1.
National Archaeological Museum, Athens
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The National Archaeological Museum in Athens houses some of the most important artifacts from a variety of archaeological locations around Greece from prehistory to late antiquity. It is considered one of the greatest museums in the world, the first national archaeological museum in Greece was established by prime minister of Greece Ioannis Kapodistrias in Aigina in 1829. The initial name for the museum was The Central Museum and it was renamed to its current name in 1881 by Prime Minister of Greece Charilaos Trikoupis. In 1887 the important archaeologist Valerios Stais became the museums curator, during World War II the museum was closed and the antiquities were sealed in special protective boxes and buried, in order to avoid their destruction and looting. In 1945 exhibits were displayed under the direction of Christos Karouzos. The south wing of the houses the Epigraphic Museum with the richest collection of inscriptions in the world. The inscriptions museum expanded between 1953 and 1960 with the designs of Patroklos Karantinos. The museum has an imposing neo-classical design which was popular in Europe at the time and is in accordance with the classical style artifacts that it houses. The initial plan was conceived by the architect Ludwig Lange and it was modified by Panagis Kalkos who was the main architect, Armodios Vlachos. At the front of the museum there is a large neo-classic design garden which is decorated with sculptures, the building has undergone many expansions. These expansions were necessary to accommodate the growing collection of artifacts. The most recent refurbishment of the museum more than 1.5 years to complete. The Minoan frescoes rooms opened to the public in 2005, on May 2008 the Culture Minister Mihalis Liapis inaugurated the much anticipated collection of Egyptian antiquities and the collection of Eleni and Antonis Stathatos. Today, there is a discussion regarding the need to further expand the museum to adjacent areas. A new plan has made for a subterranean expansion at the front of the museum. The museums collections are organised in sections, The prehistoric collection displays objects from the Neolithic era, Early and Mid-Bronze age, objects classified as Cycladic and Mycenaean art. There are ceramic finds from various important Neolithic sites such as Dimini and Sesclo from middle Helladic ceramics from Boeotia, Attica, some objects from Heinrich Schliemann excavations in Troy are also on display. Cycladic collection features the famous marble figurines from the Aegean islands of Delos and Keros including the Lutist, of great interest are the two golden cups from Vafeio showing a scene of the capture of a bull
2.
Ancient Greek
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Ancient Greek includes the forms of Greek used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around the 9th century BC to the 6th century AD. It is often divided into the Archaic period, Classical period. It is antedated in the second millennium BC by Mycenaean Greek, the language of the Hellenistic phase is known as Koine. Koine is regarded as a historical stage of its own, although in its earliest form it closely resembled Attic Greek. Prior to the Koine period, Greek of the classic and earlier periods included several regional dialects, Ancient Greek was the language of Homer and of fifth-century Athenian historians, playwrights, and philosophers. It has contributed many words to English vocabulary and has been a subject of study in educational institutions of the Western world since the Renaissance. This article primarily contains information about the Epic and Classical phases of the language, Ancient Greek was a pluricentric language, divided into many dialects. The main dialect groups are Attic and Ionic, Aeolic, Arcadocypriot, some dialects are found in standardized literary forms used in literature, while others are attested only in inscriptions. There are also several historical forms, homeric Greek is a literary form of Archaic Greek used in the epic poems, the Iliad and Odyssey, and in later poems by other authors. Homeric Greek had significant differences in grammar and pronunciation from Classical Attic, the origins, early form and development of the Hellenic language family are not well understood because of a lack of contemporaneous evidence. Several theories exist about what Hellenic dialect groups may have existed between the divergence of early Greek-like speech from the common Proto-Indo-European language and the Classical period and they have the same general outline, but differ in some of the detail. The invasion would not be Dorian unless the invaders had some relationship to the historical Dorians. The invasion is known to have displaced population to the later Attic-Ionic regions, the Greeks of this period believed there were three major divisions of all Greek people—Dorians, Aeolians, and Ionians, each with their own defining and distinctive dialects. Often non-west is called East Greek, Arcadocypriot apparently descended more closely from the Mycenaean Greek of the Bronze Age. Boeotian had come under a strong Northwest Greek influence, and can in some respects be considered a transitional dialect, thessalian likewise had come under Northwest Greek influence, though to a lesser degree. Most of the dialect sub-groups listed above had further subdivisions, generally equivalent to a city-state and its surrounding territory, Doric notably had several intermediate divisions as well, into Island Doric, Southern Peloponnesus Doric, and Northern Peloponnesus Doric. The Lesbian dialect was Aeolic Greek and this dialect slowly replaced most of the older dialects, although Doric dialect has survived in the Tsakonian language, which is spoken in the region of modern Sparta. Doric has also passed down its aorist terminations into most verbs of Demotic Greek, by about the 6th century AD, the Koine had slowly metamorphosized into Medieval Greek
3.
Virgin
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Virginity is the state of a person who has never engaged in sexual intercourse. Like chastity, the concept of virginity has traditionally involved sexual abstinence, the concept of virginity usually involves moral or religious issues and can have consequences in terms of social status and in interpersonal relationships. Although virginity has social implications and had significant legal implications in some societies in the past, the term virgin originally only referred to sexually inexperienced women, but has evolved to encompass a range of definitions, as found in traditional, modern, and ethical concepts. The social implications of virginity still remain in societies. The word virgin comes via Old French virgine from the form of Latin virgo, genitive virgin-is. As in Latin, the English word is often used with wider reference, by relaxing the age. In this case, more mature women can be virgins, men can be virgins, and potential initiates into many fields can be colloquially termed virgins, for example, in the latter usage, virgin means uninitiated. The Latin word likely arose by analogy with a suit of lexemes based on vireo, meaning to be green, fresh or flourishing, mostly with botanic reference—in particular, virga meaning strip of wood. The first known use of virgin in English is found in a Middle English manuscript held at Trinity College, Cambridge of about 1200, martirs, and confessors, and uirgines maked faier bode inne to women. By about 1300, the word was expanded to also to Mary. These are three of the eighteen definitions of virgin from the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, most of the OED1 definitions, however, are similar. The German word for virgin is Jungfrau, Jungfrau literally means young woman, but is not used in this sense. Instead junge Frau can be used, the rather dated German word for a young woman, without implications regarding sexuality, is Fräulein. Fräulein was used in German as a title of respect, equivalent to current usage of Miss in English, Jungfrau is the word reserved specifically for sexual inexperience. As Frau means woman, it suggests a female referent, unlike English, German also has a specific word for a male virgin Jüngling. It is, however, dated too and rarely used, Jungfrau, with some masculine modifier, is more typical, as evidenced by the film, The 40-Year-Old Virgin, about a 40-year-old male virgin, titled in German, Jungfrau, männlich, sucht…. Note that the used for the starsign virgo also is Jungfrau. German also distinguishes between young women and girls, who are denoted by the word Mädchen, the English cognate maid was often used to imply virginity, especially in poetry - e. g. Maid Marian, the love interest of the legendary outlaw Robin Hood in English folklore
4.
Chryselephantine sculpture
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Chryselephantine sculpture is sculpture made with gold and ivory. Chryselephantine cult statues enjoyed high status in Ancient Greece, in some cases, glass paste, glass, and precious and semi-precious stones were used for detail such as eyes, jewellery, and weaponry. The origins of the technique are not known and it is, however, not clear whether the Greek chryselephantine tradition is connected with them. Chryselephantine sculpture became widespread during the Archaic period, later, Acrolithitic statues, with marble heads and extremities, and a wooden trunk either gilded or covered in drapery, were a comparable technique used for cult images. The technique was used for cult statues within temples, typically. Construction was modular so that some of the gold could be removed and melted for coin or bullion in times of financial hardship. For example, the figure of Nike held in the hand of Pheidias Athena Parthenos was made from solid gold with this very purpose in mind. Chryselephantine statues were not only visually striking, they displayed the wealth. The creation of such a statue involved skills in sculpture, carpentry, jewellery, once completed, the statues required constant maintenance. It is known that at Olympia, skilled personnel were employed to ensure the upkeep of the statue, in the second century BC, the prominent sculptor, Damophon of Messene was commissioned to make repairs on it. Due to the value of some of the materials used and the perishable nature of others, most chryselephantine statues were destroyed during antiquity. For example, of the statue of Athena Parthenos, only the hole that held its central wooden support survives today in the floor of her temple. The appearance of the statue is known from a number of miniature marble copies discovered in Athens. Pausanias also described Pheidias statue of Zeus at Olympia, here, some of the clay moulds for parts of Zeus garments made of glass or glass-paste have been discovered in the building known as the Workshop of Pheidias. They are the only finds directly associated with the sculptors most famous works. Few examples of sculpture have been found. The most prominent surviving examples are fragments of several burnt statues from the Archaic period, unfortunately, it is not known whom they depict, although they are assumed to represent deities. The term chryselephantine is also used for a style of sculpture fairly common in European 19th century art, especially Art Nouveau
5.
Sculpture
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Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. It is one of the plastic arts, a wide variety of materials may be worked by removal such as carving, assembled by welding or modelling, or molded, or cast. However, most ancient sculpture was painted, and this has been lost. Those cultures whose sculptures have survived in quantities include the cultures of the ancient Mediterranean, India and China, the Western tradition of sculpture began in ancient Greece, and Greece is widely seen as producing great masterpieces in the classical period. During the Middle Ages, Gothic sculpture represented the agonies and passions of the Christian faith, the revival of classical models in the Renaissance produced famous sculptures such as Michelangelos David. Relief is often classified by the degree of projection from the wall into low or bas-relief, high relief, sunk-relief is a technique restricted to ancient Egypt. Relief sculpture may also decorate steles, upright slabs, usually of stone, techniques such as casting, stamping and moulding use an intermediate matrix containing the design to produce the work, many of these allow the production of several copies. The term sculpture is used mainly to describe large works. The very large or colossal statue has had an enduring appeal since antiquity, another grand form of portrait sculpture is the equestrian statue of a rider on horse, which has become rare in recent decades. The smallest forms of life-size portrait sculpture are the head, showing just that, or the bust, small forms of sculpture include the figurine, normally a statue that is no more than 18 inches tall, and for reliefs the plaquette, medal or coin. Sculpture is an important form of public art, a collection of sculpture in a garden setting can be called a sculpture garden. One of the most common purposes of sculpture is in form of association with religion. Cult images are common in cultures, though they are often not the colossal statues of deities which characterized ancient Greek art. The actual cult images in the innermost sanctuaries of Egyptian temples, of which none have survived, were rather small. The same is true in Hinduism, where the very simple. Some undoubtedly advanced cultures, such as the Indus Valley civilization, appear to have had no monumental sculpture at all, though producing very sophisticated figurines, the Mississippian culture seems to have been progressing towards its use, with small stone figures, when it collapsed. Other cultures, such as ancient Egypt and the Easter Island culture, from the 20th century the relatively restricted range of subjects found in large sculpture expanded greatly, with abstract subjects and the use or representation of any type of subject now common. Today much sculpture is made for intermittent display in galleries and museums, small sculpted fittings for furniture and other objects go well back into antiquity, as in the Nimrud ivories, Begram ivories and finds from the tomb of Tutankhamun
6.
Greek mythology
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It was a part of the religion in ancient Greece. Greek mythology is explicitly embodied in a collection of narratives. Greek myth attempts to explain the origins of the world, and details the lives and adventures of a variety of gods, goddesses, heroes, heroines. These accounts initially were disseminated in a tradition, today the Greek myths are known primarily from ancient Greek literature. The oldest known Greek literary sources, Homers epic poems Iliad and Odyssey, focus on the Trojan War, archaeological findings provide a principal source of detail about Greek mythology, with gods and heroes featured prominently in the decoration of many artifacts. Geometric designs on pottery of the eighth century BC depict scenes from the Trojan cycle as well as the adventures of Heracles, in the succeeding Archaic, Classical, and Hellenistic periods, Homeric and various other mythological scenes appear, supplementing the existing literary evidence. Greek mythology has had an influence on the culture, arts. Poets and artists from ancient times to the present have derived inspiration from Greek mythology and have discovered contemporary significance and relevance in the themes, Greek mythology is known today primarily from Greek literature and representations on visual media dating from the Geometric period from c. Mythical narration plays an important role in every genre of Greek literature. Nevertheless, the only general mythographical handbook to survive from Greek antiquity was the Library of Pseudo-Apollodorus and this work attempts to reconcile the contradictory tales of the poets and provides a grand summary of traditional Greek mythology and heroic legends. Apollodorus of Athens lived from c, 180–125 BC and wrote on many of these topics. His writings may have formed the basis for the collection, however the Library discusses events that occurred long after his death, among the earliest literary sources are Homers two epic poems, the Iliad and the Odyssey. Other poets completed the cycle, but these later and lesser poems now are lost almost entirely. Despite their traditional name, the Homeric Hymns have no connection with Homer. They are choral hymns from the part of the so-called Lyric age. Hesiods Works and Days, a poem about farming life, also includes the myths of Prometheus, Pandora. The poet gives advice on the best way to succeed in a dangerous world, lyrical poets often took their subjects from myth, but their treatment became gradually less narrative and more allusive. Greek lyric poets, including Pindar, Bacchylides and Simonides, and bucolic poets such as Theocritus and Bion, additionally, myth was central to classical Athenian drama
7.
