Antiquities Exhibits

Maya: The Great Jaguar Rises through December 31, 2019 at the Royal British Columbia Museum in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada.  Discover a powerful culture that rose in the tropical rainforests of Guatemala thousands of years ago, and learn how science and belief shaped the Maya identity from ancient times to present day.  The exhibition boasts the world’s largest and most impressive display of Maya objects from Guatemala, and features more than 300 precious jade, ceramic, gold, stone and textile artifacts reflecting classic and contemporary Maya culture. Image:  An exhibit visitor studies a Mayan relief at "The Great Jaguar Rises" in the Royal BC Museum.  Image courtesy of the Royal British Columbia Museum.

King Tut: Treasures of the Golden Pharaoh through September 15, 2019 at the Grande Halle de la Villette in Paris, France.  An exhibit said to be the last touring exhibit of actual King Tut artifacts, is now on display in Paris, France.  Although King Tut: Treasures of the Golden Pharaoh does not include the famous golden death mask, but it does include gold jewelry, sculptures, and ceremonial objects the king personally used such as gilded ushabti figurines, inlaid storage chests, Canopic utensils, the statue of Tutankhamun's ka, and vessels crafted of alabaster.  Sixty of the 150 objects have never left Egypt before.   The Louvre in Paris has loaned one of its top Egyptian pieces to the show, a statue of Amon, the king of the gods, to protect the pharaoh. Image: Guardian statue from the tomb of King Tutankhamun.  Image courtesy of "King Tut: Treasures of the Golden Pharaoh" media relations.

Buried by Vesuvius: Treasures from the Villa dei Papiri June 26 to October 28, 2019 at the Getty Villa in Pacific Palisades, California.  Although the Getty Villa is a reproduction of the Villa dei Papiri in Herculaneum that was swallowed by the 79 CE eruption of Vesuvius, this exhibit is the first time objects from the Villa will be featured in a special display within its California counterpart.  The original Villa yielded a private residence with spectacular colored marble and mosaic floors, gloriously frescoed walls, important bronze and marble statuary, plus a unique library of more than a thousand papyrus scrolls (from which it gets its name). The treasures, originally discovered in the 1750s will be accompanied by objects recovered recently in ongoing excavations at the site.  The newly conserved bronze sculpture known as the Drunken Satyr will be among the artwork on display.  It's modern replica graces the reflecting pool at the Getty Villa's Outer Perist...

The Golden Splendor of the Royal Tombs of Ur ongoing at the Penn Museum in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.  The Penn Museum joined with the British Museum to support excavations at Tell al-Muqayyar (ancient Ur), directed by Sir Leonard Woolley, from 1922-1934.   The best known artifacts are from the Royal Cemetery of Ur, a burial ground with more than 2000 internments, including those of the kings and queens who ruled the city-state ca. 2500 BCE. They include the personal jewelry of Puabi, the queen, and the “ram-in-the thicket,” a statuette of a goat rampant in a tree. The “ram-in-the-thicket” is made of shell, lapis lazuli, gold, and copper and typifies early Mesopotamian composite art. Other objects on display include a gilded bull-headed lyre, the remains of a young attendant wearing a gold headdress and jewelry of gold, lapis lazuli, carnelian, and shell, and electrotype reproductions of a bull-headed harp ornament and soldier's helmet. Soldiers were among the human s...

Roman-era mosaics in the Adana Archaeology Museum in Adana, Turkey.  Newly opened galleries at the Adana Museum now house an astonishing collection of Roman-era mosaics.  The mosaics depict an array of themes from classical mythology including Orpheus, Thetys, Artemis, and Erotes, as well as early Christian portrayals of the "Peaceful Kingdom" and Noah's Ark.  The museum has constructed elevated walkways in the new gallery space so visitors can view the expansive mosaics, many that once adorned church floors, more easily. The museum also has many objects from the Hittite period as well as artifacts from the Neolithic, Bronze Age, Iron Age, Archaic, Roman, Byzantine, and Ottoman eras.  Roman objects include sarcophagi, jugs, catapult shots, inscriptions, architectural elements, glassware, ceramics and jewellery. All images cc by courtesy of Dick Osseman:

