1.
Gudea cylinders
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The Gudea cylinders are a pair of terracotta cylinders dating to circa 2125 BC, on which is written in cuneiform a Sumerian myth called the Building of Ningursus temple. The cylinders were made by Gudea, the ruler of Lagash and they are the largest cuneiform cylinders yet discovered and contain the longest known text written in the Sumerian language. The Agaren was described on the pillar as a place of judgement, or mercy seat and they are thought to have fallen into the drain during the destruction of Girsu generations later. The two cylinders were labelled A and B, with A being 61 cm high with a diameter of 32 cm, the cylinders were hollow with perforations in the centre for mounting. These were originally found with clay plugs filling the holes, the clay shells of the cylinders are approximately 2.5 to 3 cm thick. Both cylinders were cracked and in need of restoration and the Louvre still holds 12 cylinder fragments, Cylinder A contains thirty columns and cylinder B twenty four. These columns are divided into between sixteen and thirty-five cases per column containing between one and six lines per case, script differences in the shapes of certain signs indicate that the cylinders were written by different scribes. Detailed reproductions of the cylinders were made by de Sarzac in his reports which are still used in modern times. The first translation and transliteration was published by Francois Threau-Dangin in 1905, another edition with a notable concordance was published by Ira Maurice Price in 1927. Further translations were made by M. Lambert and R. Tournay in 1948, Adam Falkenstein in 1953, Giorgio Castellino in 1977, Thorkild Jacobsen in 1987, and Dietz Otto Edzard in 1997. The latest translation by the Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature project was provided by Joachim Krecher with legacy material from Hermann Behrens, samuel Noah Kramer also published a detailed commentary in 1966 and in 1988. This proposition was met with limited acceptance, the hero of the story is Gudea, king of the city-state of Lagash at the end of the third millennium BC. A large quantity of sculpted and inscribed artifacts have survived pertaining to his reconstruction and dedication of the Eninnu, the temple of Ningursu and these include foundation nails, building plans and pictorial accounts sculpted on limestone stelae. The temple, Eninnu was a complex of buildings, likely including the E-pa, Kasurra. There are no architectural remains of Gudeas buildings, so the text is the best record of his achievements. Some fragments of another Gudea inscription were found that could not be pieced together with the two in the Louvre and this has led some scholars to suggest that there was a missing cylinder preceding the texts recovered. It has been argued that the two present a balanced and complete literary with a line at the end of Cylinder A having been suggested by Falkenstein to mark the middle of the composition. This colophon has however also been suggested to mark the cylinder itself as the one in a group of three
2.
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
3.
Metropolitan Museum of Art
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The Metropolitan Museum of Art, colloquially the Met, is located in New York City and is the largest art museum in the United States, and is among the most visited art museums in the world. Its permanent collection contains two million works, divided among seventeen curatorial departments. The main building, on the edge of Central Park along Manhattans Museum Mile, is by area one of the worlds largest art galleries. A much smaller second location, The Cloisters at Fort Tryon Park in Upper Manhattan, contains a collection of art, architecture. On March 18,2016, the museum opened the Met Breuer museum at Madison Avenue in the Upper East Side, it extends the museums modern, the Met maintains extensive holdings of African, Asian, Oceanian, Byzantine, Indian, and Islamic art. The museum is home to collections of musical instruments, costumes and accessories, as well as antique weapons. Several notable interiors, ranging from first-century Rome through modern American design, are installed in its galleries, the Metropolitan Museum of Art was founded in 1870. The founders included businessmen and financiers, as well as leading artists and thinkers of the day and it opened on February 20,1872, and was originally located at 681 Fifth Avenue. The Met maintains extensive holdings of African, Asian, Oceanian, Byzantine, the museum is also home to encyclopedic collections of musical instruments, costumes and accessories, and antique weapons and armor from around the world. A number of interiors, ranging from 1st century Rome through modern American design, are permanently installed in the Mets galleries. In addition to its permanent exhibitions, the Met organizes and hosts traveling shows throughout the year. The director of the museum is Thomas P. Campbell, a long-time curator and it was announced on February 28th,2017 that Campbell will be stepping down as the Mets director and CEO, effective June. On March 1st,2017 the BBC reported that Daniel Weiss shall be the acting CEO until a replacement is found, Beginning in the late 19th century, the Met started to acquire ancient art and artifacts from the Near East. From a few tablets and seals, the Mets collection of Near Eastern art has grown to more than 7,000 pieces. The highlights of the include a set of monumental stone lamassu, or guardian figures. The Mets Department of Arms and Armor is one of the museums most popular collections. Among the collections 14,000 objects are many pieces made for and used by kings and princes, including armor belonging to Henry VIII of England, Henry II of France, Rockefeller donated his more than 3, 000-piece collection to the museum. The Mets Asian department holds a collection of Asian art, of more than 35,000 pieces, the collection dates back almost to the founding of the museum, many of the philanthropists who made the earliest gifts to the museum included Asian art in their collections
4.
