Painted limestone funerary slab with a man controlling a rearing horse

During the Ptolemaic period a distinctive type of subterranean tomb for multiple burials proliferated in the cemeteries around the city of Alexandria. Underground chambers cut into the living rock radiated from a central courtyard open to the sky. Most chambers contained a number of loculi, long narrow niches cut into the walls, which served as burial slots. Some loculi were sealed with painted limestone slabs in the form of small shrines. Here, a lively depiction of a man trying to bridle a horse, while a boy stands behind him, commemorates a man from Thessaly in Northern Greece, who must have been one of the many foreigners who congregated in the wealthy, cosmopolitan Ptolemaic capital.

Hellenistic

limestone paintings stelae miscellaneous paintings greek hellenistic funerary slab limestone funerary slab man horse ancient greek ancient greece high resolution ultra high resolution 3 d object ancient egypt ptolemaic period metropolitan museum of art

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Metropolitan Museum of Art

http://www.metmuseum.org/

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