Images

Adult workers received standard rations of 30 to 40 pints of barley per month while children received 20; the barley was distributed as rations to about 200 workmen and their children. This scribe was clearly highly trained in this art. From...

This almost square-shaped clay tablet records a Sumerian account of silver and other commodities. There are 8 columns of inscriptions; by this stage, the reed strokes are fully wedge-shaped and the writing could convey the Sumerian language...

These 2 unusual green schist stone tablets seem to belong together and record a land sale; it appears that there was a transaction, in which land was exchanged for various goods, with the carved figures representing the individuals involved...

On this clay tablet, the lines are read from left to right and the day numbers appear at the left side (days 1-5). Several different types of rations were issued, possibly bread. Each line mentions the name of the recipient or the destination...

This is the 11th tablet of the Epic of Gilgamesh. The cuneiform text on this tablet is startlingly similar to the Biblical story of Noah and his ark in the Book of Genesis. When George Smith, an assistant in the British Museum first read...

An artist's impression of what a Greek hoplite may have looked like.

Statue of Hermes (Mercury) with winged sandals, holding his herald's staff. Formerly in the Farnese Collection in Rome. Roman, 2nd century CE, after a Greek original of the 4th century BCE the school of Praxiteles. (British Museum, London)

Statue of a dancing Faun with the infant Bacchus, the God of Wine. Formerly in the collection of The Grand Duke of Tuscany, then in the Farnese Collection in Rome. Roman, 2nd century, CE. (The British Museum, London)

This object combines both Syrian and Persian styles. While the shape of the cup echoes a classical Persian wine-pourer (rhyton), it actually functioned as a drinking cup. Large animal-headed cups were popular in Syria in earlier periods...

This is a statuette of a monkey. The monkey appears to play a harp. From Amarna, Egypt. Reign of Akhenaten, circa 1353–1336 BCE. The Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, London (with thanks to The Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology...