Simon Bralee
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simonbralee.com
Simon Bralee
@simonbralee.com
3.3K followers 860 following 480 posts
Advocate for arts and humanities. I believe in the importance of sharing the stories of research to create impact outside of universities. Comms professional and history postgrad researching Anubis in the Roman World. 🏛️🐍
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Reposted by Simon Bralee
chapps.bsky.social
Your naked, winged #Etruscan waiter pours you some olive oil while wearing a swan's head cap. God love the Etruscans.

3rd c. BCE bronze three-nozzle hanging lamp with a statuette of a rural Dionysian Etruscan 'spirit'. Replicas needed! 🏺🦢 #BritishMuseum

📸 me
Bronze three-nozzled hanging lamp surmounted by a statuette on a plinth. This winged figure wears a swan's head cap and appears to be an Etruscan spirit connected with the rural and Dionysiac world, and links with the scene on the underside of the lamp (a drawing of which shows three women holding paterae - offering dishes - and wine vessels while dancing around a floral centerpiece with the head of a smiling horned man). British Museum, London (1824,0454.25)
November 25, 2025 at 6:19 PM
simonbralee.com
12 powerful, challenging, painful and joyous artworks responding to UCL’s history of eugenics at the university’s Stratford site, including Dog Whistle, a video installation by Veronica McKenzie partly inspired by Galton’s trip to Egypt. I recommend a visit
#Egyptology www.ucl.ac.uk/ucl-east/pub...
A screen showing the artist in front of the pyramids in Giza.
November 25, 2025 at 8:46 PM
Reposted by Simon Bralee
archaeohawke.bsky.social
#MosaicMonday

Fragment of a floor mosaic depicting a woman with a sistrum, probably priestess of Isis cult -Late #Roman period, 4th century AD - from a domus in #Carthage, #Tunisia - now in the British Museum.

#History #art #Archaeology
November 24, 2025 at 8:07 AM
Reposted by Simon Bralee
sarahmay1.bsky.social
My timeline is full of images without alt text, mostly archaeological. What's going on? Is it people posting on the weekend who aren't thinking about accessibility because it's the weekend? Inclusion isn't just for professional life. Get it together folks! Use the setting, think of other people.
November 22, 2025 at 9:41 AM
simonbralee.com
My favourite detail of this fresco of Isis (and Harpocrates) is the crocodile at the bottom, just in case we missed where this scene was set #Egyptology
doccrom.bsky.social Dr Crom @doccrom.bsky.social · 6d
#FrescoFriday - Discovered November 1765: Isis welcomes Io at Canopus, complete with snakes and sistra-shaking. From the Ekklesiasterion in the Temple of Isis, Pompeii (VIII.7.28). #Pompeii #Archaeology 🏺

Image: National Archaeological Museum, Naples (9558). Link - mann-napoli.it/en/tempio-di...
November 21, 2025 at 11:26 AM
simonbralee.com
Bronze figurine of the goddess Venus from St Albans, holding an apple to entice Paris. Likely from a Roman period domestic shrine in the town. Verulamium Museum 🏺 #AncientBluesky
A bronze figurine of a woman wearing a skirt blowing open and no top. In her right hand she holds a round object, identified as an apple.
November 18, 2025 at 1:04 PM
simonbralee.com
Two jackals on a stele, dedicated to the cult of the Emperor Nero, showing a combination of Egyptian iconography and a Greek inscription. From Asyut (Greek - Lycopolis, Wolf city), home to a major temple dedicated to Wepwawet, a canine god. 🏺 #Egyptology #AncientBluesky
A stele from Egypt. At the top a winged solar disk hovers above two crouching jackals whose snouts almost touch over an ankh symbol. At the bottom, Greek text.
November 15, 2025 at 8:05 PM
simonbralee.com
To be fair, this is a pretty cool top. I realise people are doing their job, but does seem a bit silly. Either way, it’s nice to see Hellebore get free publicity ahead of the holiday season.
‘Demonic’ Wind in the Willows jumper banned from Westminster Abbey
Woman told to remove or cover up garment featuring 1908 illustration of Pan lest it offend worshippers
www.theguardian.com
November 14, 2025 at 7:55 AM
Reposted by Simon Bralee
robin-f.bsky.social
The cover of my forthcoming book, out in February/March. #dogs #Roman-Britain #animalturm #archaeology
November 12, 2025 at 5:12 PM
simonbralee.com
Osiris Ptah Sokar statuette giving Monday morning vibes (Made in Ancient Egypt, Fitzwilliam)
🏺 #Egyptology #AncientBluesky
Gilded face from a wooden statue of the god Osiris Ptah Sokar. The nose and mouth are carved but the eyes are painted in black in an ancient Egyptian style. It looks fed up.
November 10, 2025 at 11:41 AM
Reposted by Simon Bralee
sardonicus.eu
Trained Cat Hypnotizes Woman 3 panels a cat sat on a desk, next to a telephone, looking at a woman the womans head slumped forward a close up of the cats eyes
November 9, 2025 at 10:16 AM
simonbralee.com
A review of the Made in Ancient Egypt exhibition at the Fitzwilliam Museum #Egyptology
Made in Ancient Egypt
A review of the new exhibition at the Fitzwilliam Museum.
rhakotis.com
November 7, 2025 at 1:52 PM
simonbralee.com
This is a serious breach from the Culture Secretary showing a complete lack of ethical rigour. Snd does not look good for Keir Starmer to try and lessen it by saying it “was not entirely up to the standard expected”
Nandy breached code over appointment of donor to lead football regulator
Culture secretary ‘deeply regrets error’ after inquiry finds failures in declaring past donations by watchdog nominee
www.theguardian.com
November 6, 2025 at 8:09 PM
simonbralee.com
Pilgrim badge of St Leonard, looking like a medieval yoda

