HA 101 Exam 1

Ancient City of Kalhu

(modern Nimrud, Iraq): 9th century BC Assyrian Palace. City abandoned in the middle of the desert, use to be close to the river and was a thriving city due to the fact. now it is abandoned. Made of mud brick. Built think walls and the palace had stone paneling to protect against rain. Museums took things from Iraq and are now in museums.

Newgrange Monument

3000 BC cosmic sun: sun would pass right to the middle of the Mountian. Corbeling: early roofing technique where you'd stack stone closer and closer to the middle to create a roof. Spirals carved design on the entryways

CERAMICS

All types of objects made from fired clay, including pottery, porcelain and terra-cotta

Mesolithic

Ancient Greek for "Middle Stone" second of three age systems

Neolithic

Ancient Greek for "New Stone" third of three age systems

Paleolithic

Ancient Greek for "Old Stone" first of three age systems

Fertile Crescent

Arc-shaped region that was settled near the end of the Neolithic period due to its ability to support large scale agriculture. much less access to stone and timber, buildings made of mud brick.

Continuous Narrative

Artistic convention by which multiple discrete movements in time are represented in the same frame or scene

Which of the following is NOT a significant development that occurs in the Neolithic? a) Populations become sedentary b) Fired pottery is developed c) Burial customs are established d) Large-scale empires are developed

B) fired pottery is developed

"Sorcerer" from Trois Freres

Cave drawing that looks like a mash up of different animals, part deer, bear

Blombos Cave

Cave in the southern tip of Africa where ancient carved blades from animal bones were found. The blades were decorated and date to 70,000 BCE.

two examples of city states and empires

City of Ur and the Royal Necropolis at Ur Tomb of Pu Abi-queen buried with cows, servants and decorative headdresses.

Jericho

Community built as a tell: A mass of debris that results from the constant occupation of a specific location for a period of time, often spanning centuries. Massive Architecture goldmine. Found old family sculls with clay filling the head cavity and shells for eyes. (display of past relatives) lower jaws removed, clay added to create "human like features" with a flat bottom so they could display them. memory of the dead oldest Neolithic community in the West Bank between Israel and Jordan. An ancient and strategically vital city in Canaan, the first major city to be captured by the Israelites.Site of an important early agricultural settlement of perhaps 2,000 people in present-day Israel.

Where is Mesopotamia?

Between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers aka Iraq The Sumerians and Akkadians (including Assyrians and Babylonians) dominated Mesopotamia from the beginning of written history

Bison Tucd' Audou

Bison built up using clay from floor in cave and carved out. Additive technique (modeling)

Bison: Tuc d'Audoube

Relief sculpture on the ground in a cave of three bison. Additive technique might have been made out of clay

Relief from palace of Sargon at Khorsabad

Relief shows how palace was made, Showing that Sargon was bragging about how he went to Lebanon to get the wood. This shows his wealth.

Differences of Neolithic and Paleolithic

Sedentary lifestyle / domestication of food • Creation of permanent structures • Evidence for careful treatment of the dead • Clear signs of social organization • Greater technological sophistication • Appearance of men in representative art

El Castillo Cave

Spain, near Caribbean sea. Could have been Neanderthals passing through the area, discovering the cave. We think this because the hand prints were negative spaced.

Three Age System

Stone Age ?-3000 BC, Bronze Age 3000 BC-1000 BC, Iron Age 1000 BC-?

Homo Sapiens

Stone Age. Homo sapiens appeared about 400,000 years ago. Subspecies we belong to. Homo sapiens sapiens (aka Modern Humans) spread from Africa across Asia into Europe then Australia and America.

Mesopotamia

The "place between the rivers." Region stretching from the Mediterranean to the Persian Gulf that was extensively settled beginning in 3000 BC.