Athena
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Athena or Athene, often given the epithet Pallas, is the goddess of wisdom, craft, and war in ancient Greek religion and mythology. Minerva is the Roman goddess identified with Athena, Athena is known for her calm temperament, as she moves slowly to anger. She is noted to have fought for just reasons. Athena is portrayed as a companion of heroes and is the patron goddess of heroic endeavour. She is the patroness of Athens. The Athenians founded the Parthenon on the Acropolis of her city, Athens. Veneration of Athena was so persistent that archaic myths about her were recast to adapt to cultural changes, in her role as a protector of the city, many people throughout the Greek world worshipped Athena as Athena Polias. While the city of Athens and the goddess Athena essentially bear the same name, Athena is associated with Athens, a plural name, because it was the place where she presided over her sisterhood, the Athenai, in earliest times. Mycenae was the city where the Goddess was called Mykene, at Thebes she was called Thebe, and the city again a plural, Thebae. Similarly, at Athens she was called Athena, and the city Athenae, Athena had a special relationship with Athens, as is shown by the etymological connection of the names of the goddess and the city. According to mythical lore, she competed with Poseidon and she won by creating the olive tree, the Athenians would accept her gift and name the city after her. In history, the citizens of Athens built a statue of Athena as a temple to the goddess, which had piercing eyes, a helmet on her head, attired with an aegis or cuirass, and an extremely long spear. It also had a shield with the head of the Gorgon on it. A large snake accompanied her and she held Nike, the goddess of victory, therefore, Mylonas believes that Athena was a Mycenaean creation. On the other hand, Nilsson claims that she was the goddess of the palace who protected the king, a-ta-no-dju-wa-ja is also found in Linear A Minoan, the final part being regarded as the Linear A Minoan equivalent of the Linear B Mycenaean di-u-ja or di-wi-ja. Divine Athena also was a weaver and the deity of crafts, whether her name is attested in Eteocretan or not will have to wait for decipherment of Linear A. Perhaps, however, the name Theonoe may mean she who knows divine things better than others. Thus for Plato her name was to be derived from Greek Ἀθεονόα, Plato also noted that the citizens of Sais in Egypt worshipped a goddess whose Egyptian name was Neith, and which was identified with Athena. Neith was the war goddess and huntress deity of the Egyptians since the ancient Pre-Dynastic period, in addition, ancient Greek myths reported that Athena had visited many mythological places such as Libyas Triton River in North Africa and the Phlegraean plain
8.
Phidias
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Phidias or Pheidias was a Greek sculptor, painter, and architect. His statue of Zeus at Olympia was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, Phidias was the son of Charmides of Athens. The ancients believed that his masters were Hegias and Ageladas, Phidias is often credited as the main instigator of the Classical Greek sculptural design. Today, most critics and historians consider him one of the greatest of all ancient Greek sculptors, although no original works exist that can be attributed to Phidias with certainty, numerous Roman copies of varying degrees of fidelity are known to exist. Almost all classical Greek paintings and sculptures have been destroyed, and only Roman copies or notes of them exist, the ancient Romans frequently copied and further developed Greek art. In antiquity Phidias was celebrated for his statues in bronze and his chryselephantine works, in the Hippias Major, Plato claims that Phidias seldom, if ever, executed works in marble, though many of the sculptures of his times were executed in marble. Plutarch tells us that he superintended the works ordered by Pericles on the Acropolis. Ancient critics take a high view of the merits of Phidias. What they especially praise is the ethos or permanent moral level of his works as compared with those of the later so called pathetic school, demetrius calls his statues sublime, and at the same time precise. Of his life we know little apart from his works and his first commission created a group of national heroes with Miltiades as a central figure. Pericles used some of the money from the maritime League of Delos, to rebuild, inscriptions prove that the marble blocks intended for the pedimental statues of the Parthenon were not brought to Athens until 434 BC, which was probably after the death of Phidias. It is therefore possible that most of sculptural decoration of the Parthenon was the work of Phidias workshop including pupils of Phidias, such as Alcamenes, the Golden Ratio has been represented by the Greek letter φ, after Phidias, who is said to have employed it. The Golden Ratio is an irrational number approximating 1.6180 which has special mathematical properties, the golden spiral is also said to hold aesthetic values. The earliest of the works of Phidias were dedications in memory of Marathon, at Delphi he created a great group in bronze including the figures of Greek gods Apollo and Athena, several Attic heroes, and General Miltiades the Younger. On the Acropolis of Athens Phidias constructed a bronze statue of Athena, the Athena Promachos. Athena was the goddess of wisdom and warriors and the protector of Athens, at Pellene in Achaea, and at Plataea Phidias made two other statues of Athena, as well as a statue of the goddess Aphrodite in ivory and gold for the people of Elis. Both sculptures belong to about the middle of the 5th century BC, a number of replicas and works inspired by it, both ancient and modern, have been made. Phidias left Athens in about 438 BC, on completion of the Athena Parthenos, accused by a fellow worker of embezzlement, and unable to account for the amount of gold used in separate parts of the statue, he voluntarily underwent exile rather than face public humiliation
9.
Parthenon
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The Parthenon is a former temple, on the Athenian Acropolis, Greece, dedicated to the goddess Athena, whom the people of Athens considered their patron. Construction began in 447 BC when the Athenian Empire was at the peak of its power and it was completed in 438 BC although decoration of the building continued until 432 BC. It is the most important surviving building of Classical Greece, generally considered the zenith of the Doric order and its decorative sculptures are considered some of the high points of Greek art. The Parthenon is regarded as an symbol of Ancient Greece, Athenian democracy and western civilization. The Greek Ministry of Culture is currently carrying out a programme of restoration and reconstruction to ensure the stability of the partially ruined structure. The Parthenon itself replaced a temple of Athena, which historians call the Pre-Parthenon or Older Parthenon. The temple is aligned to the Hyades. While a sacred building dedicated to the patron goddess, the Parthenon was actually used primarily as a treasury. For a time, it served as the treasury of the Delian League, in the final decade of the sixth century AD, the Parthenon was converted into a Christian church dedicated to the Virgin Mary. After the Ottoman conquest, it was turned into a mosque in the early 1460s, on 26 September 1687, an Ottoman ammunition dump inside the building was ignited by Venetian bombardment. The resulting explosion damaged the Parthenon and its sculptures. From 1800 to 1803, Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin removed some of the sculptures with the alleged permission of the Ottoman Empire. These sculptures, now known as the Elgin Marbles or the Parthenon Marbles, were sold in 1816 to the British Museum in London, since 1983, the Greek government has been committed to the return of the sculptures to Greece. The Liddell–Scott–Jones Greek–English Lexicon states that this room was the western cella of the Parthenon, jamauri D. Christopher Pelling asserts that Athena Parthenos may have constituted a discrete cult of Athena, intimately connected with, but not identical to, that of Athena Polias. According to this theory, the name of the Parthenon means the temple of the virgin goddess and it has also been suggested that the name of the temple alludes to the maidens, whose supreme sacrifice guaranteed the safety of the city. Parthénos has also applied to the Virgin Mary, Parthénos Maria. The first instance in which Parthenon definitely refers to the building is found in the writings of the 4th century BC orator Demosthenes. In 5th-century building accounts, the structure is simply called ho naos, because the Parthenon was dedicated to the Greek goddess Athena, it has sometimes been referred to as the Temple of Minerva, the Roman name for Athena, particularly during the 19th century
10.
Athens
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Athens is the capital and largest city of Greece. In modern times, Athens is a cosmopolitan metropolis and central to economic, financial, industrial, maritime. In 2015, Athens was ranked the worlds 29th richest city by purchasing power, Athens is recognised as a global city because of its location and its importance in shipping, finance, commerce, media, entertainment, arts, international trade, culture, education and tourism. It is one of the biggest economic centres in southeastern Europe, with a financial sector. The municipality of Athens had a population of 664,046 within its limits. The urban area of Athens extends beyond its administrative city limits. According to Eurostat in 2011, the Functional urban areas of Athens was the 9th most populous FUA in the European Union, Athens is also the southernmost capital on the European mainland. The city also retains Roman and Byzantine monuments, as well as a number of Ottoman monuments. Athens is home to two UNESCO World Heritage Sites, the Acropolis of Athens and the medieval Daphni Monastery, Athens was the host city of the first modern-day Olympic Games in 1896, and 108 years later it welcomed home the 2004 Summer Olympics. In Ancient Greek, the name of the city was Ἀθῆναι a plural, in earlier Greek, such as Homeric Greek, the name had been current in the singular form though, as Ἀθήνη. It was possibly rendered in the later on, like those of Θῆβαι and Μυκῆναι. During the medieval period the name of the city was rendered once again in the singular as Ἀθήνα, an etiological myth explaining how Athens has acquired its name was well known among ancient Athenians and even became the theme of the sculpture on the West pediment of the Parthenon. The goddess of wisdom, Athena, and the god of the seas, Poseidon had many disagreements, in an attempt to compel the people, Poseidon created a salt water spring by striking the ground with his trident, symbolizing naval power. However, when Athena created the tree, symbolizing peace and prosperity. Different etymologies, now rejected, were proposed during the 19th century. Christian Lobeck proposed as the root of the name the word ἄθος or ἄνθος meaning flower, ludwig von Döderlein proposed the stem of the verb θάω, stem θη- to denote Athens as having fertile soil. In classical literature, the city was referred to as the City of the Violet Crown, first documented in Pindars ἰοστέφανοι Ἀθᾶναι. In medieval texts, variant names include Setines, Satine, and Astines, today the caption η πρωτεύουσα, the capital, has become somewhat common
11.
Cult image
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In the practice of religion, a cult image is a human-made object that is venerated or worshipped for the deity, spirit or daemon that it embodies or represents. Cultus, the outward religious formulas of cult, often centers upon the treatment of cult images, religious images cover a wider range of all types of images made with a religious purpose, subject, or connection. In many contexts cult image specifically means the most important image in a temple, kept in an inner space, as opposed to what may be many other images decorating the temple. The term idol is often synonymous with cult image, but may be used especially of an image believed not just to depict or represent a deity or spirit. Sometimes the image is believed to have its own powers, to grant wishes or otherwise affect the world, in cultures where idolatry is not viewed negatively, the word idol is not generally seen as pejorative, such as in Indian English. Cult of images is the practice of worshipping or venerating religious or cult images representing divine figures, common in a number of ancient religions, the practice continues most prominently today in Hinduism. Assertions by others outside the group concerned that such beliefs are held by the group are however common. Cult images were a presence in Ancient Egypt, and still are in modern-day Kemetism. A common example of an image in ancient Egypt was the Apis Bull. The term is confined to the relatively small images, typically in gold. These images usually showed the god in their sacred barque or boat, the Parthenon contained a cult image of Athena, the Greek goddess of civilization and the noble side of war. This cult image, known as Athena Parthenos, was created by Phidias and this cult image was used for religious sacrifices at this Athenian temple. Hinduism allows for many forms of worship and therefore it neither prescribes nor proscribes worship of images, in Hinduism, a murti typically refers to an image that expresses a Divine Spirit. Meaning literally embodiment, a murti is a representation of a divinity, made usually of stone, wood, or metal, hindus consider a murti worthy of serving as a focus of divine worship only after the divine is invoked in it for the purpose of offering worship. The depiction of the divinity must reflect the gestures and proportions outlined in religious tradition, members of Abrahamic religions identify cult images as idols and their worship as idolatry, the worship of hollow forms. The avoidance of such a degrading paradox was expressed in the early Christian idea of miraculous icons that were not made by human hands, acheiropoietoi. Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Christians make an exception for the veneration of image of saints, the word idol entered Middle English in the 13th century from Old French idole adapted in Ecclesiastical Latin from the Greek eidolon. Greek eidos was employed by Plato and the Platonists to signify perfect immutable forms, the local tribes, of the Arabian peninsula, came to this centre of commerce to place their idols in the Kaaba, in the process being charged tithes
12.
