Pergamon was the capital of the Kingdom of Pergamon during the reign of the Attalid dynasty in the Hellenistic period. When Attalus III died without an heir, he bequethed Pergamon to Rome. The statue of Hadrian that stands at the enterance of the Temple of Trajan are from the reign of Hadrian (117-138) when the city was declared a metropolis and a building program was initiated.
The temple of Zeus, where a single tree stands today, had the Gigantomachy which depicted the battle between the Titans and the Olympian Gods is in the Pergamon museum in Berlin.
Pergamon with its multi-layered cultural landscape was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO this summer.
Aalto designed the building accurately, the concept of its architecture and interior spaces were conceived as a “medical instrument.” Given the sanatorium’s history and its subsequent functions, wishing the future new owners to preserve the iconic space.
An introduction to polyphony in the country of Georgia. It’s thought that polyphonic singing was around before the introduction of Christianity to the region, and both sacred and secular songs are sung. While the video states there are three different styles of polyphony, you’ll find many variations and local styles throughout the country. It’s worth noting that these singers are all quite refined despite being “folk” singers. Folk music was highly prized in Soviet times as a representation of the people and regional identity, and so musicians and singers were paid to study and perform their traditional music (albeit in a sanitized and censored way). The video is from UNESCO, which designated Georgian polyphony as a part of the “Intangible Heritage of Humanity.”
FOR SWAP 1) Sentosa : An island resort off Singapore’s southern coast (1 pc available) 2) Singapore Botanic Gardens : UNESCO World Heritage Site (2 pcs available) 3) Icons of Singapore (10pcs available) 4) Map of Singapore (2 pcs available) 5) Flag of Singapore (5 pcs available)
If interested, please DM or comment your offers.
LOOKING FOR ▪Missing countries ▪Missing USA states *** Scenic views only ***
Built circa 960 C.E. during the reign of the Chandela king Dhanga and originally dedicated to Adinatha, Parshvanatha Temple is one of the finest Khajuraho monuments.
The temple is rectangular in plan, with an east projection containing the entrance porch, and the west projection housing a shrine attached to the rear of the sanctum.
The temple has an inner ambulatory, but unlike many other Khajuraho temples, it has no transepts with balconied windows. As a result, the outer wall of the temple is more solid, and the sculptors made maximum use of this blank canvas to apply their expertise.
Beautiful carvings adorn the temple exterior, in particular of apsaras caught in the act of activities such as applying eye make-up. Their voluminous nature, size, and poise, draws many parallels with the Lakshmana Temple (western group).
There’s also a vast array of vyalas with different heads, some of parrots, elephants, lions, and other creatures. The upper row of carvings is a little more animated, with varied scenes including flying figures and musicians.
Nobody is quite sure why this Jain temple contains so many images of Hindu deities on the outside wall, a theme also mirrored by the adjacent Adinatha Temple.
It is believed the earliest idol to be enshrined here was Adinatha. When Alexander Cunningham visited the temple in 1852 he found the main sanctum empty, and described it as merely “Jainatha Temple”. He also noted the temple was repaired by a Jain banker in 1847. 13 years later in 1860 a Parshvanatha idol was installed in the main sanctum.
An inscription (dated 954 C.E.) on the left door jamb of the temple records gifts and endowments of gardens by Pahila as a devotee of Jainism, and states that he was held in great esteem by king Dhanga.
The image installed in the shrine to the back of the sanctum is Adinatha, who the temple was originally dedicated to. I presume this a later installation as Cunningham made no reference to it in 1852. Repost from @kevinstandage1 #khajuraho #khajurahotemples #incredibletemples #madhyapradesh #madhyapradeshtourism #mptourism #unesco #worldheritagesite #worldhistoricalmonuments #thegenuineindia #templesofindia #ParshvanathaTemp https://www.instagram.com/p/Cc6vCvYPgM9/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=
✅Thanjai Periya Kovil also called #Rajarajeswaram is dedicated to #LordShiva located in South bank of #CauveryRiver in #Thanjavur, #TamilNadu, India.
✅ It is one of the largest #HinduTemples and exemplary example of a fully realized #TamilArchitecture.
✅Built by Chola Emperor Rajarajan one between 1003 AD and1010 AD the temple is a part of the #UNESCO #WorldHeritageSite known as the “Great Living Chola Temples ”.