Altamira Cave

The Cave of Altamira is located near the historic town of Santillana del Mar in Cantabria, Spain. It is renowned for prehistoric parietal cave art featuring charcoal drawings and polychrome paintings of contemporary local fauna and human hands Used rocks within cave to depict images of bison, seeing image of surrounding world in rocks

Positive Space

The space that represents the main focus of a picture

Negative Space

The space that surrounds an object

Neolithic Revolution

Transition from hunting and gathering to agriculture and settlement ("sedentism") occurring 8,000-3,000 BC

Neolithic Revolution

Transition from hunting and gathering to agriculture and settlements

Similarities of Neolithic and Paleolithic

Treatment of the female figure • Built architecture that is cave-like in nature • Painted designs on walls • Site-specific characteristics • Limitations of local supplies of materials

Votive figure

Unique form of representation that is dedicated to god

Representational Art

Works created by people to "re - present" to others a certain point of view

Tell Asmar Statues

[Sumerian] (2700 BCE) • Figures are of different heights, denoting hierarchy of scale • Hands are folded in gesture of prayer • Huge eyes in awe, spellbound, perhaps staring at the deity • Men: bare upper chest; skirt from waist down; beard flows in ripple patterns • Women: dress draped over one shoulder • Arms and feet cut away • Pinkie in a spiral; a wedge shape; ear a double volute • Inscribed on back: "It offers prayers" • Figures represent mortals, placed in a temple and praying- perhaps to the god Abu "Sub for humans to wait for god in the temple, waiting for god" Samaritan word for temple = waiting room eyes emphasized geometric in shape

"White Temple" to sky god Anu ca 3200-3000 BC

a Ziggurat (A tall, stepped tower, commonly used in Mesopotamia to support a shrine.) that use to be covered in white plaster, in the middle of the desert

polychromatic

a representation that utilizes two or more colors of pigment

Realism/naturalism

a style of representation that attempts to recreate the actual appearance of a subject

Subtractive technique (Carving)

a style of sculpting in which the features of an object are created by removing material

What is the style of writing seen here? a) Hieroglyphs b) Runes c) Cuneiform d) We have no word for this

a) hieroglyphs

Tomb of Pu Abi

animals and servants went with her when she died. Songs chants and expressions form era. attendants had gold headdresses. Same with the queen. Asarians took control of Egypt and a bunch of regions. Was buried with headdress. beautiful gold, and blue stones. SHOWED SOCIAL CONTROL

The material used to make this bull's beard is called lapis lazuli. It most likely comes from? a) Egypt b) Afghanistan c) Arabian Peninsula d) Spain

b) Afghanistan

Who is this handsome fellow? a) Sargon b) Gudea c) Ashurbanipal d) Sennachrib

b) Gudea

Where was this scene, depicting a hunt, found? a) Chauvet Cave b) Catal Huyuk c) Lepinski Vir d) Stonehenge

b) catal huyuk

All of the materials used to build this monument were taken from the local area. a) True b) False

b) false

Shaped boulders

boulders with face carvings, patters, and fish like features on them. from Lepenki Vir

Royal Necropolis at Ur

ca 2600 BC. Tomb "The Great Death Pit" king carried with 79 other bodies (servants ect.) when the king died everyone went with him. Shows social power/ the amount of power a single person had.

venus Impudique

carved from ivory. From immodest Venus 15,000-10,000 BC preconceived ideal of women, impression on era we think that a naked women is savage so that's what the europeans thought.

Earthenware

ceramics fired to 800 C

Stoneware

ceramics fried to 1200 c which leads to vitrification

Christian Jurgensen Thomsen

chosen in 1816 to be the first curator of the Danish Royal Commission for the Collection and Preservation of Antiquities

Pigment

coloring agent derived from naturally occurring organic material matter

Ain Ghazal Statues: ca 6500 BC

figures found in Jordan made out of plaster. lil hands lil feet. (funny doll looking sculpture) some had two heads on a rectangular body.

Lady of warka

had inlay eyebrow and possible inlay on the top of her head to drape a cloth around. Ivory or marble material. grove cut for eyebrows.

Female statues

hands and feet mall. Much attention to the brest/ pubic triangle. thighs. female statuette from Hal saflieni tomb female statute from Hagar quim Seated woman from catal huyuk. Cat feline presence.

1) The Paleolithic Period is one of the most dynamic areas in our study of visual culture in the past--new discoveries are being made every day. 2) Past study of the Paleolithic serves as a good example of the danger of analyzing visual culture with preconceived ideas.

important concepts of Paleolithic period

Paleolithic Period

is one of the most dynamic areas in our study of visual culture in the past--new discoveries are being made every day.

