Cover Story
Sacred Light, Brilliant Matter Why are we drawn to bright things? When and where did our fascination with sparkle and shine begin? Were ancient ideas of beauty and value the same as ours – or rooted more deeply in the magical worlds of sorcery… Features
Stabiae: The pursuit of leisure Buried by Vesuvius in AD 79, the Roman seaside resort of Stabiae and its opulent villas have long been overshadowed by nearby Pompeii and Herculaneum. As Dalu Jones reports, a… 
Saving Tigray’s painted churches Over the past few years, the Ethiopian Heritage Fund has been scaling cliffs and mountains to study and conserve the remarkable rock-hewn painted churches of Ethiopia’s Tigray region, currently in… 
Galen: The Emperor’s Doctor Medical stories have dominated the news this past year. While the pandemic is closing museums, some are heading online. A new virtual exhibition by the Institute for the Study of… 
A helping hand for heritage Since 1980, the UK’s National Heritage Memorial Fund has been safeguarding significant heritage at risk of loss. New archaeological finds declared as Treasure, works of art being sold to overseas… News
Secrets of a Maya sweat bath Recent research on an intriguing assemblage of artefacts excavated from a Classic Maya sweat bath in Guatemala is revealing new details about ritual activity at the unusual structure. This sweat… 
Green-fingered finds Home-improvements and gardening have been on the rise under lockdown in the UK, and, in a few cases, work in the garden has led to archaeological discoveries. One household in… 
Painting prehistoric pigs A Sulawesi warty pig painted in red ochre on an Indonesian cave wall may be the world’s oldest known representational image of an animal, dating back at least 45,500 years,… 
A pyramid puzzle A missing piece of wood, one of the three objects collected from the Great Pyramid of Giza by engineer Waynman Dixon in 1872, has been rediscovered in a cigar box… 
Frescoed food-shop unearthed at Pompeii Recent excavations in the Regio V district of Pompeii have unearthed a well-preserved Roman thermopolium – a hot-food shop – in its entirety. The counter, with a painting of a… Views
Kerma, 1913 From: The Picture Desk The sands of ancient Nubia, a region over-lapping southern Egypt and northern Sudan, are home to remains of cities, forts, and numerous pyramids. It was to these archaeologically rich sands… 
On Show – Exhibitions from around the world From: Culture, What's on Details of the latest and most interesting exhibitions. 
Jacques Francis From: People He was not, Jacques Francis insisted as prosecution witnesses tried repeatedly to have his testimony thrown out, a slave. They called him ‘blackamoor’ and ‘infidel-born’, but he called himself famulus… Reviews
The Aeneid: A New Translation The great epic by Roman poet Virgil (or Vergil; 70-19 BC) became an instant classic. His Aeneid was celebrated by other poets and the imperial family, and taught in schools… 
The Invention of Medicine: From Homer to Hippocrates Disease tearing through a community; mass fatalities; and no apparent end in sight: the pestilences plaguing Greeks at Troy at the start of Homer’s Iliad or Thebes in Sophocles’ Oedipus… 
Voyagers: The settlement of the Pacific When the many islands that are scattered across the waters of Oceania were first settled, how, and by whom are questions that have generated much discussion over the centuries. It… 
From the editor
People have long been drawn to glittering objects. For America’s indigenous inhabitants, there were depths of meaning beneath the resplendent surfaces of gold, pearls, and quetzal feathers used in an array of objects that served as symbols of power and influence. We explore these meanings in our cover feature, as Nicholas J Saunders take us into a shimmering world of sacred light.
In the Bay of Naples, a long-awaited museum has opened its doors at Roman Stabiae, overshadowed neighbour of Pompeii and Herculaneum. It was in Stabiae’s well-appointed villas, filled with mosaics, ornate stucco, and fabulous frescoes, Dalu Jones writes, that the wealthy pursued otium, a carefully cultivated type of leisure.
From Stabiae’s Roman frecoes, we head to the painted rock-hewn churches of northern Ethiopia’s Tigray region. These remote churches, whose delicate centuries-old wall-paintings are already under threat, are facing new dangers as conflict continues in the area. Blair Priday, Stephen Rickerby, and Lisa Shekede from the Ethiopian Heritage Fund tell us about their work conserving the paintings before the conflict, and how this has laid the groundwork for future conservation.
The works of Galen, physician to the emperor Marcus Aurelius, influenced medicine for centuries afterwards. His extensive writings outlined his experiments, his studies in anatomy, and his views on other physicians and on his own writings. His texts are also a valuable source on the Antonine Plague and various cures attempted – including milk from Stabiae. As we continue through a modern pandemic, Geraldine Fabrikant looks back at medicine in the time of Galen.
In the 40 years since it was set up, the UK’s National Heritage Memorial Fund has given grants for the raising and hull conservation of Henry VIII’s warship the Mary Rose, the acquisition of artworks at risk of being sold abroad, and more. We speak to Vanessa Wells about the Fund’s work, and some of the many archaeological discoveries it has helped museums acquire, including the stunning Anglo-Saxon Staffordshire Hoard, unearthed in 2009.
Decades earlier, a man named Basil Brown made a spectacular Anglo-Saxon discovery, celebrated in a new Netflix film. In 1939, Brown excavated the royal ship-burial at Sutton Hoo. As he is now brought to life on screen by Ralph Fiennes in The Dig, Lindsay Fulcher looks at the remarkable story of this self-taught Suffolk archaeologist and his excavations on the eve of war.
