GREEK AND ROMAN STATUES WORE TECHNICOLOR DREAMCOATS

GLEAMING white marble and limestone sculptures dominate our image of the Mediterranean world in classical antiquity.

However, it is not generally known that ancient architecture and sculptures were once painted in vivid colours.

But now, thanks to technology, experts are delving into the "archaeo-polychromy" of ancient reliefs and sculptures. They use digital scanners to detect faint smidgens of pigment. And then they do computer projections of what the original must have looked like.

For 10 years now, the traveling exhibit GODS IN COLOR (original title in German: Bunte Götter – Die Farbigkeit antiker Skulptur) shows statues such as "Paris the Trojan Archer" (above), from the west pediment of the Aphaia Temple in Aegina, the way that scientists believe the Ancient Greeks intended them to look.

The exhibition opens in San Francisco on 28 October 2017 at the LEGION OF HONOR.

The traveling exhibition has been seen in major cities on every continent and is still heading to new cities. Watch for it at a museum near you ....

The experts stress that these mock-ups are only "best guess scenarios" of what the originals must have looked like. And there are many, many possible variations. The result is very flat and uniform.

After all, the experts are going by only minute flakes of pigment on a chin or cheek to project the color of the entire face.

No doubt the Ancient artists used varying hues, so that this bust of Caligula (left) would look much, much more lifelike than it does here in this modern mock-up.

The experts claim that even bronze statuary was often gilded and painted. We think of bronze being beautiful when it has acquired a patina of greenish age. But the Ancients thought that was dreadful. 

They went to great pains to keep their bronze statues polished so that they gleamed in the sun. They put gemstones in the eyes and they gilded the lips and the brows and eyelashes.

Be sure to watch for this traveling exhibition at a museum near you!

ROMULUS SHRINE TO JUPITER LOCATED AT BASE OF PALATINE IN ROME

IN the old Roman calendar, September was the seventh month of the year in counting March as the first. Among the festivals observed in September were several honoring Jupiter. 

He was hailed as the chief of the gods and had many epithets as a result.

As Jupiter Optimus Maximus, he occupied the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus on the Capitoline hill with the goddesses Juno and Minerva. With them, he received a Lectisternium (September 13) and the Ludi Romani  (September 5-19). 

He was honored with festivals as Jupiter Liber and Jupiter Fulminator (September 1) and as Jupiter Stator (September 5).

Jupiter Stator is the hand of Jupiter giving Roman troops their unstoppable force.

Romulus built a temple to Jupiter Stator at the foot of the Palatine Hill, Italian archaeologists say.

The ruins of the shrine to Jupiter Stator (Jupiter the Stayer), believed to date to 750 BC, were found by a Rome University team led by Andrea Carandini.

"We believe this is the temple that legend says Romulus erected to the king of the gods after the Romans held their ground against the furious Sabines fighting to get their women back after the famous Rape (abduction)," Carandini said in the Archeologia Viva (Living Archaeology) journal.

Historians have always been intrigued by ancient references to the temple, but never knew precisely where it was located or what it looked like. The lithograph above is a fanciful 19th Century idea of its possible appearance.

According to myth, Romulus founded Rome in 753 BC and the wifeless first generation of Roman men raided nearby Sabine tribes for their womenfolk, an event that has been illustrated in art down the centuries.

Carandini added: "It is also noteworthy that the temple appears to be shoring up the Palatine, as if in defence".

Rome's great and good including imperial families lived on the Palatine, overlooking the Forum.

Long after its legendary institution by Romulus, the cult of Jupiter the Stayer fueled Roman troops in battle, forging the irresistible military might that conquered most of the ancient known world.

In the article in Archeologia Viva, Carandini's team said they might also have discovered the ruins of the last Palatine house Julius Caesar lived in - the one he left on the Ides of March, 44BC, on his way to death in the Senate.

YOUR ONLINE ANTINOUS SHOP

ANTINOPHILES who have despaired of finding Antinous-related items for their homes, cars and work places can breathe a sigh of relief. 

