LightNews LightNews
edakin.bsky.social
@edakin.bsky.social
66 followers 190 following 11 posts
Ancient World. Bonsai. Muay Thai. Husband.
Posts Replies Media Videos
Reposted
drnwillburger.bsky.social
For #EpigraphyTuesday a Roman infantery helmet (Weisenau type) with an owner’s inscription formed by punched dots on the neck guard: the helmet belonged to Lucius Lucretius Celer, legionary in the centuria of Gaius Mummius Lolianus of the legio I adiutrix. 🧵1/2

📷me

🏺 #archaeology
Side profile view of a helmet displayed in a museum case. It's mounted on a metal stand.The patinated helmet features a rounded dome-shaped skull cap, a broad flared neck guard extending downward. The punched inscripton is visible.
February 3, 2026 at 7:46 AM
Reposted
archaeohawke.bsky.social
Red clay terracotta head depicting a river divinity (Medma?) h 31.6 cm - from the ancient Medma, oggi Rosarno, Calabria, Italy 400 BC.

Musée d'art et d'history de Geneva, Switzerland.

#Archaeology #History #goddess #AncientBlueSky
February 2, 2026 at 10:37 AM
Reposted
benwurgaft.bsky.social
for, um, almost no reason at all, here is Margaret Talbot's 2018 article on how we got the myth of whiteness in classical statuary, with references to @sarahebond.bsky.social: www.newyorker.com/magazine/201...
The Myth of Whiteness in Classical Sculpture
For centuries, Westerners have been engaged in an act of collective blindness.
www.newyorker.com
February 2, 2026 at 7:05 PM
Reposted
potsofhistory.bsky.social
⏳A gentle reminder that our special offer ends on 10 Feb.
The newest figure is inspired by a Late Bronze Age terracotta from Cyprus. Learn more about her mystery, and every order of a goddess figure currently includes a FREE Miniature Palaeolithic Figurine.
potted-history.co.uk
February 2, 2026 at 7:42 PM
Reposted
ishaantharoor.bsky.social
Such is the outrage in Denmark over both Trump’s desire for Greenland and disparaging remarks about NATO that one of the country’s leading newspapers devoted their Saturday front and plenty of room inside to the bios of all 44 Danes slain during NATO missions in support of the US
February 1, 2026 at 12:01 PM
Reposted
followinghadrian.bsky.social
Happy February! The Kalends of February honoured Juno Sospita, the goddess who protected the Roman state. February was considered the month of purification rites. From 13 to 15, the Romans celebrated the Lupercalia, a festival intended to purify the city and promote fertility.
February on the Mosaic with the months of the year, starting with the Roman first month, March. From Thysdrus (El Jem). The scene shows the Lupercalia purification rites (a pastoral festival observed annually from February 13 through 15) with two men forcibly holding a naked woman while a third man whips her thighs. Dated 1st half of the 3rd century AD. Sousse Archaeological Museum, Tunisia. Statue of Juno Sospita. Dated to the 2nd century AD. Vatican Museums, Rome.
February 1, 2026 at 5:18 PM
Reposted
robertsnickc.bsky.social
#Photography, ‘Medusa,’ Nemi, Italy #art
February 1, 2026 at 2:44 PM
edakin.bsky.social
integrity
January 31, 2026 at 11:38 PM
Reposted
jonathanfoyle.bsky.social
The Ironic order
January 31, 2026 at 5:45 PM
Reposted
maris.bsky.social
I keep thinking again, in light of the latest Epstein files dump, about how MeToo “went too far.”
January 31, 2026 at 3:43 PM
edakin.bsky.social
Cookie Guggleman- you don't forget the best.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=2rIH...
Best in Show Cookie Guggleman and Malcolm
YouTube video by Brendan Barry
www.youtube.com
January 31, 2026 at 11:52 AM
edakin.bsky.social
www.theguardian.com/artanddesign...
Wall of Tears: 50ft Brooklyn mural pays tribute to children killed in Gaza
Installation remembers the names of over 18,000 children killed by Israel in Gaza between October 2023 and July 2025
www.theguardian.com
January 30, 2026 at 11:35 AM
Reposted
linmakron.bsky.social
The US Embassy removing 44 flags outside the embassy in Denmark - flags placed to honour soldiers who died fighting for the US - is disgraceful.