Gudea
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Gudea was a ruler of the state of Lagash in Southern Mesopotamia who ruled c. He probably did not come from the city, but had married Ninalla, daughter of the ruler Urbaba of Lagash and he was succeeded by his son Ur-Ningirsu. Inscriptions mention temples built by Gudea in Ur, Nippur, Adab, Uruk and this indicates the growing influence of Gudea in Sumer. His predecessor, Urbaba, had made his daughter Enanepada high priestess of Nanna at Ur. The 20 years of his reign are all known by name, Gudea chose the title of énsi, not the more exalted lugal, although he did style himself god of Lagash. Gudea claimed to have conquered Elam and Anshan, but his inscriptions emphasize the building of irrigation channels and temples, as the power of the Akkadian empire waned, Lagaš again declared independence, this time under Puzer-Mama, who declared himself lugal of Lagaš. Thereafter, this title would not be associated with Lagaš, at least until the end of the Gudean period, twenty-six statues of Gudea have been found so far during excavations of Telloh with most of the rest coming from the art trade. The early statues were made of limestone, steatite and alabaster, later, when wide-ranging trade-connections had been established, diorite had already been used by old Sumerian rulers. These statues include inscriptions describing trade, rulership and religion and these were one of many types of Neo-Sumerian art forms. Times were violent after the Akkadian empire lost power over southern Mesopotamia, though there is only one mention of martial success on the part of Gudea, the many trappings of war which he builds for Ningirsu indicate a violent era. Southern Mesopotamian cities defined themselves through their worship, and the decision on Gudea’s part for Lagaš to fashion regalia of war for its gods is indicative of the temperament of the times. The one is length, Gudea’s curse lasts nearly a quarter of the considerable length. The gods will not merely reduce the offender’s progeny to ash and destroy his foundations, no, they will and he will be slaughtered like a bull… seized like an aurochs by his fierce horn. Changing the words of Naram-Sin, the god, is treason. But changing the words of Gudea, simple governor of Lagaš, is unjust, the social reforms instituted during Gudea’s rulership, which included the cancellation of debts and allowing women to own family land, may have been honest reform or a return to old Lagašite custom. His era was one of artistic development. But it was Ningirsu who received the majority of Gudea’s attention, Ningirsu the war god, for whom Gudea built maces, spears, and axes, all appropriately named for the destructive power of Ningirsu—enormous and gilt. However, the devotion for Ningirsu was especially inspired by the fact that this was Gudeas personal god, in matters of trade, Lagash under Gudea had extensive commercial communications with distant realms
5.
Lagash
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Lagash/ˈleɪɡæʃ/ is an ancient city located northwest of the junction of the Euphrates and Tigris rivers and east of Uruk, about 22 kilometres east of the modern town of Ash Shatrah, Iraq. Lagash was one of the oldest cities of the Ancient Near East, the ancient site of Nina is around 10 km away and marks the southern limit of the state. Nearby Girsu, about 25 km northwest of Lagash, was the center of the Lagash state. Lagashs main temple was the E-Ninnu, dedicated to the god Ningirsu, from inscriptions found at Girsu such as the Gudea cylinders, it appears that Lagash was an important Sumerian city in the late 3rd millennium BC. It was at that time ruled by independent kings, Ur-Nanshe and his successors, who were engaged in contests with the Elamites on the east and the kings of Kienĝir and Kish on the north. After the collapse of Sargons state, Lagash again thrived under its independent kings, Ur-Bau and Gudea and his was especially the era of artistic development. We even have a good idea of what Gudea looked like. At the time of Gudea, the capital of Lagash was actually in Girsu, the kingdom covered an area of approximately 1,600 square kilometres. It contained 17 larger cities, eight district capitals, and numerous villages, according to one estimate, Lagash was the largest city in the world from ca.2075 to 2030 BC. Soon after the time of Gudea, Lagash was absorbed into the Ur III state as one of its prime provinces, there is some information about the area during the Old Babylonian period. In ca.2450 BC, Lagash and the city of Umma fell out with each other after a border dispute. As described in Stele of the Vultures the current king of Lagash, Eannatum, inspired by the god of his city, Ningirsu. Initial details of the battle are unclear, but the Stele is able to portray a few details about the event. According to the Steles engravings, when the two met each other in the field, Eannatum dismounted from his chariot and proceeded to lead his men on foot. After lowing their spears, the Lagash army advanced upon the army from Umma in a dense Phalanx, after a brief clash, Eannatum and his army had gained victory over the army of Umma. Despite having been struck in the eye by an arrow, the king of Lagash lived on to enjoy his armys victory and this battle is one of the earliest organised battles known to scholars and historians. These dynasties are not found on the Sumerian King List, although one extremely fragmentary supplement has been found in Sumerian, at the end of the list is the statement Written in the school, suggesting this was a scribal school production. A few of the names from the Lagash rulers listed below may be out, including Ur-Nanshe, Ane-tum, En-entar-zid, Ur-Ningirsu, Ur-Bau
6.
