- Examines The Alexander Mosaic also known as the 'Battle of Issus' with photography by Luigi Spina and essays by Valeria Sampaolo and Fausto Zevi - The third volume in the Hidden Treasures series The third volume in the Hidden Treasures series launched in 2018 with the Farnese Cup examines another undoubted masterpiece: The Alexander Mosaic. It is certainly one of the great attractions for visitors who everyday throng the rooms of the National Archaeological Museum in Naples. The mosaic is made up of over one and a half million tesserae, arranged asymmetrically using the opus vermiculatum technique, which allows the figures to be outlined to make them stand out against the background. Luigi Spina gets his camera in close to the crush of men and animals to bring out all the stunning detail in the expressions, gestures, and poses that the viewer often overlooks when taking in the scene as a whole. Eyes wide open and alert, loose reins, flying whips, but also unwonted finery: sumptuous fabrics, precious ornaments, and elaborately coiffed manes. Essays by Valeria Sampaolo and Fausto Zevi close the book, placing the floor mosaic in its context and highlighting its extraordinary nature within the panorama of ancient art.

A well illustrated and highly detailed study of the Alexander Mosaic which once furnished the floor of the House of the Faun in Pompeii. Moreno discusses the background to the mosaic, speculating on which battle may have been depicted, when the piece was produced and by which artist. The composition of the scene, the figures portrayed and the artistic style and conventions are discussed in detail and other works of art are consulted in Moreno's attempt to link the mosaic with the work of the artist Apelles. Includes many close-ups of the mosaic in colour.

A study of the richest, most complex and visually stunning monuments of classical antiquity.

In her pursuit of metaphorical, transhistorical imagery, representing men as predators and women as their victims over the centuries, Cohen (Dartmouth) lays out a vast network of interpretive associations that have neither cultural nor chronological limits. Developing her analysis of three late-fourth-century BCE Macedonian monumental themes--the abduction of Helen, the lion hunt, and war--Cohen puts them into a context of large significance through her creation of an ingenious, erudite, and extended repertory of analogous images, accompanied by well-selected exempla. Her proposed network traces patterns established by anthropological perspectives of masculinity and its association with aggressive violence and by principles of feminist ideology, partly derived from Judith Butler. The book's introduction and many subsequent methodological digressions set out the conceptual lines of her approach, as do paradigmatic chapter headings, e.g., "War as Hunt: Hunt as War?" "Rape as Hunt: Hunt as Rape?" and "Rape as War: War as Rape?" Provocative indeed, her categories of enduring imagery challenge traditional views of ancient art in ways both beneficial and problematic, viz., her remark "Ovid, the premier Freudian thinker of the Roman World." Whether modern conceptions of sexuality and the struggles of contrasting genders pertain to antiquity remains as an acknowledged issue. Summing Up: Recommended. Graduate students through faculty/researchers. Graduate Students; Researchers/Faculty. Reviewed by R. Brilliant.

During his reign and following his death, the physiognomy of Alexander the Great was one of the most famous in history, adorning numerous works of art. This study demonstrates how the various portraits transmit not so much a likeness of Alexander as a set of cliches that symbolized the ruler

An “intriguing and invaluable” biography of Alexander the Great by the novelist whose fiction redefined Ancient Greece (The New York Times). Acclaimed writer Mary Renault is widely known for her provocative historical novels of Alexander the Great and his lovers. But she also authored this nonfiction classic, a fresh, illuminating look at a man whose legend has remained larger than life for more than two thousand years. From his dysfunctional family dynamics to his molding under Aristotle, from his shocking rise to power at age twenty to the staggering violence of his military campaigns, Renault is clear-eyed about Alexander’s accomplishments and his flaws. Infectious in its enthusiasm, this is a penetrating study of an unrivaled conqueror, enduring icon, and fascinating man. Hailed as both “a splendid achievement in nonfiction” (The Plain Dealer) and “the perfect companion to her Alexander novels” (The Wall Street Journal), Renault’s engrossing and accessible biography stands alone in the pantheon of Alexander the Great literature. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Mary Renault including rare images of the author.

This book provides a comprehensive account of mosaics in the ancient world from the early pebble mosaics of Greece to the pavements of Christian churches in the East. Separate chapters in Part I cover the principal regions of the Roman Empire in turn, in order to bring out the distinctive characteristics of their mosaic workshops. Questions of technique and production, of the role of mosaics in architecture, and of their social functions and implications are treated in Part II. The book discusses both well-known works and recent finds, and balances consideration of exceptional masterpieces against standard workshop production. Two main lines of approach are followed throughout: first, the role of mosaics as a significant art form, which over an unbroken span illuminates the evolution of pictorial style better than any comparable surviving medium; and secondly, their character as works of artisan production closely linked to their architectural context.

The largest carved hardstone cup to have survived from the ancient world has come down to us through the ages probably without ever becoming an archaeological find: its peregrinations took it from Alexandria to Rome and thence to Constantinople, before it returned to Rome in the fifteenth century, where it was bought by the sharp-eyed connoisseur Lorenzo de? Medici. It then joined the Farnese Collection, from where it reached the National Archaeological Museum of Naples.0The intriguing story of the cup?s vicissitudes as it passed from one glittering court to another is matched by the still not wholly resolved interpretation of the scene depicted on its inner face, which has been the subject of a number of different readings and continues to be a matter of debate. The work is a tour de force of the carver?s art, with the figures in the inner scene and the terrifying face of the Gorgon on the outside picked out with unerring skill, exploiting every shade of the sardonyx agate of which it is made.

In the past century, exploration and serendipity have uncovered mosaic after mosaic in the Near East—maps, historical images and religious scenes constituting a treasure of new testimony from antiquity. In them, Bowersock finds historical evidence, illustrations of literary and mythological tradition, religious icons, and monuments to civic pride.

The best-illustrated survey of a spectacular ancient art, now available in an affordable edition Mosaic has been called “painting for eternity,” and it is in fact one of the few arts of antiquity to survive in something like its original condition and variety. Mosaic pavements with geometric and figural motifs first appeared in Greece at the end of the fifth century BC and subsequently spread throughout the classical world, from the palaces of emperors and kings to even relatively modest private homes. Across the Mediterranean, local workshops cultivated many distinctive regional styles, while traveling teams of Hellenistic craftsmen produced figural mosaics of stunning refinement, often modeled after famous paintings; indeed, their work constitutes one of our only records of classical Greek painting, which has been almost entirely lost. The styles and techniques of the ancient mosaicist’s art are given a concise yet authoritative exposition in the first part of this handsome volume. The second, and larger, part conducts the reader on a chronologically ordered tour of the most important centers of the art form’s development, from the Macedonian capital of Pella, whose compositions in natural pebbles set a high artistic standard for mosaics at the beginning of their history, to the Basilica of San Vitale at Ravenna, whose wall and vault mosaics, with their glittering vision of a triumphant Christianity, mark the transition between antiquity and the Middle Ages. Special attention is given to Pompeii and its surroundings, where the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79 preserved intact an astonishing variety of mosaics, including such ambitious figural scenes as the famous Alexander Mosaic, composed of some four million miniscule tesserae, as well as characteristically Roman pavements in black and white, and the brightly colored wall mosaics of garden grottoes. Featuring more than 230 vibrant photographs, many newly commissioned, Greek and Roman Mosaics is the first survey of its subject to be illustrated in full color. It will be an essential visual reference for every student of classical antiquity, and a source of considerable delight for art lovers.