Constantinople
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Constantinople was the capital city of the Roman/Byzantine Empire, and also of the brief Latin, and the later Ottoman empires. It was reinaugurated in 324 AD from ancient Byzantium as the new capital of the Roman Empire by Emperor Constantine the Great, after whom it was named, Constantinople was famed for its massive and complex defences. The first wall of the city was erected by Constantine I, Constantinople never truly recovered from the devastation of the Fourth Crusade and the decades of misrule by the Latins. The origins of the name of Byzantion, more known by the later Latin Byzantium, are not entirely clear. The founding myth of the city has it told that the settlement was named after the leader of the Megarian colonists, Byzas. The later Byzantines of Constantinople themselves would maintain that the city was named in honour of two men, Byzas and Antes, though this was likely just a play on the word Byzantion. During this time, the city was also called Second Rome, Eastern Rome, and Roma Constantinopolitana. As the city became the remaining capital of the Roman Empire after the fall of the West, and its wealth, population, and influence grew. In the language of other peoples, Constantinople was referred to just as reverently, the medieval Vikings, who had contacts with the empire through their expansion in eastern Europe used the Old Norse name Miklagarðr, and later Miklagard and Miklagarth. In Arabic, the city was sometimes called Rūmiyyat al-kubra and in Persian as Takht-e Rum, in East and South Slavic languages, including in medieval Russia, Constantinople was referred to as Tsargrad or Carigrad, City of the Caesar, from the Slavonic words tsar and grad. This was presumably a calque on a Greek phrase such as Βασιλέως Πόλις, the modern Turkish name for the city, İstanbul, derives from the Greek phrase eis tin polin, meaning into the city or to the city. In 1928, the Turkish alphabet was changed from Arabic script to Latin script, in time the city came to be known as Istanbul and its variations in most world languages. In Greece today, the city is still called Konstantinoúpolis/Konstantinoúpoli or simply just the City, apart from this, little is known about this initial settlement, except that it was abandoned by the time the Megarian colonists settled the site anew. A farsighted treaty with the emergent power of Rome in c.150 BC which stipulated tribute in exchange for independent status allowed it to enter Roman rule unscathed. The site lay astride the land route from Europe to Asia and the seaway from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean, and had in the Golden Horn an excellent and spacious harbour. He would later rebuild Byzantium towards the end of his reign, in which it would be briefly renamed Augusta Antonina, fortifying it with a new city wall in his name, Constantine had altogether more colourful plans. Rome was too far from the frontiers, and hence from the armies and the imperial courts, yet it had been the capital of the state for over a thousand years, and it might have seemed unthinkable to suggest that the capital be moved to a different location. Constantinople was built over 6 years, and consecrated on 11 May 330, Constantine divided the expanded city, like Rome, into 14 regions, and ornamented it with public works worthy of an imperial metropolis
13.
Pausanias (geographer)
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Pausanias was a Greek traveler and geographer of the 2nd century AD, who lived in the time of Roman emperors Hadrian, Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius. He is famous for his Description of Greece, a work that describes ancient Greece from his first-hand observations. This work provides crucial information for making links between classical literature and modern archaeology, andrew Stewart assesses him as, A careful, pedestrian writer. interested not only in the grandiose or the exquisite but in unusual sights and obscure ritual. He is occasionally careless, or makes unwarranted inferences, and his guides or even his own notes sometimes mislead him, yet his honesty is unquestionable, before visiting Greece, he had been to Antioch, Joppa and Jerusalem, and to the banks of the River Jordan. In Egypt, he had seen the pyramids, while at the temple of Ammon, in Macedonia, he appears to have seen the alleged tomb of Orpheus in Libethra. Crossing over to Italy, he had something of the cities of Campania. He was one of the first to write of seeing the ruins of Troy, Alexandria Troas, Pausanias Description of Greece is in ten books, each dedicated to some portion of Greece. He begins his tour in Attica, where the city of Athens, subsequent books describe Corinthia, Laconia, Messenia, Elis, Achaea, Arcadia, Boetia, Phocis and Ozolian Locris. He famously leaves out key portions of Greece such as Crete, the project is more than topographical, it is a cultural geography. Pausanias digresses from description of architectural and artistic objects to review the mythological and historical underpinnings of the society that produced them and his work bears the marks of his attempt to navigate that space and establish an identity for Roman Greece. He is not a naturalist by any means, though he does from time to comment on the physical realities of the Greek landscape. He notices the pine trees on the sandy coast of Elis, the deer and the boars in the oak woods of Phelloe. Pausanias is most at home in describing the art and architecture of Olympia. Yet, even in the most secluded regions of Greece, he is fascinated by all kinds of depictions of gods, holy relics, Pausanias has the instincts of an antiquary. Some magnificent and dominating structures, such as the Stoa of King Attalus in the Athenian Agora or the Exedra of Herodes Atticus at Olympia are not even mentioned. While he never doubts the existence of the gods and heroes, he criticizes the myths. His descriptions of monuments of art are plain and unadorned and they bear the impression of reality, and their accuracy is confirmed by the extant remains. He is perfectly frank in his confessions of ignorance, when he quotes a book at second hand he takes pains to say so
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Sphinx
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A sphinx is a mythical creature with the head of a human and the body of a lion. In Greek tradition, it has the head of a human, the haunches of a lion and it is mythicised as treacherous and merciless. Those who cannot answer its riddle suffer a fate typical in such stories, as they are killed. This deadly version of a sphinx appears in the myth and drama of Oedipus, unlike the Greek sphinx, which was a woman, the Egyptian sphinx is typically shown as a man. In European decorative art, the sphinx enjoyed a revival during the Renaissance. Sphinxes are generally associated with structures such as royal tombs or religious temples. The oldest known sphinx was found near Gobekli Tepe at another site, Nevali Çori, or possibly 120 miles to the east at Kortik Tepe, Turkey, and was dated to 9,500 BCE. The largest and most famous sphinx is the Great Sphinx of Giza, situated on the Giza Plateau adjacent to the Great Pyramids of Giza on the west bank of the Nile River, the sphinx is located southeast of the pyramids. Although the date of its construction is uncertain, the head of the Great Sphinx now is believed to be that of the pharaoh Khafra, what names their builders gave to these statues is not known. At the Great Sphinx site, a 1400 BCE inscription on a stele belonging to the 18th dynasty pharaoh Thutmose IV lists the names of three aspects of the sun deity of that period, Khepera–Rê–Atum. The theme was expanded to form great avenues of guardian sphinxes lining the approaches to tombs, nine hundred with ram heads, representing Amon, were built in Thebes, where his cult was strongest. Perhaps the first sphinx in Egypt was one depicting Queen Hetepheres II and she was one of the longest-lived members of the royal family of that dynasty. The Great Sphinx has become an emblem of Egypt, frequently appearing on its stamps, coins, from the Bronze Age, the Hellenes had trade and cultural contacts with Egypt. Before the time that Alexander the Great occupied Egypt, the Greek name, the historians and geographers of Greece wrote extensively about Egyptian culture. Herodotus called the ram-headed sphinxes Criosphinxes and called the hawk-headed ones Hieracosphinxes, the word sphinx comes from the Greek Σφίγξ, apparently from the verb σφίγγω, meaning to squeeze, to tighten up. This name may be derived from the fact that the hunters for a pride of lions are the lionesses, There was a single sphinx in Greek mythology, a unique demon of destruction and bad luck. According to Hesiod, she was a daughter of Orthrus and either Echidna or the Chimera, or perhaps even Ceto, according to others, she was a daughter of Echidna and Typhon. All of these are figures from the earliest of Greek myths
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Griffin
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The griffin, griffon, or gryphon is a legendary creature with the body, tail, and back legs of a lion, the head and wings of an eagle, and an eagles talons as its front feet. Because the lion was considered the king of the beasts and the eagle the king of birds. The griffin was thought of as king of all creatures. Griffins are known for guarding treasure and priceless possessions, in Greek and Roman texts, griffins and Arimaspeans were associated with gold. Indeed, in later accounts, griffins were said to lay eggs in burrows on the grounds, in antiquity it was a symbol of divine power and a guardian of the divine. The derivation of this remains uncertain. It could be related to the Greek word γρυπός, meaning curved, also, this could have been an Anatolian loan word, compare Akkadian karūbu, and similar to Cherub. A related Hebrew word is כרוב, Most statuary representations of griffins depict them with bird-like talons, although in some older illustrations griffins have a lions forelimbs, they generally have a lions hindquarters. Its eagles head is given prominent ears, these are sometimes described as the lions ears, but are often elongated. Infrequently, a griffin is portrayed without wings, or a wingless eagle-headed lion is identified as a griffin, in 15th-century and later heraldry, such a beast may be called an alce or a keythong. In heraldry, a griffin always has forelegs like an eagles hind-legs, there is evidence of representations of griffins in Ancient Iranian and Ancient Egyptian art dating back to before 3000 BC. In Egypt, a griffin can be seen in a cosmetic palette from Hierakonpolis, known as the Two Dog Palette, which is dated to ca. In Iran, griffins appeared on seals from Susa as early as 3000 BC. Griffin depictions appear in the Levant, Syria. Early depictions of griffins in Ancient Greek art are found in the 15th century BC frescoes in the Throne Room of the Bronze Age Palace of Knossos and it continued being a favored decorative theme in Archaic and Classical Greek art. In Central Asia, the griffin appears about a years after Bronze Age Crete, in the 5th–4th centuries BC. The Achaemenids considered the griffin a protector from evil, witchcraft, the modern generalist calls it the lion-griffin, as for example, Robin Lane Fox, in Alexander the Great,1973,31 and notes p. The Pisa Griffin is a bronze sculpture that has been in Pisa in Italy since the Middle Ages. It is the largest bronze medieval Islamic sculpture known, at three feet tall, and was probably created in the 11th century in Al-Andaluz
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Medusa
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In Greek mythology Medusa was a monster, a Gorgon, generally described as a winged human female with living venomous snakes in place of hair. Gazers upon her hideous face would turn to stone, most sources describe her as the daughter of Phorcys and Ceto, though the author Hyginus makes her the daughter of Gorgon and Ceto. According to Hesiod and Aeschylus, she lived and died on an island named Sarpedon, the 2nd-century BCE novelist Dionysios Skytobrachion puts her somewhere in Libya, where Herodotus had said the Berbers originated her myth, as part of their religion. In classical antiquity the image of the head of Medusa appeared in the device known as the Gorgoneion. The three Gorgon sisters—Medusa, Stheno, and Euryale—were all children of the ancient marine deities Phorcys and his sister Ceto, in an ode written in 490 BC Pindar already speaks of fair-cheeked Medusa. In Ovids telling, Perseus describes Medusas punishment by Minerva as just, in most versions of the story, she was beheaded by the hero Perseus, who was sent to fetch her head by King Polydectes of Seriphus because Polydectes wanted to marry his mother. The gods were well aware of this, and Perseus received help and he received a mirrored shield from Athena, gold, winged sandals from Hermes, a sword from Hephaestus and Hadess helm of invisibility. Since Medusa was the one of the three Gorgons who was mortal, Perseus was able to slay her while looking at the reflection from the mirrored shield he received from Athena. During that time, Medusa was pregnant by Poseidon, when Perseus beheaded her, Pegasus, a winged horse, and Chrysaor, a giant wielding a golden sword, sprang from her body. Jane Ellen Harrison argues that her potency only begins when her head is severed, the basis of the Gorgoneion is a cultus object, a ritual mask misunderstood. In the Odyssey xi, Homer does not specifically mention the Gorgon Medusa, Lest for my daring Persephone the dread, harrisons translation states the Gorgon was made out of the terror, not the terror out of the Gorgon. According to Ovid, in northwest Africa, Perseus flew past the Titan Atlas, who stood holding the sky aloft, and transformed him into stone when he tried to attack him. Furthermore, the poisonous vipers of the Sahara, in the Argonautica 4.1515, Ovids Metamorphoses 4.770, the blood of Medusa also spawned the Amphisbaena. Perseus then flew to Seriphos, where his mother was about to be forced into marriage with the king, King Polydectes was turned into stone by the gaze of Medusas head. It is immediately obvious that the Gorgons are not really three but one + two, the two unslain sisters are mere appendages due to custom, the real Gorgon is Medusa. A number of early scholars interpreted the myth of the Medusa as a quasi-historical. According to Joseph Campbell, In 1940, Sigmund Freuds Das Medusenhaupt was published posthumously and this article laid the framework for his significant contribution to a body of criticism surrounding the monster. Medusa is presented by Freud as the supreme talisman who provides the image of castration — associated in the mind with the discovery of maternal sexuality —
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Nike (mythology)
