The view from my balcony looking out on Viros Gorge, one of many mountain ranges on the Pelopenese in Greece. We arrived for a climbing holiday and the first thing I always do is feel and embrace the sea. I dived off a rock covered in slime and broke my toe. No hiking or climbing. The hospital was miles away in the wrong direction of travel. You Tube helped me to strap my toe and Croc sandals became the only footwear I could walk in. I never got to climb but my husband did. I watched as he crossed the gorge on his ascent. The funny thing is I had no idea I still had photos of this event until we recently cleared and replaced our computer. Imagine, a hiking holiday watching the mountain range you are supposed to be hiking!

There is a story behind this image which can be found in alt text. A view of the Viros Gorge on the mountain range of the Pelopenese. That is all from me for now as I head off to celebrate my husband's 60th!
Thank you all for likes & more!

#mountainrange #virosgorge #landscapephotography #greece

Virginia Woolf, more than a hundred years ago:

"I had, by cross-ways and by-paths, once more drawn near the tract of moorland;"

("Jane Eyre: An Autobiography", 1847)

Charlotte Brontë was born #OTD 1816

🎨 Edward A. Wilson (1944)

#booksky #bookillustration

Two terracotta tiles with white slip design. The design of the two adjacent tiles forms half of a circle. Half a small circle in the centre is surrounded by top half of an 8 pointed star form. Between the points of the stars can be seen 4 small 5 petal flowers. On the visible corners of each tile, at the top left and right are fleur de lis designs. Eltham Palace would have been in countryside during its royal habitation, but now in greater London south of Greenwich / Woolwich. Much later in 20th C converted by Courtaulds to stylish Art Deco residence.

#TilesOnTuesday
From decorative pavement of 1290s Great Hall, the earliest building at Eltham Palace, built for Bishop Bek of Durham.
Bek presented Eltham to Edward II in 1305, and it remained a royal residence, enhanced, altered and used by monarchs through to Charles I. Henry VIII grew up here.

Sunrise this morning here in Glastonbury.

My photo shows a Paleo-Babylonian clay tablet inscribed with cuneiform text, still partially enclosed in its original clay envelope. The clay is pale orangey-brown in colour displayed against a grey display case background. The outer envelope has been broken open, revealing the inner tablet beneath. Both surfaces are covered with densely packed wedge-shaped characters, which record a contract for the sale of a house purchased by Mannum-balu-Samas at the price of 1/3 shekel and 15 grains of silver. This is followed by the names of the numerous witnesses including the mayor Sin-magir and the courier Apil-ilisu. The same text is repeated on the envelope in the event of a dispute, which was broken to inspect the internal document. It is dated 32nd year of Hammurabl's reign, 10th month, c. 1750 BC. The clay envelope measures 87 mm (height) × 55 mm (width), while the inner tablet measures 64 mm (height) × 43 mm (width). On display at the Museum of Antiquity in Turin. Collection number MAT 740.

A 3,750 year-old contract for the sale of a house recorded on a clay tablet, still in its original clay envelope!

Museo di Antichità, Turin
📷 by me

#Archaeology

A photo of the Porta Nigra, a massive Roman city gate in Trier. Constructed of sandstone blocks, featuring two large cylindrical towers with multiple arched windows and passageways. The weathered structure stands prominently in a modern urban setting, surrounded by buildings. Sunlight casts shadows on the stone facade, highlighting its intricate details and imposing presence.

The Porta Nigra in Trier is the best preserved Roman city gate North of the Alps. It was built around 170 AD and converted into a church in the Middle Ages.
The Porta Nigra was restored to its original state in 1804 at Napoleon's behest.

📷me

🏺

Photograph featuring the top five storeys of a tall white apartment block with blue balconies on each flooe, against a grey blue sky

'Hidden Beauty', 2016 by photographer Sandra Jordan depicts buildings that often go unnoticed #WomensArt

Nine previously shown images on the womensart account, imcluiding paintings, embroidery, ceramics and sculpture

Have a great day :) xx

The view captures tall trees with a carpet of bluebells for company. In the middle of the image a member of the public is walking focused on his mobile phone. The lesson, do not forget to look up!

I was in the process of framing a view and the gentleman captured walked across my lens. I decided to capture the image. Bluebells. Catch them when you can for they will not last!

#bluebells #HumansOfBlueSky #woodlandphotography #forestfriday #photography #ECK

'The big tree'
by UK printmaker Sarah Morgan #WomensArt

Goodnight from Nev Rampley, clothes reeking of petrol and burning after attempts to destroy evidence of his dealings with Faeries in Hedgegate Lane. Goodnight from Sarah Passmore, hoping the cart and call of the phantom cat’s meat man won’t keep her awake. Goodnight from Hookland.

A gosling eating bread stopped as I sat down to capture this image. Looking direct at the camera and as if it knew the theme for today!

Today's #BirdOfTheDay theme, #ComeEatWithMe, birds who have food in their beaks.

Oh, if you feed water fowl bread, it really is time to stop as it is not good for their diet. Honest!

