A global guide to the art of ancient civilisations, sacred objects, architecture, archaeology and symbols.
Prehistoric art includes painting, engraving, sculpture and decorated objects made before written historical records became available for the societies that produced them.
Ancient Egyptian art was a visual system linking image, writing, architecture and ritual to kingship, divine order and the afterlife.
Ancient Greek art developed through Geometric, Archaic, Classical and Hellenistic periods, transforming sculpture, vase painting, architecture and ideas of representation.
Ancient Roman art was a flexible imperial and domestic visual culture built from portraiture, architecture, wall painting, mosaic, relief, luxury objects and the adaptation of Greek,…
Mesopotamian art developed in the urban cultures of Sumer, Akkad, Babylonia and Assyria, linking temples, kingship, administration and narrative power.
Ancient Persian art expressed imperial order through palaces, reliefs, metalwork, gardens and objects that brought many regional traditions into a deliberate court language.
Byzantine art joined Christian theology, imperial ceremony and inherited Roman techniques in icons, mosaics, manuscripts, architecture and luxury objects.
Ancient Chinese art developed through ritual bronzes, jade, lacquer, ceramics, tomb objects, calligraphy, painting and imperial architecture, with ancestry and statecraft central to many forms.
Ancient art is the visual culture of early societies and civilisations, expressed through buildings, sculpture, painting, relief, ceramics, metalwork, textiles and objects of ritual or daily…
