
The ancient Greek hydria
Form and function
There were all sorts of different types of ancient Greek pottery. Let’s examine the hydria, a vessel used for transporting and pouring water.

Palmyra: Mirage in the Desert
A book from the Metropolitan Museum of Art
Thanks to the MET, readers can now experience the ancient site of Palmyra and learn more about its history and modern plight.

Neptune and Amphitrite
A mosaic from Herculaneum
A small, but richly decorated house in Herculaneum, features a mosaic depicting the sea-god Neptune and his wife.

A marble lekythos in Leiden
Hoplites during the Classical period
“Hoplites” of the seventh century BC were “men of bronze”. A few centuries later, they had shed most of their armour, as a marble lekythos in Leiden shows.

Ancient Greek heroes at play
On a black-figure amphora by Exekias, the Greek heroes Achilles and Ajax are shown playing a game to while away the hours at Troy.

Roman girls in “bikinis”
A mosaic from the Villa Romana del Casale
One of many beautiful mosaics from a large Roman villa near Piazza Armerina, Sicily, features girls dressed in what look like bikinis.

Gods of Egypt in Leiden
Review of a new exhibition
A new exhibition about the Egyptian deities in the National Museum of Antiquities in Leiden is interesting, but workmanlike.

Ancient Greek shield blazons
Greek shields from at least the later eighth century BC onwards were often decorated with abstract or figurative blazons.

The hunter Actaeon
Victim of divine wrath
The Olympian gods punished the hunter Actaeon by having his own hounds tear him apart. But what exactly had he done wrong?

Etruscans in Perugia
The archaeological museum of Perugia without a doubt houses the largest collection of Etruscan objects in Umbria.