Cavalry combat helmet
Roman Britain, 1st century AD
From Witcham Gravel, Ely, Cambridgeshire
The British Museum, Located in Room 49: Roman Britain
Marble pilaster capital from the Pantheon in Rome
From the Pantheon in Rome, Italy
AD 118-128
The British Museum
“These marble capitals come from the interior of the Pantheon, one of the most iconic buildings of ancient Rome. They were originally located at the top of shafts of porphyry – a rare and expensive stone – and decorated the upper area of the round Pantheon, beneath the dome. The walls, and the floor beneath, were covered in colourful marbles and other precious stones.”
Limestone Head of a Woman Resembling Cleopatra VII
Roman, about 50-30 BC
Acquired in Italy
The British Museum, Located in Room 70: Roman Empire
Bust of Antinous
From Rome, Italy
AD 130-140
The emperor Hadrian’s young lover
The British Museum
“Antinous was Greek and born in Mantineum, a small place near the city of Bithynion-Claudiopolis (now northern Turkey). This bust originally belonged to a full-length statue, which was found in the eighteenth century, built into a wall on the Janiculum Hill in Rome.
It is known that the Roman emperor Hadrian passed through the area where Antinous was born in AD 123 and many scholars believe this was when they met. Later sources make it very clear that Hadrian and Antinous formed a homosexual relationship. Although we know little of their personal relationship, it is understood they shared a passion for hunting.
In AD 130 Hadrian visited Egypt with the imperial entourage, including his wife Sabina and Antinous. After an extended stay in Alexandria, they embarked on a voyage up the River Nile. On 24 October Antinous drowned in the river, on the same day the locals were commemorating the death, by drowning in the Nile, of the Egyptian god Osiris. Although Hadrian maintained Antinous’ death was an accident, malicious rumours soon spread. Some thought he had committed suicide or that he had been sacrificed. Others claimed Antinous sacrificed himself to prolong the life of the emperor.
For the Romans homosexual relationships were not unusual, but the intensity with which Hadrian mourned Antinous’ premature death and encouraged his cult in the eastern empire was without precedent.
The presence of an ivy wreath in this portrait links Antinous to the god Dionysus, the closest Greek equivalent to the Egyptian god Osiris. Roman aristocrats frequently incorporated fragments of classical statuary into the walls of their estates, but the rest of this statue has not been found.”
Marble portrait bust of Perikles
Roman, 2nd century AD
Said to be from Hadrian’s Villa at Tivoli, Lazio, Italy
The British Museum
“This is a Roman copy of an original portrait which was perhaps created in Perikles’ own day, or shortly after his death. However, it probably bears little physical resemblance to Perikles’ actual appearance, showing an ideal type of the mature soldier citizen, wearing a helmet pushed back on his head.”
Funerary relief bust
3rd century (dated 231 C.E.)
Limestone
Syria
Smithsonian Museums
Dagger-axe (ge) with dragons
ca. 1300-1200 B.C.E.
Late Shang dynasty
Early Anyang period
Bronze with turquoise inlay and jade (nephrite) blade
China
Smithsonian Museums
Hafted axe with dragons
ca. 1300-1200 B.C.E.
Unidentified, Chinese
Late Shang dynasty
Early Anyang period
Bronze with turquoise inlay and jade (nephrite) blade
Anyang, China
Smithsonian Museums
Lidded ritual ewer (huo) in the form of an elephant with masks and dragons
ca. first half 11th century B.C.E.
Shang dynasty
Late Anyang period
Bronze
Middle Yangzi Valley, China
Smithsonian Museums
Fitting in the form of a supernatural animal
ca. 1st-2nd century
Eastern Han dynasty
Bronze
China
Smithsonian Museums
