Symposia in a museion
The word museum goes back to Greek μουσεῖον, which first meant a sanctuary of the Muses—a place where they led their dances, dances that were themselves called mouseia—by the same pattern as a Heraion (a temple of Hera) or a Serapeum (a temple of Serapis). Later it came to mean a “gathering” in the broadest sense: Plato, in the Phaedrus, uses it in the phrase “a gathering of [wise] speeches” (μουσεῖα λόγων).
On this blog, the Museion is a very wide section indeed. On its own it reports what I saw in the museums I visited—the modern heirs of those sanctuaries. But it also gathers into one virtual dance the Olympian patrons of its several subsections.
You can read straight through, or simply open a post at random and follow the links to earlier, later and related pieces until you have had enough.
🧑🎨Apollo — ✍️Calliope — 📜Clio — 🎭Euterpe — 🙏Polyhymnia — 🏗️Urania — ⚒Vulcan — and the 🏛️museums themselves!
🧑🎨Apollo—the fine arts
Painting, sculpture, drawing: everything people come to a museum to look at rather than to read.
The Treasures of HALEPLİBAHÇE
The museum of Şanlıurfa—Edessa in antiquity—preserves mosaics of the Roman period. They are less celebrated
Libiamo, libiamo ne’ lieti calici!..
To wish you a happy New Year, I have chosen this mosaic from Zeugma. It
✍️Calliope—writers
Poets and novelists, their houses, their manuscripts, their words.
Second Only to Rome
The rise of Utica was short-lived. As the Romans began cultivating grain upstream from the
📜Clio—historians
Calliope’s sister, entrusted with the past and with those who write it down.
On Ways, Quirks and Reversed Perspective
Inscrutable, as we are so frequently reminded, are the ways of Providence. Having duly paid
An Etymological Dessert from Persian Apples
On Ribs, Heroes, and the Surprising Geography of Language Summer is upon us, bringing with
🎭Euterpe—music and dance
Calliope’s sister, entrusted with the past and those who write it down.
Culture on the Edge of Agglutination
A trip to the Atatürk Cultural Centre (AKM) at Taksim is invariably a bit of
Tainted Classics and Soviet Relics
We recently took a flight to Yerevan for the express purpose of visiting the Opera
🙏Polyhymnia—solemn rites
Ceremony and ritual, religious ones among them, and whatever they have left behind in stone and in daily habit.
On Ways, Quirks and Reversed Perspective
Inscrutable, as we are so frequently reminded, are the ways of Providence. Having duly paid
A Guide to Winged Angelology
This wooden cherub of nineteenth-century vintage once adorned a house transported from the abandoned settlement
🏗️Urania—architecture
In my department the muse of astronomy also looks after what gets built on the ground.
An Oriental Chamber
This is what a typical 19th-century Tunisian mansion looked like. This interior is a preserved
The Comfort of the Age of Marcus Aurelius
One of the most striking and memorable landmarks of Roman Carthage is the Villa of
⚒Vulcan—the crafts
Things made by hand and for the hand: clay, metal, cloth, tools.
The Bronze Echoes of the Steppe
Are you feeling a trifle parched for museum artefacts? I have curated something rather special
Red Gold for Young Türkiye
Following centuries of military confrontation between the Ottoman and Russian Empires, Soviet Russia and Kemalist
The 🏛️museums themselves
The Museion began as a sanctuary and ended up as a building with a cloakroom and a ticket desk. This is what I saw in the museums as museums: arranged by gallery rather than by theme.
For the Average Visitor
At the entrance to the archaeology department of the Trabzon Museum the visitor is met
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