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Since the beginning of Gandhāran studies in the nineteenth century, chronology has been one of the most significant challenges to the understanding of Gandhāran art. Many other ancient societies, including those of Greece and Rome, have left a wealth of textual sources which have put their fundamental chronological frameworks beyond doubt. In the absence of such sources on a similar scale, even the historical eras cited on inscribed Gandhāran works of art have been hard to place. Few sculptures have such inscriptions and the majority lack any record of find-spot or even general provenance. Those known to have been found at particular sites were sometimes moved and reused in antiquity. Con...
From one of the world’s leading authorities on ancient Greek art, a groundbreaking account of how Greek images were understood and used by other ancient peoples, from Britain to China In this book, acclaimed archaeologist and art historian John Boardman explores Greek art as a foreign art transmitted to the non-Greeks of antiquity—peoples who weren’t necessarily able to judge the meaning of Greek art and who may have regarded the Greeks themselves with great hostility. Boardman examines how and why the arts of the classical world traveled and to what effect, from Britain to China, from roughly the eighth century BCE to the early centuries CE. In some places, such as Italy, Greek images...
Spanning centuries and the vastness of the Roman Empire, The Last Statues of Antiquity is the first comprehensive survey of Roman honorific statues in the public realm in Late Antiquity. Drawn from a major research project and corresponding online database that collates all the available evidence for the "statue habit" across the Empire from the late third century AD onwards, the volume examines where, how, and why statues were used, and why these important features of urban life began to decline in number before eventually disappearing around AD 600. Adopting a detailed comparative approach, the collection explores variation between different regions--including North Africa, Asia Minor, and the Near East--as well as individual cities, such as Aphrodisias, Athens, Constantinople, and Rome. A number of thematic chapters also consider the different kinds of honorand, from provincial governors and senators, to women and cultural heroes. Richly illustrated, the volume is the definitive resource for studying the phenomenon of late-antique statues. The collection also incorporates extensive references to the project's database, which is freely accessible online.
Location and the Find-spot -- Experiencing Material Culture -- Historical and Artistic Contexts -- Re-contextualization.
Perhaps the most spectacular of all Greek vases, the Sarpedon krater depicts the body of Sarpedon, a hero of the Trojan War, being carried away to his homeland for burial. It was decorated some 2,500 years ago by Athenian artist Euphronios, and its subsequent history involves tomb raiding, intrigue, duplicity, litigation, international outrage, and possibly even homicide. How this came about is told by Nigel Spivey in a concise, stylish book that braids together the creation and adventures of this extraordinary object with an exploration of its abiding influence. Spivey takes the reader on a dramatic journey, beginning with the krater’s looting from an Etruscan tomb in 1971 and its acquisi...
Pliny and the Eruption of Vesuvius is a forensic examination of two of the most famous letters from the ancient Mediterranean world: Pliny the Younger’s Epistulae 6.16 and 6.20, which offer a contemporary account of the eruption of Vesuvius in AD 79. These letters, sent to the historian Tacitus, provide accounts by Pliny the Younger about what happened when Mt Vesuvius exploded, destroying the surrounding towns and countryside, including Pompeii and Herculaneum, and killing his uncle, Pliny the Elder. This volume provides the first comprehensive full-length treatment of these documents, contextualized by evidence-rich biographies for both Plinys, and a synthesis of the latest archaeologica...
Between the 6th and 4th centuries BC, Phoenician workshops produced green jasper scarabs which demonstrated both Greek and Persian influences. This volume presents a fully illustrated catalogue of examples drawn from across the area of Phoenician influence, including Spain, Sardinia, North Africa and theEastern Mediterranean. The scarabs, which are held in collections worldwide, are catalogued according to their cultural influences: Egyptian, Levantine, Hellenistic and miscellaneous. Within each of these four groups the scarabs are organised iconographically, with scenes including beetles, boats, birds, gods, fantastic creatures, warriors and kings, chariots, trees and animal attacks. John Boardman's introduction discusses the style, function and source material of the scarabs and the location of the workshops.
This volume provides a thorough conspectus of the field of Graeco-Bactrian and Indo-Greek studies, mixing theoretical and historical surveys with critical and thought-provoking case studies in archaeology, history, literature and art. The chapters from this international group of experts showcase innovative methodologies, such as archaeological GIS, as well as providing accessible explanations of specialist techniques such as die studies of coins, and important theoretical perspectives, including postcolonial approaches to the Greeks in India. Chapters cover the region’s archaeology, written and numismatic sources, and a history of scholarship of the subject, as well as culture, identity a...
A radical, lively departure from received notions about art of the Romantic period For many, the term "neoclassicism" has come to imply discipline, order, restraint, and a certain myopia. Leaving the term behind, this book radically challenges enduring assumptions about the art produced from the late 18th century to the early Victorian period, casting new light on appropriations of the classical body by British artists. It is the first to foreground the intersections of gender, race, and class in discussions of British visual classicism, laying bare artists' alternately politicizing and emphatically sensual engagements with Greco-Roman art. Rather than rely exclusively on subsequent scholarship, the book takes up the poet John Keats (1795-1821) as a theoretical framework. Eschewing the "Golden Age" narrative, which sees J. M. W. Turner (1775-1851) as the pinnacle of the period's artistic achievement, the book examines overlooked artists, such as Henry Howard (1769-1847) and John Graham Lough (1798-1876). The result is a fresh account of underappreciated works of British painting and sculpture. Distributed for the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art