).

These dancer frescoes became famous when they were discovered in Pompeii during the excavations of the Villa of Cicero in 1748/9 and 1763, and a great deal of art reproducing these images was produced in the 18th and 19th centuries. They remain popular today, prominently decorating the swag at the Pompeii gift shop.

Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli (inv. 9297)

The complex motion of this bronze statuette of a dancer is conveyed exclusively through the interaction of the body with several layers of dress. Over an undergarment that falls in deep folds and trails heavily, the figure wears a lightweight mantle, drawn tautly over her head and body by the pressure applied to it by her right arm, left hand, and right leg. Its substance is conveyed by the alternation of the tubular folds pushing through from below and the freely curling softness of the fringe. The woman's face is covered by the sheerest of veils, discernible at its edge below her hairline and at the cutouts for the eyes. Her extended right foot shows a laced slipper. This dancer has been convincingly identified as one of the professional entertainers, a combination of mime and dancer, for which the cosmopolitan city of Alexandria was famous in antiquity.

Greek, Hellenistic era, 3rd–2nd century BCE.

Met Museum, New York (1972.118.95)

My short-haired Staffie-mix ‘tuxedo dog’, Maya, sitting in the local vet’s waiting room, surrounded by staff who are gesturing for her to stay sitting while holding out treats for her.

Closeup of the chryselephantine decoration of one of the funerary couches of Macedonian Aigai's tombs. Below the carved ivory are small panels of transparent glass with embedded figures cut from gold foil or leaf.

Transparent flat glass oval set into a chunky modern gold ring. The glass has an embedded gold foil image of winged Eros drawing his bow.

Christie's, 5 December 2001.

Transparent glass ring with an oval bezel. Embedded within the bezel a gold foil figure, perhaps a helmeted winged Nike, her left hand raised, her right hand lowered and holding on to a staff.

Greek, 350-100 BCE (probably closer to the earlier date). Made in the Eastern Mediterranean, possibly Greece or Macedonia.

Classical Greek glass ring embedded with a thin gold foil representation of an alighting winged Nike, personification of Victory.

Ancient artisans placed an intricately cut or stamped piece of gold leaf or foil directly onto a base layer of glass, then sealed it under a protective layer of clear or translucent molten glass. This method represents the earliest precursor to the famous Hellenistic "sandwich" gold-glass technique. Scholars believe the technique originated during the 4th to 3rd centuries BCE in Greece, with early milestones linked to the workshops of masters like Phidias at Olympia.

350-300 BCE, Met Museum (17.194.2537)

Photo: my own

Late black-figure style terracotta pinax (plate) with purple details (helmet crest, greaves and salpinx chinstrap). It depicts a warrior with short curly hair, crested helmet, cuirass ornamented with volutes, short embroidered chiton, chlamys tied in front, sword-belt, and purple greaves, blowing a salpinx (trumpet) with a phorbeia (chinstrap). The salpinx has a long thin tube, about half the height of a man, with a roundish bulb at the end, which serves as the bell of the trumpet.

The opposite side of the lebes, this one showing almost exclusively marching men with shields and spears, and a few men on horseback, a military procession. The top row of marching geese is a nice counterpoint to the men. The six snake protomes around the rim each rear up, as if about to strike.

Closeup of the same side of this gilded silver cauldron. We see the royal hunting party (or military procession) on the left, with men marching in front of an elite man on a horse; the marching men have round shields (one with a fish on it) and each carry two spears over their shoulders. A small hill in front of them has a date palm, with a lion chasing a stag - a duck or goose flies in the air above them. More men march in procession on the bottom register, with ducks flying in the air and date palms on hills. A few men are on horseback.

Gilt silver lebes (cauldron) depicting four rows of scenes including a row of geese, a royal hunting expediiton, and military processions. On the convex bottom there is a medallion with a lion trampling a man on all fours while a hawk flies overhead. Six snake protomes were added around the rim at a later date.

The Etruscans were master metalsmiths. As metal was readily available in Etruria, artisans created a wide repertoire of vessels in bronze, gold, silver, and silver gilt, sometimes reflecting an influence from the Near East. This cauldron with attached snake protomes (decorative motifs usually of a head and torso of an animal) is a good example. Objects like these, which accompanied the deceased in their tombs, inform us of a love for luxurious objects including those inspired by their Mediterranean trading partners.