Art of the ancient world at The Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts in Moscow, Russia. The ancient collection of the Pushkin State Museum currently includes more than 37,000 pieces. Antique art is dedicated to 8 rooms on the first and second floors of the Main building with a special hall dedicated to Heinrich Schliemann's "Gold of Troy". Works include not only original pieces from Cyprus, Greece, Etruria, Rome, Egypt, and Mesopot amia, but casts from major objects held in other museums including the Museo Archeologico in Naples, the Louvre, the Vatican Museums, the British Museum, the Cairo Museum, and the Antik Sammlung in Berlin. The art of ancient Greece and Rome was a particular interest of the museum's founder, Ivan Tsvetaev, and initially 12 out of 20 rooms were dedicated to it. Galleries containing objects from ancient Egypt and the Near East were updated in 2012 as part of the museum's 100th anniversary. A new hall was also added to house the museum...

Artifacts of the Kingdom of Baekje ongoing at the Buyeo National Museum in Buyeo, Chungcheongnam-do, South Korea. Since Buyeo was once the capital of the Baekje kingdom during the Sabi period (538-660 CE), the Museum is fully devoted to the Baekje culture.  Baekje was a kingdom located in southwest Korea from 18 BCE to 660 CE.   It was one of the Three Kingdoms of Korea, together with Goguryeo and Silla.  Baekje alternately battled and allied with Goguryeo and Silla as the three kingdoms expanded control over the peninsula. At its peak in the 4th century, Baekje controlled most of the western Korean peninsula, as far north as Pyongyang, and may have even held territories in China, such as in Liaoxi, though this view is controversial. It became a significant regional sea power, with political and trade relations with China and Japan.  Its nautical skill, which made it the Phoenicia of East Asia, was instrumental in the dissemination of Buddhism throughout East...

Antiquities of Southeast Asia at the National Museum of the Philippines in Manila, Philippines.  The National Museum's collection of antiquities date from the Paleolithic Period to about 1,000 CE.    Artifacts range from stone tools to jewelry and ceramics including an assortment of burial jars.  Jar burials are thought to have originated in southern China and were brought to the Philippines as early as 895 CE.  One such jar found in the early 1960’s in Manunggul Cave, Lipuun Point, Palawan has an upper  part as well as the cover  incised with curvilinear scroll designs and painted with natural iron or hematite. On top of lid is a boat with two human figures representing two souls on a voyage to the afterlife. The boatman is seated behind a figure whose hands are crossed on the chest, a traditional funerary pose. Later burial jars dating from 5 BCE to 225 CE feature head-shaped covers displaying different facial expressions such as sadness, joy, or ...

Splendid Valuables, the luxury of the ornaments at Herculaneum, through September 30, 2019 at the new Antiquarium in the archaeological site of Herculaneum in Naples, Italy.  Like the citizens of Pompeii, many of the residents of Herculaneum grabbed their most precious possessions, like jewellery, hoards of coins and objects in gold and silver when Mount Vesuvius erupted in 79 CE and examples of these are now on show in a new museum there. In their respective display cases we can admire perfectly preserved pieces of jewellery like golden bracelets, a necklace of rock crystal, a handful of bronze coins, a finely wrought belt of spun gold, and a pair of gold earrings set with emeralds and pearls, intact but fused by the heat of the holocaust to. Many of the items on exhibit had been worn by the 300 fugitives found in the shallow grottos along the sea shore where they had waited in vain for rescue. Other items include decorative furniture attachments, wall sconces, candleholders, c...