One-stop shopping is just one click away at the online TEMPLE OF ANTINOUS SHOP

This shop features official Antinous articles selected and designed by FLAMEN ANTONIUS SUBIA personally.

If you admire the artwork of Antonyus, then order your own posters of his hand-picked favorite paintings and photographs.

A wide range of T-shirts is available, including classic "T", fitted "T", ringer "T", sleeveless, long-sleeve and baseball jersey — in up to nine colors, depending on the style and design you prefer.

The handy Antinous Tote Bag is a must-have as is a wide array of Antinous lapel buttons and refrigerator magnets in various sizes and designs.

Naturally, there are coffee mugs — and even an official Antinous beer stein appropriately adorned with the well-known Subian portrait of Antinous/Dionysus.

One of our favorites is the Antinous Keepsake Box, available in red-mahogany or black, with a tile cover portrait of the Louvre's breath-taking Ecouen Antinous. This roomy box is perfect for any home shrine or altar and is the perfect jewelry box.

And of course the ever-popular Antinous bumper sticker (at the top of this entry) provides the Beauteous Boy's blessings on any vehicle.

All items are ordered with safety and guaranteed efficiency through cafepress, which has a sound reputation for speedy delivery around the world, with secure payment in all major currencies.

ANTINOUS IN TYRE/SIDON

IN summer of the year 129 AD, the Imperial entourage wound its way through the mountains of Asia Minor (modern-day Anatolia) and visited such cities as Ephesus and Tarsus before arriving in Antioch.

Antioch was their base of operations for the rest of that autumn and winter. From Antioch, they made excursions to other cities.

One jaunt in late summer was to the the ancient Phoenician twin cities of Tyre and Sidon on the Mediterranean coast.

Tyre and Sidon were famous for the production of the dye called Tyrian Purple which was used to color the robes of Emperors and Kings.

The dye was derived from "milking" thousands of sea snails known as porphyra in Greek and purpura in Latin ... from which we get the word purple.

The snails secrete a silvery semen-like mucous which is dripped on hand spun cotton thread. The color makes several color shifts and eventually colors the thread a beautiful violet color.

Arriving here in the late summer of 129, Antinous and Hadrian were draped in purple as they entered the temple of the great god Baal whose name means "Lord."

Baal was primarily the sun god, but he was also the ruler of the sky god, of war and the bestower of fertility. The mysterious El was his father. El placed Baal on the throne of the world, from which Baal waged war against evil and brought storms and life giving rains to the fields.

At his online Temple of Antinous, ANTONIUS SUBIA outlines a very curious and very interesting link between Hadrian and the Temple of Baal at Tyre/Sidon:

"When the Phoenicians colonized the Mediterranean, they brought the religion of Baal with them. So it was that Baal was installed first in Carthage, and then later in Spain, when the Carthaginians conquered the Iberian Peninsula.

"Baal was still worshipped in Spain when Hadrian was born, and so the visitation to the ancient Temple in the city of Tyre was touched with the reminiscence of Spain. The religion of Baal had a dark side in that human sacrifice was demanded in times of crisis, particularly the sacrifice of children. The Canaanites worshipped Baal along with the early Jews.

"Competition led to the demonization of Baal, who became known as Baal-zevuv, 'Lord of the Flies.' Later tradition would make Baal, called Beelzebub, one of the primary fallen angels, indeed the right hand man of Satan. It is in this sense that we view the entry of Antinous, the Demon, into the blood-soaked temple of Baal."

The early Christians demonized Antinous and denounced all his followers as devil worshippers.

Ironically, the Beauteous Boy was worshiped as a "daimon" (blessed spirit) in ancient times.

SAINT WILLI NINJA

ON September 2nd, the Religion of Antinous honors St. Willi Ninja, who made the whole world take notice of a gay ghetto dance style called Vogueing.

Vogueing ... with its angular body movements, exaggerated model poses and intricate mime-like choreography ... and the colorful characters who populated Willi Ninja's world were introduced to the public at large by Paris Is Burning, the award-winning 1990 documentary about New York's drag vogue-ball scene. Later in his career, Willi Ninja also performed in works by postmodern choreographers including Doug Elkins, David Neuman and Karole Armitage.