🏛️ Kings Chapel Museum, Cambridge
A thin metal badge depicting a monk wearing robes and holding a staff. He looks like he has pointed ears.
November 5, 2025 at 4:16 PM
simonbralee.com
Londoners have always been grumpy as can been proved by this fossil of brychaetus muelleri found in London Clay (Island of Sheppey, so technically not London). They were large fish with armour-covered bodies and sharp teeth, 50-55 million years ago.
🏛️Sedgwick Museum.
Fossil of Brychaetus muelleri
November 4, 2025 at 9:51 PM
simonbralee.com
Classical bust (of Antoninus Pius?) covered in shells in the window of Sinai & Sons, Kensington Church Street 🏺 #AncientBluesky
A black Roman bust covered in various shells.
November 3, 2025 at 9:25 PM
Reposted by Simon Bralee
damienhuffer.bsky.social
www.bbc.com/news/article... @museumofloot.bsky.social
Netherlands to return stolen ancient sculpture to Egypt
The 3,500-year-old stone head was likely stolen during the Arab Spring uprising.
www.bbc.com
November 3, 2025 at 7:32 AM
simonbralee.com
So we enter November, aka Anubis month. This image from a calendar mosaic from Thysdrus (El-Jem, Tunisia) depicts a festival commemorating the death of Osiris, which was celebrated all over the Roman Empire (Sousse Archaeological Museum, © Ad Meskens / Wikimedia Commons) 🏺 #AncientBluesky
Detail from a mosaic depicting three similarly sized men. The first on the right is dressed as Anubis. He is wearing a dog mask and red robe. He holds a caduceus. His hands seem to be a different colour to his mask, suggesting he is a human and not the god. The two men to his right are wearing white robes, possibly linen. Both of their heads are clean shaven and they wear feathers on their head, possibly a symbol of priestly office. According to Clement of Alexandria, scribes wore feathers. Above them the text reads ‘November’
November 1, 2025 at 8:39 AM
Reposted by Simon Bralee
drannaclark.bsky.social
November
Englishmen vs Frenchmen
Thomas Rowlandson 1788
Royal Collections Trust
November 1, 2025 at 6:05 AM
simonbralee.com
When they re-installed it, they joked the Glass Armonica would sound again only when America was in peril. Recently a strange, high pitched, eldritch noise has been heard coming from the room. Yet when the curators go up to investigate no one is there and the instrument is closed up.
simonbralee.com Simon Bralee @simonbralee.com · 27d
A replica of Benjamin Franklin’s Glass Armonica in his London home, now a museum. He said this musical instrument was the invention that gave him the most joy. It was quite the hit in Europe: Mozart composed for it, and Beethoven, Donizetti and Saint-Saëns all used it in pieces.
A long rectangular wooden cupboard with a section open on the shortest side, like a piano or harpsichord keyboard but it contains a cylinder of decreasing-sized glass bowls. You play it by rubbing the glass bowls which are all tuned to different pitches.
October 31, 2025 at 9:42 PM
simonbralee.com
A replica of Benjamin Franklin’s Glass Armonica in his London home, now a museum. He said this musical instrument was the invention that gave him the most joy. It was quite the hit in Europe: Mozart composed for it, and Beethoven, Donizetti and Saint-Saëns all used it in pieces.
A long rectangular wooden cupboard with a section open on the shortest side, like a piano or harpsichord keyboard but it contains a cylinder of decreasing-sized glass bowls. You play it by rubbing the glass bowls which are all tuned to different pitches.
October 31, 2025 at 4:05 PM
Reposted by Simon Bralee
chapps.bsky.social
This bronze head of a goddess with her spooky, hypnotic inlaid silver eyes, will be roaming the shadows tonight on All Hallows Eve! Still looking for her body, 2,000 years later … 😱 🏺 1/

Hellenistic, 150-100 BCE, Mersin, Turkey. #BritishMuseum
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Bronze head of a woman or goddess, torn from a full-sized statue. She wears a lunette diadem with inlaid silver patterns, with a star in the middle. Her wavy hair is center parted and pulled back into a bun. She looks directly into the camera with inlaid silver eyes, set beneath shadowed brows. With her mottled brown and green patina, the effect is frightening! British Museum (1928,0416.1)
October 30, 2025 at 2:14 PM
Reposted by Simon Bralee
archaeocarrie.bsky.social
Here’s a beautiful little monkey from the tomb of Maya and Merry from Saqqara. #Egyptology #Archaeology
A carved relief of a monkey underneath a throne
October 29, 2025 at 3:06 AM
simonbralee.com
A friend sent me this: NYT Connections trying to build bridges after Victoria Coren-Mitchell insulted it last week. #OnlyConnect
NYT Wall
October 27, 2025 at 8:07 PM
simonbralee.com
Loving this version of The Hymn to Inanna by Enheduanna, translated into Scots by Robert Crawford. Available in most recent issue of the LRB.

“I’ve sang yir halie sang.
Goddess, fit for aa airts, it’s blythe tae hymn ye,
Kind, bricht, guid woman, aa yir airts I’ve sang!”

🏺 #AncientBluesky
Robert Crawford · Poem: ‘Enheduanna’s Song’
www.lrb.co.uk
October 27, 2025 at 5:23 PM