Images

Detail of the "Bikini Mosaic" in the Villa Romana del Casale in Pompeii (Italy), depicting Roman girls exercising. 4th century CE.

An ancient Roman mosaic from the 4th century CE depicting an Amazon warrior in mounted combat against a Greek rider. The Greek is seizing the Phrygian cap of the Amazon. Cropped detail of a mosaic from Daphne, a suburb of Antioch on the Orontes...

A fresco depicting the Laocoön story in the Casa del Menandro, Pompeii. (Wikimedia CC BY-SA 3.0)

In the comic Asterix and Cleopatra (1963), Caesar exclaims, “she is kind, but the spices that easily go up her nose... she is pretty, too, though!” The joke (translated in the English edition as “only her nose is so easily put out of joint”...

The iconic cinematic performance of Elizabeth Taylor in the motion picture Cleopatra (1963) left a lasting impression of the Egyptian queen’s supposed beauty. Despite its emphatic opulence, the movie still implies that Cleopatra could only...

Limestone relief from the Chapel of Ptolemy II at Tanis in the Nile Delta representing Ptolemy II facing Arsinoe II (San el-Hagar, ca. 275-250 BCE; BM reg. no. 1885,1101.5, inv. no. EA-1056). Courtesy of the Trustees of the British Museum...

A photo of the Lion Hunt Mosaic from Pella, Macedon. The mosaic dates to around the late 4th Century BCE, the same time as the Royal Tombs at Vergina.

Professor Theodore Antikas with Laura-Wynn Antikas holding the shorter greave from the Royal Tomb of Vergina in front of the display cabinet in the Archaeological Museum of Vergina. Courtesy of the Antikas team archive.

A detail from the Laocoön group, showing the anguished expression on the face of Laocoön's younger son, Thymbraeus. A Roman copy made after a Hellenistic original from c. 200 BCE.

A fresco showing a silver tray containing prunes, dried figs and dates, and a glass cup with red wine. From the House of the Deer (Casa dei Cervi) at Herculaneum. Naples National Archaeological Museum (Italy).