Mesopotamia
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In the Iron Age, it was controlled by the Neo-Assyrian and Neo-Babylonian Empires. The Sumerians and Akkadians dominated Mesopotamia from the beginning of history to the fall of Babylon in 539 BC. It fell to Alexander the Great in 332 BC, and after his death, around 150 BC, Mesopotamia was under the control of the Parthian Empire. Mesopotamia became a battleground between the Romans and Parthians, with parts of Mesopotamia coming under ephemeral Roman control. In AD226, eastern part of it fell to the Sassanid Persians, division of Mesopotamia between Roman and Sassanid Empires lasted until the 7th century Muslim conquest of Persia of the Sasanian Empire and Muslim conquest of the Levant from Byzantines. A number of primarily neo-Assyrian and Christian native Mesopotamian states existed between the 1st century BC and 3rd century AD, including Adiabene, Osroene, and Hatra, Mesopotamia is the site of the earliest developments of the Neolithic Revolution from around 10,000 BC. The regional toponym Mesopotamia comes from the ancient Greek root words μέσος middle and ποταμός river and it is used throughout the Greek Septuagint to translate the Hebrew equivalent Naharaim. In the Anabasis, Mesopotamia was used to designate the land east of the Euphrates in north Syria, the Aramaic term biritum/birit narim corresponded to a similar geographical concept. The neighbouring steppes to the west of the Euphrates and the part of the Zagros Mountains are also often included under the wider term Mesopotamia. A further distinction is made between Northern or Upper Mesopotamia and Southern or Lower Mesopotamia. Upper Mesopotamia, also known as the Jazira, is the area between the Euphrates and the Tigris from their sources down to Baghdad, Lower Mesopotamia is the area from Baghdad to the Persian Gulf and includes Kuwait and parts of western Iran. In modern academic usage, the term Mesopotamia often also has a chronological connotation and it is usually used to designate the area until the Muslim conquests, with names like Syria, Jazirah, and Iraq being used to describe the region after that date. It has been argued that these later euphemisms are Eurocentric terms attributed to the region in the midst of various 19th-century Western encroachments, Mesopotamia encompasses the land between the Euphrates and Tigris rivers, both of which have their headwaters in the Armenian Highlands. Both rivers are fed by tributaries, and the entire river system drains a vast mountainous region. Overland routes in Mesopotamia usually follow the Euphrates because the banks of the Tigris are frequently steep and difficult. The climate of the region is semi-arid with a vast desert expanse in the north which gives way to a 15,000 square kilometres region of marshes, lagoons, mud flats, in the extreme south, the Euphrates and the Tigris unite and empty into the Persian Gulf. In the marshlands to the south of the area, a complex water-borne fishing culture has existed since prehistoric times, periodic breakdowns in the cultural system have occurred for a number of reasons. Alternatively, military vulnerability to invasion from marginal hill tribes or nomadic pastoralists has led to periods of trade collapse and these trends have continued to the present day in Iraq
7.
Ernest de Sarzec
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Ernest Choquin de Sarzec was a French archaeologist, to whom is attributed the discovery of the civilization of ancient Sumer. He was in the French diplomatic service, on being transferred to Basra in 1872 as a vice-consul, he interested in the excavations at Ur. In 1877, he began a dig at Telloh, the site, in present-day Iraq in the southern delta lowlands, had been drawn to his attention by local dealers in antiquities. During the 1880s he succeeded in finding evidence of the reign of Gudea and he continued to work on the site until 1901
8.
Girsu
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Girsu was a city of ancient Sumer, situated some 25 km northwest of Lagash, at the site of modern Tell Telloh, Dhi Qar Governorate, Iraq. Girsu was possibly inhabited in the Ubaid period, but significant levels of activity began in the Early Dynastic period. At the time of Gudea, during the Second Dynasty of Lagash, Girsu became the capital of the Lagash kingdom, during the Ur III period, Girsu was a major administrative center for the empire. After the fall of Ur, Girsu declined in importance, excavations continued under Abbé Henri de Genouillac in 1929–1931 and under André Parrot in 1931–1933. It was at Girsu that the fragments of the Stele of the Vultures were found, the site has suffered from poor excavation standards and also from illegal excavations. About 50,000 cuneiform tablets have been recovered from the site, media related to Girsu at Wikimedia Commons Ningirsu Statues of Gudea Short chronology timeline Cities of the ancient Near East Harriet Crawford, The Construction Inférieure at Tello. 49, pp. 71–76,1987 Benjamin R. Foster, The Sargonic Victory Stele from Telloh, Iraq, Vol.47, pp. 15–30,1985 Claudia E. Suter, A Shulgi Statuette from Tello, Journal of Cuneiform Studies, vol
9.
