Review by Nigel Fletcher-Jones In recent years there has been increasing desire among travellers to visit the archaeological sites of southern Egypt and Sudan in search of ‘ancient Nubia’, an elongated oval that stretched either side of the Nile from…
As the Tuscan city of Siena grew in prosperity, its citizens made their mark through magnificent art and architecture, from aristocratic towers to allegorical frescoes. Historian Jane Stevenson takes us on a tour of its medieval monuments.
Moai are monolithic stone statues with elongated human faces, thought to have been created by Rapa Nui’s ancestral inhabitants more than 500 years ago.
An astonishing array of wooden objects has survived from Herculaneum, carbonised by the volcanic eruption that destroyed the town. This invaluable material may be less showy than the celebrated marble and bronze statuary, but it was still used for everything from beams and boats to purses and small shrines, as Dalu Jones finds out.
The Fayum mummy portraits are masterpieces of ancient painting, but are they portraits? With an exhibition of these paintings and golden mummies on view in Manchester, Lucia Marchini speaks to Egyptologist Campbell Price to find out more.
These same people would not hesitate to wear a scarab-ring taken off a dead man’s hand… Their objections – their opinions even – are an offence to science.
Review by Eric Singleton It is a welcome departure to see a scholar stepping outside their regionalised field of study to offer an interconnected view of North American history that is not often discussed. This is what Timothy Pauketat, an…
Viewers of the Netflix competition series Blown Away will be familiar both with the mesmerising transformations that take place under extreme heat as glass is blown, shaped, and decorated, and with the Corning Museum of Glass in upstate New York,…
At another English cathedral, that of Exeter, excavations have revealed Roman remains
Ancient Egyptians believed that the foods and goods listed in their tombs would magically become available to them for eternity. Hilary Wilson reports.
Myth surrounds the famous Palace of Knossos, but there is much more to the Cretan site than the fabled Minotaur and King Minos. A new exhibition at the Ashmolean Museum delves into the archaeology of the Minoan site and the later work that is reshaping Arthur Evans’ controversial interpretations, as Maev Kennedy finds out.
Archaeologists from MOLA were excavating the site in Northamptonshire when they uncovered a group of some 30 pendants, other grave goods, and fragments of tooth enamel in a grave.
Water may separate the Mediterranean islands from the mainland, but the sea also offers a vital link. Anastasia Christophilopoulou considers how objects from Crete, Cyprus, and Sardinia reveal aspects of shifting island identities over time, and stories of their connections.
The mountains and forests of Epirus offer a dramatic backdrop for a tour through the theatres of the Greek region’s ancient cities. Diana Bentley finds stories of a famed oracle and a celebrated victory along the way.
Recent breakthroughs in the study of Maya hieroglyphs have revealed artist signatures on artefacts long considered to be the work of anonymous artisans. Joanne Pillsbury and Laura Filloy Nadal introduce us to the newly identified sculptors and painters who worked in the Maya royal courts.
The former palace of the Farnese family in Parma contains no fewer than five cultural institutions. Dalu Jones is our guide to the recently renovated Pilotta complex, where the dukes of Parma put art, archaeology, and theatre to use.
Review by Robert Harding The ancient Mauryan Empire and its third emperor Ashoka (c.304-232 BC) represent a striking departure for Colleen Taylor Sen. The author’s reputation rests on her series of food books, most notably Curry: a global history. Nevertheless,…
Thousands of engraved owl-shaped plaques have been discovered in Copper Age tombs and pits throughout the Iberian Peninsula.
The dates listed below may have changed since we went to print. Check the websites of the museums for the most up-to-date information and bookings.
Between 1926 and 1935, American scholar William F Badè and his team unearthed the remains of a small town at the site of Tell en-Nasbeh in Mandate-era Palestine. Thought to be the biblical town of Mizpah, the site, which flourished…
Finds from the palace include a large stone vase and inscribed fragments of ivory and of ostrich eggshell.
Review by Diana Bentley The ancient Near East has not always attracted the popular attention it deserves, especially in comparison with other cultures of the surrounding area, like Greece, Rome, and Egypt. This latest work by Amanda H Podany, Professor…
The Manchester Museum, Bengaluru's new art gallery, and the House of the Vettii in Pompeii open to the public.
A deity of wisdom and war, born fully grown, and armed, from the head of her father Zeus/Jupiter, Minerva – and her Greek counterpart Athena – played an important part in Greek and Roman religion.
Kingfishers and pigeons had previously been identified amid this scene in the palace’s so-called ‘Green Room’, but new research has offered explanations of further details.
In those days, Mesoamerican archaeology was not for the faint-hearted, and Sylvanus Griswold Morley – ‘physically frail, short of stature, squeaky-voiced and near-sighted’, according to Prudence Rice and Christopher Ward – wasn’t really cut out for it. He suffered stomach…
The exhibition Golden Mummies of Egypt opens in February at Manchester Museum for its only European showing after an international tour that has included venues in the USA and China. Curator Campbell Price discusses the artefacts on display and their significance to the Greek and Roman Egyptians and to modern visitors.
The discovery was made during excavations that uncovered two separate clusters of Pre-Pottery Neolithic buildings at the site.
The relief panels depict interactions between humans and the animal world.
The dates listed below may have changed since we went to print. Check the websites of the museums for the most up-to-date information and bookings.
Alexander the Great’s ambitions of conquest took him far from his Macedonian home and into Asia and Babylon, where he died. Ursula Sims-Williams investigates the mythical legacy of Alexander in the East, where different traditions cast him variously as an accursed figure, a philosopher-king, and even a prophet.
Review by David Stuttard On an Apulian funerary vase, a fair-haired young man sits clutching a spear in his left hand as he exclaims in terror, ‘I’m not coming!’ But it is no use. Grabbing his wrist in a vice-like…
Conservation work is being carried out on a painting of Hercules and Omphale, recently attributed to Artemisia Gentileschi, that was damaged during the massive explosion in 2020 in Beirut.
The garment comes from the Palmwood Wreck, which was discovered in 2014 off the Texel coastline.
Among the early Christian catacombs in northern Rome, beyond the walls of the ancient city, are those of the Sant’Agnese fuori le mura complex. It is here along the via Nomentana that St Agnes of Rome is said to have…
Review by Diana Bentley Years of research as a folklorist and historian have enabled Adrienne Mayor, research scholar in classics and the history of science at Stanford University and an acclaimed author, to discover a marvellous array of the more…