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In ancient Greek religion, Nike was a goddess who personified victory. She was variously described as the daughter of the Titan Pallas and the goddess Styx, and the sister of Kratos, Bia, the word νίκη nikē is of uncertain etymology. R. S. P. Beekes has suggested a Pre-Greek origin, Nike and her siblings were close companions of Zeus, the dominant deity of the Greek pantheon. According to classical myth, Styx brought them to Zeus when the god was assembling allies for the Titanomachy against the older deities, Nike assumed the role of the divine charioteer, a role in which she often is portrayed in Classical Greek art. Nike flew around rewarding the victors with glory and fame. Nike is seen with wings in most statues and paintings, with one of the most famous being the Winged Victory of Samothrace, most other winged deities in the Greek pantheon had shed their wings by Classical times. Nike is the goddess of strength, speed, and victory, Nike was a very close acquaintance of Athena, and is thought to have stood in Athenas outstretched hand in the statue of Athena located in the Parthenon. Nike is also one of the most commonly portrayed figures on Greek coins, the sports equipment company Nike, Inc. is named after the Greek goddess Nike. Project Nike, an American anti-aircraft missile system is named after the goddess Nike, a figure of Nike with a vessel was the design of the first FIFA World Cup trophy, known also as the Jules Rimet trophy. Since Giuseppe Cassiolis design for the 1928 Summer Olympics, the face of every Olympic medal bears Nikes figure holding a palm frond in her right hand. The goddess appears on the emblem of the University of Melbourne, spirit of Ecstasy, the hood ornament used by the automobile manufacturer Rolls-Royce was inspired by Nike. The Titanic Engineers Memorial, Southampton depicts Nike blessing the engineers of the RMS Titanic for staying at their post as the ship sank, the Honda motorcycle companys logo is inspired by the goddess Nike. Winged Victory of Samothrace Altar of Victory Nike of Paeonius Ángel de la Independencia Smith, William, A Dictionary of Greek, online version at the Perseus Digital Library. Media related to Nike at Wikimedia Commons The dictionary definition of Nike at Wiktionary Theoi Project, Nike Goddess Nike
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Cubit
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The cubit is an ancient unit based on the forearm length from the middle finger tip to the elbow bottom. Cubits of various lengths were employed in many parts of the world in antiquity, during the Middle Ages, the term is still used in hedge laying, the length of the forearm being frequently used to determine the interval between stakes placed within the hedge. The English word cubit comes from the Latin noun cubitus elbow, from the verb cubo, cubare, cubui, cubitum to lie down, the ancient Egyptian royal cubit is the earliest attested standard measure. Cubit rods were used for the measurement of length, a number of these rods have survived, two are known from the tomb of Maya, the treasurer of the 18th dynasty pharaoh Tutankhamun, in Saqqara, another was found in the tomb of Kha in Thebes. Fourteen such rods, including one double cubit rod, were described and compared by Lepsius in 1865. These cubit rods range from 523.5 to 529.2 mm in length, and are divided into seven palms, each palm is divided into four fingers and the fingers are further subdivided. Use of the royal cubit is also known from Old Kingdom architecture, in 1916, during the last years of the Ottoman Empire and in the middle of World War I, the German assyriologist Eckhard Unger found a copper-alloy bar while excavating at Nippur. The bar dates from c.2650 BC and Unger claimed it was used as a measurement standard and this irregularly formed and irregularly marked graduated rule supposedly defined the Sumerian cubit as about 518.6 mm. The Near Eastern or Biblical cubit is usually estimated as approximately 457.2 mm, in ancient Greek units of measurement, the standard forearm cubit measured approximately 0.46 m. The short forearm cubit, from the wrist to the elbow, in ancient Rome, according to Vitruvius, a cubit was equal to 1 1⁄2 Roman feet or 6 palm widths. Other measurements based on the length of the forearm include some lengths of ell, the Chinese chi, the Japanese shaku, the Indian hasta, the Thai sok, the Tamil, the Telugu, a cubit arm in heraldry may be dexter or sinister. It may be vested and may be shown in positions, most commonly erect. It is most often used erect as a crest, for example by the families of Poyntz of Iron Acton, Rolle of Stevenstone, the Encyclopaedia of Ancient Egyptian Architecture. The Cubit, A History and Measurement Commentary, Journal of Anthropology doi,10. 1155/2014/489757,2014 Media related to Cubit arms at Wikimedia Commons The dictionary definition of cubit at Wiktionary
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Erichthonius of Athens
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King Erichthonius was a legendary early ruler of ancient Athens, Greece. According to some myths, he was autochthonous and raised by the goddess Athena, early Greek texts do not distinguish between him and Erectheus, his grandson, but by the fourth century BC, during Classical times, they are distinct figures. According to the Bibliotheca, Athena visited the smith-god Hephaestus to request some weapons, determined to maintain her virginity, Athena fled, pursued by Hephaestus. He caught Athena and tried to rape her, but she fought him off, during the struggle, his semen fell on her thigh, and Athena, in disgust, wiped it away with a scrap of wool and flung it to the earth. As she fled, Erichthonius was born from the semen that fell to the earth, Athena, wishing to raise the child in secret, placed him in a small box. Athena gave the box to the three daughters of Cecrops, the king of Athens, and warned never to open it. Overcome with curiosity, Aglaurus and Herse opened the box, which contained the infant and future-king, the sisters were terrified by what they saw in the box, either a snake coiled around an infant, or an infant that was half-man and half-serpent. They went insane and threw themselves off the Acropolis, other accounts state that they were killed by the snake. An alternative version of the story is that Athena left the box with the daughters of Cecrops while she went to fetch a limestone mountain from the Pallene peninsula to use in the Acropolis, while she was away, Aglaurus and Herse opened the box. A crow saw them open the box, and flew away to tell Athena, as in the first version, Herse and Aglaurus went insane and threw themselves to their deaths off a cliff. When he grew up, Erichthonius drove out Amphictyon, who had usurped the throne from Cranaus twelve years earlier and he married Praxithea, a naiad, and had a son, Pandion I. During this time, Athena frequently protected him and he founded the Panathenaic Festival in the honor of Athena, and set up a wooden statue of her on the Acropolis. According to the Parian Chronicle, he taught his people to yoke horses and use them to pull chariots, to smelt silver and it was said that Erichthonius was lame of his feet and that he consequently invented the quadriga, or four-horse chariot, to get around more easily. He is said to have competed often as a driver in games. Zeus was said to have been so impressed with his skill that he raised him to the heavens to become the constellation of the Charioteer after his death, Erichthonius was succeeded by his son Pandion I. The snake is his symbol, and he is represented in the statue of Athena in the Parthenon as the snake hidden behind her shield, smith, William, Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, London. Erichthonius Images of Erichthonius in the Warburg Institute Iconographic Database
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Pandora
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In Greek mythology, Pandora was the first human woman created by the gods, specifically by Hephaestus and Athena on the instructions of Zeus. As Hesiod related it, each god helped create her by giving her unique gifts, Zeus ordered Hephaestus to mold her out of earth as part of the punishment of humanity for Prometheus theft of the secret of fire, and all the gods joined in offering her seductive gifts. Her other name—inscribed against her figure on a white-ground kylix in the British Museum—is Anesidora, the Pandora myth is a kind of theodicy, addressing the question of why there is evil in the world. Hesiod, both in his Theogony and in Works and Days, gives the earliest version of the Pandora story, the Pandora myth first appears in lines 560–612 of Hesiods poem in epic meter, the Theogony, without ever giving the woman a name. After humans received the gift of fire from Prometheus, an angry Zeus decides to give humanity a punishing gift to compensate for the boon they had been given. He commands Hephaestus to mold from earth the first woman, a beautiful evil whose descendants would torment the human race, after Hephaestus does so, Athena dresses her in a silvery gown, an embroidered veil, garlands and an ornate crown of silver. This woman goes unnamed in the Theogony, but is presumably Pandora, whose myth Hesiod revisited in Works, when she first appears before gods and mortals, wonder seized them as they looked upon her. But she was sheer guile, not to be withstood by men, the more famous version of the Pandora myth comes from another of Hesiods poems, Works and Days. In this version of the myth, Hesiod expands upon her origin, finally, Hermes gives this woman a name, Pandora – All-gifted – because all the Olympians gave her a gift. In this retelling of her story, Pandoras deceitful feminine nature becomes the least of humanitys worries, for she brings with her a jar containing burdensome toil and sickness that brings death to men, diseases and a myriad other pains. Prometheus had warned his brother Epimetheus not to accept any gifts from Zeus, but Epimetheus did not listen, he accepted Pandora, who promptly scattered the contents of her jar. As a result, Hesiod tells us, the earth and sea are full of evils, one item, however, did not escape the jar, Hesiod does not say why hope remained in the jar. Hesiod closes with this moral, Thus it is not possible to escape the mind of Zeus, Thus, Pandora was created as the first woman and given the jar which releases all evils upon man. Archaic and Classic Greek literature seem to no further mention of Pandora, though Sophocles wrote a satyr play Pandora. Sappho may have reference to Pandora in a surviving fragment. Later, mythographers filled in minor details or added postscripts to Hesiods account, for example, the Bibliotheca and Hyginus each make explicit what might be latent in the Hesiodic text, Epimetheus married Pandora. They each add that they had a daughter, Pyrrha, who married Deucalion, however, the Hesiodic Catalogue of Women, fragment #5, had made a Pandora one of the daughters of Deucalion, and the mother of Graecus by Zeus. In a major departure from Hesiod, the 6th-century BC Greek elegiac poet Theognis of Megara tells us, in this, he appears to follow a possibly pre-Hesiodic tradition, preserved by the second-century fabulist Babrius, that the gods sent a jar containing blessings to humans
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Votive offering
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A votive deposit or votive offering is one or more objects displayed or deposited, without the intention of recovery or use, in a sacred place for broadly religious purposes. Such items are a feature of modern and ancient societies and are made in order to gain favor with supernatural forces. In buddhism Votive offerings as construction of stupas was a prevalent and holy practice in ancient india which can be observed in ruins of vikramshila university, the modern construction practice called topping out can be considered as an example of a votive practice that has very ancient roots. In Europe, votive deposits are known from as early as the Neolithic, with polished axe hoards, high status artifacts such as armor and weaponry, fertility and cult symbols, coins, various treasures and animals were common offerings in antiquity. The votive offerings were sacrificed and buried or more commonly cast into bodies of water or peat bogs, in certain cases entire ships have been sacrificed, as in the Danish bog Nydam Mose. Often all the objects in a ritual hoard are broken, possibly killing the objects to put even further beyond utilitarian use before deposition. The purposeful discarding of valuable items such as swords and spearheads is thought to have had ritual overtones, the items have since been discovered in rivers, lakes and present or former wetlands by construction workers, peat diggers, metal-detectorists, members of the public and archaeologists. In Mesoamerica, votive deposits have been recovered from the Olmec site of El Manati, in archaeology, votive deposits differ from hoards in that although they may contain similar items, votive deposits were not intended for later recovery. Some archaeologists have recovered some votive offerings in ancient Sparta from the 5th century BC and these votive offerings give evidence to the presence of literacy in Spartan culture. One piece of pottery was found that may have had measurement signs on it and this would indicate an everyday literacy among the Spartans if this is true. Unfortunately, scholars have not recovered any other piece of pottery with an inscription to support that single find. The 13 Ancient Votive Stones of Pesaro were unearthed in 1737 on a local Pesaro farm in the Province of Pesaro e Urbino, Italy and they are inscribed with the names of various Roman gods such as APOLLO, MAT-MATVTA, SALVS, FIDE, and IVNONII. A curse tablet or defixio is a sheet of tin or lead on which a message wishing misfortune upon someone else was inscribed. The two largest concentrations are from the springs at Aquae Sulis, where 130 examples are recorded, and at Uley. The usual form of divine invocation was through prayer, sacrifice, many unrecovered ancient votive offerings are threatened in todays world, especially those submerged in wetlands or other bodies of water. Wetlands and other aquatic sites often protect and preserve materials for thousands of years, therefore many remaining objects are in danger of oxidation and eventual rapid deterioration. The Torah makes provision for free-will offerings which may be made by any individual. These are different from votive offerings which are linked to a vow. cf Leviticus 22.23 where the Hebrew root letters for an offering are נדב
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Engraved gem
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An engraved gem is a small gemstone, usually semi-precious, that has been carved, in the Western tradition normally with images or inscriptions only on one face. The engraving of gemstones was a luxury art form in the ancient world. Strictly speaking, engraving means carving in intaglio, but relief carvings are covered by the term. This article uses cameo in its sense, to denote a carving exploiting layers of differently coloured stone. The activity is also called gem carving, and the artists gem-cutters, vessels like the Cup of the Ptolemies and heads or figures carved in the round are also known as hardstone carvings and similar terms. Glyptics, or glyptic art, covers the field of small carved stones, including seals and inscriptions. A finely carved seal was practical, as it made more difficult – the distinctive personal signature did not really exist in antiquity. Gems were mostly cut by using abrasive powder from harder stones in conjunction with a hand-drill, emery has been mined for abrasive powder on Naxos since antiquity. Some early types of seal were cut by hand, rather than a drill, there is no evidence that magnifying lenses were used by gem cutters in antiquity. A medieval guide to gem-carving techniques survives from Theophilus Presbyter, byzantine cutters used a flat-edged wheel on a drill for intaglio work, while Carolingian ones used round-tipped drills, it is unclear where they learnt this technique from. In intaglio gems at least, the cut surface is usually very well preserved. The colour of several gemstones can be enhanced by a number of methods, using heat, sugar. Many of these can be shown to have used since antiquity – since the 7th millennium BC in the case of heating. The technique has an ancient tradition in the Near East, and is represented in all or most early cultures from the area, and these were made in various types of stone, not all hardstone. The Greek tradition emerged in Ancient Greek art under Minoan influence on mainland Helladic culture, pre-Hellenic Ancient Egyptian seals tend to have inscriptions in hieroglyphs rather than images. The Biblical Book of Exodus describes the form of the hoshen, round or oval Greek gems are found from the 8th and 7th centuries BC, usually with animals in energetic geometric poses, often with a border marked by dots or a rim. Early examples are mostly in softer stones, Gems of the 6th century are more often oval, with a scarab back, and human or divine figures as well as animals, the scarab form was apparently adopted from Phoenicia. The forms are sophisticated for the period, despite the small size of the gems
