Like a scene from "Ben Hur": For #ReliefWednesday a terracotta relief depicting an accident at a chariot-race at the Circus Maximus. The famous circus in #Rome can be recognised due to the seven movable dolphins on the central dividing barrier, the... 🧵1/2 🏺 #archaeology

An early medieval fibula (a decorative pin for fastening garments/a brooch) in the form of an eagle, made of gold and silver inlaid with garnets and lapis lazuli. It's part of the so-called Domagnano Hoard consisting of 21 pieces. They belonged to an Ostrogothic...🧵1/3 🏺 #archaeology

Thank you so much for your kind words and support! @giboutziopoulos.bsky.social

Successfully defended my doctoral thesis on the Byzantine Empire and the enemy tribes along the Danube frontier and the dioecesis of Thrace (4th-7th c.). Today was a good day! #PhD

And now attention, late antique people! Today in Trier I was shown the Trier Ivory up close, from the front and - unseen before, at least by me- from the back! Note the strange markings, apparently by the craftsmen, and the hole for the elephant’s nerve reaching into the tusk

Historians will never be replaced by AI

OUP's Women in Antiquity is such a good idea - with recent additions on Balthild, Radegund and Theodora. global.oup.com/academic/con...

Visited the Giustiniani Palace inside the Castle of #Chios for the temporary exhibition of excavation findings from the Kaloplytis stream area with the 4th c. #mosaic floor at its forefront.

A super-rare surviving record of 174 men swearing an oath to a Carolingian king, probably Louis II in 846.

Our new article is out in Speculum! @robin-f.bsky.social called it “ #isotopes for poets” it’s a fab ongoing interdisciplinary project on a late #Roman & #EarlyMedieval cemetery in Hampshire read more 🔗 https//doi.org/10.... @hcaatedinburgh.bsky.social @edinburgharchaeo.bsky.social #archsci

Visited the early Christian basilica of St. Isidore in #Chios. Built upon the remains of an earlier structure, it encloses the martyrium of the Saint and impressive 5th-6th c. #mosaic floors with geometric patterns. #Roman #Byzantine

Dragons in Caen! I repeat dragons in Caen! Superb graffiti! Last time I was at the castle, it was a building site. I can't wait to go back (possibly next month) @catrionacooper.bsky.social #medievalsky #castles #normans

In February 360, the emperor Julian was almost crowned with a piece of jewelry that his wife Helena wore "on her head or around her neck" (Amm. Marc. 20.4.17). It's intriguing to think that it was similar to this late antique object that could be worn both as headband or as neckband. 1/

Belt buckles and brooches from the Visigothic, Ostrogothic and Merovingian Kingdoms are at the epicentre of Sam Fogg's current exhibition "Dark Ages?". www.samfogg.com/exhibitions/...

A cute cat roaming through the Archaeological Museum of Kavala, #Greece. #Caturday

Futhark runic alphabet and a cipher St. Gallen, Stiftsbibliothek, Cod. Sang. 270; Educational manuscript; second half of the 9th century; St. Gall; f.52 (e-codices.ch/en/list/one/...)

13th. c. banner of #SaintGeorge from the Musei Capitolini, #Rome.

2778 years of #Rome! #NatalediRoma

The Resurrection. Tapestry from the workshop of Pieter Van Aelst (Brussels), ca. 1524-1531. Currently at the Vatican Museums. #EasterSunday

The Trinity by Niccolò di Pietro Gerini, ca. 1400 - Musei Capitolini, #Rome. #GoodFriday

1. Yesterday @Römisch-Germanisches Museum, I had the opportunity to reacquaint myself with one of my favourite Late Roman inscriptions. This is an epitaph set up for an elite guardsman ('protector') Viatorinus, who was killed in "Barbaricum" near Deutz by "a Frank". The writing is remarkably crude.

This stunning bow fibula (a decorative pin) was found in Wittislingen, Bavaria. At nearly 16 centimeters in length, it is among the largest and most elaborately decorated examples of early medieval fibulae of its kind. Made of gold and silver inlaid with garnets and glass. A Latin...🧵1/2 📷 me

New episode out now! We talk with Dr Bart Janssens, @brepols.bsky.social about how to get published as a Byzantinist — from proposal to peer review, and what’s trending in the field. youtu.be/qhRX_yOmuXg #Byzantioexplained #ByzantineStudies #AcademicPublishing

#DidYouKnow that Theodoric the Great, ruler of the Ostrogoths (c. 475-526), was the son of two slaves? Well, he probably wasn't really... But he was according to the 7th century Merovingian Chronicle of Fredegar. It's a story -at least in Fredegar's telling- of love, deceit, dreams, & tall trees...