✅ Height -217 feet Area-44.7 Acres Buffer zone -23.7 acres.
✅Built using granite, the Vimana tower above the Shrine is one of the tallest in South India.
✅ The temple has a massive colonnaded prakara (corridor) and one of the largest Shiva lingas in India.
Smithsonian Magazine. “Researchers Decipher the Glyphs on a 1,300-Year-Old Frieze in Mexico”
“The original frieze is estimated to have been about 100 feet long and would have decorated the main façade of the Casa del Sur, according to the Art Newspaper’s Gabriella Angeleti. It would have been visible to a busy ceremonial plaza, and, due to its location, Robles García says the glyphs impart a “message or discourse of power.””
Že drugo leto zapored smo se ‘babn’ce’ (mama, sestra, botra in jaz) odpravile na potep po Češki. Lansko leto smo si ogledale lepote južne Češke, letos pa nas je pot zanesla bolj na vzhod. Prvi dan smo začele z rahlo zamudo, vendar smo se še pravi čas odpravile na pot. Najprej smo se ustavile tik za mejo, v mestu Mikulov. Gre za starejše mesto, znano po istoimenskem gradu,…
Pozdravljeni! Pred približno tremi tedni smo se ženske (beri: jaz, sestra, mama in dve mamini prijateljici) usedle v avto in se v zgodnjih jutranjih urah podale na več kot 4 ure oddaljeni izlet na Češko. Češka je zagotovo ena izmed maminih najljubših in najlepših držav in čeprav je tam bila že dvakrat (ali trikrat), sem bila prav vesela, da ji je prav ta država padla na misel, ko smo se…
This 2,413 years-old city, the pride of Albanian architecture which is under the protection of UNESCO, is located 120 km from Tirana. The city forms a wonderful combination of eastern and western cultures, costumes, traditions and outlook. Berat is a treasure-trove of Albanian history, culture and a testament to the country’s tradition of religious harmony. @leonidaa__
Hadrian’s Villa in Tivoli. Tivoli (the Ancient Tibur, 23 kilometers from Rome) is the site of an imposing architectural complex, Hadrian’s Villa. Built between the years 118 and 134. It were meant to remind emperor Hadrian of the places he most loved in Greece and the Near East. Hadrian’s Villa is one of Italian UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
Oualata (also known as “Walata”), located in Southeast Mauritania, is one town out of a string of 4 in total, coined by UNESCO as the Ksour (ksar - singular, ksour - plural; a Maghrebi Arabic term meaning “fortified village”) of Ouadane, Chinguetti, Tichitt and Oualata. The city of Oualata became a popular caravan city, a trading hub, between the 12th and 16th centuries CE. [1] Today it is renowned for its decorative vernacular houses.
The medieval Moroccan traveler and scholar, Ibn Battuta, wrote of his stay in Oualata in his Travels in Asia and Africa 1325-1354, saying:
“Thus we reached the town of Iwalatan [Walata] after a journey from Sijilmasa of two months to a day. Iwalatan is the northernmost province of the Negroes, and the sultan’s representative there was one Farba Husayn, ‘farba’ meaning deputy [in their Ianguage]. When we arrived there, the merchants deposited their goods in an open square, where the blacks undertook to guard them, and went to the farba. He was sitting on a carpet under an archway, with his guards before him carrying lances and bows in their hands, and the headmen of the Massufa behind him. The merchants remained standing in front of him while he spoke to them through an interpreter, although they were close to him, to show his contempt for them. It was then that I repented of having come to their country, because of their lack of manners and their contempt for the whites.
…Later on the mushrif [inspector] of Iwalatan, whose name was Mansha Ju, invited all those who had come with the caravan to partake of his hospitality. At first I refused to attend, but my companions urged me very strongly, so I went with the rest. The repast was served–some pounded millet mixed with a little honey and milk, put in a half calabash shaped like a large bowl. The guests drank and retired. I said to them, ‘Was it for this that the black invited us?’ They answered, ‘Yes; and it is in their opinion the highest form of hospitality.’ This convinced me that there was no good to be hoped for from these people, and I made up my mind to travel [back to Morocco at once] with the pilgrim caravan from Iwalatan. Afterwards, however, I thought it best to go to see the capital of their king [of the kingdom of Mali, at the city of Mali].”
