Best babysitter ❤️

💖 Hope this Quokka brings ya
joy 🌿 Happy Everything 💚🤎

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A cartoon-style drawing shows two cats sitting in front of a pet carrier. One cat says: “I go in, and when I come out I’m at the vet… then I go back in, and when I come out I’m home…” The other cat responds: “Could it be? A wormhole!”

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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

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Part of a colourful Roman mosaic floor depicting doves drinking from a vase from a townhouse that dates AD 1-50. The house is now below the Caseggiato delle Taberne in #OstiaAntica.
📷 my own.
#MosaicMonday #Archaeology #AncientRome

HERACLITOS. ASÀROTOS ÒIKOS MOSAIC, DETAIL, C. 125 CE. VATICAN MUSEUMS This famous mosaic is signed by one Heraclitos, who may have copied the "unswept floor" mosaic by Sosos of Pergamon in the C2 CE, but as a border to a large and mainly vanished central scene with Egyptian and Nilotic details. Mosaic representations of pharaonic statues were set at the corners, and along the edge are lively riverside scenes like this duck which is peering into a curved lilypad leaf to see if a delicious frog or insect is hiding there. The duck's form is beautifully modelled in light and shadow, and the border of the mosaic at bottom is a wonderful undulating wave.

The splendid Asàrotos òikos #mosaic at the #VaticanMuseums is a #Hadrianic copy of a mosaic described by #Pliny the Elder at #Pergamon. Here, instead of looking at the famous "unswept floor" border, for #MosaicMonday we're looking at part of the #Nilotic mosaic it surrounded. #AncientBluesky 🏺

Stained glass depicting the martyrdom St Alphege by James Powell & Sons 1928 at St Alphege Solihull.

#stalphege #saintsday #stainedglass

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Two former slaves and their 4 children are remembered on this grand funerary stele.

The Cartorii were very wealthy brick-makers and many terracotta bricks in the region bear the CARTORIANA stamp.

📸 Us, Musei Civici #Padua

#Archaeology #TombTuesday
#AncientBluesky #Classicsbluesky #AncientRome

Boy with goose. Paper says mon oye faict tout --bilingual pun meaning My goose does everything/Money does everything. Early capitalist cleverness by Jacob Cuyp, whose day is today.

I finally visited Tito Bustillo Cave.

For our eyes, a purple horse might not stand out much, mainly because we’re used to modern art. But modifying nature like this was not common even 150 years ago—so this kind of representation was a significant creative step at the time.

#Prehistory #Rockart

The Great Lady Offerant, a pre-Roman Iberian limestone sculpture from the 3rd century BC.

Found at the Sanctuary of Cerro de los Santos (Albacete), she is shown presenting an offering, with remarkable detail in her clothing, jewelry and ceremonial dress.

#Archaeology #AncientArt #Museum #History

Women messing with men's heads du jour: Judith, Abra, & head of Holofernes, 1584. By Paolo Veronese, whose day is today.

Correction 🩷💛💚

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Property from Goucher College Mummy Portrait of a Man, Roman Egypt, Flavian Period, circa late 1st century CE. Painted with encaustic (pigmented wax) on wood (probably sycamore), his head turned to his right, and wearing a white chiton (tunic) and white himation (cloak) falling from the nape of the neck, his solemn face with full lower lip, long aquiline nose, translucent hazel eyes, bushy eyebrows, and furrowed brow, his wavy gray hair brushed forward above the forehead. 12 3⁄4 by 6 in.; 32.5 by 15.4 cm Auction page: https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/auction/2026/master-paintings-sculpture-part-i/mummy-portrait-of-a-man-roman-egypt-flavian-period

This realistically rendered Flavian era mummy portrait from Roman Egypt gives us a rare look at an older person from that era. It has been on loan for over 70 years to the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore, but was recently sold at auction. Will it disappear into a private collection? 🏺

📸 Sotheby’s

This is such a lovely, clear image - fantastic detail 🙂

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“The Troubles” - for 3 decades there was inter-communal violence in the north of Ireland. Working with the Institute for Conflict Research & residents of Tiger’s Bay, North Belfast, the master glass maker, David Esler created this window. Library notice - “The window contains representations of places and people of significance in North Belfast where residents are proud of the natural environment of the Cave Hill and their industrial heritage. Jonathan Swift was inspired by the North Belfast skyline to write the world-renowned Gulliver's Travels. Central to the window is a pouncing tiger emerging from an eggshell which is symbolic of resilience and new beginnings. Representations of mills, including Jennymount Mill, refer to the importance of the linen industry to the area. And the image of the jackal refers to boxer Carl Frampton MBE, who grew up in North Belfast, and whose sportsmanship, professionalism and achievements are inspirational to young people from the area.”

“Gulliver & Tiger Window”
Glass maker - David Esler

Linen Hall Library, Belfast

Working with the Tiger’s Bay community the window looks to the history of the area & the future

A pouncing tiger emerging from an eggshell, is symbolic of resilience & new beginnings

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#StainedGlassSunday

This bud of love, by summer’s ripening breath,
May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet..

Romeo and Juliet - Act 2, scene 2

Glass by Vernon Spreadbury, Stratford-upon-Avon.

#shakespearesunday #stainedglasssunday

Awww feel better! 😢

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SARCOPHAGUS LID WITH RECLINING WOMAN AND SNAKE, C. 150 CE, AND CHILD'S SARCOPHAGUS WITH BACCHIC THIASOS, 260-270 CE. VATICAN MUSEUMS These disparate pieces were placed together in about 1790 in the Octagonal Courtyard of the Belvedere. The box is a child's sarcophagus from the later C3, with a playful series of Erotes imitating a Dionysiac triumph or thiasos. The central Eros, representing a tipsy Dionysus, has its face unfinished: it should be a portrait of the dead child. Ahead of him and behind him are Erotes making music and dancing. Atop the box is a beautiful reclining female figure from about 150 CE, which once had a dedication by Lucius Valerius Victor to his wife Andia Melissa. It entered the Verospi collection and was identified as a Cleopatra. Andia Melissa's head is a restoration, and so is the head of the snake wrapped around her bare right arm. But the arm is original and so is the snake. Perhaps it indicates Andia's devotion to Isis.

Tonight's #SarcophagusSaturday from the #VaticanMuseums offers us two separate pieces: an extraordinary #lid with a reclining woman whose arm is wrapped round with a #snake, and a child's #sarcophagus with a parade of #Erotes imitating a #Dionysiac #thiasos. #AncientBluesky 🏺

Wonderful! I can almost hear the music playing!

Stunning frescoes of the Assumption of the Virgin in the Carafa Chapel, Santa Maria sopra Minerva, Rome. Painted by today's guy, Filippino Lippi, in 1490.

2/2 Venetian sculptor Alessandro Vittoria, 1570, by Venetian painter Paolo Veronese whose day is today.

One of the four ‘Dacre Bears’ located in the churchyard of St. Andrew’s Church at Dacre in Cumbria. Their origins are unknown, but it has been suggested that they are pre-Saxon and may have served as boundary markers for a pagan shrine. 📸 My own. #StoneworkSunday #Darce