Authenticity in art
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Authenticity in art is the different ways in which a work of art or an artistic performance may be considered authentic. Denis Dutton distinguishes between nominal authenticity and expressive authenticity, the second sense refers to how much the work possesses original or inherent authority, how much sincerity, genuineness of expression, and moral passion the artist or performer puts into the work. A quite different concern is the authenticity of the experience, which may be impossible to achieve. A modern visitor to a museum may not only see an object in a different context from that which the artist intended. The authentic experience may be impossible to recapture, Authenticity is a requirement for inscription upon the UNESCO World Heritage List. Authenticity of provenance means that the origin or authorship of a work of art has been correctly identified, as Lionel Trilling points out in his 1972 book Sincerity and Authenticity, the question of authenticity of provenance has acquired a profoundly moral dimension. Regardless of the appearance of the object or the quality of workmanship and this intense interest in authenticity is relatively recent and is largely confined to the western world. In the medieval period, and in such as modern Thailand. The case of Han van Meegeren is well known, after failing to succeed as an artist in his own right, he turned to creating fake Vermeer paintings. These were accepted as genuine by experts and acclaimed as masterpieces, after being arrested for selling national treasures to the Germans, he caused a sensation when he publicly demonstrated that he was the artist. To guard against forgeries like this, a certificate of authenticity may be used to prove that a work of art is authentic, but there is a sizable market in fake certificates. The financial importance of authenticity may bias collectors to acquiring recent works of art where provenance can more easily be proven, for older works, an increasingly sophisticated array of forensic techniques may be deployed to establish authenticity of provenance. The philosopher Nelson Goodman discusses at length the question raised by Aline B, the question of the value of a forgery may be irrelevant to a curator, since they are concerned only with the provenance of the work and not with its artistic merit. Even for the curator, in many cases provenance is a matter of probabilities rather than a certainty - absolute proof is not possible. But once a forgery has been exposed, no matter how highly the work was praised when it was thought to be there is rarely any interest in evaluating the work on its own merit. Reproduction is inherent to some forms of art, in Medieval Europe, an artist might create a drawing which was used by another craftsman to create a woodcut block. The drawing was destroyed in the block-cutting process, and the block was thrown away when it became worn out. The copies printed from the block are all that remain of the work, in a 1936 essay, Walter Benjamin discussed the new media of photography and film, in which the work of art can be reproduced many times with no one version being the authentic original
10.
Kaunakes
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Kaunakes, from Greek for thick cloak, also known as persis, was a woolen skirt or cloak which was worn during the Sumerian civilization around 2,500 BC. It was woven in a tufted pattern suggesting overlapping petals or feathers, the origin of this dress is traced to the Sumerian civilization which existed even before 4,000 BC. The period between 2,700 and 2,350 BC of this civilization was marked by high culture, the dress was a unisex garment which both men and women wore. The skirt was made from sheepskin and was worn with the skin turned inside and it was used in the form of a wraparound skirt tied and worn from the waist extending to the knees. Servants and soldiers wore the shortest garments, while persons of high status wore longer ones with the skirt often extending down to the ankles, the upper part of the body was either covered with another sheepskin cloak spread across the shoulders, or left bare. The Greek called this dress kaunakes and this type of dress is featured in sculptures and mosaics of this period. In a Sumerian image dated between 2,900 and 2,600 BC, the dress was worn as a pagne, in some images the wraparound covered the body crossed over the left shoulder. Following the discovery of weaving, kaunakes were designed with tufts of wool stitched into the cloth to simulate the curling fleece fur and it is also believed that kaunakes, as a fashioned fleece, while not mentioned prior to 300 BC could be traced to the 400–300 BC. During the Greek period of Aristophanes the garment was made from hair or wool in the style of a weighty mantle or cape. Coptic Egypt, not Mesopotamia, is credited with the design of woven tapestry with projecting long locks or strands of wool. Its manufacture evolved into kaunakes when the woven fringe design began to mirror the original fleece and these were worn during the winter season as a shawl over the shoulders, and during summer adapted as a skirt. Over the centuries many designs evolved with sleeves, then variants were made with cloth instead of fleece, part of the confusion arose from the naming of the garment, because the root word is linguistically closer to Iranian language, rather than Babylonian language. From 2,450 BC it was a dress, as seen from the figures in prayer mode in Mesopotamia. In this, the dress was formed with woolly tufts laid successively in horizontal lines and it was fashioned generally as a womans dress, adorning the left arm and shoulder with the right side exposing the skin and the breast. Forbes, R. J. studies in ancient technology, athens and Persia in the Fifth Century BC, A Study in Cultural Receptivity. Book Reviews, Le Kaunakès by Emile Cherblanc, Sumerian Dress Lengths as Chronological Data. Langdon, S. V. —Sumerian Origins and Racial Characteristics, the Authenticity of a Sumerian Statue. A Sumerian Sculpture of the Third Millennium B. C, the Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin
11.
Manishtushu
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Manishtushu was a king of the Akkadian Empire from 2270 to 2255 BC. Manishtushu was the king of the Akkadian Empire. He was the son of Sargon of Akkad and Queen Tashlultum, brother of En-hedu-ana, Rimush, and Shu-Enlil, and he became king in c.2270 BC after the death of his brother Rimush. Manishtushu, freed of the rebellions of his brothers reign, led campaigns to distant lands, according to a passage from one of his inscriptions, he led a fleet down the Persian Gulf where 32 kings allied to fight him. Manishtushu was victorious and consequently looted their cities and silver mines and he also sailed a fleet down the Tigris River that eventually traded with 37 other nations, conquered the city of Shirasum in Elam, and rebuilt the destroyed temple of Inanna in Nineveh in c.2260 BC. In c.2255 BC he died, assassinated by members of his own court, a pyramidal stele erected by Manishtushu bearing a long cuneiform inscription in Akkadian is featured in the Louvre. History of Sumer Sumerian king list Manishtushu Obelisk
12.
