May 18, 2005
May 18 Photos: Peter
A view of some of the remains of large houses at Pella. In the foreground, you see a dark and light mosaic with diamond shapes. Behind the mosaic are the columns from an internal peristyle that would have provided light and air to the inside of the house.
A mosaic from an interior room in the House of the Lion Hunt. Executed in small pebbles that varied slightly in color and size in order to generate effects, even this simple design has a great deal of texture and color variation. Because of the textural variation, the location of the light source could greatly affect the way the mosaic would be perceived by the viewer.
The Stag Hunt mosaic from the House of the Abduction of Helen, one of the most famous mosaics from Pella. The mosaic was impressively executed and has made it into many art history books. However, photographs rarely show how the mosaic looks to someone standing on the floor (or, for that matter, reclining on a couch). As you can see, the image depicted in the mosaic appears a bit distorted because the camera is less than two meters above the floor rather than hovering above it.
Pella was covered with beautiful poppies. I was lucky enough to capture this image of a bee as it flew toward the pistils of the poppy.
Jackie is standing in front of part of a painted stucco wall we saw at the Pella museum. The faux stone effect executed on this wall was very convincing even close up, reminiscent of some of the best painted imitation stone we’ve seen at churches like Hagia Sophia. The use of many colors as well as plaster architectural elements like the engaged pilasters and balustrade visible here only add to the impressive nature of this composition.
Neha stands in front of another impressive mosaic from Pella, this one in the museum. The four main colors used are most visible in this mosaic – white, gray, black, and reddish orange. The billowing drapery and positioning of the figures are reminiscent of some of the best contemporary sculpture we have seen.
A gold diadem from the Pella museum. We saw quite a few Macedonian diadems today between the Pella museum and the Museum of the Great Tumulus at Vergina. This was the best one I was able to photograph. Note the inlays on the petals of the flower.
Outside of the royal palace at Aigai (near modern Vergina), we came across this herd of goats and their goatherd. He unfortunately was not yodeling at that moment, but we’re sure he would have given enough time.
The ruins of the palace at Aigai. Hard to tell, but you are looking toward the palace’s large internal peristyle court. The preservation of the palace is sadly not very good. It was a bit difficult to imagine walking in the footsteps of Alexander and Phillip II with so little stone and so much grass around.
The impressive mosaic from the Palace at Aigai. Unfortunately this mosaic has been covered with a protective tarp and weighed down with rocks, so you are seeing as much of it as we could manage to see from a secondary source.
The theater at Aigai where Phillip II was murdered. The theater only had stone seats going up a couple of rows and featured earthen seating from there upwards, making it humble in comparison to great theaters like the one at Epidauros.
The façade of the Rhomaios tomb, a tomb for an unidentified individual that was excavated by an archaeologist named Rhomaios. Visiting Macedonian tombs today was extremely frustrating – two were closed and inaccessible, and we weren’t allowed to photograph any except for the Rhomaios tomb. Note the use of engaged Ionic columns and dentils beneath the pediment.
Since the façade of the tomb of Phillip II couldn’t be photographed, here is a reconstruction of what it originally looked like. The tomb’s façade is very well preserved, and only the painted frieze at the top looks somewhat different from the reconstruction. One interesting feature, perhaps borrowed from Mycenaean tholos tombs, is the usage of doorways that taper slightly as they go up.
A piece of purple and gold cloth used to wrap the cremated remains of a woman buried in the anteroom to the tomb of Phillip II. This is one of the oldest pieces of Aegean textiles still in existence (though textiles had been in use for centuries and likely millennia prior to this) and is one of the first examples we have of the use of purple as a color for royal textiles in a Greek context.
This silver oinochoi, or wine jug, is from Phillip II’s tomb. The execution of the head where the handle meets the body of the jug is very impressive.
Jumping forward a little more than seven hundred years to the era of the Roman Tetrarchy, we have two monuments built by augustus Galerius in Thessalonica. In the foreground to the left, the remains of a triumphal arch can be seen. Behind the group to the right, you can see Galerius’ rotunda.
A close-up of the sculpture found on the piers supporting the triumphal arch. Galerius made Thessalonica his imperial capital and used the arch in part to glorify the accomplishments of the Tetrarchy. You can see Galerius to the left of the altar while his co-augustus, Diocletian, stands to the right of the altar and sacrifices on it.
The exterior of Galerius’ rotunda, with our group acting as human scale as they make a bee line for the door. The rotunda was likely intended to be used as a mausoleum for Galerius, but Galerius died away from Thessalonica and his successors wouldn’t allow him to be buried in the building. After a period of disuse, the rotunda was converted into a Christian church and, except for a several hundred year stint as a mosque during the Ottoman period, has remained a Christian church since.
Katherine looks up in awe at the large dome capping the rotunda. Pictures of the dome unfortunately didn’t come out, but the dome is only about five meters smaller in diameter than the dome at Hagia Sophia and has the remains of mosaics of angels. The usage of large brick arches, visible in the background, is characteristic of many works of Roman architecture. Though damaged in a large earthquake that rocked Thessalonica back in the 1970’s, the rotunda is once again open to the public and in the process of continued restoration.