Really enjoyed last afternoon's talk on the Visigothic queens and female patronage throughout late antique Iberia by @carrielarocco.bsky.social, featuring many interesting observations on a great collection of inscriptions! @staclassics.bsky.social

In the seventh century, it became a thing for women across the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms to wear pieces of old Roman glass framed in gold settings as pendants on necklaces. Top left is a new find recorded this week on @findsorguk.bsky.social with others on PAS & the necklace from Sarre.

One of many things I learned through the late Walter Goffart is that there was no ubiquitous vision of "Germanic Peoples" in Late Antiquity. It only applied to communities closest to the Rhine. Once you know that, sources like the Historia Augusta here become unsurprising (i.e. Goths =/= Germani).

In The Conqueror’s Gift, Michael Maas examines the ethnographic infrastructure of the Roman Empire and the transformation of Rome’s ethnographic vision during Late Antiquity. Out now. Learn more and read a free sample: press.princeton.edu/books/hardco...

Nice find of a die for foils akin to those on the helmets from Sutton Hoo & Valsagarde - but found in southern Denmark. New find; Sutton Hoo (redrawn by @archaeodeathprof.bsky.social); Valsagarde 8 & 7; Pliezhausen disc s. Germany. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Late 15th - early 16th c. Royal Iconostasis Doors from Rethymno, depicting the #Annunciation. Currently at the museum of the Arkadi Monastery, #Crete.

In the mid-9th century, amidst fierce Viking raids, scribes in northeast Ireland copied a Latin textbook written in 6th-century Constantinople, this manuscript, is key to understanding the Irish language of the time. #NMIBlog #MuseumBlog #CuratorBlog #Archaeology www.museum.ie/en-IE/Collec...

🦅 Visigothic Eagles 🦅 These fibulae (cloak fasteners) from Valence d'Agen in SW France date to the late C6th AD and feature gilt bronze, garnet and glass. Eagles were popular Migration-era motifs due to their Roman imperial associations. Refs. MdC, Walters Art Museum My 📷 @museecluny.bsky.social

'Bene valere te cupimus' - we desire that you be well. This might be the only known handwriting of a Roman emperor. A note on a papyrus with a petition from a bishop asking for help against raiders. The note in the upper right corner might have been written by Theodosius II. P.Leid. II Z, ca. 430

Tonight's reason to go to the #cinema: Bong Joon Ho's latest flick is a must see for science fiction or Studio Ghibli aficionados!

Statue base honouring as "mistress of the world" empress Eudoxia (d. 404). Her name replaced that of an earlier empress, perhaps Constantia (d. 383). Previously the base was used for a Tyche. Some recyling! Sagalassus, Pisidia, image & discussion at laststatues.classics.ox.ac.uk/database/det...

The ruins of the Church of St. George at the northern end of the Long Wall of Thrace near cliffs of the Black Sea coast at Evcik

Find out about how the #Roman empire and its military influenced huge societal and economic changes in Scandinavia. If you like the #Romans, Scandinavia, and everything the brilliant Dagfinn Skre writes, then this is the article (and book) for you. www.khm.uio.no/english/news...

A new aDNA study, using genetics to argue that the migration of the Huns looked quite different from that of the Avars. www.pnas.org/doi/epub/10....

#news in #numismatics The Online Coins of Ostrogothic Italy (OCOI) numismatics.org/coi/ is now online! A digital typology initiated by the Münzkabinett Berlin using stable numismatic identifiers and linked open data methodologies established by nomisma.org.

On #ReliefWednesday, let's consider some rule-breaking on the Tropaeum Traiani at #Adamclisi in the Dobruja (ROM). These metopes are weathered and damaged, but the way each legionary is holding his weighted #pilum by his side (thumb forward) rather than raised (thumb back) is plainly visible.

First photo from #TheOdysseyMovie! #AncientBlueSky

Valentine's loot from my dear girlfriend! #BookSky @penguinbooksusa.bsky.social

New volume of Cahiers « Mondes anciens » Vol. 19 (2025) journals.openedition.org/mondesancien... #openaccess Chrétiens ariens et nicéens en Afrique vandale (Ve-VIe siècles)

Great start of the Centre for Late Antique Studies' spring seminars with P. Duarte Silva's talk on Sermons on the Barbarian Threat in the West! @staclassics.bsky.social

The Gothic alphabet, copied into Vienna cod. 795 around the year 800, perhaps in preparation for trying to convert the Avars?