Zeus

Olive oil is used today in mostly cooking and for health reasons. But in Rome there were many more ways it was used, making it one of the most valuable goods in the empire.

Tragedy and comedy as we know these theatrical forms today were developed by the Greeks as early as the 6th century BCE. This gallery features rare objects depicting scenes and actors from plays, many of which are now lost to us. Ephemeral performances of dancers, musicians, singers, and actors live on here. In ancient Greece, plays began as a way to honor Dionysos—the Greeks wrote and performed for the festivals held in his honor.

The two separate areas of figural decoration on this vase have been attributed to different painters: the small satyr and maenads on the shoulder to the Berlin Painter; and the larger figures of Athena and the slain Giant Enkelados on the body to the Painter of Goluchow 37. Scholars have named these two painters, whose actual names remain unknown, after other vases they have painted, now in Berlin and Warsaw. The victory of Athena and the Olympian gods over the Giants has been interpreted as a metaphor for the Greek victory over the Persians around the time this vase was made. Thus, although Enkelados appears as a fully armed warrior, he falls in utter and complete defeat—bleeding from multiple wounds, eyes rolling back, sword dropping from his hand.

v. I. The neolithic and early and middle Minoan ages. -- v. II. pt. I. Fresh lights on origins and external relations: the restoration in town and palace after...