Vogueing had been around for years, but Willi Ninja brought it to a level of visibility and perfection in performance that no one had ever reached before, according to Sally Sommer, a professor of dance at Florida State University.

"He was tall man, about 6-3," she said, "and God gave him the biggest, broadest dance shoulders in the world, so when he would do those things with his arms it was just so impressive."

Willi Ninja is featured in Sommer's 2006 documentary Check Your Body at the Door.

William R. Leake was born in Queens New York on April 12, 1961. He began dancing at 7. By the early 1980s he was vogueing in Washington Square Park in Greenwich Village and at drag balls throughout Harlem. He prided himself on being a clean, sharp dancer, with swiftly moving arms and hands, and he was deeply inspired by the martial arts ... hence his adopted name, Ninja.

As the "mother" of the House of Ninja ... part dance troupe, part surrogate family ... he became a New York celebrity, known as much for his quick wit and sharp tongue as for his darting limbs.

His ensembles ... a coat made of braided synthetic hair, a suit jacket with a skirt and Doc Marten boots ... also turned heads wherever he went: "SEVERE" is the word.

An androgynous, self-described "butch queen," St. Willi Ninja taught vogueing throughout Europe and Japan, modeled in runway shows for the fashion designers Jean Paul Gaultier and Thierry Mugler and danced in music videos such as Madonna's 1990 hit "Vogue".

He also taught models how to strut, giving stars like Naomi Campbell pointers early in their careers. Before his death in 2006, he worked with the socialite Paris Hilton, whose red carpet sashay has since become her signature.

In 2004, he opened a modeling agency, EON (Elements of Ninja), but he never gave up dancing, appearing on televisions series like "America's Next Top Model" and "Jimmy Kimmel Live", and dropping in at local clubs.

"If he saw someone doing something on the dance floor that he loved, he'd walk up to them and say, 'Oooh, child, you are fierce,'" his friend Archie Burnett recalled. "That was one of his highest compliments."

In 2003 he was diagnosed with HIV, but he continued working to support his elderly mother, despite the fact that he could not afford medical health care for himself.

His mother was a wheelchair-bound woman suffering from Parkinson's. One of Ninja's best friends, fellow dancer Archie Burnett, said St. Willi was always grateful that his mother had taken him to the ballet and the Apollo when he was a boy, which inspired him to become a dancer. So he was determined to care for her at the expense of his own seriously declining health.

St. Willi Ninja died September 2, 2006, three years after an HIV diagnosis. In the end, the famous dancer had lost his sight and become paralyzed. But that didn't stop him from being fabulous.

"He was weak, but let me tell you, he was running the show," his friend Archie said, recalling how his acolytes did his hair in the hospital room.

He said, "Child, if I gonna die, then I want to look as fabulous as possible."

The Religion of Antinous honors Willi Ninja as a Saint of Antinous and Blessed Prophet of Homoeros for his courage in overcoming racial discrimination and homophobia. While others of his generation turned to drugs or alcohol or dysfunctional violence to assuage their shattered self-esteem ... St. Willi Ninja turned to the dance floor, where he converted the simple act of walking into a high-art form of sheer FABULOUSNESS.

THIS STUNNING ANTINOUS SCULPTURE WAS BRIGHTLY PAINTED AND GILDED

A stunning new exhibition of Antinous sculpture in San Antonio, Texas, has amazed the world of archaeology with the revelation that this head of Antinous as Dionysus once was painted in bright colors ... and partially gilded in glittering gold.

The color is long gone, but thanks to modern technology, the San Antonio Museum of Art has a better idea of what the sculpture looked like when it was newly created. In 2011, a study of the piece revealed a thrilling surprise: minute traces of gold.

The exhibition Antinuous, the Emperor’s Beloved: Investigating a Roman Portrait provides a peek at the museum’s behind-the-scenes research and reveals what the museum has learned about the artwork, the only marble statue of Antinous on which gilding has been found.

“It was really the unexpected discovery of the gilding that drove the whole project and inspired doing things like looking more closely at the pose and the figure of Antinous,” said Jessica Powers, the museum’s curator of art of the ancient Mediterranean world.