Roma Universalis - the Severans, at the Colosseum in Rome, Italy through August 25, 2019.  A new exhibition at the Colosseum pays tribute to the Severans, Rome’s fourth and final dynasty which ruled from 193-235 CE.  Sculptures include portrait heads of Domna Julia, a young Geta, Heliogabulus, and the infamous Caracalla.  Artifacts include a tray-handle engraved with the triumph of Bacchus on loan from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, calyxes, cups and beakers from Germany and Tunisian earthenware.  Along the Forum, Romulus’s temple hosts 33 artifacts from the recent excavation of Eliogabalus’s Baths (between the Arches of Titus and Constantine).  A multimedia presentation entitled "Time's vortex" is also included in the admission ticket. Image: Marcus Aurelius through the Severans from the exhibition Roma Universalis.  Courtesy of Roma Universalis.

Museum of Ancient Cultures at McQuarie University in New South Wales, Australia. This Museum celebrates the diversity and cultural achievements of ancient societies, including Egypt, the Ancient Near East, Greece and Rome. More than 4000 ancient objects are the core of a research-driven exhibition narrative that explores ancient daily life, afterlife beliefs, religion, technology and popular culture as well as the largest collection of ancient coins and papyrus manuscripts in the Southern Hemisphere. Roman objects date from the Villanovan and Etruscan periods to the 5th century CE. The Greek collection includes Minoan and Mycenaean material as well as objects from the Hellenistic Period. Exhibits from ancient Egypt span the periods from the Pre-dynastic to the Graeco-Roman Period. Objects from the early 3rd millenium BCE to the Late Iron Age are showcased in the galleries of the ancient Near East and Cyprus. There is even a small collection of artifacts from the Bronze Age Indus Va...

European Art from antiquity at the Columbia Museum of Art in Columbia, South Carolina. A small but significant collection of art and artifacts from the ancient Mediterranean world is presented in a second floor gallery of this museum. Presented here are examples of early-Greek ceramics from the R.V.D. Magoffin Collection, a large black-figured Greek lekythos acquired in 1973, the Robert L. Hanlin Collection of 4th-century BCE G reek vases from South Italy, Roman glass from the George C. Brauer Collection and a collection of 12 Greco-Roman marble sculptures donated by Robert Y. Turner in 2002. These marbles include a headless standing statue of Hygeia and 11 Roman portrait heads. The museum also recently received a donation of ancient Chinese art dating from 2000 BCE to 1400 CE (Xiajiadian Culture to the Yuan Dynasty. Image: Roman male portrait head from the 3rd century CE. Image courtesy of the Columbia Museum of Art.

Gold of Mapungubwe at the Museum of Anthropology and Archaeology at the University of South Africa in Pretoria, South Africa.  Artifacts including objects known collectively as the Mapungubwe Gold from the Mapungubwe archaeological site discovered in 1933  are on display at this museum on the campus of the University of South Africa in Pretoria.  Mapungubwe originated as a complex Iron Age society on the borders of Zimbabwe and Botswana and evolved into the first South African state, now recognized as a World Heritage Site. This museum is home to 27,000 objects dating from prehistory to the Iron Age and beyond including pottery, beadwork, musical instruments and utensils.  Not to be missed is the paleo-anthropology collection of casts taken from original hominid fossils. Two exceptional specimens are Taung Child and Mrs Ples (both belonging to Australopithecus africanus).  Image: Golden rhinoceros found at the Mapungubwe World Heritage Site. Image courtes...

Archaeological finds of ancient Gaul at the National Archaeological Museum of France in Saint-Germain-en-Laye, France. This museum houses about 3 million archaeological objects, of which about 30,000 are on exhibit, representing life from prehistoric times to the Merovingian period, making it one of the richest collections in Europe. The finds are presented chronologically in themed galleries grouped by the Paleolithic, Neolith ic, Bronze Age, Iron Age, Roman period (Roman Gaul) and the early Middle Ages (Merovingian Gaul). Objects include jewelry, armor, weapons, ceramics, religious artifacts, and funerary art. Image: God of Etang-sur-Arroux, possible depiction of Cernunnos wearing a torc at the neck and on the chest with two snakes with ram heads encircling him at the waist. Two cavities at the top of his head are probably designed to receive deer horns. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons contributor PHGCOM.