It's considered a Phoenician-style import or heavy imitation, with Egyptian-influenced iconography.

The Bernardini Tomb is one of the most celebrated princely burials of the ancient Mediterranean. Discovered in 1876 in Palestrina (the ancient Latin city of Praeneste), this 7th-century BCE trench grave (fossa) belonged to a high-ranking male elite or prince.

Etruscan, from Praeneste (modern Palestrina), 'princely' Bernardini Tomb, 2nd quarter of 7th century BCE.

Museo Nazionale Etrusco di Villa Giulia (Villa Poniatowski), Rome (inv. 61566)

This terracotta kantharos - a double-handled wine cup - is a janiform vessel, meaning it has two faces, back to back. Seen here is the leering face of a satyr with fleshy lips, a beard arranged in rows of ringlets, small horns emerging from his temple, and pointed ears. His nose is very small and pug-like, and the bridge is set very low, between the inner corners of his eyes, the brow turned down in an animalistic way. He also wears an ivy berry wreath. The bell of the cup is decorated with palmettes. The color of the raw terracotta is a light earthy brown, and is overlaid in spots by the original pigments: green, blue, pink, red, black.

Etruscan, mid-4th century BCE.
Museo Nazionale Etrusco di Villa Giulia, Rome (2769)

Photo: my own

Fresco from the House of Actius Anicetus in Pompeii, showing the riot between Pompeiians and Nucerians that began in the amphitheater of the city, and spilled out into its streets. We see the scene from above, as if in flight, and small dark figures are chasing others, and beating them.

MANN inv. 112222

The site of the Temple of Venus, as it appears today. A modern sculpture of a naked man - without arms and legs - stands on the platform for the temple, red poppies blooming all around the base.

A highly colorful 19th century watercolor by the artist Francois Chabrol, reconstructing the Temple of Venus as it existed before the 62 CE earthquake. A central temple with a small cella sits up on a tall platform, surrounded by frescoed porticos. A large gilded Nike acroterion sits atop the highest point of the room, above the pediment with its painted and gilded sculpture. Three altars sit at ground level, in front of the tall staircase that accesses the temple.

Gold lamp with two nozzles and vertical loop handle. A handle-reflector in the shape of a lotus leaf is attached over the handle. The body is cup-shaped and is decorated with a band of lotus leaves and stripes. It was discovered during 19th century excavations of Pompeii's Temple of Venus, found hidden inside a small, temporary chapel chamber located at the bottom of the temple's cella (inner sanctuary).

Dark brown Etruscan terracotta horse-head oinochoe (jug or pitcher). Although impasto ware is composed of coarse, gritty clay with impurities, skillful manipulation of the clay in these examples nevertheless built up the body, elongated neck, and handles to form sculptural vessels. These pitchers have a whimsical air to them, as exemplified here by the spouts fashioned into horses' heads, or the body turning into four upright "handles" funneling liquids through a trefoil spout, giving it a contemporary look.

Etruscan (southern) or Faliscan, second quarter of the 7th century BCE.

Height: 13 3/4 in. (35 cm)

The panel is worked on both sides: the front face presents sculptures of the mask of a deity wearing a crown in archaizing style and a tripod in the background; on the opposite side, against the background of a theatre tent, is a mask from New Comedy.
Panels of this type, sculpted on both sides, were placed on small pillars or columns to decorate gardens.

Second half of the 1st cent. AD.

Palazzo Massimo alle Terme, Rome (inv. 112158)

Closeup of the head and upper torso of the bronze statue of Veiovis. His face is very youthful and pretty, and the hair is wildly wavy and goes down to just below his shoulders. Clearly modeled on portraits of Alexander the Great, particularly the ones as the god Helios.

