Alexander Mosaic
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The Alexander Mosaic, dating from approx. 200 BC, is a famous mosaic from Pompeii that depicts a battle between the armies of Alexander the Great and Darius III of Persia. The Mosaic measures 5.82 x 3.13m (19ft x 10ft 3in), and is made of about one and a half million tiles, or tesserae.
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[edit] Description
One commonly held view is that the mosaic depicts the Battle of Issus (333 BC) between the forces of Alexander the Great and Darius III. Other historians state that it may also be the Battle of Gaugamela in 331 BC where Alexander again attempted to capture or kill Darius.
Despite being partially ruined, the two main figures are easy to recognize. The portrait of Alexander is one of his most famous. Alexander's breastplate depicts Medusa, the famous Gorgon. Darius is shown in a chariot fleeing from Alexander's army. He seems to be desperately commanding his frightened charioteer to turn to meet Alexander. Oxyathres, the brother of Darius, is portrayed sacrificing himself to save the King.
According to different theories, the mosaic may be a copy of a painting contemporary to Alexander by an artist Apelles or a copy of an otherwise lost fresco from the fourth century BC by the painter Philoxenos of Eretria for the Macedonian king Cassander.
The mosaic measures 5.82 x 3.13 m (19 ft x 10 ft 3 in). It is an unusually detailed work of mosaic for a private residence and was probably commissioned by a wealthy person or family. Another theory states that it might have been an originally Hellenic mosaic that was looted from Greece and carried off to Rome. Italian archaeologist Fausto Levi supports the first theory.
[edit] History of the mosaic
The mosaic was rediscovered in the House of the Faun in Pompeii on October 24, 1831. In September of 1843 it was moved to Naples, where it is currently preserved in the Museo Archeologico Nazionale.
[edit] Copy of the mosaic
In 2003 the International Center for the Study and Teaching of Mosaic (CISIM) in Ravenna, Italy, proposed to create a copy of the mosaic. When they had received approval, the mosaic master Severo Bignami and his eight-person team took a large photograph of the mosaic, made a tracing of the image with a dark marker and created a negative impression of the mosaic.
The team composed the mosaic in sections in 44 clay frames, trying to preserve the pieces of the mosaic in the exact positions they are in the original mosaic. They had to keep the plates wet all the time. Then they pressed a tissue on the clay to create an image of the outlines of the mosaic in the clay.
The team recreated the mosaic with about 2 million pieces of various marble types. When they had placed all the pieces, they covered the result with a layer of glue and gauze and pulled it out of the clay. They placed each section on synthetic concrete and then united the sections with the compound of glasswool and plastic.
The project took 22 months and a cost equivalent to US$216,000. The copy was installed on the House of the Faun in 2005.
[edit] References
- Marco Merola - Alexander Piece by Piece (Archaeology magazine January/February 2006)
