Jon Hawke
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archaeohawke.bsky.social
Jon Hawke
@archaeohawke.bsky.social
3.2K followers 830 following 1.1K posts
#Archaeology, #Ancient #Classical World & #Roman Frontier Studies MA. Former life Archaeologist doing a bit now and then. Every day above ground is a good day! Romanes eunt domus!😂
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archaeohawke.bsky.social
Jon Hawke @archaeohawke.bsky.social · Jun 30
The #Welsh phrase

"dod yn ôl at fy nghoed",

meaning

"to return to a balanced state of mind",

literally means

"to return to my #trees"
🌲🌳🌳🌲🌳🌲
Reposted by Jon Hawke
romanbritain.bsky.social
#RomanSiteSaturday

The #basilica occupied one side of the #forum. This building was huge, measuring 260 ft long and 182 ft wide. The basilica was used for civic events.

It must have dwarfed other buildings, standing roughly 65 ft high. #Caerwent #RomanBritain #Archaeology
Forum to the left.
December 6, 2025 at 3:35 PM
archaeohawke.bsky.social
#RomanSiteSaturday
Carsium was a fortress built in the #Roman province of Moesia in the 1st C AD by the #Emperor #Trajan on campaign against Dacia.

The Ist Italica #legion stationed there. It defended the province and the River #Danube.
#Archaeology #Military #History #Romania
December 6, 2025 at 3:37 PM
Reposted by Jon Hawke
kpw1453.bsky.social
A fragment of late 2nd century wall plaster from Roman Winchester (Venta Belgarum). Now part of the collections at Winchester City Museum. 📸 #FrescoFriday #Winchester #RomanBritain
December 5, 2025 at 7:11 AM
Reposted by Jon Hawke
chapps.bsky.social
This small bronze figurine of a naked Gaulish woman projects great vulnerability - which was certainly the point, but not in a good way. She's identified by her torc and represents the eroticization of a conquered people. 🏺

Found in the River Seine, Paris. Roman, 100-200 CE. #BritishMuseum
📸 me
Small bronze figurine of a naked woman - a girl, really - sitting on the ground, mostly on her left thigh, as her legs are pulled back. She has her right hand on her right ankle, and her head is turned to her left and slightly upwards; her left hand is on the ground. This pose creates a great tension in the work. She wears a large torc around her neck, with bulbous terminals, and a bracelet on each wrist (which may have been gilded, as well as the torc). The bronze surface is heavily corroded from centuries in the river. A very affecting portrait of a conquered Gaulish woman. British Museum, London (1867,0508.748)
December 5, 2025 at 4:04 PM
Reposted by Jon Hawke
kpw1453.bsky.social
Detail from the Winchester Hanging Bowl. Dating from the late C7th or C8th, the bowl was found as part of an Anglo-Saxon burial at Oliver's Battery, near Winchester in Hampshire. Now part of the collections at Winchester City Museum. 📸 #FindsFriday #AngloSaxon #Winchester
December 5, 2025 at 7:11 AM
Reposted by Jon Hawke
drnwillburger.bsky.social
One of my most favourite glass vessels: A marvellous Roman vessel in the form of a pig, made of blue glass. It was used to hold ointment or perfume.
Found in a burial in Cologne. Dating late 2nd/early 3rd century AD

📷 Römisch-Germanisches Museum Köln

🏺 #archaeology
Deep blue glass vessel shaped like a stylized animal with four legs, a pointed snout, and decorative ridges along its back, resembling a whimsical pig.
December 5, 2025 at 9:10 AM
Reposted by Jon Hawke
theduncanmackay.bsky.social
Snap.
Here’s one I made earlier…
Crude face carved onto a natural stone boulder.
December 5, 2025 at 10:38 AM
Reposted by Jon Hawke
drtobydriver.bsky.social
#FindsFriday A mystery stone head on display at Castell Henllys Iron Age fort in Pembrokeshire, found locally in north Pembrokeshire

Not a typical 'Celtic' head but nonetheless possesses many features which could suggest an Iron Age date 🧐🤔

📷 My own, last week
December 5, 2025 at 9:01 AM
archaeohawke.bsky.social
#FrescoFriday
#Roman fresco excavated dating back to the late 1st century BC. It depicts a human figure against a vibrant red background. This is one of the finest #paintings ever found in #ancient Gaul
(Arles Departmental Museum of Antiquities) #France
#Archaeology #art
December 5, 2025 at 2:41 PM
archaeohawke.bsky.social
The Wandsworth Shield, a 2nd century BC #Celtic bronze boss found in the River Thames on display at the British Museum.