Limestone
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Limestone is a sedimentary rock, composed mainly of skeletal fragments of marine organisms such as coral, forams and molluscs. Its major materials are the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of calcium carbonate, about 10% of sedimentary rocks are limestones. The solubility of limestone in water and weak acid solutions leads to karst landscapes, most cave systems are through limestone bedrock. The first geologist to distinguish limestone from dolomite was Belsazar Hacquet in 1778, like most other sedimentary rocks, most limestone is composed of grains. Most grains in limestone are skeletal fragments of organisms such as coral or foraminifera. Other carbonate grains comprising limestones are ooids, peloids, intraclasts and these organisms secrete shells made of aragonite or calcite, and leave these shells behind when they die. Limestone often contains variable amounts of silica in the form of chert or siliceous skeletal fragment, some limestones do not consist of grains at all, and are formed completely by the chemical precipitation of calcite or aragonite, i. e. travertine. Secondary calcite may be deposited by supersaturated meteoric waters and this produces speleothems, such as stalagmites and stalactites. Another form taken by calcite is oolitic limestone, which can be recognized by its granular appearance, the primary source of the calcite in limestone is most commonly marine organisms. Some of these organisms can construct mounds of rock known as reefs, below about 3,000 meters, water pressure and temperature conditions cause the dissolution of calcite to increase nonlinearly, so limestone typically does not form in deeper waters. Limestones may also form in lacustrine and evaporite depositional environments, calcite can be dissolved or precipitated by groundwater, depending on several factors, including the water temperature, pH, and dissolved ion concentrations. Calcite exhibits a characteristic called retrograde solubility, in which it becomes less soluble in water as the temperature increases. Impurities will cause limestones to exhibit different colors, especially with weathered surfaces, Limestone may be crystalline, clastic, granular, or massive, depending on the method of formation. Crystals of calcite, quartz, dolomite or barite may line small cavities in the rock, when conditions are right for precipitation, calcite forms mineral coatings that cement the existing rock grains together, or it can fill fractures. Travertine is a banded, compact variety of limestone formed along streams, particularly there are waterfalls. Calcium carbonate is deposited where evaporation of the leaves a solution supersaturated with the chemical constituents of calcite. Tufa, a porous or cellular variety of travertine, is found near waterfalls, coquina is a poorly consolidated limestone composed of pieces of coral or shells. During regional metamorphism that occurs during the building process, limestone recrystallizes into marble
13.
Soapstone
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Soapstone is a talc-schist, which is a type of metamorphic rock. It is largely composed of the mineral talc and is rich in magnesium. It has been a medium for carving for thousands of years, petrologically, soapstone is composed dominantly of talc, with varying amounts of chlorite and amphiboles, and trace to minor iron-chromium oxides. It may be schistose or massive, Soapstone is formed by the metamorphism of ultramafic protoliths and the metasomatism of siliceous dolostones. By mass, pure steatite is approximately 63. 37% silica,31. 88% magnesia and 4. 74% water and it commonly contains minor quantities of other oxides such as CaO or Al2O3. However, this mineral typically does not have such a feel as soapstone. Soapstone is relatively soft because of its high content, talc having a definitional value of 1 on the Mohs hardness scale. Softer grades may feel similar to soap when touched, hence the name, common, non-architectural grades of soapstone can just barely be scratched with a fingernail and are thus considered to have a hardness of 2.5 on the Mohs scale. If a candidate rock cannot be scratched with a knife blade, Soapstone is often used as an insulator for housing and electrical components, due to its durability and electrical characteristics and because it can be pressed into complex shapes before firing. Soapstone undergoes transformations when heated to temperatures of 1000–1200 °C into enstatite and cristobalite, in the Mohs scale, Soapstone is used for inlaid designs, sculpture, coasters, and kitchen countertops and sinks. The Inuit often use soapstone for traditional carvings, some Native American tribes and bands make bowls, cooking slabs, and other objects from soapstone, historically, this was particularly common during the Late Archaic archaeological period. Locally quarried soapstone was used for gravemarkers in 19th century northeast Georgia, US, around Dahlonega, vikings hewed soapstone directly from the stone face, shaped it into cooking-pots, and sold these at home and abroad. It is also used for counter tops and bathroom tiling because of the ease of working the material, a weathered or aged appearance will occur naturally over time as the patina is enhanced. Applying mineral oil simply darkens the appearance of the stone, it does not protect it in any way, tepe Yahya, an ancient trading city in southeastern Iran, was a center for the production and distribution of soapstone in the 5th–3rd millennia BC. It was also used in Minoan Crete, at the Palace of Knossos, archaeological recovery has included a magnificent libation table made of steatite. The Yoruba of West Nigeria utilized soapstone for several statues most notably at Esie where archaeologists have uncovered hundreds of male and female statues, about half of life size. The Yoruba of Ife also produced a miniature soapstone obelisk with metal studs called superstitiously the staff of Oranmiyan Soapstone has been used in India for centuries as a medium for carving, mining to meet world-wide demand for soapstone is threatening the habitat of Indias tigers. These handicrafts are sold in street markets found in cities across the state
14.