Cernavodă Figures: 3500 BC

made from clay. 3500 BC. molded and fired. found in same grab context. two figures man and woman. man with arms resting on knees. woman has rounded hips

Newgrange Monument

made from corbeling 3000 BC Newgrange is a prehistoric monument in County Meath, Ireland, located 8 kilometres west of Drogheda on the north side of the River Boyne. It is an exceptionally grand passage tomb built during the Neolithic period, around 3200 BC, making it older than Stonehenge and the Egyptian pyramids. Its entrance is aligned with the rising sun on the winter solstice, when sunlight shines through a 'roofbox' and floods the inner chamber

Bronze Age

more social orgnization 3000 BC-1000 BC, Mesopotamia, geology & lack of resources, large city state and empires, artistic conventions, like symbols. creation of written word.

mud brick construction

mud bricks made out of organic material and mud sun dried. houses built out of it

Venus Figure

name commonly (and erroneously) given to representations o the female body, often found in Paleolithic contexts.

Trapezoidal Houses

probably based off Mountian Treskavac, the Mountian across the river. Lepenki Vir. Houses had bigger doors and smaller backs. Probably made of organic material as top. but placed rocks along front door and along walls with carvings on them.

The City of Ur

site where when a powerful person died all their servants were buried with them, Royal graves = social power. Form of social control Polytheistic time period. shows rise of city state with rulers. Polytheistic: Engaging in the practice of worshipping more than one god

Chauvet Cave

very sophsicated cave drawings with continuous narratives, positive space and negative space. shows continuous narrative of rhino. Also had image of owl carved out and point perspective or buffalo. Also included hand prints southern France is a cave that contains some of the best-preserved figurative cave paintings in the world, as well as other evidence of Upper Paleolithic life.

Corbeling:

Early roofing technique in which each layer / row of stone projects outward (or inward) from the layer upon which it rests. Corbeling is used to form arches and vaults.

Polytheistic

Engaging in the practice of worshipping more than one god

Postl and Lintel

Form of construction where two or more vertical elements (posts) suppose a horizontal element (lintel)

Inlay

Form of surface decoration that involves setting one material into a shaped space in another.

Ishtar Gate of Babylon 604-562 BC

Glazed brick, created a relief pattern. Blue colored gate so when you walked into the city you were in awe over the gate, especially since the city was made out of mud brick. Showed power of kingdom . Stunning entry way for city. Assembled and then dis assembled gate to fire bricks with patterns of lions.

Statuette of Gudea

Has inscription written on his kilt saying "this is not made of stone" saying this is a rare material. showing how lack of resources shows power in having certain unique rocks stating this was important.

1. In this period, formerly migratory groups become sedentary, which results in the creation of "built environments" or architecture. 2. Yet many representational images retain their "Paleolithic look."

Important concepts of Neolithic Period

Prehistory

Includes all of human existence before the emergence of writing and long before that people were carving objects, painting images and creating shelters and other objects.

Mortice and tenon

Joining technique for two elements in which a projecting pin (tenon) in one element fits into a hole designed for it (mortice)

Scientific Revolution

Lead to a spike in searching for artifacts. Everyone wanted something exotic/ different. They went on a scavenger hut to find new different things. Found a bunch of objects. Didn't know how to sort them.

Mesopotamia 1. As we enter the Bronze Age we see a greater sense of social organization reflected in the visual culture 2. The geology and available material supplies of this region have affected the appearance and preservation of settlements. 3. This region has varied historically between periods of localized authority of city-states and ever larger empires. 4. Mesopotamian artistic conventions--commonly practiced or accepted way of representing a scene or object--are strongly maintained for over three millennia, but we should be careful not to assume that different individuals and groups in close to 3000 years of history are all the same. More....

5. Art and architecture are often created to communicate a specific message. 6. Quite often in Mesopotamian art, that message concerns the power and dominance of the ruler. 7. This concept can be seen not only in representations of rulers, but also in the buildings constructed under their rule.

Çatal Höyük

7000-5000 BC. southern Anatolia. large settlement walls made of mud brick. we've only exhibited part of it. Entered houses from roofs, had bulls heads and paintings on the roofs, replastered houses frequently, raised beds in houses to burry dead. Open couryards. Houses piled on top of each other. houses had hundreds of phases people are now connected to homes. when someone dies houses destroyed and rebuilt. Skulls defleshed and painted on with red paint. bulls heads in houses drawing of people trying to yank Tounge and tail off cow. A lot more representations of people on the walls. Still doing hand prints/patterns painting and replastering Relief designs: of arms, legs geometric lines on stomach Stated staying in one place burring dead using mud bricks with organic degree "throwing stuff away" found fox teeth ect on floor

Which of the following is NOT a significant empire mentioned in your readings? a) Akkadian b) Assyrian c) Persian d) Scythian

?

