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Category Archives: Art History/Antiquity/Anthropology
king solomon: bible as divining rod
The boundaries of entire lands and the nature of their ancient civilizations can be made clear by following clues in the Bible. It is almost as if one waves a magic wand over a blank area of the earth, and … Continue reading
pool of gibeon: sacred swords
It was the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls which was the most dramatic of many discoveries which threw light on the beginnings of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. It is worth emphasizing that in all this work to date of … Continue reading
henry VIII: spare the rod
Ever since Henry VIII’s death, at the age of fifty-seven, people have asked how a once splendid monarch could come to such a pass. Some historians have suggested that during the last years of the reign he was slowly sinking … Continue reading
philistines: bastards in ashdod
The Bible’s final statement about the Philistines is found in Zechariah, the next-to-lat book of the Old testament, and it is a bitter curse: “And a bastard shall dwell in Ashdod, and I will cut off the pride of the … Continue reading
a dying monarch
Death of Henry VIII… Age had dug deep trenches upon a face once as pink and delicate as a young bride’s; the soft beard of red and gold had given way to coarse white; the sturdy muscular belly was now … Continue reading
audubon: legacy
The fame of his paintings has tended to distract us from the volumes of text Audubon compiled to accompany Robert Havell Jr.’s engraved plates. Much of its ornithological data has been superceded by subsequent studies, but the accounts of his … Continue reading
audubon: birds, birds and more birds
A nuber of the paintings carried detailed instructions for Robert Havell Jr.,the English engraver, to guide him and his colorists in the preparation of the copies, notations which were naturally suppressed in the making of the engraved plates. Occasionally the … Continue reading
monumental stairs
The monumental. Rome, the grandest of Italian hill towns, has an abundance of stairs unequaled anywhere in the world. A complicated topography, and a populace with an insatiable appetite for pomp, spurred architects to devise panoramic staircases for social and … Continue reading
audubon: illusions of spontaneity
Returning to the original paintings of John James Audubon and not the proliferation of cheap prints, brings us directly back to his highly personal method and approach- and to the most intimate aspects of his artistic labors. On several occasions … Continue reading
upstairs downstairs
To speak of the ups and downs of stairs would sound like punning, had history not left a graphic record of their shifting importance. In the past, stairs always ranked with the noblest elements of architecture. Ascending or descending a … Continue reading
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