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Chiton (costume)
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A chiton was a form of clothing in Ancient Greece, worn by both sexes, but especially men. It is a garment, unlike the female peplos, a draped garment held on the shoulders by a fibula. There are two forms of chiton, the Doric chiton and the later Ionic chiton, the Doric style was simpler and had no sleeves, being simply pinned, sewn, or buttoned at the shoulder. The Ionic style was made of a wider piece of fabric, and was pinned, sewn, or buttoned all the way from the neck to the wrists. By the late Archaic, Ionic chitons had become more common, the Doric chiton is a single rectangle of woolen or linen fabric. It can be plain or with an overfold called an apoptygma. It can be draped and fastened at the shoulder by pins or sewing, the Ionic chiton could also be made from linen or wool and was draped without the fold and held in place from neck to wrist by several small pins. A large belt called a zoster could be worn over the chiton, the chitons length was greater than the height of the wearer, so excessive fabric was pulled above the belt, like a blouse. The chiton was worn in combination with the heavier himation over it. When used alone, the chiton was called a monochiton, a long chiton which reached the heels was called a chiton poderes, while a longer one which dragged the ground was called a chiton syrtos or an elkekhitōnes. A womans chiton would always be worn at ankle length, men wore the long chiton during the Archaic period, but later wore it at knee length, except for certain occupations such as priests and charioteers, and also the elderly. A sleeved form was worn by priests and actors, the colour or pattern would often indicate status, but varied over time. The chiton was the outfit of Aphrodite because it was considered very feminine, dionysus is often depicted wearing it. The chiton was worn by the Romans after the 3rd century BC. However, they referred to it as a tunica, an example of the chiton can be seen, worn by the caryatids, in the porch of the Athens Erechtheum. A charioteers chiton can be seen on the Charioteer of Delphi, clothing in the ancient world Zoster Exomis Tunic References Sources Chiton Encyclopædia Britannica Greek Dress Greek clothes
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Serpent (symbolism)
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The serpent, or snake, is one of the oldest and most widespread mythological symbols. The word is derived from Latin serpens, an animal or snake. Snakes have been associated with some of the oldest rituals known to humankind and represent dual expression of good, in some cultures, snakes were fertility symbols. For example, the Hopi people of North America performed an annual snake dance to celebrate the union of Snake Youth and Snake Girl, during the dance, live snakes were handled and at the end of the dance the snakes were released into the fields to guarantee good crops. The snake dance is a prayer to the spirits of the clouds, the thunder and the lightning, in other cultures, snakes symbolized the umbilical cord, joining all humans to Mother Earth. The Great Goddess often had snakes as her familiars—sometimes twining around her staff, as in ancient Crete—and they were worshiped as guardians of her mysteries of birth. Historically, serpents and snakes represent fertility or a life force. As snakes shed their skin through sloughing, they are symbols of rebirth, transformation, immortality, the ouroboros is a symbol of eternity and continual renewal of life. In some Abrahamic traditions, the serpent represents sexual desire, according to some interpretations of the Midrash, the serpent represents sexual passion. In Hinduism, Kundalini is a serpent, the residual power of pure desire. Serpents are represented as potent guardians of temples and other sacred spaces, thus, they are natural guardians of treasures or sacred sites which cannot easily be moved out of harms way. At Angkor in Cambodia, numerous stone sculptures present hooded multi-headed nāgas as guardians of temples or other premises, the Gadsden flag of the American Revolution depicts a rattlesnake coiled up and poised to strike. Below the image of the snake is the legend, Dont tread on me, the snake symbolized the dangerousness of colonists willing to fight for their rights and homeland. The motif is repeated in the First Navy Jack of the US Navy, Serpents are connected with poison and medicine. The snakes venom is associated with the chemicals of plants and fungi that have the power to either heal, because of its herbal knowledge and entheogenic association the snake was often considered one of the wisest animals, being divine. Its divine aspect combined with its habitat in the earth between the roots of plants made it an animal with chthonic properties connected to the afterlife and immortality. Asclepius, the god of medicine and healing, carried a staff with one serpent wrapped around it, Moses also had a replica of a serpent on a pole, the Nehushtan, mentioned in Numbers 21,8. Serpents are connected with vengefulness and vindictiveness and this connection depends in part on the experience that venomous snakes often deliver deadly defensive bites without giving prior notice or warning to their unwitting victims
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Aegis
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The aegis or aigis, as stated in the Iliad, is carried by Athena and Zeus, but its nature is uncertain. It had been interpreted as a skin or a shield. There may be a connection with a deity named Aex or Aix, a daughter of Helios, the aegis of Athena is referred to in several places in the Iliad. It produced a sound as from a myriad roaring dragons and was borne by Athena in battle, the modern concept of doing something under someones aegis means doing something under the protection of a powerful, knowledgeable, or benevolent source. The word aegis is identified with protection by a force with its roots in Greek mythology and adopted by the Romans, there are parallels in Norse mythology. Where the Greek word aegis is applied by extension, some of the Attic vase-painters retained an archaic tradition that the tassels had originally been serpents in their representations of the aegis. When the Olympian deities overtook the older deities of Greece and she was born of Metis and re-born through the head of Zeus fully clothed, when the Olympian shakes the aegis, Mount Ida is wrapped in clouds, the thunder rolls and men are struck down with fear. Aegis-bearing Zeus, as he is in the Iliad, sometimes lends the fearsome aegis to Athena. In the Iliad when Zeus sends Apollo to revive the wounded Hector, Apollo, holding the aegis, charges the Achaeans, according to Edith Hamiltons Mythology, Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes, the Aegis is the breastplate of Zeus, and was awful to behold. However, Zeus is normally portrayed in sculpture holding a thunderbolt or lightning, bearing neither a shield nor a breastplate. Classical Greece interpreted the Homeric aegis usually as a cover of some kind borne by Athena, the Douris cup shows that the aegis was represented exactly as the skin of the great serpent, with its scales clearly delineated. John Tzetzes says that aegis was the skin of the monstrous giant Pallas whom Athena overcame and whose name she attached to her own. The aegis appears in works of art sometimes as an animals skin thrown over Athenas shoulders and arms, occasionally with a border of snakes, usually bearing the Gorgon head. In some pottery it appears as a cover over Athenas dress. It is sometimes represented on the statues of Roman emperors, heroes, and warriors, herodotus thought he had identified the source of the ægis in ancient Libya, which was always a distant territory of ancient magic for the Greeks. Athenes garments and ægis were borrowed by the Greeks from the Libyan women, in this context, Graves identifies the aegis as clearly belonging first to Athena. The Greek αἰγίς aigis, has many meanings including, violent windstorm, the shield of a deity as described above. Goatskin coat, from treating the word as meaning something grammatically feminine pertaining to goat, Greek αἴξ aix = goat, + suffix -ίς -is
26.
Pushkin Museum
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The Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts is the largest museum of European art in Moscow, located in Volkhonka street, just opposite the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour. The International musical festival Svyatoslav Richters December nights has been held in the Pushkin museum since 1981. The museums current name is misleading, in that it has no direct associations with the famous Russian poet Alexander Pushkin. The facility was founded by professor Ivan Tsvetaev, Tsvetaev persuaded the millionaire and philanthropist Yuriy Nechaev-Maltsov and the fashionable architect Roman Klein of the urgent need to give Moscow a fine arts museum. The Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts building was designed by Roman Klein and Vladimir Shukhov, construction work began in 1898 and continued till 1912. Ivan Rerberg headed structural engineering effort on the site for 12 years. In 2008, President Dmitri A. Medvedev announced plans for a $177 million restoration, in 2014, Russian architect Yuri Grigoryan, and his firm Project Meganom, were chosen to take over the project. Tsvetaevs dream was realised in May 1912, when the museum opened its doors to the public, the museum was originally named after Alexander III, although the government provided only 200,000 rubles toward its construction, in comparison with over 2 million from Nechaev-Maltsev. Its first exhibits were copies of ancient statuary, thought indispensable for the education of art students, the only genuinely ancient items - Moscow Mathematical Papyrus and Story of Wenamun - had been contributed by Vladimir Golenishchev three years earlier. After the Russian capital was moved to Moscow in 1918, the Soviet government decided to transfer thousands of works from St Petersburgs Hermitage Museum to the new capital, the entire collection of Western art from the Museum Roumjantsev was added too. These paintings formed a nucleus of the Pushkin museums collections of Western art, but the most important paintings were added later from the State Museum of New Western Art. These comprised Impressionist and Post-Impressionist artwork, including top works by Van Gogh, Gauguin, Picasso, Dufrénoy, Derain, among them, Van Goghs La Vigne Rouge, apparently the only painting sold during the artists lifetime. In 1937, Pushkins name was appended to the museum, because the Soviet Union marked the centenary of the death that year. After World War II the evacuated Dresden Gallery had been stored in Moscow for 10 years, the Pushkin Museum has a numismatic collection which is unpublished. It includes archaeological material from Central Asia, such as a hoard of Kushano-Sasanian coins acquired in 2002 William Craft Brumfield
27.
Louvre
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The Louvre or the Louvre Museum is the worlds largest museum and a historic monument in Paris, France. A central landmark of the city, it is located on the Right Bank of the Seine in the citys 1st arrondissement, approximately 38,000 objects from prehistory to the 21st century are exhibited over an area of 72,735 square metres. The Louvre is the second most visited museum after the Palace Museum in China. The museum is housed in the Louvre Palace, originally built as a fortress in the late 12th century under Philip II, remnants of the fortress are visible in the basement of the museum. Due to the expansion of the city, the fortress eventually lost its defensive function and. The building was extended many times to form the present Louvre Palace, in 1692, the building was occupied by the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres and the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture, which in 1699 held the first of a series of salons. The Académie remained at the Louvre for 100 years, during the French Revolution, the National Assembly decreed that the Louvre should be used as a museum to display the nations masterpieces. The museum opened on 10 August 1793 with an exhibition of 537 paintings, because of structural problems with the building, the museum was closed in 1796 until 1801. The collection was increased under Napoleon and the museum renamed Musée Napoléon, the collection was further increased during the reigns of Louis XVIII and Charles X, and during the Second French Empire the museum gained 20,000 pieces. Holdings have grown steadily through donations and bequests since the Third Republic, whether this was the first building on that spot is not known, it is possible that Philip modified an existing tower. According to the authoritative Grand Larousse encyclopédique, the name derives from an association with wolf hunting den, in the 7th century, St. Fare, an abbess in Meaux, left part of her Villa called Luvra situated in the region of Paris to a monastery. This territory probably did not correspond exactly to the modern site, the Louvre Palace was altered frequently throughout the Middle Ages. In the 14th century, Charles V converted the building into a residence and in 1546, Francis acquired what would become the nucleus of the Louvres holdings, his acquisitions including Leonardo da Vincis Mona Lisa. After Louis XIV chose Versailles as his residence in 1682, constructions slowed, however, on 14 October 1750, Louis XV agreed and sanctioned a display of 96 pieces from the royal collection, mounted in the Galerie royale de peinture of the Luxembourg Palace. Under Louis XVI, the museum idea became policy. The comte dAngiviller broadened the collection and in 1776 proposed conversion of the Grande Galerie of the Louvre – which contained maps – into the French Museum, many proposals were offered for the Louvres renovation into a museum, however, none was agreed on. Hence the museum remained incomplete until the French Revolution, during the French Revolution the Louvre was transformed into a public museum. In May 1791, the Assembly declared that the Louvre would be a place for bringing together monuments of all the sciences, on 10 August 1792, Louis XVI was imprisoned and the royal collection in the Louvre became national property
28.