#Archaeology #History #artwork #art #FindsFriday
December 5, 2025 at 1:15 PM
archaeohawke.bsky.social
#RomanFortThursday

Satala - Some remains of the walls of the rectangular #Roman #legionary #fortress survive, though much ruined. Their line can be traced on all four sides of the fortress that encompassed an area of 15.7 ha. Originally home to the 16th legio Flavia
#History
December 4, 2025 at 8:30 AM
Reposted by Jon Hawke
drjeball.bsky.social
A beautiful #Roman glass bowl, cobalt blue with an irregular white swirling pattern - it must have looked fantastic on an ancient table! (📷 Bonhams) 🏺 #AncientBlueSky
December 3, 2025 at 8:05 PM
Reposted by Jon Hawke
rogueclassicist.bsky.social
Classical Sparta: A Militaristic Society?
www.karwansaraypublishers.com/en-ca/blogs/...
Classical Sparta: A Militaristic Society?
Here is an excerpt from an article in the upcoming issue of Ancient History 57 in which Stephen Hodkinson, Emeritus Professor of Ancient History at the University of Nottingham and Director Emeritus o...
www.karwansaraypublishers.com
December 3, 2025 at 8:02 PM
Reposted by Jon Hawke
chapps.bsky.social
Abbondanza! This large mosaic emblema uses a limited palette of stone tesserae to depict baskets of fish and fruit, symbols of abundance from the sea and land. It probably once decorated the floor of a Roman villa's triclinium (dining room). 🏺

1st-2nd c. CE, Carthage. #BritishMuseum
📸 me
Large rectangular section of a mosaic floor. It depicts a round wicker basket at the bottom, spilling out a variety of fish, eels, and crustaceans. At the top, a tube-like wicker basket is on its side, with an intricate diamond pattern around the rim - it holds masses of fruit, probably figs, as fig leaves stick out at the bottom). The background is made of white tesserae, and the scene is contained within a thick black border.
December 2, 2025 at 5:43 PM
Reposted by Jon Hawke
drtobydriver.bsky.social
On the first fabulous #HillfortsWednesday of December ☃️🎄 - the mysterious Dinas Mawr coastal promontory fort above Pwll Deri on Stumble Head, Pembrokeshire

Two ramparts cut off a tiny headland dominated by a rock tower - presumably the focus of all the enclosure effort 🧐⛰️

📷 My own, Sunday
A rocky headland looking out across the sea
December 3, 2025 at 7:38 AM
Reposted by Jon Hawke
durotrigesdig.bsky.social
With shades of The Killer Rabbit of Caerbannog this RCHME plan of Coney's Castle hillfort has a Dorset mega-bunny on the N arrow 🐇

It used to be thought the name came from the Saxon / Germanic word for king (Cyning / König)

More likely it reflects later rabbit (Coney) breeding

#HillfortsWednesday
A black and white inked plan of the ramparts that define the Iron Age hillfort of Coney's Castle in Dorset with trees depicted in the top left and a giant rabbit over the north arrow
December 3, 2025 at 9:18 AM
Reposted by Jon Hawke
anthonymajanlahti.bsky.social
This #ReliefWednesday at the exhibition "La Grecia a Roma" at the #CapitolineMuseums, we're admiring an #Attic #relief of dancing #nymphs from 390-380 BCE, borrowed from the #VaticanMuseums. Perhaps from a funeral stela, this dance might be a reminder of how quickly time passes. #AncientBluesky 🏺
MARBLE RELIEF OF DANCING NYMPHS, 390-380 BCE. MUSEO GREGORIANO PROFANO, VATICAN MUSEUMS This beautiful graceful relief of unknown provenance shows three female figures in full figure, holding hands and dancing. Though the faces of the figures are almost completely worn off, the rest of the relief is full of movement and detail. The light dresses of the women cling to their bodies and flutter in the dance. The two figures at centre and at right are looking at each other, the central woman turning her head to look back at the woman on the right. This is not a Dionysiac dance, but might be a representation of the Horai, nymphs of the hours, and their dance might be a lyrical expression of the swift passage of time.
December 3, 2025 at 10:53 AM
Reposted by Jon Hawke
rogueclassicist.bsky.social
First evidence of lost-wax casting for silver in Bronze Age Western Europe uncovered
phys.org/news/2025-12...
First evidence of lost-wax casting for silver in Bronze Age Western Europe uncovered
In a recent study, Dr. Linda Boutoille uncovered the first evidence of lost-wax casting of silver objects in Bronze Age Iberia and, to date, Western Europe. Published in the Oxford Journal of Archaeol...
phys.org
December 3, 2025 at 7:50 PM
Reposted by Jon Hawke
anthonymajanlahti.bsky.social
#EpigraphyTuesday brings us to a tombstone from the C2 CE, found just outside the #PortaSalaria. It's a sad #inscription with odd spelling, commemorating Gaius Pomponius Heracon, an architect and ship-builder, dead at 25. #AncientBluesky 🏺
TOMBSTONE OF C. POMPONIUS HERACON, C2 CE. CAPITOLINE MUSEUMS D(is) M(anibus). / C(aio) Pomponio / Heraconti / dulcissimo, / M(arcus) Ulpius Hera / et Valeria Sa/tornina (!), pa/rentes, harchi/tecto (!), eabro (!) / nabali (!) optumo (!); / vixit annos XXV. "For the souls departed. The parents Marcus Ulpius Hera and Valeria Saturnina (had this made) for their sweet (son) Caius Pomponius Heracon, great architect and builder of ships, (who) lived 25 years." This touching inscription is evenly though not deeply carved, and the letterforms are good. But the spelling is full of strange mistakes, which might indicate that the carver was illiterate in Latin. Each mistake on its own is forgivable, but five mistakes in a short epitaph? Luckily there's a rough outline of a ship carved below, to help comprehension.
December 2, 2025 at 8:09 PM
archaeohawke.bsky.social
#TombTuesday
Chambered cairn on the summit of Ronas Hill, the highest mountain in Shetland. Is this well-preserved #Neolithic burial monument comprising a stone built chamber within a mound of stones.