The flags were placed by veterans, furious over Trump's dismissal of NATO allied soldiers.
This isn't "protocol." It's cowardly, insulting, and shameful.
January 28, 2026 at 12:48 PM
Reposted
doccrom.bsky.social
#ReliefWednesday - A rather fabulous polychrome relief of a 'secutor' type gladiator, with wonderful colour survival: ca. 2nd Century AD. Its excavation context was only rediscovered in 2017. #Art #Gladiator 🏺

Image: Archaeological Museum of Thessaloniki (MTH 28158). Link - amth.gr/en/exhibitio...
January 28, 2026 at 9:48 AM
Reposted
phillipspobrien.bsky.social
Anyone surprised by this story has been living in a fantasy world. Since Jan 2025, the Trump administration has been using lots of different tactics to force Ukraine to commit strategic suicide. This is just the latest.
The real story is that people have not grasped this reality.
January 27, 2026 at 9:37 AM
Reposted
paregorios.bsky.social
What's happening in the camps:

> Senator Ossoff’s investigation has received or identified over a thousand credible reports of human rights abuses within U.S.
immigration detention since January 20, 2025

www.ossoff.senate.gov/wp-content/u...
www.ossoff.senate.gov
January 27, 2026 at 6:46 PM
Reposted
brittunculus.bsky.social
'Victory' and inscription recording construction of a section of the Antonine Wall, AD140s.

"For the Emperor Caesar Titus Aelius Hadrianus Antoninus Augustus Pius, father of his country, a detachment of the 20th Legion Valeria Victrix built 4,411 feet."

RIB 2208.
#EpigraphyTuesday
#ReliefWednesday
A personification of Victory reclining languidly, framed within a temple. She has a palm leaf in her left hand, elbow resting on a globe, and holds a huge wreath with her right. The inscription is split into three with the name and titles of the emperor in the pediment, the reference to the legion in the wreath and the distance constructed in a tablet at the base. The boar shown running across the tablet was the emblem of Leg XX VV. (And maybe brags of how quickly the legion built their section?) The slab marked the western end of the Wall near Old Kilpatrick. Photo - The Hunterian, University of Glasgow
January 27, 2026 at 8:03 AM
Reposted
chapps.bsky.social
The article below adds some fascinating detail to the rule of the #Thracian king Seuthes III, whose bronze portrait head, greaves and helmet I've photographed, below. He straddled multiple cultures, as the treasures from his tomb attest. 🏺

📸 me #ancientbluesky

flic.kr/s/aHBqjBSifK
The slightly over-life-size bronze head of a bearded man was found ipropped up on the ground of a rich Thracian tomb. As can be seen from the ragged edges of the bronze's neck, the head was crudely separated from the body of a statue, of which no trace was discovered in the tumulus. The excavators have speculated that the comprehensive equipment of the tomb with royal accoutrements despite the absence of human remains, together with the deposition of a reused partial portrait statue, suggests a symbolic rather than physical interment of the king. His body was not in the tomb. The hollow-cast bronze itself is in an exceptional state of preservation. The surfaces of both the hair and the flesh parts display a noble patina, in a palette between malachite green and dark chocolate browns. Most extraordinary, however, are the composite eyes, made from various materials, including alabaster for the sclera and glass in contrasting colors and opacity levels for the pupils, irises, and lacrimal caruncles. The eyes are inserted into open sockets of the hollow bronze, where they are framed by eyelashes cut from thin sheets of copper. The translucency and reflectiveness of the irises are such that the eyes retain their literal sparkle, giving the portrait an intense gaze that has rarely failed to stun viewers in the twenty years since the portrait's discovery. The image of a mature man is characterized by an ovoid skull, with a rounded forehead, wide-set eyes under bushy eyebrows, a large and aquiline nose, long handlebar mustache, and an untrimmed, scraggly beard - spade-like and jutting forward. In the combination of these iconographic and physiognomic details, the head is unlike any known portrait of a Greek man, including philosophers or rulers. The context of the head's discovery in the tomb of Seuthes Ill makes it more than plausible that the portrait indeed represents that Odrysian king. 3/4 view of the front, with its shaggy beard jutting forward. The slightly over-life-size bronze head of a bearded man was found ipropped up on the ground of a rich Thracian tomb. As can be seen from the ragged edges of the bronze's neck, the head was crudely separated from the body of a statue, of which no trace was discovered in the tumulus. The excavators have speculated that the comprehensive equipment of the tomb with royal accoutrements despite the absence of human remains, together with the deposition of a reused partial portrait statue, suggests a symbolic rather than physical interment of the king. His body was not in the tomb. The hollow-cast bronze itself is in an exceptional state of preservation. The surfaces of both the hair and the flesh parts display a noble patina, in a palette between malachite green and dark chocolate browns. Most extraordinary, however, are the composite eyes, made from various materials, including alabaster for the sclera and glass in contrasting colors and opacity levels for the pupils, irises, and lacrimal caruncles. The eyes are inserted into open sockets of the hollow bronze, where they are framed by eyelashes cut from thin sheets of copper. The translucency and reflectiveness of the irises are such that the eyes retain their literal sparkle, giving the portrait an intense gaze that has rarely failed to stun viewers in the twenty years since the portrait's discovery. The image of a mature man is characterized by an ovoid skull, with a rounded forehead, wide-set eyes under bushy eyebrows, a large and aquiline nose, long handlebar mustache, and an untrimmed, scraggly beard - spade-like and jutting forward. In the combination of these iconographic and physiognomic details, the head is unlike any known portrait of a Greek man, including philosophers or rulers. The context of the head's discovery in the tomb of Seuthes Ill makes it more than plausible that the portrait indeed represents that Odrysian king. Right side view, showing the hooked nose in particular. Excavated from the Golyama Kosmatka tumulus (burial mound) in 2004, these bronze greaves were among the opulent grave goods associated with the Thracian King Seuthes III. The armor found in the tumulus - a bronze helmet, this pair of decorated bronze greaves, a gorget-pectoral, and fragments of a composite (leather?) corselet - was all highly decorative and probably ceremonial. The greaves were cast in separate molds for the right and left legs, and additionally forged and chiseled; the knees are decorated in high relief with heads of Athena wearing an Attic helmet with three crests, supported by figures of a sphinx (the central one) and griffins (the lateral ones). Bronze, late 4th century BCE. Kazanlak, Iskra Historical Museum, Bulgaria. Photographed by me at an exhibition on ancient Thrace at the Getty Villa Museum in Malibu, California. From the Golyama Kosmatka tumulus near the town of Shipka, Bulgaria. The tomb inside is believed to be associated with the Thracian king Seuthes III (ca. 330-300/295 BCE). A rich assembly of luxury objects and armor were found in the burial chamber, including this bronze helmet and several silver vessels bearing inscriptions with the king's name, as well as a few bronze coins of Seuthes. The archaeologists did not, however, find any human remains or other evidence of an actual burial. This helmet is of the so-called Chalkidian type, with fixed cheekpieces, and belongs to the "Thracian group" with an outwardly curved nape guard. In the middle of the pediment-like frontal part, there is a dotted inscription: ΣΕΥΘΟΥ, "(belonging to) Seuthes." Soldered above the inscription is a gilded-silver appliqué depicting the frontally facing head of the goddess Athena wearing a winged helmet terminating in a swan's head at the top. Two silver plume holders were attached above the temples. Late 4th century BCE, bronze and silver with partial gilding. Kazanlak, Iskra Historical Museum, Bulgaria. ______ Photographed at the Getty Villa Museum, part of the 'Ancient Thrace and the Classical World: Treasures from Bulgaria, Romania, and Greece' exhibition.
January 26, 2026 at 7:19 PM
Reposted
randalljstephens.bsky.social
This March 1965 Herblock cartoon about police violence against civil rights activists has added relevance today.
January 26, 2026 at 1:08 PM
Reposted
drnwillburger.bsky.social
Given the news, it seems appropriate to share this photograph once more. Feel free to share.