Stone Age

?-3000 BC, neolithic period, Stonehenge, cave drawings. cata hoyuk,

Sedentism

A change in behavioral patterns from more to less migratory movement of populations.

Henge

A circular area enclosed by stones or wood posts set up by Neolithic peoples. It is usually bounded by a ditch and raised embankment.

mixed perspective

A convention in art in which every aspect of a body or object is represented from its more characteristic viewpoint.

Tell

A mass of debris that results from the constant occupation of a specific location for a period of time, often spanning centuries.

City state

A political entity, with its own region / cultural traditions that remains at the scale of a city

silhouette

A representation takes the form of a dark shape against a light background

Monochromatic

A representation that utilizes only one color of pigment

Sculpture in the Round

A representational object carved in such a way that it is free-standing and can be seen on all sides

relief sculpture

A representational object carved in such a way that it is remains attached to the material from which is is made

Idealism

A style of representation that attempts to modify the appearance of a subject to match a cultural standard or idea of beauty.

Additive technique (modeling)

A style of sculpting which the creatures of an object are created by adding material

perspective

A system for representing three-dimensional space on a two-dimensional surface

Ziggurat:

A tall, stepped tower, commonly used in Mesopotamia to support a shrine.

Incising

A technique which a design is cut into a hard surface with a sharp instrument

Dolmen

Name given to prehistoric structures that are built a large flat stone set atop two or more upright stones

Megalithic

Name given to prehistoric structures that are built from large stones

Monolithic

Name given to prehistoric structures that are built from one stone

Stonehenge 2800-1500 BC

Neolithic Period: 2800-1500 BC Dolmen, Megalithic, Monolithic. henge. posts and lintel. mortice & tenon. Made out of bluestones 25 miles away and Sarsen stones. Started with a layer of chalk. then timber posts then blue stones came in then blue stones moved then Darden stones and those moved. Earliest stage of Stonehenge was a Barrel sight made for the barrel of the dead. woodhange was an area for the living and Stonehenge was a place for the dead. This helped them distinguish themselves.The dead on one side of the river (west) than the living. A way to orient themselves in the world around them. separate places for the living and the dead.

Lepinski Vir

Neolithic discovered in 1965 b/c damn was built so they had to move the exivation site to higher ground and was relocated in 1971. had trapezoidal houses with the front facing the river and the backend was "pinched" the houses mimicked the mountains. seventies: a change in behavioral patterns. Archologist think this was a seasonal camp for fishing. Barials associated with the houses when someone died they collapsed the housed when babies died they buried them under the houses. Also has a collection of shaped boulders that surrounded the entry of house and along house walls. Boulders normally 2 ft tall they were river rocks. With carvings of fish or people on them. Mouth normally droopy like a fishes mouth. took materials around them that they had and utilized it.

Cosquer Cave . 25,000 BC

New Evidence: that the caves dated back to 38,000 BC. Habit used during the Ice Age, but the water level rose after ice age and now the cave is underwater. Two scuba divers got trapped in cave. located in the Calanque de Morgiou in Marseille, France, near Cap Morgiou. The entrance to the cave is located 37 m underwater,

Maria and Marcelino Sanz de Sautuola Altamira Cave (1879)

Paleolithic Cave in Spain found by minor archeologist and daughter. At first people didn't believe him but soon after they kept finding more caves with drawings on the walls around Spain and France. daughter saw buffaloes on the ceiling of the caves when looking for curiositys

Venus of Willenforf

Paleolithic. limestone with ochre smoothes over her. 25,000 BC- 21,000 BC. Most typical example of Paleolithic image of human female body. don't know where she came from exactly. Hand held sculpture or women, when you look down at her it looks like what a women sees her body like. Much attention applied to hips, belly, chest. No head, hands or feet detail. not meant to stand up.

Prehistory

Period before systematic writing

Pre-pottery

Period before the systematic used of fired clay vessels occurring roughly before 6,000 BC