Alabaster
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Alabaster is a mineral or rock that is soft and often used for carving, as well as being processed for plaster powder. The term is used in different ways by archaeologists and the processing industry on the one hand. The first use is in a meaning, covering varieties of two different minerals, the fine-grained massive type of gypsum, as well as the fine-grained banded type of calcite. Geologists only define the gypsum variety as alabaster, chemically, gypsum is a hydrous sulfate of calcium, while calcite is a carbonate of calcium. Both types of alabaster have broadly similar properties and they are usually light-coloured, translucent and soft stones that have been used throughout human history mainly for carving decorative artifacts. Onyx-marble must be understood as a traditional, but geologically inaccurate term, in general, ancient alabaster is calcite in the wider Middle East, including Egypt and Mesopotamia, while it is gypsum in medieval Europe. Modern alabaster is calcite, but may be either. Both are easy to work and slightly water-soluble and they have been used for making a variety of indoor artworks and carvings, as they will not survive long outdoors. Moreover, calcite alabaster, being a carbonate, effervesces when treated with hydrochloric acid, the origin of the word alabaster is in Middle English through Old French alabastre, in turn derived from the Latin alabaster, and that from Greek ἀλάβαστρος or ἀλάβαστος. The Greek words were used to identify a vase made of alabaster and this name may be derived further from the Ancient Egyptian word a-labaste, which refers to vessels of the Egyptian goddess Bast. She was represented as a lioness and frequently depicted as such in figures placed atop these alabaster vessels, other suggestions include derivation from the town of Alabastron in Egypt, described in sometimes contradictory manner by Roman-era authors Pliny and Ptolemy and whose location is not yet known. The purest alabaster is a material of fine uniform grain, but it often is associated with an oxide of iron. The coarser varieties of gypsum alabaster are converted by calcination into plaster of Paris, the softness of alabaster enables it to be carved readily into elaborate forms, but its solubility in water renders it unsuitable for outdoor work. If alabaster with a smooth, polished surface is washed with dishwashing liquid, it will become rough, dull and whiter, losing most of its translucency and lustre. The finer kinds of alabaster are employed largely as a stone, especially for ecclesiastical decoration and for the rails of staircases. Alabaster is mined and then sold in blocks to alabaster workshops, the effect of heating appears to be a partial dehydration of the gypsum. If properly treated, it closely resembles true marble and is known as marmo di Castellina. Alabaster is a stone and can be dyed into any colour or shade
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Diorite
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Diorite is an intrusive igneous rock composed principally of the silicate minerals plagioclase feldspar, biotite, hornblende, and/or pyroxene. The chemical composition of diorite is intermediate, between that of gabbro and felsic granite. Diorite is usually grey to dark-grey in colour, but it can also be black or bluish-grey and it is distinguished from gabbro on the basis of the composition of the plagioclase species, the plagioclase in diorite is richer in sodium and poorer in calcium. Diorite may contain small amounts of quartz, microcline, and olivine, zircon, apatite, titanite, magnetite, ilmenite, and sulfides occur as accessory minerals. Minor amounts of muscovite may also be present, varieties deficient in hornblende and other dark minerals are called leucodiorite. When olivine and more iron-rich augite are present, the grades into ferrodiorite. The presence of significant quartz makes the rock type quartz-diorite or tonalite, and if orthoclase is present at greater than 10 percent, a dioritic rock containing feldspathoid mineral/s and no quartz is termed foid-bearing diorite or foid diorite according to content. Diorite has a phaneritic, often speckled, texture of coarse grain size and is occasionally porphyritic, orbicular diorite shows alternating concentric growth bands of plagioclase and amphibole surrounding a nucleus, within a diorite porphyry matrix. Diorites may be associated with granite or gabbro intrusions, into which they may subtly merge. Diorite results from the melting of a mafic rock above a subduction zone. It is commonly produced in volcanic arcs, and in mountain building, such as in the Andes Mountains. The extrusive volcanic equivalent rock type is andesite, diorite is an extremely hard rock, making it difficult to carve grand work with. It is so hard that ancient civilizations used diorite balls to work granite and its hardness, however, also allows it to be worked finely and take a high polish, and to provide a durable finished work. One comparatively frequent use of diorite was for inscription, as it is easier to carve in relief than in three-dimensional statuary, perhaps the most famous diorite work extant is the Code of Hammurabi, inscribed upon a 2.23 m pillar of black diorite. The original can be today in Paris Musée du Louvre. The use of diorite in art was most important among very early Middle Eastern civilizations such as Ancient Egypt, Babylonia, Assyria, and Sumer. It was so valued in early times that the first great Mesopotamian empire—the Empire of Sargon of Akkad—listed the taking of diorite as a purpose of military expeditions. Although one can find diorite art from later periods, it more popular as a structural stone and was frequently used as pavement due to its durability