Bronze 1/3 life size statue of a naked and muscular youth. His legs are particularly large. He's clean shaven and wearing a wreath on his head; his hair is wavy and falls to his shoulders, clearly based on portraits of Alexander the Great. He stands in contrapposto, all the weight on his right leg, his left slightly bent. He's leaning on his raised left arm, which once held a staff; he clutches a thunderbolt in his right hand, which is lowered against his leg. On his raised left shoulder is drapery, and his feet are shod in sandals.

Etruscan, Viterbo, Monterazzano, 1st c. CE.
Museo Nazionale Etrusco Rocca Albornoz, Viterbo (inv. 53597)

Photo: my own, taken at the Legion of Honor in San Francisco, part of the exhibition 'The Etruscans: From the Heart of Ancient Italy'.

This mosaic decoration is composed of greenstone, forming the image of a seated figure, and spiny oyster shell (Spondylus spp.), forming the throne on which he sits and the background of the scene. The old man, whose age is suggested by the wrinkles etched into his face, wears a distinctive rounded head wrap. Similar turbans appear in other mediums adorning scribes and supernatural figures.
The mosaic decorates the back of a mirror, whose reflective surface of polished pyrite has been lost. Throughout Mesoamerica, including among present-day Indigenous communities, mirrors play an important divinatory role, allowing skilled practitioners to see future events with a clarity of sight usually reserved for deities. Images in the reflections could be “read” as one might read a manuscript or a map.

LACMA (M.2010.115.725)

Bronze weathervane atop a tiled turret in the shape of a galleon on the waves, pennants and sails blowing in the wind.

Reduced size bronze sculpture entitled 'The Kiss', by Auguste Rodin, depicting naked lovers, a man and a woman, passionately embracing and kissing, while sitting on a rock.

Created 1881-82, on display at the Legion of Honor, San Francisco.

Photo: my own

Fallen Caryatid Carrying an Urn, originally titled Sorrow, was considered by Rodin and his contemporaries as among his best compositions. Unlike the standing caryatids (female support figures) of classical tradition, Rodin’s version folds into herself, compressed beneath the weight of the vessel she carries. In another large variant, the caryatid bears a massive rock that the poet Rainer Maria Rilke metaphorically described as the "burden . . . from which we can find no escape."

Auguste Rodin (French, 1840-1917), bronze with some gilt, after 1900. Cast by Eugène Rudier (1875-1952), Paris, by 1918.

16 x 10 7/8 x 9 5/8 in. (40.6 x 27.6 x 24.4 cm)

Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, Legion of Honor (1950.60)

Egyptian silver mirror with a gilded handle in the form of a Hathor emblem. The handle of this mirror was originally made of wood (now restored) covered with gold foil. The woman's face with cow's ears represents the goddess Bat and is also an emblem of the goddess Hathor. The use of gold and silver, rather than wood and bronze, identifies this as the possession of a member of the elite, in this case one of three foreign wives of Thutmose III. The king's cartouche is inscribed above the face. From the tomb of the three foreign wives of Tuthmosis III, Thebes, Egypt.

Period: New Kingdom

Dynasty: Dynasty 18

Reign: reign of Thutmose III

Date: ca. 1479–1425 B.C.

Geography: From Egypt, Upper Egypt, Thebes, Wadi Gabbanat el-Qurud, Wadi D, Tomb of the Three Foreign Wives of Thutmose III

Medium: Disk: silver; handle: wood (modern) sheathed in gold (ancient)

Met Museum, New York

Another high end luxury good from the burial of an aristocratic warrior in the Bashova Tumulus, one of the richest in all of 5th century BC Thrace.

This detail of the galloping horse protome on this gilded drinking horn (rhyton) shows the fine workmanship, and is thought by some scholars to be Athenian workmanship. The top of the long horn has a broad band of engraved and gilded palmettes and lotuses, and the rim is turned out and down with a bead-and-egg motif. The spout for pouring wine is located in the middle of the horse's breast. The horse's mane, the strap around his neck, the hoofs, the decorative band at the top of the horn, and the rim are gilded.

ca. 425-400 BCE, silver with gilding.

Plovdiv, Regional Archaeological Museum (inv. 1517)

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Photographed at the Getty Villa Museum, part of the 'Ancient Thrace and the Classical World: Treasures from Bulgaria, Romania, and Greece' exhibition.