National Roman Museum
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The National Roman Museum is a museum, with several branches in separate buildings throughout the city of Rome, Italy. Founded in 1889 and inaugurated in 1890, the museums first aim was to collect, the collection was appropriated by the state in 1874, after the suppression of the Society of Jesus. Renamed initially as the Royal Museum, the collection was intended to be moved to a Museo Tiberino, in 1901 the State granted the National Roman Museum the recently acquired Collection Ludovisi as well as the important national collection of Ancient Sculpture. Findings during the renewal of the late 19th century added to the collections. The palace was built on the site occupied by the Villa Montalto-Peretti, named after Pope Sixtus V. The present building was commissioned by Prince Massimiliano Massimo, so as to give a seat to the Jesuit Collegio Romano, originally within the convent of the church of SantIgnazio. In 1871, the Collegio had been ousted from the convent by the State which converted it into the Liceo Visconti, erected between 1883 and 1887 by the architect Camillo Pistrucci in a neo-cinquecentesco style, it was one of the most prestigious schools of Rome until 1960. During World War II, it was used as a military hospital, but it then returned to scholastic functions until the 60s. In 1981, lying in a state of neglect, the Italian State acquired it for 19 billion lire, the museum houses the Ancient Art as well as the Numismatic Collection, housed in the Medagliere, i. e. the Coin Cabinet. One room is devoted to the mummy that was found in 1964 on the Via Cassia, inside a richly decorated sarcophagus with several artefacts in amber. It begins with the triclinium of Livias Villa “ad Gallinas Albas”. The frescoes, discovered in 1863 and dating back to the 1st century BC, show a garden with ornamental plants. The Museums numismatic collection is the largest in Italy, among the coins on exhibit are Theodoric’s medallion, the four ducats of Pope Paul II with the navicella of St Peter, and the silver piastre of the Pontifical State with views of the city of Rome. The Palazzo Altemps is located in the modern rione Ponte, part of the Campus Martius, in the ancient Rome, this site was only 160 meters from the Ponte Elio, and was one of the two main marble ports on the Tiber River in Rome. The other was located in what is now Testaccio, in 1891, during the construction works to build the embankments that now hold back the Tiber River, the remains of this dock were uncovered. A few of these ancient shops bear signs of hasty abandonment after the time of the emperor Trajan, tools, there was also likely a temple to Apollo located in this area, over which has been built the church of SantApollinare. The division was abandoned after the Great Schism in the 15th century. The building was designed in the 15th century by Melozzo da Forlì for Girolamo Riario, when the Soderini family fell on hard times, he in turn sold it in 1568 to the Austrian-born cardinal Mark Sittich von Hohenems Altemps, the son of the sister of Pope Pius IV
29.
National Museum of Serbia
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The National Museum of Serbia is the largest and oldest museum in Serbia and former Yugoslavia. It is located in the zone of Belgrade on a square area between the Republic Square, former Theatre Square, and three streets Čika Ljubina, Vasina and Laze Pačua. Its main facade is on the Republic Square, the museum was established on May 10,1844. Since it was founded, its collection has grown to over 400,000 objects, currently, the museum is closed for renovation. The National Museum of Serbia building was declared a Monument of Culture of Great Importance in 1979, before erection of the building of the National Museum on this place was famous tavern called Dardanelles, meeting point of cultural and artistic elite of the time. Demolition of the old tavern signified the beginning of the transformation of The Republic Square, building has constructed according to design of architects Andra Stevanović and Nikola Nestorović after a competition on which they received the first prize. It was one of the first building in which was used some form of reinforced concrete for the foundation, actually during the digging foundation trenches, the various pits, wells and basements were encountered because of the proximity of the former Istanbul Gate. Newly built two-storeyed building was a palace of its time. The greatest attention was given to the staircase and the hall with bank windows which as the basic premises of a bank was given a secondary importance. Almost three decades later, a development of Mortgage Bank, influenced a need for a reconstruction of the building. The extension was made without competition by architect Vojin Petrović, who designed the added wing, during World War II Mortgage Bank building was bombed and the central part with the dome was destroyed. After the war, the building got a new purpose when one of the most important national cultural institution moved in. Since its establishing during the Constitutionalist, until the end of the Second World War the National Museum changed location for several times. At a beginning, it was placed in Captain Miša’s building, at the same time the museum art collections were seized and looted by the invaders. During the interwar period the Museum didn’t get its own building, the museum was located in a rented private house in Knez Milos Street 58. In 1935 the New Royal Palacе became the residence of the museum, subsequently it was renamed into the Museum of Prince Paul which consisted of Historical Museum and the Museum of Contemporary Art. In 1948 the New Palace was restored and became seat of the Republic. For that purpose the Museum was transferred into a building of the former Stock Exchange on the Student Square, the first architectural competition for the proper National Museum building, planned to be on Tašmajdan was announced the following year
30.
Belgrade
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Belgrade is the capital and largest city of Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers and its name translates to White city. The urban area of the City of Belgrade has a population of 1.34 million, one of the most important prehistoric cultures of Europe, the Vinča culture, evolved within the Belgrade area in the 6th millennium BC. In antiquity, Thraco-Dacians inhabited the region, and after 279 BC Celts conquered the city and it was conquered by the Romans during the reign of Augustus, and awarded city rights in the mid-2nd century. In 1521, Belgrade was conquered by the Ottoman Empire and became the seat of the Sanjak of Smederevo and it frequently passed from Ottoman to Habsburg rule, which saw the destruction of most of the city during the Austro-Ottoman wars. Belgrade was again named the capital of Serbia in 1841, northern Belgrade remained the southernmost Habsburg post until 1918, when the city was reunited. As a strategic location, the city was battled over in 115 wars, Belgrade was the capital of Yugoslavia from its creation in 1918, to its final dissolution in 2006. Belgrade has an administrative status within Serbia and it is one of five statistical regions of Serbia. Its metropolitan territory is divided into 17 municipalities, each with its own local council, City of Belgrade covers 3. 6% of Serbias territory, and 22. 5% of the countrys population lives within its administrative limits. It is classified as a Beta- global city, chipped stone tools found at Zemun show that the area around Belgrade was inhabited by nomadic foragers in the Palaeolithic and Mesolithic eras. Some of these belong to the Mousterian industry, which are associated with Neanderthals rather than modern humans. Aurignacian and Gravettian tools have also discovered there, indicating occupation between 50,000 and 20,000 years ago. The first farming people to settle in the region are associated with the Neolithic Starčevo culture, there are several Starčevo sites in and around Belgrade, including the eponymous site of Starčevo. The Starčevo culture was succeeded by the Vinča culture, a more sophisticated farming culture that grew out of the earlier Starčevo settlements which is named for a site in the Belgrade region. Evidence of early knowledge about Belgrades geographical location comes from ancient myths, the rock overlooking the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers has been identified as one of the place in the story of Jason and the Argonauts. The Paleo-Balkan tribes of Thracians and Dacians ruled this area prior to the Roman conquest, Belgrade was inhabited by a Thraco-Dacian tribe Singi, after the Celtic invasion in 279 BC, the Scordisci took the city, naming it Singidūn. In 34–33 BC the Roman army led by Silanus reached Belgrade, jovian reestablished Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire, ending the brief revival of traditional Roman religions under his predecessor Julian the Apostate. In 395 AD, the passed to the Eastern Roman or Byzantine Empire
31.
Percy Smythe, 6th Viscount Strangford
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Percy Clinton Sydney Smythe, 6th Viscount Strangford GCB GCH was an Anglo-Irish diplomat. He was the son of Lionel Smythe, 5th Viscount Strangford, in 1769, his sixteen-year-old father left Ireland, joined the army and served during the American War of Independence. While quartered in New York in the winter of 1776 to 1777, he met and she was the daughter of Frederick Philipse III, the third and last Lord of Philipsburg Manor and a descendant of the Dutch founder of the city. They married in September 1779 at Trinity Church in Manhattan and they returned to the United Kingdom, upon the withdrawal of the British troops from New York in 1783, Philipse also went to England, where he later died. In 1806, he served as chargé daffaires under the Earl of Rosslyn and the Earl of St Vincent, in 1807, he was appointed British Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to Portugal under the reign of King George III. In 1807, as Britains envoy to Portugal, Lord Strangford coordinated the Portuguese royal familys flight from Portugal to Brazil. Lord Clinton, as he was known in Brazil, he arrived with the Royal Family in Salvador in January 1808, Lord Clinton and the Brazilian accountant Dom Fernando José de Portugal had a hard work to do in the Brazilian Imperial Palace. They had to raise the money moved from Portugal to Brazil under the English escort and their work was during thirty days. The tax service of 2% was according the Prize Money and they counted one hundred million Pounds and two million pounds in taxes. After that, the payment delayed fourteen years to be paid after the English recognizance of the Brazilian Independence and that was the money Napoleon wanted to finance his war against England. Napoleon said in his memoirs that Don Jon was the one to trick him. He was British Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary at the Court of Stockholm in Sweden from 1817 to 1820, during the reign of Charles XIII of Sweden, the Levant Company nominated Lord Strangford and his appointment was confirmed in 1820 as the British Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire. As ambassador to the Sublime Porte, he had opportunities to assemble fragments of Greek sculpture, among his collection of antiquities was the Strangford Shield, a 3rd-century CE Roman marble that reproduces the shield of Athena Parthenos, Phidias sculpture formerly in the Parthenon. The Strangford Shield is conserved in the British Museum and his diplomatic career went into decline after he was caught falsifying dispatches to the British government and revealing confidential documents to the Austrian ambassador in St Petersburg. In 1817, he married Ellen Burke Browne, daughter of Sir Thomas Burke, 1st Baronet and sister of Sir John Burke, 2nd Baronet. Ellen had previously married to Nicholas Browne, Esq. of Mount Hazel, in Galway. Together, Percy and Ellen had five children, after Smythes death, she married Charles Bateman-Hanbury-Kincaid-Lennox. Philippa Eliza Sydney Smythe, who married Henry James Baillie, the Under-Secretary of State for India, Lionel Philip Thomas Henry Smythe, who died young of tuberculosis Louisa Ellen Frances Augusta Smythe, who married George Browne, 3rd Marquess of Sligo in 1847
32.
British Museum
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The British Museum is dedicated to human history, art and culture, and is located in the Bloomsbury area of London. The British Museum was established in 1753, largely based on the collections of the physician, the museum first opened to the public on 15 January 1759, in Montagu House, on the site of the current building. Although today principally a museum of art objects and antiquities. Its foundations lie in the will of the Irish-born British physician, on 7 June 1753, King George II gave his formal assent to the Act of Parliament which established the British Museum. They were joined in 1757 by the Old Royal Library, now the Royal manuscripts, together these four foundation collections included many of the most treasured books now in the British Library including the Lindisfarne Gospels and the sole surviving copy of Beowulf. The British Museum was the first of a new kind of museum – national, belonging to neither church nor king, freely open to the public, sloanes collection, while including a vast miscellany of objects, tended to reflect his scientific interests. The addition of the Cotton and Harley manuscripts introduced a literary, the body of trustees decided on a converted 17th-century mansion, Montagu House, as a location for the museum, which it bought from the Montagu family for £20,000. The Trustees rejected Buckingham House, on the now occupied by Buckingham Palace, on the grounds of cost. With the acquisition of Montagu House the first exhibition galleries and reading room for scholars opened on 15 January 1759. During the few years after its foundation the British Museum received several gifts, including the Thomason Collection of Civil War Tracts. A list of donations to the Museum, dated 31 January 1784, in the early 19th century the foundations for the extensive collection of sculpture began to be laid and Greek, Roman and Egyptian artefacts dominated the antiquities displays. Gifts and purchases from Henry Salt, British consul general in Egypt, beginning with the Colossal bust of Ramesses II in 1818, many Greek sculptures followed, notably the first purpose-built exhibition space, the Charles Towneley collection, much of it Roman Sculpture, in 1805. In 1816 these masterpieces of art, were acquired by The British Museum by Act of Parliament. The collections were supplemented by the Bassae frieze from Phigaleia, Greece in 1815, the Ancient Near Eastern collection also had its beginnings in 1825 with the purchase of Assyrian and Babylonian antiquities from the widow of Claudius James Rich. The neoclassical architect, Sir Robert Smirke, was asked to draw up plans for an extension to the Museum. For the reception of the Royal Library, and a Picture Gallery over it, and put forward plans for todays quadrangular building, much of which can be seen today. The dilapidated Old Montagu House was demolished and work on the Kings Library Gallery began in 1823, the extension, the East Wing, was completed by 1831. The Museum became a site as Sir Robert Smirkes grand neo-classical building gradually arose
33.