Hand of a gilded bronze statue of an Roman emperor.

From Kempten, 1st to 3rd c. AD
On display at Archäologische Staatssammlung

📷 me
A large bronze hand is displayed in a museum, with its middle finger extended while the other fingers except the thumb are broken or missing
January 25, 2026 at 10:09 AM
edakin.bsky.social
"He likened the US to Imperial Rome."
www.bbc.com/news/article...
As we return to a pre-WW2 order, the middle powers face a challenge
With economic stagnation and extremes of inequality comes corrosion of trust in democratic institutions. So Trump may be a symptom, not a cause, of what Carney called a "rupture" with the post-WW2 ord...
www.bbc.com
January 25, 2026 at 2:34 PM
edakin.bsky.social
www.theguardian.com/world/2026/j...
‘If you haven’t served, respect those who have’: Nato soldiers on Trump’s slurs
For those who fought alongside US troops in Afghanistan and Iraq, president’s remarks have cut deep
www.theguardian.com
January 25, 2026 at 1:52 PM
edakin.bsky.social
Great pictures. Hard choice, but Aspens in the fall was my favorite.
kschafferphoto.bsky.social Kevin Schaffer @kschafferphoto.bsky.social · Dec 31
As 2025 winds down I'd like to take a moment and thank everyone for your support this past year, and this past decade, since none of this would be possible without you.

And, ICYMI, here are some of my favorite images from 2025...

kevinschaffer.wordpress.com/2025/12/26/2...
2025 Favorites
It’s that time of year where I look ahead and look back. Every year I enjoy looking at the images I’ve made over the past twelve months, reliving the memories, the mistakes, the could haves should …
kevinschaffer.wordpress.com
January 25, 2026 at 1:24 PM
Reposted
michaeljflynn.bsky.social
Bronze statue of Artemis, swept by a flood, in a side wadi near Petra's city centre.
The only known large cast-bronze statue from Petra; melting metal objects during this era was common practice. She was probably portrayed holding down an animal with her knee.
Petra/ Roman period (2nd century CE)
January 23, 2026 at 2:21 PM
Reposted
robertsnickc.bsky.social
Hypnos, the Greek personification of sleep.

#Photography by Henry Beauchamp Walters (1915) #art #sculpture
January 23, 2026 at 2:38 PM