Ancient and classical cultures at the South African Museum in Cape Town, South Africa. The Ancient and Classical Cultures are well represented by artefacts from Egypt dating from the Predynastic to Graeco-Roman Periods. The Predynastic and Early Dynastic artefacts, mainly pottery, are from Kafr-Tarkhan and were excavated by Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie. Forming part of the Ancient Near Eastern collection are cuneiform ta blets that are mostly of Neo-Babylonian origin, with one being Sumerian. From Greece is the valuable De Pass collection of Attic Red-figure vases and Attic Black-figure vases. The Roman collection includes glass, ceramic lamps, medical instruments and other pieces of ceramics. Image: Egyptian tomb mural. Image courtesy of the South African Museum. Note: I searched and searched for pictures from their collections and came up totally empty. This small picture on their website about their ancient collections was the best I could do!

Ancient Greek and Roman Art at the Blanton Museum of Art, University of Texas, in Austin, Texas. Although antiquities are not listed directly as part of the permanent collection at the Blanton Museum of Art, they are housed with works of European Art. The collection includes not only original ancient sculpture but quality casts of a number of ancient pieces in collections of museums worldwide. You will also find Greek ceramics including black and red-figured vessels and gr aceful Tanagra figurines. Image 1 - Dancing Figure 2nd-1st century BCE Bronze. The exaggerated features, such as the beaked nose, ill-proportioned head, and strangely thin arms, indicate that he probably belonged to a marginalized class in society. The shaved head with a single lock of hair on top may suggest that he is a slave. The exotic portrayal of slaves and foreigners in bronze figurines was popular in Alexandria, a major port city in the Hellenistic period. (Image courtesy of the Blanton Museum o...

Art of the Ancient World at the Museum of Fine Arts Houston, Texas.  Glowing with natural light, works from ancient Greece, Rome, and the Near East include a gold myrtle wreath, a lama deity, a magnificent bronze head of a god or hero, and a monumental bronze sculpture of a Roman ruler. Among the objects from ancient Egypt are a spectacular coffin of the priest Pedi-Osiris and a rare sculpture of the god Thoth as an ibis.  The museum's art from ancient America include Olmec jade, Maya stone sculpture, Nasca and Paracas textiles, and fine Moché ceramics. Images: Mosaic panels depicting the musical contest between Apollo and Marsyas Roman (100-300 CE), a bronze head of Caligula 37-41 CE, and an endearing silver figurine of a Persian mountain goat (Elamite?) 3000 BCE.

The Ancient Collection at the Joslyn Art Museum in Omaha, Nebraska. Joslyn Art Museum’s collection of antiquities includes objects from Egypt, Greece, and Rome, among them a portrait bust of the Egyptian princess Amenirdas I, a Roman bust of Augustus re-carved from an earlier portrait of Nero, and a respected group of Greek pottery, including an Attic Black-Figure Amphora attributed to The Omaha Painter, and an Italo-Corinthian  Olpe attributed to The Joslyn Painter. Image: Sculpture of Amenirdas I, daughter of King Kashta of Nubia, Late 8th century BCE 25th dynasty. Amenirdas came to Egypt with the successful invasion of her brother, King Piankhi of Kush in 716–715 B.C. At the time of the Kushite conquest, Shepenupet I, daughter of the last native king, held the supreme religious office of the land at Thebes, which had long been the spiritual capital of Egypt. Shepenupet was compelled to adopt the Kushite princess, who henceforth as Amenirdas I became the Divine Conso...

The new Museum of Romanity in Nîmes, France brings ancient Gaul to life.  Once a major metropolis in Roman Gaul, Nîmes today boasts a plethora of important sites including the temple of Maison Carré , a large and well-preserved amphitheater, and a massive Roman guard tower.  Now the city boasts the new Museum of Romanity, covering 2500 years of life in ancient Gaul.  The museum features dozens of multimedia devices throughout, including interactive maps, 3D reconstructions, audio and video clips, augmented reality and fun mini-games for kids to augment displays of  carved columns and porticos, beautifully preserved frescoes, coins in near-mint condition, marble and bronze statues and religious inscriptions. The highlight of the museum is its magnificent collection of mosaics that once covered floors and walls in the homes of the wealthy with the most beautiful being the 400 square foot Pentheus mosaic depicting the vivid and tragic end of the mythical Pentheus. ...

