#roman classics

[firnen-the-teragram-teabag]

[blvvdk3ep]

I love you people going into "useless" fields I love you classics majors I love you cultural studies majors I love you comparative literature majors I love you film studies majors I love you near eastern religions majors I love you Greek, Latin, and Hebrew majors I love you ethnic studies I love you people going into any and all small field that isn't considered lucrative in our rotting capitalist society please never stop keeping the sacred flame of knowledge for the sake of knowledge and understanding humanity and not merely for the sake of money alive

[constanzarte]

Death of Sappho, by Miguel Carbonell Selva

[theghostofbean]

”Men think about the Roman Empire” “What’s the female version of the Roman Empire” SHUT UPPPPP. SHUT THE FUCK UPPPPPP. AS A WOMAN I LOVE THE ROMAN EMPIRE. AS A WOMAN I LOVE ANCIENT HISTORY AND BATTLES AND POLITICAL INSTABILITY. THE “GIRL VERSION OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE” IS THE ROMAN EMPIRE. IM GOING TO STAB YOU 23 TIMES

[the-evil-clergyman]

A Favorite Custom by Lawrence Alma-Tadema (1909)

[thefoilguy]

Pieta by Michelangelo - Aluminum Foil Sculpture

[illustratus]

The Triumph of Light over Darkness by Franz von Matsch

[onesockartist]

Birth of Venus 🩵✨

One of the rare instances a school assignment actually turns out good

[artifacts-and-arthropods]

Child's Sock from Egypt, c.250-350 CE: this colorful sock is nearly 1,700 years old

This sock was discovered during excavations in the ancient city of Oxyrhynchus. It was likely created for a child during the late Roman period, c.250-350 CE.

Similar-looking socks from late antiquity and the early Byzantine period have also been found at several other sites throughout Egypt; these socks often have colorful, striped patterns with divided toes, and they were crafted out of wool using a technique known as nålbinding.

Above: a similar child's sock from Antinoöpolis, c.250-350 CE

The sock depicted above was created during the same period, and it was found in a midden heap (an ancient rubbish pit) in the city of Antinoöpolis. A multispectral imaging analysis of this sock yielded some interesting results back in 2018, as this article explains:

... analysis revealed that the sock contained seven hues of wool yarn woven together in a meticulous, stripy pattern. Just three natural, plant-based dyes—madder roots for red, woad leaves for blue and weld flowers for yellow—were used to create the different color combinations featured on the sock, according to Joanne Dyer, lead author of the study.

In the paper, she and her co-authors explain that the imaging technique also revealed how the colors were mixed to create hues of green, purple and orange: In some cases, fibers of different colors were spun together; in others, individual yarns went through multiple dye baths.

Such intricacy is pretty impressive, considering that the ancient sock is both “tiny” and “fragile."

Given its size and orientation, the researchers believe it may have been worn on a child’s left foot.

Above: another child's sock from Al Fayyum, c.300-500 CE

The ancient Egyptians employed a single-needle looping technique, often referred to as nålbindning, to create their socks. Notably, the approach could be used to separate the big toe and four other toes in the sock—which just may have given life to the ever-controversial socks-and-sandals trend.

Sources & More Info:

Manchester Museum: Child's Sock from Oxyrhynchus

British Museum: Sock from Antinoupolis

Royal Ontario Museum: Sock from Al Fayyum

Smithsonian Magazine: 1,700-Year-Old Sock Spins Yarn About Ancient Egyptian Fashion

The Guardian: Imaging Tool Unravels Secrets of Child's Sock from Ancient Egypt

PLOS ONE Journal: A Multispectral Imaging Approach Integrated into the Study of Late Antique Textiles from Egypt

National Museums Scotland: The Lost Sock

[artthatgivesmefeelings]

Charles-Amable Lenoir (French, 1860-1926) A dance by the sea, n.d.

[lionofchaeronea]

Mosaic of sea creatures (the so-called "Fish Catalog") from the House of the Geometric Mosaics (VIII.2.16) at Pompeii. Artist unknown; ca. 100 BCE. Now in the Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Naples. Photo credit: Massimo Finizio.

[firnen-the-teragram-teabag]

Rest in peace Cicero you would've loved twitter

[orbch]

twin sisters

[constanzarte]

Eugène Fromentin, Centaures

[copperbadge]

Some photos of the “food” section of the Pompeii exhibit at the MSI. I found this section especially fascinating because 1. I love food but also 2. People really are just gonna people. That frying pan, which I think is bronze, looks like the cast iron frying pan I cook with. Next to it is a strainer that’s actually very similar to my mesh strainer and if I could buy one like that today, I would. 

That large orange terracotta bowl is two thousand years old and looks like something you could buy in a bougie home goods store today. 

The last photo is recognizable to most people with a tumblr and a passing interest in history as a loaf of Roman bread -- it has the classic round shape with scoring across the top and an indentation around the edge where it was baked with a cord wrapped around it. It’s a copy of course, but it’s a resin cast of an actual loaf of bread recovered from Pompeii. As a bread baker myself I spent quite a while studying it. 

[ID: Three photos; top, a display of cookware including a modern-looking likely-bronze skillet, a small, deep strainer with a long handle, and an angular, deep cooking pot. Lower left, a bright orange bowl with a flat bottom, high rim, and decorative printing on the outside; it has been cleaned and shines with a high red burnish. Lower right, the bread loaf appears as a round black disc with score marks around the edge and on the top.]

[the-evil-clergyman]

Flora by Valentine Walter Bromley (1874)