Ancient Landscape - Vasily Polenov, 1906

Some more ornament features of Cyzicus ✨

A city so old it hosted (and suffered from) the Argonauts. A temple so grand ancient observers thought it deserved a place among the Seven Wonders — as an Eighth. A capital so elaborate it makes you want to touch it, just to check if it’s real. Cyzicus today is mostly forgotten

I know what’s left is not enough to fully understand what was going on there or what its purpose was, so here is a reconstruction drawing by Georg Niemann, a key member of Karl Graf Lanckoroński’s team that pioneered the scholarly research of Termessos 🙌

My favorite: the corner. Look at how precisely the three surfaces meet to form a perfect right angle—no trivial job. Also notice the line mark on the horizontal surface running from the corner to the edge of the block. It resembles marks left by modern disc saws doing similar

Below that symbol is a perfectly polished, vase-like hollow, cut deep into the limestone layer.

Or this damaged symbol—you can easily imagine how it must have looked when complete.

Here’s what I mean: look at how impeccable this bas-relief of an eagle is. The detailing of the wings, the snake the eagle is holding, the fine depth—all of it stands out sharply against the surrounding bare rock surface 🤌

Tomb of Alcetas I is one of the most peculiar locations at Termessos. Carved into the rock, this tomb clearly shows the difference between worked and raw surfaces, preserved from precipitation thanks to the natural cover of the site 🧵

A man you’d trust your life with. This prominent figure in the portrait is a member of the Beni Sa‘id tribe, named Beshara. He was one of the guides in David Roberts’ party during his journey through the Holy Land. Beshara accompanied Roberts all the way from Suez to Aqaba,

Nine close-up 📸 shots of St. Mark’s horses and their history. These magnificent four horses probably stood as part of a decorative quadriga in the Hippodrome of Constantinople. Modern scholars believe they were made between the late 100s and early 200s AD. However, carbon

"The Honourable Charles Leonard Irby" by Jean Baptiste Borely

We have it so easy today. “Great were the obstacles which presented themselves, and innumerable the difficulties which we had to surmount before we could commence our journey to Petra,” wrote The Honourable Charles Leonard Irby, an English Royal Navy officer who travelled

Here is the original

Bronze profiles in columns of Baalbek 🎥 Credits to Max from yt @ antik_ruins (AI translated)

If you ever hear someone mention “named beasts in a Roman mosaic” (you know, as one does on a morning commute), they’re talking about the Magerius Mosaic — a 3rd-century venatio scene from a small villa in Tunisia. What makes it rare is that every hunter and every beast has a

Imagine a continuous painting the length of a football field and as tall as an exceptionally tall man. That’s the Panorama of the Monumental Grandeur of the Mississippi Valley — painted by John J. Egan for archaeologist Montroville W. Dickeson. He used it in live lectures with

Is there anyone who wouldn’t be impressed standing face-to-face with the bringer of cosmic order and balance?.. 📍 Musée Guimet, Paris — 11th–12th century, bluish schist

It would take just one rock-solid (pun intended) piece of evidence — something undeniably beyond the technological limits of its supposed era, say, the Baalbek trilithons, Puma Punku, Sacsayhuamán, or the Egyptian granite vessels, admitted openly and globally — to tip the balance

Large Gallery Grave in the rock-necropolis area of Ancient Dara city has this substantial shaft going through smooth ceiling all the way up to the surface. No one even measured it properly, I couldn't find its precise dimensions, and of course I measured shit when I was there.