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Entemena
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Entemena was a son of En-anna-tum I, and he reestablished Lagash as a power in Sumer. He defeated Illi of Umma, with the aid of Lugal-kinishe-dudu of Uruk, successor to Enshakushanna and he has one of the earliest statues of a known king from Mesopotamia. The statue was housed in the National Museum of Iraq, in May 2003 the statue was stolen during the Second Gulf War. It was found and returned in 2010, a tripod of silver dedicated by Entemena to his god is now in the Louvre. A frieze of lions devouring ibexes and deer, incised with great skill, runs round the neck. The vase is a proof of the degree of excellence to which the goldsmiths art had already attained. A vase of calcite, also dedicated by Entemena, has found at Nippur. A foundation deposit clay nail of Entemena, in excellent condition relates a peace treaty and it is one of the oldest diplomatic documents known
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Gabbro
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Gabbro refers to a large group of dark, often phaneritic, mafic intrusive igneous rocks chemically equivalent to basalt. It forms when magma is trapped beneath the Earths surface. Much of the Earths oceanic crust is made of gabbro, formed at mid-ocean ridges, Gabbro is also found as plutons associated with continental volcanism. Due to its variant nature, the term gabbro may be applied loosely to a range of intrusive rocks. The term gabbro was used in the 1760s to name a set of types that were found in the ophiolites of the Apennine Mountains in Italy. Then, in 1809, the German geologist Christian Leopold von Buch used the term more restrictively in his description of these Italian ophiolitic rocks and he assigned the name gabbro to rocks that geologists nowadays would more strictly call metagabbro. Von Buch named gabbro after Gabbro, a village in Rosignano Marittimo municipality of Tuscany, Gabbro is dense, greenish or dark-colored and contains pyroxene, plagioclase, and minor amounts of amphibole and olivine. The pyroxene content is mostly clinopyroxene, generally augite, but small amounts of orthopyroxene may also be present, if the amount of orthopyroxene is more than 95% of the total pyroxene content, then the rock is termed norite. On the other hand, gabbro has more than 95% of its pyroxenes in the form of the monoclinic clinopyroxene/s, the calcium rich plagioclase feldspar and pyroxene content vary between 10% - 90% in gabbro. If more than 90% plagioclase is present, then the rock is an anorthosite, if on the other hand, the rock contains more than 90% pyroxenes, it is termed pyroxenite. Gabbro may also contain amounts of olivine, amphibole and biotite. The quartz content in gabbro is less than 5% of total volume, quartz gabbros or monzogabbros are also known to occur, for example the cizlakite at Pohorje in northeastern Slovenia, and are probably derived from magma that was over-saturated with silica. Gabbros contain minor amounts, typically a few percent, of iron-titanium oxides such as magnetite, ilmenite, Gabbro is generally coarse grained, with crystals in the size range of 1 mm or greater. Finer grained equivalents of gabbro are called diabase, although the term microgabbro is often used when extra descriptiveness is desired, Gabbro may be extremely coarse grained to pegmatitic, and some pyroxene-plagioclase cumulates are essentially coarse grained gabbro, some may exhibit acicular crystal habits. Gabbro is usually equigranular in texture, although it may be porphyritic at times, cumulate gabbros are more properly termed pyroxene-plagioclase adcumulate. Gabbro is an part of the oceanic crust, and can be found in many ophiolite complexes as parts of zones III. Long belts of gabbroic intrusions are typically formed at proto-rift zones and around ancient rift zone margins, mantle plume hypotheses may rely on identifying mafic and ultramafic intrusions and coeval basalt volcanism. It is better to base a rock definition on descriptive characteristics of the rather than how or where it was formed
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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
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Inanna
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Inanna was the Sumerian goddess of love, beauty, sexual desire, fertility, knowledge, wisdom, war, and combat. She was also the goddess of the E-Anna temple at the city of Uruk. She was one of the most widely venerated deities in the ancient Sumerian pantheon and her Akkadian and Babylonian equivalent was the goddess Ishtar. Several of her most important myths involve the story of her descent into and return from Kur, Inanna was the most prominent female deity in ancient Mesopotamia. As early as the Uruk period, Inanna was associated with the city of Uruk. The famous Uruk Vase depicts a row of naked men carrying various objects, bowls, vessels, and baskets of farm products and this figure was ornately dressed for a divine marriage, and attended by a servant. Especially in the Uruk period, the symbol of a ring-headed doorpost is associated with Inanna, seal impressions from the Jemdet Nasr period show a fixed sequence of city symbols including those of Ur, Larsa, Zabalam, Urum, Arina, and probably Kesh. It is likely that this list reflects the report of contributions to Inanna at Uruk from cities supporting her cult and they had been used to lock storerooms to preserve materials set aside for her cult. Inannas primary temple of worship was the Eanna, located in Uruk and her temple, the Eanna would also seem to have been taken from Anu, the head of the Sumerian pantheon, prior to the rise of Enlil of