Search Results: Mosaic

Mosaics are designs and images created using small pieces (tesserae) of stone or other materials which have been used to decorate floors, walls, ceilings, and precious objects since before written records began. Like pottery, mosaics have...

Lying at the crossroads of the eastern Mediterranean, the island of Cyprus has long been a meeting point for many of the world's great civilizations. Situated where Europe, Asia and Africa meet, its location shaped its history of bringing...

Dion is located at the foot of Mount Olympus in the north of Greece, in what would have been ancient Macedon. It takes its name from the most important Macedonian sanctuary dedicated to Zeus ("Dios” meaning "of Zeus”). Legend claims this...

The gooseherd: A boy and a girl herding two geese are depicted in this mosaic. Great Palace Mosaic Museum, Istanbul, Turkey. Period: Early Byzantine, circa 6th. century CE. Place: Constantinople, (Modern Istanbul, Turkey). Great Palace Mosaic...

Roman mosaics were a common feature of private homes and public buildings across the empire from Africa to Antioch. Not only are mosaics beautiful works of art in themselves but they are also an invaluable record of such everyday items as...

An ancient Roman mosaic from the 4th century CE depicting an Amazon warrior in mounted combat against a Greek rider. The Greek is seizing the Phrygian cap of the Amazon. Cropped detail of a mosaic from Daphne, a suburb of Antioch on the Orontes...

The mosaic of Daedalus, Icarus, and Pasiphaë from Zeugma depicts the wife of King Minos of Crete Pasiphaë (ΦACIΦAH), an unidentified maiden, and her nanny Trophos (TPOΦOC) watching as Daedalus (ΔΕɅɅΟC) and his son Icarus (ΕIKAPOC) make a...

This mosaic depicts the twelve labours the demigod Hercules had to perform as penance for killing his wife and children. It decorated the triclinium (dining room) of the so-called House of the Labours of Hercules in Volubilis (modern-day...

Bear hunting a lamb, Byzantine Mosaic. Period: Early Byzantine, circa 6th. century C.E. Place: Constantinople, (Modern Istanbul, Turkey). Great Palace Mosaic Museum, Istanbul, Turkey. The Great Palace Mosaic Museum was inaugurated in 1987...

This detail is part of a mosaic column, which may have stood at the side of the entrance into the temple. The whole column originally had a core of palm-wood (now perished). A layer of bitumen coated that wood. The mosaic inlay pieces (mother-of-pearl...