Antiquities Exhibits

National Archaeological Museum of Tirana, Albania National Archaeological Museum of Tirana, Albania, opened in 1948, houses more than 2,000 items. These objects include artifacts from the Stone Age (100,000 to 2000 BCE, the Bronze Age and Iron Age from 2000 to 800 BCE, the beginnings of the Illyrian civilization from ca. 1000 BCE, the Illyrian Antiquity Period from 1000 BCE to 100 CE, the Roman and Byzantine civilization in Alban ia from 100 to 600 CE and the Albanian Middle Ages through Ottoman rule from 600 CE until Independence in 1912. Art on display includes sculpture, funerary monuments, ceramics, tools, weapons, and ancient jewelry. Image: Artemis Hekate 3rd century BCE from Apollonia courtesy of Wikimedia Commons contributor Fanny Schertzer

Giovanni Barracco Ancient Sculpture Museum in Rome, Italy What was once known as the Ancient Sculpture Museum and is now known as the Museo Barracco, houses a collection of ancient Egyptian, Near Eastern, Etruscan, Cypriot, Phoenician, Hellenistic, Italic and Roman art once owned by Giovanni Barracco, quaestor of the Senate of the Kingdom who donated them to the city of Rome in 1904.  The first two rooms are dedicated to Egyptian and Near Eastern art.  Highlights include a female sphinx attributed to Queen Hatshepsut, a black granite portrait of Ramses II, and a diorite figure of a bearded priest that Barracco believed to represent Julius Caesar, dated to the third century CE.  There is also a large basalt hourglass attributed to Ptolemy Philadelphus found in fragments at the Campense Serapeum in Rome.  Near eastern art consists primarily of a variety of reliefs from the Assurbanipal's palace in Nineveh depicting Assyrian archers, Elamite warriors, and grooms and ...

Artifacts recovered from a Roman imperial era transport vessel at The Ancient Delta Museum of Comacchio, Italy.  Artifacts recovered from a Roman imperial era transport vessel at The Ancient Delta Museum of Comacchio, Italy.The Ancient Delta Museum of Comacchio, Italy is an archaeological museum housing over 2,000 finds from the Po Delta and the necropolis of an ancient Etruscan port near the modern village of Spina containing 4,000 tombs, as well as the remains of a Roman imperial era commercial transport vessel previously displayed in the Museum of the Roman Ship in Bellini Palace. The entire cargo of the vessel as well as equipment and clothing of the crew are displayed.  The museum also has a medieval gallery featuring objects related to the sale of the salt and the manufacture of objects in glass and metal. Image: Lead temple votive offerings were part of the cargo of the imperial era Roman vessel dubbed the Stella Maris.  Image courtesy of Trip Advisor visit...

Artifacts from ancient civilization at The Allard Pierson Museum in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. The Allard Pierson Museum is the archaeological museum of the University of Amsterdam. Artifacts from the ancient civilizations of ancient Egypt, the Near East, the Greek World, Etruria, and the Roman Empire are curated and exhibited in this museum. The collections include art objects and utensils dating from 4000 BCE to 500 CE. Ther e are also scale models of ancient temples and buildings. In the Ancient Egypt exhibition there is a room dedicated to death, with mummies, sarcophagi, and a film showing the process of mummification. The plaster-cast attic, to be visited only with a guided tour, shows copies of Roman and Greek statues. A collection of Roman sarcophagi is also on display, including a rare wooden anthropomorphic coffin from around 150 CE. Image: Pottery depicting girls playing from Corinth, circa 300 BCE. Courtesy of the Wikimedia Commons contributor 23 dingen voor m...