📸 Bill Griffiths
#Archaeology #History #architecture
December 2, 2025 at 12:53 PM
archaeohawke.bsky.social
#TombTuesday
Barpa Langais, Isle Of North Uist is the best preserved Neolithic chambered cairn in the Outer Hebrides. It is typical of tombs built all over the islands by #Neolithic farming communities.
#Archaeology
December 2, 2025 at 12:44 PM
Reposted by Jon Hawke
brittunculus.bsky.social
Relief from Aphrodisias in Turkey.

A heroically nude Claudius dominates a pleading woman, captioned below in Greek as BPETANNIA.

The relief commemorates the emperor's invasion of Britain in 43, and was found in 1980.
(Now in Aphrodisias Archaeological Museum.)
#EpigraphyTuesday
#ReliefWednesday
Claudius, wearing a short billowing cloak, a hemet and a sword-belt stands over a slumped Britannia. His knee pinions her to the ground while his left hand holds her by the hair. His right arm is raised to plunge a (now missing) spear into her neck. The personification of Britannia raises her right arm in a despair. Her right breast is shown uncovered in a trope usually applied to Amazons. The contrast between Claudius' buff physique and his bookish middle-aged face is rather incongruous. A pediment below the scene names the participants.
December 2, 2025 at 8:46 AM
Reposted by Jon Hawke
anthonymajanlahti.bsky.social
#MosaicMonday takes us into the chapel of S. Giovanni Evangelista in the #Lateran #baptistery in #Rome, which preserves intact its ceiling #mosaic from 461-468 CE, a glorious trellis enclosing the Lamb of God within a wreath, and birds with kantharoi - #syncretic #LateAntiquity. #AncientBluesky 🏺
CEILING MOSAIC, 461-468 CE. CHAPEL OF ST JOHN THE EVANGELIST, LATERAN BAPTISTERY This room, with a Greek cross floorplan, is very difficult to get into as it now functions as the sacristy of the Lateran Baptistery. However, it preserves its dazzling original gold mosaic ceiling, dating from the reign of pope Hilarus in the second half of the C5. The ceiling, four equal vaults meeting at centre, uses the four ribs as supports for a pergola bedecked with fruits and flowers, forming a central square containing a wreath with the haloed Lamb of God at centre. Four garlands drape downwards to make a clover pattern. On green lines following the bottom of the vaults, two per side, are kantharoi filled with fruit flanked by two birds, 4 per side, 16 in total: 4 peacocks, 4 ducks, 4 doves, 4 gallinules (?). The kaleidoscopic symmetry of the mosaic symbolises how the world is multiplied through the bounty of God. It is an extraordinary example of Christian cosmology seen through a late-antique lens.
December 1, 2025 at 6:11 PM
archaeohawke.bsky.social
Ariarathes I. 333-322 BC. AR Drachm (19mm, 5.40 g, 4h). Gaziura mint.

Baal of Gaziura seated left, torso facing, holding grapes, grain ear, and eagle in extended right hand, lotus- tipped scepter in left; B'L GZYR to right / Griffin left attacking stag kneeling left; "Ariarathes" below.
Simonetta 3a; Simonetta, Coins 1c; HGC 7, 791 var. (no inscription on rev.); SNG von Aulock 6256; SNG Copenhagen 629; BMC 3. Good VE, a little off center, some die wear, slight die shift on reverse. Very rare.
December 1, 2025 at 8:20 PM
Reposted by Jon Hawke
archaeohawke.bsky.social
House of Antiope, a #Roman villa decorated with floor #mosaics. Bulgaria’s Devnya.

The #villa was built in the late 3rd or early 4thC AD, perhaps during the rule of #Emperor #Constantine the #Great (r. 306–337). 

The best-known of the mosaics is the depiction of the #gorgon #Medusa #MosaicMonday
The villa itself was a lavish urban mansion (domus) constructed in the late 3rd or early 4th century AD. It had 21 rooms arranged around a central courtyard (atrium) and was decorated with frescoes and intricate floor mosaics made from marble, limestone, clay, and colored glass tiles. The mosaics in the House of Antiope are exclusively pagan in character, despite the rise of Christianity at the time of its construction. The Medusa mosaic and the "Satyr and Antiope" mosaic are prominent floor decorations from a large, late Roman villa known as the House of Antiope, now preserved within the Museum of Mosaics in Devnya, Bulgaria. The villa was part of the ancient city of Marcianopolis
December 1, 2025 at 8:12 AM