Painted illustration of the largest temple in ancient Etruscan Vulci. Two rows of thick columns with Ionic capitals support a massive timber roof with a triangular pediment. In many ways, it resembles the construction of ancient Japanese temple roofs. All of the end of the rafters are decorated with painted terracotta caps, and sculpted and painted reliefs hang down in front of the pediment. Acroteria are seen on the terracotta-edged roof, including two galloping flying horses. We see people in chariots and walking around and into the temple.

At the right end of the triangular pediment of a temple, against the background of the final slab covering the lateral beam of the tympanum, the winged horse emerges in clear relief, in the act of taking flight, with its front hooves worked in the round and silhouetted against the sky. A sober polychrome decoration, expertly alternated with unembellished areas, defines the details of the figure and qualifies the surface, decorated with scales. The horse would originally have been harnessed with a bit, possibly made of bronze. The painted details seem to be entirely in burnt red and charcoal grey-black. The wings have red feathers around the shoulder, then alternating long feathers in stripes of black and red. The eyes are red, and the tubular base is painted in a black scale pattern. However, the interior of the flaring nostrils and slightly open mouth seem to be pink. A hole exists in the back of the teeth where a metal bit was once situated (perhaps gilded bronze).

The figure falls fully within the Greek iconographic tradition, which already in the Archaic period offered isolated horse heads as a single decorative element in Attic ceramics. For the naturalism and vigour of the sculpture, this Pegasus, influenced by the formal achievements of Greek art in the early fifth century BCE, is among the finest examples of surviving Etruscan coroplastic art, worthy of the good reputation it enjoyed in ancient Italy.

Etruscan, Caere (modern Cerveteri), ca. 500-475 BCE. Terracotta with polychromy.

Musei Vaticani, Museo Gregoriano Etrusco, Vatican City (14130)

Closeup of the handle of a cista (cylindrical vessel used to hold an upper-class woman's grooming and beauty products during life, and placed in her tomb at death), still attached to its lid. It's in the form of a naked female acrobat, bending over backwards, her hands and feet touching the ground.

ca. 4th-1st c BCE, from Praeneste. Morgan Library and Museum.

Designed for attachment to the lid of a large bronze cista, a cylindrical lidded box, these three figures probably represent Sleep (Hypnos) and Death (Thanatos) holding the body of Sarpedon. A son of Zeus who helped to defend Troy from invading Greek forces, "godlike Sarpedon of the brazen helmet" fell at the hands of Patroclus, as told by Homer in Book XVI of the Iliad. Apollo then intervened to protect the body, removing it from danger and entrusting it to the two winged deities, as depicted here and in a number of other ancient artworks, Greek and Etruscan alike. If not Sarpedon, the fallen warrior could be Memnon, the son of Eos and Tithonos slain by Achilles.

The figures of Hypnos and Thanatos are winged, and wearing armor, including crested helmets, cuirasses, with short chitons, baring their legs. They wear no sandals and are barefoot. The stiff dead body of the man they're carrying is fully naked, his long hair hanging down.

Same votive terracotta head as in the main post in this thread, except here he's at his home in the Villa Giulia in Rome, with cold fluorescent uplighting. He looks like a zombie - it's an eerie, unsettling effect (the lighting in the museum is almost uniformly bad). The red color of his skin looks slightly purple and cold.

A male terracotta head with reddish skin tones and residual light pigment over the hair, giving it a grayish appearance today. While initiated from a workshop press-mold, the facial features were heavily hand-modeled to achieve an intense, personalized verism: a high, deeply wrinkled forehead, an asymmetrical aquiline nose, pronounced cheekbones, and prominent ears. Rather than a generic archetype, the piece functions as an authentic individual portrait, likely offering the specific identity of a worshipper to the gods. This refined image attests to the skills and expertise of its sculptor and painter that could artistically rival any Greek or Roman counterpart.

And, yes, people compare him to former US Vice President Mike Pence all the time.

This highly stylized, lion-shaped terracotta vessel has a tall spout on its back and pierced nostrils for pouring; it's decorated with painted red and orange stripes, almost in a basket-weave pattern. Its mouth is open, and upper and lower fangs touch.