Alan LeQuire
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Alan LeQuire is an American sculptor from Nashville, Tennessee. Many of his sculptures are installed in the city, alan LeQuire was born in 1955. His father, Virgil, was a physician and researcher on the faculty of Vanderbilt University School of Medicine and his mother, Louise, was a painter, art teacher, and writer. The young LeQuire showed an early interest in sculpture, while an undergraduate at Vanderbilt University, he studied independently under professor of sculpture Puryear Mims and Middle Tennessee State University sculptor Jim Gibson. He spent his year in France, studied art history. LeQuire specializes in work of great scale, usually large public commissions and his most famous work is the replica of Phidias Athena Parthenos that stands in the naos of the full-scale reconstruction of the Acropolis Parthenon in Nashvilles Centennial Park. This statue, cast in a composite of gypsum and fiberglass on a steel and aluminum armature, is currently the largest piece of sculpture in the Western World. LeQuire received the commission for the work in 1982, and it was unveiled in 1990 in a stark, in 2002, LeQuire oversaw a polychroming and gilding process that brought the statue to an appearance close to what ancient Greek visitors may have seen at the original Parthenon. In 1997 LeQuire created a group of life-size portraits of Tennessee womens suffrage activists Elizabeth Avery Meriwether, Anne Dallas Dudley. The sculpture is on display in Market Square in downtown Knoxville, LeQuire also created a large bronze relief for the Tennessee State Capitol in Nashville dedicated to the Womens Rights Movement and commemorating passage of the Nineteenth Amendment to the U. S. Constitution in 1920—Tennessee was the 36th state to ratify the Nineteenth Amendment, musica is over 40 feet tall, and consists of nine colossal nude figures, male and female, dancing in a circle. It is the largest bronze figure group in the United States, LeQuire is also a portrait sculptor. Other works by LeQuire include, Life-size bronze sculptures at Blair School of Music, a heroic bronze of Timothy Demonbreun, French fur trapper and an early Nashville inhabitant, was completed in 1996 and now stands on the west bank of the Cumberland River. Tennessees Vietnam Veterans Memorial, a grouping of three figures in action, is located on War Memorial Plaza, the building the houses the Tennessee General Assembly. 24 bronze reliefs of Tennessee scenes and wildlife are displayed on the doors of the downtown Nashville Public Library. LeQuire also has two portrait busts in the librarys Grand Reading Room, a life-size statue of Jack Daniel, located at the distillery in Lynchburg, TN. A monument in Centennial Park in Nashville, featuring depictions of Carrie Chapman Catt, Anne Dallas Dudley, Abby Crawford Milton, Juno Frankie Pierce, LeQuire was a Tennessee Arts Commission Fellow in 1986, and received a Tennessee Governors Citation in 1987. In 1990 he was awarded an American Institute of Architects Design Award for Athena Parthenos
34.
Parthenon (Nashville)
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The Parthenon in Nashville, Tennessee is a full-scale replica of the original Parthenon in Athens. It was built in 1897 as part of the Tennessee Centennial Exposition, today the Parthenon, which functions as an art museum, stands as the centerpiece of Centennial Park, a large public park just west of downtown Nashville. Alan LeQuires 1990 re-creation of the Athena Parthenos statue is the focus of the Parthenon just as it was in ancient Greece. The plaster replicas of the Parthenon Marbles found in the naos are direct casts of the sculptures which adorned the pediments of the Athenian Parthenon. Many fragments of the originals are housed in the British Museum in London, nashvilles moniker, the Athens of the South, influenced the choice of the building as the centerpiece of the 1897 Centennial Exposition. A number of buildings at the Exposition were based on ancient originals and it was also the only one that was preserved by the city, although the Knights of Pythias Pavilion building was purchased and moved to nearby Franklin, Tennessee. Mr. Lewis also served as the civil engineer for the Nashville, Chattanooga. In 1895 George Julian Zolnay was employed to make models for the ornamentation for the building, some of the most elaborate events that occurred at the Parthenon were the Spring Pageants of 1913 and 1914. These extravaganzas were theatrical productions on a massive scale, with casts of up to 500, the Pageants brought in audiences from surroundings states and rail prices were lowered to encourage attendance. The entire city of Nashville reveled in the opportunity to celebrate the Athens of the South, the 1913 performance was entitled The Fire Regained, a play written by Sidney Mttron Hirsch, and featured a mythological storyline enhanced by theatrical spectacle popular in that era. The 1914 production, The Mystery at Thanatos, had a mythological plot. A copy of the script is on file at the Nashville Public Library, the most impressive thing about these Pageants was the incredible use of visual spectacle. As an art museum, the Parthenons permanent collection is a group of 63 paintings by 19th-, additional gallery spaces provide a venue for a variety of temporary shows and exhibits. In the summertime, local theatre productions use the building as a backdrop for classic Greek plays such as Euripides Medea and Sophocles Antigone, other performances, such as Mary Zimmermans Metamorphoses, have been done inside, at the foot of Athenas statue. It contains a replica, completed in 1990, of the Athena Parthenos statue which was in the original Parthenon in Athens, the Parthenon got a full makeover in 2002 with a much needed cleaning and restoration to the exterior. The exterior lighting was upgraded to allow the columns of building to be illuminated with different colors than the facade, the Parthenon served as the location for the political rally in the climactic scene of Robert Altmans 1975 film Nashville. It was also used as a backdrop for the battle against the Hydra in the 2010 film Percy Jackson & the Olympians and it features in the title and lyrics of the song Nashville Parthenon from the album Etiquette, by Casiotone for the Painfully Alone. It was used in the 2000 PBS series Greeks, Crucible of Civilization, the structure also figures in the climax of the Hector Lassiter novel, Three Chords & The Truth, by Craig McDonald
35.
Nashville, Tennessee
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Nashville is the capital of the U. S. state of Tennessee and the county seat of Davidson County. It is located on the Cumberland River in the central part of the state. The city is a center for the music, healthcare, publishing, banking and transportation industries and it is known as a center of the country music industry, earning it the nickname Music City, U. S. A. Since 1963, Nashville has had a consolidated city-county government which includes six municipalities in a two-tier system. Nashville is governed by a mayor, vice-mayor, and 40-member Metropolitan Council, thirty-five of the members are elected from single-member districts, five are elected at-large. Reflecting the citys position in government, Nashville is home to the Tennessee Supreme Courts courthouse for Middle Tennessee. According to 2015 estimates from the U. S. Census Bureau, the balance population, which excludes semi-independent municipalities within Nashville, was 654,610. The 2015 population of the entire 13-county Nashville metropolitan area was 1,830,345, the 2015 population of the Nashville-Davidson–Murfreesboro–Columbia combined statistical area, a larger trade area, was 1,951,644. The town of Nashville was founded by James Robertson, John Donelson, and it was named for Francis Nash, the American Revolutionary War hero. Nashville quickly grew because of its location, accessibility as a port on the Cumberland River, a tributary of the Ohio River. By 1800, the city had 345 residents, including 136 African American slaves and 14 free blacks, in 1806, Nashville was incorporated as a city and became the county seat of Davidson County, Tennessee. In 1843, the city was named the permanent capital of the state of Tennessee, by 1860, when the first rumblings of secession began to be heard across the South, antebellum Nashville was a prosperous city. The citys significance as a port made it a desirable prize as a means of controlling important river. In February 1862, Nashville became the first state capital to fall to Union troops, the state was occupied by Union troops for the duration of the war. Within a few years after the Civil War, the Nashville chapter of the Ku Klux Klan was founded by Confederate veteran John W. Morton, meanwhile, the city had reclaimed its important shipping and trading position and developed a solid manufacturing base. The post–Civil War years of the late 19th century brought new prosperity to Nashville and these healthy economic times left the city with a legacy of grand classical-style buildings, which can still be seen around the downtown area. Circa 1950 the state approved a new city charter that provided for the election of city council members from single-member districts. This change was supported because at-large voting diluted the minority populations political power in the city and they could seldom gain a majority of the population to support a candidate of their choice
36.
Tennessee
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Tennessee is a state located in the southeastern region of the United States. Tennessee is the 36th largest and the 17th most populous of the 50 United States, Tennessee is bordered by Kentucky and Virginia to the north, North Carolina to the east, Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi to the south, and Arkansas and Missouri to the west. The Appalachian Mountains dominate the eastern part of the state, Tennessees capital and second largest city is Nashville, which has a population of 654,610. Memphis is the states largest city, with a population of 655,770, the state of Tennessee is rooted in the Watauga Association, a 1772 frontier pact generally regarded as the first constitutional government west of the Appalachians. What is now Tennessee was initially part of North Carolina, Tennessee was admitted to the Union as the 16th state on June 1,1796. Tennessee was the last state to leave the Union and join the Confederacy at the outbreak of the American Civil War in 1861, occupied by Union forces from 1862, it was the first state to be readmitted to the Union at the end of the war. Tennessee furnished more soldiers for the Confederate Army than any other state besides Virginia and this sharply reduced competition in politics in the state until after passage of civil rights legislation in the mid-20th century. This city was established to house the Manhattan Projects uranium enrichment facilities, helping to build the worlds first atomic bomb, Tennessees major industries include agriculture, manufacturing, and tourism. Poultry, soybeans, and cattle are the primary agricultural products, and major manufacturing exports include chemicals, transportation equipment. In the early 18th century, British traders encountered a Cherokee town named Tanasi in present-day Monroe County, the town was located on a river of the same name, and appears on maps as early as 1725. The meaning and origin of the word are uncertain, some accounts suggest it is a Cherokee modification of an earlier Yuchi word. It has been said to mean meeting place, winding river, according to ethnographer James Mooney, the name can not be analyzed and its meaning is lost. The modern spelling, Tennessee, is attributed to James Glen, the governor of South Carolina, the spelling was popularized by the publication of Henry Timberlakes Draught of the Cherokee Country in 1765. In 1788, North Carolina created Tennessee County, the county to be established in what is now Middle Tennessee. When a constitutional convention met in 1796 to organize a new out of the Southwest Territory. Other sources differ on the origin of the nickname, according to the Columbia Encyclopedia. Tennessee ties Missouri as the state bordering the most other states, the state is trisected by the Tennessee River. The highest point in the state is Clingmans Dome at 6,643 feet, Clingmans Dome, which lies on Tennessees eastern border, is the highest point on the Appalachian Trail, and is the third highest peak in the United States east of the Mississippi River
37.