The marble head of Antinous in the museum’s collection was a gift from Gilbert M. Denman, Jr. 

It originally was part of a larger-than-life sculpture depicting Antinous as Dionysus, the Greek god of wine, theater and religious ecstasy. 

A hand ... once connected to an arm ... rests on top of the the marble head, which is crowned with thick curls and an ivy wreath.

The famous Frugiferus statue of Antinous (pictured at left) shows how it would have looked.

About six years ago, Michelle Bushey, then a chemistry professor at Trinity University, reached out to Powers. The school recently has acquired an X-ray fluorescence instrument.

Shaped like a ray gun from a sci-fi movie, it can be used to analyze the elements present in a variety of materials, including the composition of historic pigments on paintings and other objects. Bushey offered to examine works in the museum’s collection.

“Some of the pieces that we have have been in collections for a long time, so they’ve been really heavily cleaned, like down to the marble,” Powers said. “When that happens, you lose the polychromy.”

Since the hair and ivy wreath on Antinous’ portrait had not been overly cleaned, it was a good candidate, Powers said. After the initial readings were taken, a research assistant who was working with Bushey emailed Powers.

"She said, ‘Would you expect to find gold in the XRF readings for a marble portrait?’ and suddenly I was very interested in what was coming out of the XRF,” Powers said. “So we did more XRFs and were able to show that bits of gilding survived on all of the leaves of the ivy wreath. Then we examined the surface with the microscope and we were able to see it.”

Those findings kicked off a fuller investigation. In addition to Bushey, Powers worked with Mark Abbe, a professor in the department of classics at the University of Georgia, to better understand the portrait’s gilding and original appearance.

In addition to the Antinous head, the exhibit also features a portrait of Hadrian, and ancient coins of Antinous (left).

As part of the exhibition programming, Bushey, who is currently with the National Science Foundation, gave a talk at the museum about the use of X-ray fluorescence to unlock ancient and historical secrets.

Using the technology on artworks “gives me a way to connect with people who might otherwise recoil at the word chemistry,” Bushey said. 

“But there’s also the aspect of this is our collective heritage and our history and to understand better the importance of these items and how people functioned, I don’t think that we give people enough credit who lived in maybe less technologically advanced times. I think if we really go back and take a look at what they were able to accomplish, given what they know, given what we know, given our tools and given their tools, we’ve lost a lot of knowledge about how important these items were, how people did things and how they understood the world.”

“Antinous, the Emperor’s Beloved” runs September 1st to November 26th at the San Antonio Museum of Art, 200 W. Jones Ave. $5 in addition to museum admission for those 18 and older. 210-978-8100, samuseum.org.

HADRIAN'S HOMETOWN PROVIDED DRAGONPIT FOR 'GAME OF THRONES'

THE ancient Hispania city where Hadrian was born was the location of the "dragonpit" in the grand finale episode of the Seventh Season of the television megahit series "Game of Thrones."

The HBO drama filmed that dramatic part of season seven in Santiponce, Spain. 

Santiponce is a suburb of modern Seville known in ancient times as Italica, hometown of Hadrian's Roman forefathers.

The ancient Roman city is remarkably well-preserved and boasts an impressive amphitheater.

When Hadrian became emperor, he launched a massive building program for his hometown, erecting public monuments and a lavish amphitheater.

The town itself probably had a population of only 8,000 … but the enormous amphitheater could seat 25,000 spectators … clearly making it a monument to the emperor's power and grandeur.

It is believed that crowds from throughout the region converged on the amphitheater for celebrations of Hadrian's birthday with spectacular gladiatorial and animal combat displays and pageantry of a sort otherwise only seen in the Colosseum of Rome.

In an interview with the Spanish publication "Los Siete Reinos," the mayor of Santiponce revealed that HBO had also considered filming in a monastery in the town, the Monasterio de San Isidoro del Campo.

But he said the HBO location scouts later decided the monastery was too modern-looking.

But Hadrian's sprawling hometown amphitheater turned out to be the pivotal location of the Season 7 final episode.