#UKWildlife #gosling #birds #photography #wildlife

A picture of a rather dilapidated copy of "The picture of Dorian Gray" There is visible water damage to the cover and the plastic cover is yellowing. Obviously, not evident from the picture but there is a truly foul musty smell emanating from it!

Last week, a gentleman returned this rather dilapidated copy of this famous book to us after 50 years. He had found it in his attic!
Presumably this means there is a pristine copy somewhere in our libraries....

Mosaic with blue/red/white guilloche borders top and bottom. Silenus caped in panther skin cloak behind a panther on the left, following Dionysus holding a wine vessel on the right, his arm around a young satyr.

#MosaicMonday
How to make an entrance: bring a panther to the party. Dionysiac scene of Silenus, a panther, Dionysus and Ampelos, a young satyr.
One of impressive #Roman mosaics at Musée départemental Arles antique, excavated 1914 in Trinquetaille area of Arles, thriving port area C1 BC-C3 AD. 🏺

"Sure as the most certain sure....plumb in the uprights, well entretied, braced in
the beams,
Stout as a horse, affectionate, haughty, electrical,
I and this mystery here we stand."
Walt Whitman (1855)
#Scotland #Beauty #Horses #Art #Kelpies #Falkirk #statue
#AndyScott #BlueSky

Stone circle

Good morning from the Merry Maidens

The picture shows a pair of Egyptian sandals made of woven reed and palm leaves, the sole with bound edges and pointed toe. One sandal is completely preserved with ankle strap and toe strap.

#Egyptian flip flops: a pair of sandals made of woven reed and palm leaves. Dating around 1500-1400BC

On display at Museum of the University of Tübingen

📷me

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Certain doors demand your attention when walking passed them, demand you wonder about what happens beyond them. They generate an intimate, personal folklore, unfold odd stories in your mind. I'd knock upon them, but the sense of mystery is just too valuable. – #MattAdams

Recently restored castle in Norwich among five institutions shortlisted for UK's top museum prize Spaces in Norwich, Plymouth and Cambridge will be considered alongside London heavyweights for the £120,000 award

www.theartnewspaper.com/2026/04/20/r...

Two dandified young men in Regency fashions have mounted their velocipedes.

The same young men on their velocipedes are panicking because a pair of geese are squawking at them.

One of the young men has fallen into a faint thanks to his terrifying experience with the geese and is being carried on the back of a yokel into a house. Is friend looks on in distress.

The distressed dandy is sitting in his mother's lap being scolded.

I love these 'Dandy's Perambulations' cartoons from 1819. No idea who drew them but they make me chortle.
#dandies #Regency #cartoons #artsky #BookChatWeekly

Step into a world where art meets function. Let's celebrate the legacy that continues to shape our modern world. #Bauhaus #Design #Art #Architecture

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In the week before Walpurgis Night, the owl came one last time to the lost town of Stolberg on the foot of the Harz mountains to remember.

Our 51st #arkstringtide story is a little tale for #owlishmonday.

Read it below.

🎨 Craig Kosak

Photograph just of the face of a bronze statue of an athlete. scraping dirt and sweat from his body

Croatian Apoxyomenos, ca. 100 BCE
Bronze

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Croatia...

My photo shows a Hellenistic era hemispherical mosaic glass bowl viewed from above. The glass has a floral pattern made up of tiny, many-petalled blue, white, and yellowy-green flowers against a dark purple background (looks black in my photo). The bowl has an alternating diagonal-striped black and white glass rim. The bowl has been reconstructed from fragments and the plain light blue areas are where missing glass fragments have been replaced during reconstruction. It measures 13.2 cm in diameter and 7.5 cm in height. It was made in the eastern Mediterranean about 200-100 BC.

This Hellenistic mosaic glass bowl looks so modern, yet it was made over 2,000 years ago!

Ancient glassmakers created the tiny flower pattern using a technique now known as ‘millefiori’ (thousand flowers). A timeless design still made by glassmakers today!

British Museum 📷 by me

#Archaeology

Lots of white and pink-edged Daisies, not yet open.

Early morning Daisies. #WildflowerHour

The arched top of a Roman mosaic, with partial damage, showing the head of Oceanus with fish, dolphins and (possibly lobster claws?) in a demi-lune surrounded by three lines of patterns

Oceanus giving some splendid side eye in the fabulous Fordington High Street Mosaic, 2nd century CE, now on the wall of the Dorset Museum
#MosaicMonday

‘The Moon and The Zoo’: Simon Armitage poem celebrates 200 years of ZSL Zoological Society of London commissions poet laureate for animation to mark its 200th anniversary

www.theguardian.com/science/2026...

It slides in under the turnstile after dark,

moves in a silent arc at an ancient pace…

“Victor looked up at the mountains,
The mountains all covered with snow;
Cried: ‘Are you pleased with me, Father?’
And the answer came back, ‘No’.”
W H Auden (1937)
#photography #LandscapePhotography #mountains #sky #PotD #poetry #WHAuden #horizon #sunset #Scotland