Ancient Syrian, Greek, and Roman art at the National Museum of Damascus in Damascus, Syria. This museum's unique displays include the restorations of the Dura Europos Synagogue from the 3rd century CE, the hypogeum of Yarhai from Palmyra, dating to 108 CE, and the façade and frescoes of Qasr Al-Heer Al-Gharbi, 80 km south of Palmyra, which dates back to the 8th century CE. Artifacts include a tablet containing the world's first  alphabet from Ugarit, sculptures, marble and stone sarcophagi, funerary monuments and reliefs, mosaics, jewelry and coinage from the Seleucid, Roman and Byzantine periods. Image: Hypogeum of Yarhai from Palmyra, 2nd century CE, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons contributor Arian Zwegers.

"The Road to Rome" is a documentary narrated by Sir Ian McKellen that follows the journey of three historical fiction authors (L to R),   Anthony Riches ,  Ben Kane,  and Russell Whitfield, as they walk from Naples to Rome dressed as Roman soldiers to raise money for charity. HistoryHit, a subscription streaming service, is available on Apple TV, Apple App Store for iPhone and iPad, Google Play Store for Android devices and Amazon Fire TV.

Troy: Myth and Reality November 21, 2019 - March 8, 2020 at the British Museum in London.  The legend of Troy has endured for more than 3,000 years. The story of a great city, plunged into a 10-year war over the abduction of the most beautiful woman in the world, is irresistibly dramatic and tragic. This allure has sent adventurers and archaeologists in quest of the lost city, which is now widely believed to have existed.  But what of the heroes and the heartbroken, the women and the wanderers, who are said to have a played a part in the Trojan War? Why have they inspired so many retellings, from Homer to Shakespeare and Hollywood? Get closer to these captivating characters as you explore the breath-taking art that brings them to life, from dramatic ancient sculptures and exquisite vase paintings to powerful contemporary works. Image: The Wounded Achilles by Filippo Albacini, 1825. Image courtesy of the British Museum.

The Gallo-Roman Museum of Saint-Romain-en-Gal - Vienne is one of the most important archaeological sites in Europe. On the right bank of the Rhone, 30 km south of Lyon, it adjoins more than three hectares of the remains of the Roman city of Vienne dating from the 1st to the 4th centuries CE. The collection consists  of mosaics, murals, and statues as well as objects related to domestic and craft activities. The museum also presents numerous reconstructions in the form of models.

The Keir Collection of Islamic Art through April 26, 2020 at the Dallas Museum of Art. The Keir Collection Gallery presents a selection of masterworks of Islamic art from the Keir Collection, now on long-term loan to the Dallas Museum of Art. Ranking among the finest private collections of Islamic art in the world, the collection is particularly strong in Islamic ceramics, encompassing almost the whole range of innovations in ce ramic design and technology from the 8th to the 19th century. The collection also includes fascinating examples of medieval Islamic metalwork, including a bronze ewer with silver inlay made for a Christian monastery in Mosul, Iraq, by famed artisan Ahmad al-Dhaki al-Mawsili. Perhaps the most emblematic object in the Keir Collection is a 10th-century rock crystal ewer (pitcher) made for a Fatimid caliph in Cairo from a single, massive quartz crystal. It has gold enameled mounts added by French jeweler Jean-Valentin Morel in the late 19th century. Im...

Ancient artifacts recovered around the Mediterranean at the Museum of Mediterranean Archaeology in Marseille, France. Museum of Mediterranean Archaeology in Marseille houses the most important ensemble of Egyptian art in France after the Louvre.  Their Egyptian collections offer a thematic presentation of daily life, cults and funerary rites from prehistory to the second century CE. The classical collections offer a geographical and chronological discovery of the Middle East, with Assyrian coins and objects from Nineveh, Greece, Rome, Cyprus, Etruria and Gaul, from the fourth millennium to the third century CE including  Cycladic vases, a remarkable Minoan oenochoe (fifteenth century BCE), Corinthian perfume vases decorated with animal or floral prints, ceramics, a black figure vessel with a red face , a kouros, and Etruscan and Roman bucchero ware, bronze objects, children's toys, a Venus marble, and glassware. Image: Doll in a sitting position, articulated arms. Fema...