Watercolor reproductions of the murals from Room 5 of the Villa of the Mysteries in Pompeii ongoing at the Kelsey Museum of Archaeology in Ann Arbor, Michigan. In 1924, Francis W. Kelsey commissioned an Italian artist, Maria Barosso,  to reproduce the wall murals of the Villa of the Mysteries in Pompeii. Barosso chose watercolor as her medium. The entire project was finished in just over 18 months and later exhibited in the Villa Borghese with much fanfare by Benito Mussolini. After the exhibit, the life-sized watercolors were shipped to Kelsey in Ann Arbor, Michigan. But Kelsey died before the watercolors could be housed in a new museum and the works were stored away for decades. In 2008, the Kelsey Museum undertook an exciting conservation project to preserve these beautiful watercolors and they are now on display as part of the Kelsey's permanent exhibition in their new museum. Image: Fresco from the Villa de Misteri in Pompeii 1st century CE courtesy of Wikimedia C...

A Millennium of ancient Roman culture at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, Onatario, Canada. The Eaton Gallery of Rome at the Royal Ontario Museum is home to a millennium of ancient Roman culture. It has the largest collection of classical antiquities in Canada, displaying more than 500 objects that range from marble or painted portraits of historical figures to magnificent Roman jewellery. The gallery also features the Bratty  Exhibit of Etruria that sheds some light on the Etruscans, a neighbouring civilization. The Joey and Toby Tanenbaum Gallery of Rome and the Near East depicts the lifestyle and culture of societies under Roman rule and their influence in the Near East and the Byzantine gallery reflects the history of the Byzantine Empire from 330 to 1453 CE. Other ancient cultures represented in the ROM's collections include ancient Cyprus, Egypt, Nubia, Bronze Age Aegean, and the Archaeic, Classical, and Hellenistic Periods of Greece. Image: Finial with the b...

Classical antiquities, ancient Asian and pre-Columbian American art ongoing at the Portland Art Museum in Portland, Oregon. Museum founder Winslow B. Ayer purchased 100 plaster casts of Greek and Roman sculptures in 1895 to form the core of the museum's early European collection. These sculptures have been augmented over the years with a selection of Greek, Roman, and Etruscan objects, including red- and black-figure vases, sm all bronzes, funerary art including monuments from Palmyra, Syria and glassware. The museum's Chinese collection includes objects that date as far back as the Neolithic Period and include tomb objects from the Han (206 BCE - 220 CE) and Tang (618-907 CE) dynasties. In the last few years, major gifts of Han and pre–Han objects including an array of ceramic court nobles, dancers, and musicians — not to mention dogs, horses, and supernatural creatures have brought even more prominence to the museum's Asian collection. Roman Funerary Monument from ...

Art of Ancient America ongoing at the Gardiner Museum in Toronto, Canada. The Gardiner Museum’s Ancient Americas collection is considered to be the foremost in Canada. It encompasses 47 separate cultures from the vast modern day geographical areas of the American Southwest, Mexico, Central and South America. Some of the cultures and people of these areas date back as far as 3500 BCE up to 1550 CE, just before the arrival of th e Spanish conquistadors. The low-fired earthenware vessels and sculptures are made without the use of the potter’s wheel and are decorated using various techniques. Some of these finishes are applied prior to firing, such as slip decoration, and others, including the application of resins and pigments, are added post-firing. The themes illustrated on the works are often influenced by the flora and fauna found in their highly varied environmental zones, from rugged highlands and arid deserts to humid tropical lowlands. Image: Michoacan (Mexico) Standi...