Jesus is a complex mix of mystery, miracle, and myth. Let's step away from Sunday school for a minute and explore who he really was and is.

From Reuters: Proponents of a female priesthood say frescoes in the newly restored Catacombs of Priscilla prove there were women priests in early

For centuries the intricate frescoes, found in the Domitilla catacombs in Rome, were covered with a thick layer of algae, calcium deposits and smoke stains from oil lamps.

The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan is well known, and on many bucket lists because of, the archaeological site of Petra. Most people have seen the extraordinary

Archaeologists have revealed elaborate frescoes on the walls of the ancient catacombs of St. Domitilla, a labyrinth of tunnels beneath Rome that contains numerous tombs.

Third-century scene of a feast decorating a Christian tomb in the Catacomb of St. Callixtus in Rome, Italy.

¿Quién es Jesús? ¿qué sabemos de Él? El autor de este artículo define la figura de Cristo como "una piedra de escándalo para la razón".

К сожалению большинство картинок без подписей, поэтому уточнение сюжета, времени, названия катакомб, или копий и их авторов только приветствуется. 1. Добрый пастырь 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. фрагмент Маэста, катакомбы Петра и Марцеллина 7. Даниил во рву со львами 8. Самсон убивающий льва 9.…

Выкладываю подборку фотографий с помпейскими фресками. Сам город снаружи выглядит так: Монументальный пейзаж из Дома малого фонтана. Дом античного охотника. Египетские мотивы. Домов так много, что все за день никак не обойти. Хотя, половина закрыта. Одна из самых хорошо сохранившихся вилл -…

Suggestions that the frescoes, found in the Catacombs of Priscilla of Rome, show female priests have been dismissed by the Vatican as sensationalist 'fairy tales'.

Our knowledge of Ancient Roman painting relies in large part on the preservation of artifacts from Pompeii and Herculaneum, and particularly the Pompeian mural painting, which was preserved after the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 CE. Nothing remains of the Greek paintings imported to Rome during the 4th and 5th centuries, or of the painting on wood done in Italy during that period. In sum, the range of samples is confined to only about 200 years out of the about 900 years of Roman history, and of provincial and decorative painting. Most of this wall painting was done using the secco (“dry”) method, but some fresco paintings also existed in Roman times. There is evidence from mosaics and a few inscriptions that some Roman paintings were adaptations or copies of earlier Greek works.[12] However, adding to the confusion is the fact that inscriptions may be recording the names of immigrant Greek artists from Roman times, not from Ancient Greek originals that were copied. Roman painting provides a wide variety of themes: animals, still life, scenes from everyday life, portraits, and some mythological subjects. During the Hellenistic period, it evoked the pleasures of the countryside and represented scenes of shepherds, herds, rustic temples, rural mountainous landscapes and country houses. Erotic scenes are also relatively common. In the late empire, after 200AD, early Christian themes mixed with pagan imagery survive on catacomb walls. Roman mural painting is generally distinguished by four periods, as originally described by the German archaeologist August Mau and dealt with in more detail at Pompeian Styles. The main innovation of Roman painting compared to Greek art was the development of landscapes, in particular incorporating techniques of perspective, though true mathematical perspective developed 1,515 years later. Surface textures, shading, and coloration are well applied but scale and spatial depth was still not rendered accurately. Some landscapes were pure scenes of nature, particularly gardens with flowers and trees, while others were architectural vistas depicting urban buildings. Other landscapes show episodes from mythology, the most famous demonstrating scenes from the Odyssey. The art of the ancient East would have known the landscape only in terms of civil or military scenes. This theory, defended by Franz Wickhoff, is debatable. It is possible to see evidence of Greek knowledge of landscape portrayal in Plato's Critias (107b-108b): "...and if we look at the portraiture of divine and of human bodies as executed by painters, in respect of the ease or difficulty with which they succeed in imitating their subjects in the opinion of onlookers, we shall notice in the first place that as regards the earth and mountains and rivers and woods and the whole of heaven, with the things that exist and move therein, we are content if a man is able to represent them with even a small degree of likeness..." Still life Roman still life subjects are often placed in illusionistic niches or shelves and depict a variety of everyday objects including fruit, live and dead animals, seafood, and shells. Examples of the theme of the glass jar filled with water were skillfully painted and later served as models for the same subject often painted during the Renaissance and Baroque periods.