Brutkey

The Partial Historians
@phistorians@kolektiva.social

🏛️The so-called Tellus panel of the Ara Pacis🏛️

The Ara Pacis Augustae was one of the significant structures that emerged under Augustus’ rule and the highly allegorical ‘Tellus’ panel is a testament to the artistry that went into the construction.

#AncientRome #History #ReliefWednesday

Here we see the panel as it appears today housed in the purpose-built museum in Rome, the central figure, identified variously as Roma, Tellus, Ceres amongst others who holds two infants. She is accompanied by lesser divinities as well as variety of real and imagined animals as well as a range of flowering and fruiting plants. The sense of abundance is palpable.

The second version of the panel is a posited reconstruction of how it might have looked like when originally completed, painted to bring the scene to life. Other reconstructions use much more saturated colours which may also be plausible.