Greek and Roman antiquities at the Archaeological Museum of the City of Vis, Croatia. This museum's collections include Greek ceramics dating back to 3rd -1st century BCE, a Roman relief of the god Mars from the 1st-2nd centuries CE, Roman funerary sculpture, and amphorae recovered from ancient shipwrecks in the Vela Svitnja Bay. The amphorae are exhibited in a storage area arranged in the same way there were transported below  deck in the ancient ships. Objects from the Bronze and Iron Ages include painted ceramic fragments, fibulae, decorative glassware, jewelry, ritual vessels, and stone altars. The museum also houses the largest collection of Hellenistic monuments in Croatia, stored there by the Split Archaeological Museum. Images: Storage vault with amphorae recovered from ancient shipwrecks,  Bronze head of the goddess Artemis,  and  collection of recovered Greek ceramics.  Images courtesy of the museum.

Alalia, the Battle that Changed History, through November 3, 2019 at the Musei Di Maremma in Vetulonia, Italy.  The naval Battle of Alalia took place between 540 BCE and 535 BCE off the coast of Corsica between Greeks and an allied fleet of Etruscans and Carthaginians.  The Punic-Etruscan fleet of 120  pentekonters (ships with 48 oars and two steering rudders) defeated a Greek force of Phocaean ships while emigrating to the western Mediterranean and the nearby colony of Alalia (now Aléria).   Although the Greeks drove the allied fleet off, they lost almost two-thirds of their own fleet, a Cadmean victory according to Herodotus. Realizing they could not withstand another attack, the Greeks evacuated Corsica, and initially sought refuge in Rhegion in Italy. A legend describes how Greek prisoners were stoned to death at Caere by the Etruscans, while the Carthaginians sold their prisoners into slavery.  The exhibit features 150 objects on loan from the museu...

Closing soon! The World Between Empires: Art and Identity in the Ancient Middle East at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York through June 23, 2019. For over three centuries, the territories and trading networks of the Middle East were contested between the Roman and Parthian Empires (ca. 100 B.C.–A.D. 250), yet across the region life was not defined by these two superpowers alone. Local cultural and religious traditions flo urished, and sculptures, wall paintings, jewelry, and other objects reveal how ancient identities were expressed through art. Featuring 190 works from museums in the Middle East, Europe, and the United States, this exhibition follows a journey along the great incense and silk routes that connected cities in southwestern Arabia, Nabataea, Judaea, Syria, and Mesopotamia, making the region a center of global trade. Image: Jointed alabaster statuette of a nude goddess with gold and ruby accents from Babylon in ancient Mesopotamia 1st century BCE - 1st...

Roman, Visigoth, and Moorish art at the Museo de Cuenca in Cuenca, Spain. This museum, situated in the Casa Curato de San Martín, provides a journey through the history of Cuenca. The ground floor is dedicated to prehistory from the Paleolithic to the Iron Age and includes artifacts from the Neolithic Verdelpino Shelter and the Bronze Age idol of Chillarón and the sword of Carboneras. The first floor features finds from the Rom an world. The collection includes everything from ceramic pieces and utensils to statues, column capitals, precious metalwork and coins from the Roman towns of Segóbriga, Valeria and Ercávica. You will find Visigoth and Moorish artifacts from the third to 18th century on the second floor. All of the exhibits are accompanied by illustrative panels, which enhance their educational value. Note, this museum houses some of the finds from the Villa de Noheda. Bust of Lucius Caesar from the forum of Ercávica, Cuenca courtesy of Wikimedia contributor Angel ...