Nippur. Inannas name derives from Lady of Heaven, the cuneiform sign of Inanna, however, is not a ligature of the signs lady and sky. The view that there was a Proto-Euphratean substrate language in Southern Iraq before Sumerian is not widely accepted by modern Assyriologists, Inanna was one of the most widely venerated deities in the Sumerian pantheon. Many shrines and temples dedicated to Inanna were built along the Tigris, the deity of this fourth-millennium city was probably originally An. After its dedication to Inanna the temple seems to have housed priestesses of the goddess, a Sacred Marriage to Inanna may have conferred legitimacy on a number of rulers of Uruk. Gilgamesh is reputed to have refused marriage to Inanna, on the grounds of her misalliance with such kings as Lugalbanda, Inannas symbol is an eight-pointed star or a rosette. She was associated with lions – even then a symbol of power – and was depicted standing on the backs of two lionesses. Her cuneiform ideogram was a twisted knot of reeds, representing the doorpost of the storehouse. Inanna was associated with the planet Venus, which at time was regarded as two stars, the morning star and the evening star. There are hymns to Inanna as her astral manifestation and it also is believed that in many myths about Inanna, including Inannas Descent to the Underworld and Inanna and Shukaletuda, her movements correspond with the movements of Venus in the sky
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Ningishzida
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Ningishzida is a Mesopotamian deity of the underworld. His name in Sumerian is translated as lord of the tree by Thorkild Jacobsen. In Sumerian mythology, he appears in Adapas myth as one of the two guardians of Anus celestial palace, alongside Dumuzi and he was sometimes depicted as a serpent with a human head. Lagash had a dedicated to Ningishzida, and Gudea, patesi of Lagash in the 21st century BC, was one of his devotees. Ningishzida is sometimes the son of Ninazu and Ningiridda, even though the myth Ningishzidas journey to the netherworld suggests he is the son of Ereshkigal, following an inscription found at Lagash, he was the son of Anu, the heavens. His wife is Azimua and also Geshtinanna, while his sister is Amashilama, in some texts Ningishzida is said to be female, which means Nin would then refer to Lady, which is mostly how the word is used by the Sumerians. He or she was one of the ancestors of Gilgamesh, Ningishzida is the earliest known symbol of snakes twining around an axial rod. It predates the Caduceus of Hermes, the Rod of Asclepius, one Greek myth on the origin of the caduceus forms part of the story of Tieresias, who finds two snakes copulating and kills the female with his staff. The god appears in the Simon Necronomicon under the spelling Ninnghizhidda, in Marilyn Mansons 1998 autobiography The Long Hard Road Out Of Hell, Manson encountered a suburban Occultist who pays tribute to Ningishzida
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Geshtinanna
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The Levantine Adonis, who was drawn into the Greek pantheon, was considered by Joseph Campbell among others to be another counterpart of Tammuz, son and consort. The Aramaic name Tammuz seems to have derived from the Akkadian form Tammuzi. The later standard Sumerian form, Dumu-zid, in turn became Dumuzi in Akkadian, tamuzi also is Dumuzid or Dumuzi. In cult practice, the dead Tammuz was widely mourned in the Ancient Near East, locations associated in antiquity with the site of his death include both Harran and Byblos, among others. O Dumuzid of the mouth, of the ever kind eyes, she sobs tearfully, O you of the fair-spoken mouth, of the ever kind eyes. Lad, husband, lord, sweet as the date, O Dumuzid, then said he unto to me, Hast thou seen this, O son of man. Turn thee yet again, and thou shalt see greater abominations than these, —Ezekiel 8, 14-15 Tammuz idol worship was inconsistent with Yahwism. Ezekiels testimony is the only mention of Tammuz in the Hebrew Bible, though echoes of Tammuz have been seen in the Book of Isaiah. Other Sumerian texts showed that kings were to be married to Inanna in a sacred marriage, a number of pastoral poems and songs relate the love affair of Inanna and Dumuzid the shepherd. A text recovered in 1963 recounts The Courtship of Inanna and Dumuzi in terms that are tender, ereshkigal is in mourning at the death of her consort, Gugalanna. She passed through seven gates and at each one was required to leave a garment or an ornament so that when she had passed through the gate she was a simple woman. Despite warnings about her presumption, she did not turn back, immediately the Anunnaki of the underworld judged her, gazed at her with the eyes of death, and she became a corpse, hung up on a meathook. This is the form of the myth as it appeared in M. Jastrows Descent of the Goddess Ishtar into the Lower World,1915. New texts uncovered in 1963 filled in the story in another fashion, showing that Dumuzi was in fact consigned to the Underworld himself. Inannas faithful servant attempted to get help from the other gods, the details of Enki/Eas plan differ slightly in the two surviving accounts, but in the end, Inanna/Ishtar was resurrected. However, a conservation of souls law required her to find a replacement for herself in Kur. She went from one god to another, but each one pleaded with her and she had not the heart to go through with it until she found Dumuzid/Tammuz richly dressed, Inanna/Ishtar immediately set her accompanying demons on Dumuzid/Tammuz. At this point the Akkadian text fails as Tammuz sister Belili, introduced for the first time, strips herself of her jewelry in mourning but claims that Tammuz and the dead will come back
