Felis catus
Seen on Facebook: cat mosaics purported to be from Pompeii. Snopes says no, they’re by a contemporary artist. Still nice cat mosaics though.
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Seen on Facebook: cat mosaics purported to be from Pompeii. Snopes says no, they’re by a contemporary artist. Still nice cat mosaics though.
I saw Pompeii…uhhh…50 years ago.
They’ve recovered lots of good stuff there, but it’s mostly fragments; old; broken; discolored. Nothing like as good condition as the pictures above.
Also, the style above is too modern. For comparison, here’s a fresco from Pompeii: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Pompeii_-_Casa_di_Marte_e_Venere_-_MAN.jpg
I think that top left one is my cat. I wonder when she found time to pose?
I went to Pompeii on my honeymoon 23 years ago. It was incredible but far, far too hot and busy and we were unwisely with a tour group and ended up rushing far too much for my liking. I’d like to be able to spend a whole day there.
With superhuman patience and effort, extremely impressive reconstructions can be made from fragments, and examples can be seen at the Pergamon Museum in Berlin, such as the Ishtar Gate (https://www.pinterest.com/pin/621426448552638175/ (my own photos are better, but they aren’t accessible on the web)). One of the things they have displayed is a chest of about 1 x 0.5 x 0.5 m full of little bits of mosaics all strewn together, each of them about 3 to 4 cm in length. The notice attached to it says that the main things on display were assembled as giant jigsaws of pieces just like that.
After a bit of searching I’ve found much better pictures of the Ishtar Gate than the one I linked to earlier:
https://www.dailyartmagazine.com/ishtar-gate/
This also includes a black and white photo of the rubble from which the gate was reconstructed.
Well there are a couple of dog mosaics in Pompeii:
http://ancientrome.ru/art/img/8/8748.jpg
https://c8.alamy.com/comp/BHG07H/roman-mosaic-of-dog-cave-canem-pompeii-italy-BHG07H.jpg
I remember when I was there some areas (e.g. the brothel) were completely packed with tourists, but other areas I was able to wander around completely alone. It was uncanny. And only a small fraction of the city has been excavated.
Well, you both had more luck than I did. Back in 1980, I was on a school trip to the eastern Mediterranean organized and led by one of my history teachers. One of our last stops before returning home was Naples. But it was a Monday, so Pompeii itself was closed. We did get to the nearby volcanic fumerole site of Solfatara, which featured hot, bubbling mud, and the pervasive aroma of rotten eggs. Not so many toursists there! We might not have got to the ruins, but we did get a tiny glimpse of the same forces that won the geologic game of rock, paper, scissors way back when.
And at least one dog: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Pompeii_dog_%2824042189872%29.jpg
Authentic cat mosaic from Pompeii