Forgotten Kingdoms: From the Hittite Empire to the Arameans through August 12, 2019 at The Louvre in Paris, France. The Hittite empire, a great rival power of ancient Egypt, ruled over Anatolia and held sway over the Levant until about 1200 BC. Its demise gave rise to Neo-Hittite and Aramean kingdoms in modern-day Turkey and Syria, heirs of the political, cultural, and artistic traditions of the fallen empire. The exhibition inv ites visitors to rediscover the mythic sites of this forgotten civilization, such as the majestic remains of the Tell Halaf site, located near the current Turco-Syrian border. This major Syrian heritage site was discovered by Max von Oppenheim, who conducted excavations there from 1911 to 1913. The large sculptures, which adorned the palace of the Aramean king Kapara, were brought back to Berlin where they were exhibited, then very heavily damaged in WW2 bombings. An incredible conservation project carried out in the early 2000s made it possible to rehabili...

Treasures of Ancient Greece opening Saturday at the Children's Museum in Indianapolis, Indiana. This exhibit, on display from June 15, 2019 - January, 2020, is a collaborative partnership with the Hellenic Ministry of Culture and Sports. It will allow visitors to explore the history and mythology of the ancient Greeks and discover how the ancient Greeks influenced the realms of sports, government, entertainment, and beauty by  examing more than 150 objects including scientific inventions, sculptures, jewelry, armor, and ceramics. Opening day activities include a performance by the Triada Dancers from Fort Wayne, Indiana. Children will be encouraged to paint a vase and make their own mosaics, too. Image: Exhibit media provided by the museum (Artemis reaching for an arrow for her bow?)

Nuragic art at the National Archaeological Museum of Cagliari, Sardinia. This museum houses findings from the pre-Nuragic and Nuragic age through the Byzantine age. These include a large collection of prehistoric bronze statuettes from the Nuragic age, some earlier stone statuettes of female divinities, reconstruction of a Phoenician settlement, the Nora Stone, Carthaginian goldsmith examples, Roman and Italic ceramics and Byzanti ne jewels. Nuragic civilization lasted on the island of Sardinia from the 18th century BCE to 238 BCE when the Romans colonized the island. The term "Nuragic" is derived from the island's most characteristic monument, the nuraghe, a tower-fortress type of construction the ancient Sardinians built in large numbers. Even today more than 7,000 nuraghes dot the Sardinian landscape. These warrior people have been associated with the Sherden tribe of the late Bronze Age Sea Peoples. Simonides of Ceos and Plutarch spoke of raids by Sardinians ag...

Iran - Cradle of Civilizations through September 1, 2019 at the Archaeological Museum of Alicante in Alicante, Spain. This exhibit will showcase 196 works including 20 gold pieces, and a replica of the Frieze of the Archers by Darius the Great (510 BCE) as well as objects used in the earliest developments of agriculture and livestock farming dating back 10,000 years. Also displayed are cuneiform clay tablets, gold beakers and o rnaments, bronze weapons and beautifully painted ceramics associated with successive Iranian kingdoms. The Archaeological Museum of Alicante also houses Roman objects from the nearby archaeological site of Lucentum. Diodorus Siculus ascribes the foundation of the town to the Carthaginian general Hamilcar Barcas. It was refounded and named Lucentum after the area was conquered by P. Cornelius Scipio during the Second Punic War. It rose in prominence to be a major city in the Roman province of Hispania Tarraconensis until its decline and abandonment at the end...

Henry Blundell Collection of Roman Sculpture, ongoing, at the World Museum in Liverpool, United Kingdom. Henry Blundell ( 1724-1810 ) was educated in the Classics in France and when the market for Italian antiquities dried up at the close of 18th century, Blundell purchased a variety of statues, busts and ash chests at auctions of important British collections of Roman sculpture. His collection is one of the few such collection s that remained together over the years and not scattered across different institutiions or individuals. Many of the statues and busts represent deities, heroes, and other mythological beings as well as a few well-known Roman emperors. The collection is said to be the largest collection of Roman sculpture outside of the British Museum. Image: Hermaphrodite struggling with old saytr found in the remains of a villa at Prato Bagnato on the Via Prenestina in 1776. Image courtesy of the World Museum, Liverpool then digitally enhanced.