Cella
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A cella or naos is the inner chamber of a temple in classical architecture, or a shop facing the street in domestic Roman architecture, such as a domus. Its enclosure within walls has given rise to extended meanings, of a hermits or monks cell, in Ancient Greek and Roman temples the cella is a room at the centre of the building, usually containing a cult image or statue representing the particular deity venerated in the temple. In addition the cella may contain a table or plinth to receive votive offerings such as statues, precious and semi-precious stones, helmets, spear and arrow heads, swords. The accumulated offerings made Greek and Roman temples virtual treasuries, the cella is typically a simple, windowless, rectangular room with a door or open entrance at the front behind a colonnaded portico facade. In larger temples, the cella was divided by two colonnades into a central nave flanked by two aisles. A cella may contain an adyton, an inner area restricted to access by the priests—in religions that had a consecrated priesthood—or by the temple guard. With very few exceptions Greek buildings were of a design that placed the cella in the center of the plan, such as the Parthenon. The Romans favoured pseudoperipteral buildings with a portico offsetting the cella to the rear, the pseudoperipteral plan uses engaged columns embedded along the side and rear walls of the cella. The Temple of Venus and Roma built by Hadrian in Rome had two cellae arranged back-to-back enclosed by a single outer peristyle, according to Vitruvius, the Etruscan type of temples had three cellae, side by side, conjoined by a double row of columns on the facade. The cella, also called the naos, holds many box-like shrines, the Greek word naos has been extended by archaeologists to describe the central room of the pyramids. Towards the end of the Old Kingdom, naos construction went from being subterranean to being directly into the pyramid. The naos was surrounded by different paths and rooms, many used to confuse and divert thieves. In early Christian and Byzantine architecture, the cella or naos is an area at the centre of the reserved for performing the liturgy. In later periods a small chapel or monks cell was also called a cella, list of Greco-Roman roofs This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh, ed. Cella. Trachtenberg and Hyman, Architecture, From Prehistory to Post Modernity Vitruvius, De architectura, Book IV. ch 7, translation, plans and reconstructions of Tuscan cellae
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Gypsum
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Gypsum is a soft sulfate mineral composed of calcium sulfate dihydrate, with the chemical formula CaSO4·2H2O. It is widely mined and is used as a fertilizer, and as the constituent in many forms of plaster, blackboard chalk. Mohs scale of hardness, based on scratch Hardness comparison. It forms as a mineral and as a hydration product of anhydrite. The word gypsum is derived from the Greek word γύψος, plaster, because the quarries of the Montmartre district of Paris have long furnished burnt gypsum used for various purposes, this dehydrated gypsum became known as plaster of Paris. Upon addition of water, after a few tens of minutes plaster of Paris becomes regular gypsum again, causing the material to harden or set in ways that are useful for casting, Gypsum was known in Old English as spærstān, spear stone, referring to its crystalline projections. Gypsum may act as a source of sulfur for plant growth, which was discovered by J. M. Mayer, american farmers were so anxious to acquire it that a lively smuggling trade with Nova Scotia evolved, resulting in the so-called Plaster War of 1820. In the 19th century, it was known as lime sulfate or sulfate of lime. Gypsum is moderately water-soluble and, in contrast to most other salts, it exhibits retrograde solubility, when gypsum is heated in air it loses water and converts first to calcium sulfate hemihydrate, and, if heated further, to anhydrous calcium sulfate. As for anhydrite, its solubility in saline solutions and in brines is also dependent on NaCl concentration. Gypsum crystals are found to contain water and hydrogen bonding. Gypsum occurs in nature as flattened and often twinned crystals, and transparent, selenite contains no significant selenium, rather, both substances were named for the ancient Greek word for the Moon. Selenite may also occur in a silky, fibrous form, in case it is commonly called satin spar. Finally, it may also be granular or quite compact, in hand-sized samples, it can be anywhere from transparent to opaque. A very fine-grained white or lightly tinted variety of gypsum, called alabaster, is prized for ornamental work of various sorts, in arid areas, gypsum can occur in a flower-like form, typically opaque, with embedded sand grains called desert rose. It also forms some of the largest crystals found in nature, up to 12 m long, Gypsum is a common mineral, with thick and extensive evaporite beds in association with sedimentary rocks. Deposits are known to occur in strata from as far back as the Archaean eon, Gypsum is deposited from lake and sea water, as well as in hot springs, from volcanic vapors, and sulfate solutions in veins. Hydrothermal anhydrite in veins is commonly hydrated to gypsum by groundwater in near-surface exposures and it is often associated with the minerals halite and sulfur
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Glass fiber
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Glass fiber is a material consisting of numerous extremely fine fibers of glass. Glassmakers throughout history have experimented with glass fibers, but mass manufacture of fiber was only made possible with the invention of finer machine tooling. In 1893, Edward Drummond Libbey exhibited a dress at the Worlds Columbian Exposition incorporating glass fibers with the diameter and this was first worn by the popular stage actress of the time Georgia Cayvan. Glass fibers can also occur naturally, as Peles hair, Glass wool, which is one product called fiberglass today, was invented in 1932–1933 by Russell Games Slayter of Owens-Corning, as a material to be used as thermal building insulation. It is marketed under the trade name Fiberglas, which has become a genericized trademark, Glass fiber has roughly comparable mechanical properties to other fibers such as polymers and carbon fiber. Although not as strong or as rigid as carbon fiber, it is much cheaper and this structural material product contains little or no air or gas, is more dense, and is a much poorer thermal insulator than is glass wool. Glass fiber is formed when thin strands of silica-based or other formulation glass are extruded into fibers with small diameters suitable for textile processing. The technique of heating and drawing glass into fine fibers has been known for millennia, however, until this time, all glass fiber had been manufactured as staple. The modern method for producing glass wool is the invention of Games Slayter working at the Owens-Illinois Glass Co and he first applied for a patent for a new process to make glass wool in 1933. The first commercial production of fiber was in 1936. In 1938 Owens-Illinois Glass Company and Corning Glass Works joined to form the Owens-Corning Fiberglas Corporation, when the two companies joined to produce and promote glass fiber, they introduced continuous filament glass fibers. Owens-Corning is still the major producer in the market today. The most common types of fiber used in fiberglass is E-glass. Other types of glass used are A-glass, E-CR-glass, C-glass, D-glass, R-glass, and S-glass. Pure silica, when cooled as fused quartz into a glass with no true melting point, can be used as a fiber for fiberglass. In order to lower the necessary temperature, other materials are introduced as fluxing agents. Ordinary A-glass or soda lime glass, crushed and ready to be remelted, E-glass, is alkali free, and was the first glass formulation used for continuous filament formation. It now makes up most of the production in the world
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Aluminium
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Aluminium or aluminum is a chemical element in the boron group with symbol Al and atomic number 13. It is a silvery-white, soft, nonmagnetic, ductile metal, Aluminium metal is so chemically reactive that native specimens are rare and limited to extreme reducing environments. Instead, it is combined in over 270 different minerals. The chief ore of aluminium is bauxite, Aluminium is remarkable for the metals low density and its ability to resist corrosion through the phenomenon of passivation. Aluminium and its alloys are vital to the industry and important in transportation and structures, such as building facades. The oxides and sulfates are the most useful compounds of aluminium, despite its prevalence in the environment, no known form of life uses aluminium salts metabolically, but aluminium is well tolerated by plants and animals. Because of these salts abundance, the potential for a role for them is of continuing interest. Aluminium is a soft, durable, lightweight, ductile. It is nonmagnetic and does not easily ignite, a fresh film of aluminium serves as a good reflector of visible light and an excellent reflector of medium and far infrared radiation. The yield strength of aluminium is 7–11 MPa, while aluminium alloys have yield strengths ranging from 200 MPa to 600 MPa. Aluminium has about one-third the density and stiffness of steel and it is easily machined, cast, drawn and extruded. Aluminium atoms are arranged in a cubic structure. Aluminium has an energy of approximately 200 mJ/m2. Aluminium is a thermal and electrical conductor, having 59% the conductivity of copper. Aluminium is capable of superconductivity, with a critical temperature of 1.2 kelvin. Aluminium is the most common material for the fabrication of superconducting qubits, the strongest aluminium alloys are less corrosion resistant due to galvanic reactions with alloyed copper. This corrosion resistance is reduced by aqueous salts, particularly in the presence of dissimilar metals. In highly acidic solutions, aluminium reacts with water to form hydrogen, primarily because it is corroded by dissolved chlorides, such as common sodium chloride, household plumbing is never made from aluminium
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Armature (sculpture)
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In sculpture, an armature is a framework around which the sculpture is built. This framework provides structure and stability, especially when a material such as wax. When sculpting the human figure, the armature is analogous to the skeleton and has essentially the same purpose. An armature is often made of heavy, dark aluminium wire which is stiff, the wire is affixed to a base which is usually made of wood. The artist then begins fleshing out the sculpture by adding wax or clay over the wire, depending on the material and technique, the armature may be left buried within the sculpture but, if the sculpture is to be hollowed out for firing, it must1 be removed. Large representational sculptures meant for display are typically fashioned of bronze or other types of sheet metal. For example, a large armature designed by Gustave Eiffel holds up the Statue of Liberty, the armature can be seen from below by visitors to the base of the sculptures interior. An armature used in animation is an articulated metal, wire or even wooden figure covered with material to build the character. Lost wax Skeletal animation ^1 For this reason, much work for firing begins with a simple paper and/or wood armature. These materials can be removed relatively easily from finished piece while it is still fairly plastic, any paper left behind will burn out in the kiln. A metal armature would expand in the heat and burst the piece
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Steel
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Steel is an alloy of iron and other elements, primarily carbon, that is widely used in construction and other applications because of its high tensile strength and low cost. Steels base metal is iron, which is able to take on two forms, body centered cubic and face centered cubic, depending on its temperature. It is the interaction of those allotropes with the elements, primarily carbon. In the body-centred cubic arrangement, there is an atom in the centre of each cube. Carbon, other elements, and inclusions within iron act as hardening agents that prevent the movement of dislocations that otherwise occur in the lattices of iron atoms. The carbon in steel alloys may contribute up to 2. 1% of its weight. Steels strength compared to pure iron is possible at the expense of irons ductility. With the invention of the Bessemer process in the mid-19th century and this was followed by Siemens-Martin process and then Gilchrist-Thomas process that refined the quality of steel. With their introductions, mild steel replaced wrought iron, further refinements in the process, such as basic oxygen steelmaking, largely replaced earlier methods by further lowering the cost of production and increasing the quality of the product. Today, steel is one of the most common materials in the world and it is a major component in buildings, infrastructure, tools, ships, automobiles, machines, appliances, and weapons. Modern steel is generally identified by various grades defined by assorted standards organizations, the noun steel originates from the Proto-Germanic adjective stakhlijan, which is related to stakhla. The carbon content of steel is between 0. 002% and 2. 1% by weight for plain iron–carbon alloys and these values vary depending on alloying elements such as manganese, chromium, nickel, iron, tungsten, carbon and so on. Basically, steel is an alloy that does not undergo eutectic reaction. In contrast, cast iron does undergo eutectic reaction, too little carbon content leaves iron quite soft, ductile, and weak. Carbon contents higher than those of steel make an alloy, commonly called pig iron, while iron alloyed with carbon is called carbon steel, alloy steel is steel to which other alloying elements have been intentionally added to modify the characteristics of steel. Common alloying elements include, manganese, nickel, chromium, molybdenum, boron, titanium, vanadium, tungsten, cobalt, and niobium. Additional elements are important in steel, phosphorus, sulfur, silicon, and traces of oxygen, nitrogen, and copper. Alloys with a higher than 2. 1% carbon content, depending on other element content, cast iron is not malleable even when hot, but it can be formed by casting as it has a lower melting point than steel and good castability properties
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Gilding
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The term gilding covers a number of decorative techniques for applying fine gold leaf or powder to solid surfaces such as wood, stone, or metal to give a thin coating of gold. A gilded object is described as gilt. Where metal is gilded, it was silver in the West, to make silver-gilt objects, but gilt-bronze is commonly used in China. Methods of gilding include hand application and glueing, chemical gilding, and electroplating, parcel-gilt objects are only gilded over part of their surfaces. This may mean that all of the inside, and none of the outside, of a chalice or similar vessel is gilded, herodotus mentions that the Egyptians gilded wood and metals, and many such objects have been excavated. Certain Ancient Greek statues of great prestige were chryselephantine, i. e. made of gold and ivory, extensive ornamental gilding was also used in the ceiling coffers of the Propylaea. But he adds that luxury advanced on them so rapidly that in very little time you see all, even private and poor people, gild the walls, vaults. Owing to the thickness of the gold leaf used in ancient gilding. Fire-gilding of metal goes back at least to the 4th century BC, in Europe, silver-gilt has always been more common than gilt-bronze, but in China the opposite has been the case. The ancient Chinese also developed the gilding of porcelain, which was taken up by the French. Modern gilding is applied to numerous and diverse surfaces and by various processes, mechanical gilding includes all the operations in which gold leaf is prepared, and the processes to mechanically attach the gold onto surfaces. The process is completed by cold burnishing, overlaying or folding or hammering on gold foil or gold leaf is the simplest and most ancient method, and is mentioned in Homers Odyssey and the Old Testament. The Ram in a Thicket of about 2600–2400 BCE from Ur uses this technique on wood, the next advances involved two simple processes. The first involves gold leaf, which is gold that is hammered or cut very thin sheets. If gilding on canvas or on wood, the surface was often first coated with gesso, gesso is a substance made of finely ground gypsum or chalk mixed with glue. Other gilding processes involved using the gold as pigment in paint, then the gold was applied in the same way as with any paint. Sometimes, after either gold-leafing or gold-painting, the artist would heat the piece enough to melt the gold slightly and these techniques remained the only alternatives for materials like wood, leather, and the vellum pages of illuminated manuscripts. Chemical gilding embraces those processes in which the gold is at some stage of chemical combination and these include, In this process the gold is obtained in a state of extremely fine division, and applied by mechanical means
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Gold leaf
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Gold leaf is gold that has been hammered into thin sheets by goldbeating and is often used for gilding. Gold leaf is available in a variety of karats and shades. The most commonly used gold is 22-karat yellow gold, Gold leaf is a type of metal leaf, but the term is rarely used when referring to gold leaf. The term metal leaf is used for thin sheets of metal of any color that do not contain any real gold. Real yellow gold leaf is about 91. 7% pure gold, silver colored white gold is approximately 50% pure gold. Layering gold leaf over a surface is called gold leafing or gilding, traditional water gilding is the most difficult and highly regarded form of gold leafing. It has remained unchanged for hundreds of years and is still done by hand. Gold leaf is used in art in a raw state. It has been used in jewellery in various periods, often as small pieces hanging freely. Gold glass is gold leaf held between two pieces of glass, and was used for decorated Ancient Roman vessels, where some of the gold was scraped off to form an image, Gold leaf is also used in Buddhist art to decorate statues and symbols. Gold leafing can also be seen on domes in religious and public architecture, from the ancient temples to modern day buildings, gold leaf has been an integral component of architecture to designate important structures since the dawn of humankind. Due to gold’s resilience, golden-domed buildings can stand up to weather, deterioration and even modern pollution, Gold in architecture became an integral component of Byzantine and Roman churches and basilicas in 400 AD, most notably Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome. The church was built by Pope Sixtus III and is one of the earliest examples of gold mosaics, the mosaics were made of stone, tile or glass backed on gold leaf walls, giving the church a beautifully intricate backdrop. The 14th century campanile, or bell tower, is the highest in Rome, the apse mosaic, the Coronation of the Virgin, is from 1295, signed by the Franciscan friar, Jacopo Torriti. It is also the location of ceremonial spaces, such as the Hall of Honour, the Memorial Chamber. Capping the room is a ceiling with deep octagonal coffers, each filled with heraldic symbols, including maple leaves, fleur-de-lis, lions rampant, clàrsach, Welsh Dragons. This plane rests on six pairs and four pilasters, each of which is capped by a caryatid. Below the windows is an architrave, broken only by baldachins at the base of each of the above pilasters