He seems to have met an hateful sentiment against “white” North Africans from someone within the city. Nonetheless, he did not hate the blacks. Also by his own account (and as seen in the next excerpt), this city was inhabited by the Masufa Berbers, a tribe not known much about. The demographics of Oualata, being mostly black, could mean the Masufa are one of the few heavily black Berber tribes (the main most notably being Tuareg people), or they simply could have been the typical “white” Berbers.
University of Georgia historian Timothy Cleaveland notes in his book Becoming Walata: A History of Saharan Social Formation and Transformation (2002), on page 176, that the city was inhabited by a mix of the original Mande-speaking peoples (also inhabited by Soninke people as well), and later migrations of Zenaga-speaking Berbers, followed even further down the line by Arab or “Arabized” nomads. Although, he notes that the composition of the population didn’t change very much. [2]
The famous Israeli historian and expert of African Islamic history Nehemia Levtzion says in his book Ancient Ghana and Mali (1973) on page 147 that “Walata” had a mixed population of [”white”] Berbers and “Sudanese”; blacks. On pages 80 and 158, we read that it fell from its trading popularity to the city of Timbuktu in the second half of the 14th century. [3]
This is what Ibn Battuta had to say of his stay in the city of Oualata, its men and the quality of their women:
“My stay at Iwalatan lasted about fifty days; and I was shown honor and entertained by its inhabitants. It is an excessively hot place, and boasts a few small date-palms, in the shade of which they sow watermelons. Its water comes from underground waterbeds at that point, and there is plenty of mutton to be had. The garments of its inhabitants, most of whom belong to the Massufa tribe, are of fine Egyptian fabrics.
Their women are of surpassing beauty, and are shown more respect than the men. The state of affairs amongst these people is indeed extraordinary. Their men show no signs of jealousy whatever; no one claims descent from his father, but on the contrary from his mother’s brother. A person’s heirs are his sister’s sons, not his own sons. This is a thing which I have seen nowhere in the world except among the Indians of Malabar. But those are heathens; these people are Muslims, punctilious in observing the hours of prayer, studying books of law, and memorizing the Koran. Yet their women show no bashfulness before men and do not veil themselves, though they are assiduous in attending the prayers. Any man who wishes to marry one of them may do so, but they do not travel with their husbands, and even if one desired to do so her family would not allow her to go.
The women there have ‘friends’ and ‘companions’ amongst the men outside their own families, and the men in the same way have ‘companions’ amongst the women of other families. A man may go into his house and find his wife entertaining her ‘companion’ but he takes no objection to it. One day at Iwalatan I went into the qadi’s house, after asking his permission to enter, and found with him a young woman of remarkable beauty. When I saw her I was shocked and turned to go out, but she laughed at me, instead of being overcome by shame, and the qadi said to me ‘Why are you going out? She is my companion.’ I was amazed at their conduct, for he was a theologian and a pilgrim [to Mecca] to boot. I was told that he had asked the sultan’s permission to make the pilgrimage that year with his ‘companion’–whether this one or not I cannot say–but the sultan would not grant it.”
In a quite hilarious situation, Battuta is surprised by this beautiful woman and attempts to flee like a nervous boy. And he does end up leaving the city of Oualata, in frustration, for Mali to see the king, and notes that it takes 24 days to reach if the caravan pushes on rapidly. [4]
Citation 4 is the text provided by Fordham University’s IHSP.
The renowned 15th-16th century Moroccan Berber-Andalusi writer, Leo Africanus, notes in his Descrittione dell’Africathat:
“The fourth part of Africa which is called the land of Negros, beginneth eastward at the kingdome of Gaoga, from whence it extendeth west as far as Gualata.” (pg 124)
“I* my selfe saw fifteene kingdoms of the Negros: howbeit there are many more, which although I saw not with mine owne eies, yet are they by the Negros sufficiently knowen and frequented. Their names there fore (beginning from the west, and so proceeding Eastward and Southward) are these following: Gualata, Ghinea, Melli, Tombuto, Gago, Guber, Agadez, Cano, Cafena, Zegzeg, Zanfara, Guangara, Borno, Gaogo, Nube.” (pg 128) [5]
The last two citations are unrelated pieces written to explain what exactly this “Gaoga” kingdom was, seeing that it isn’t written of otherwise, for anyone interested.
The beautiful ancient city of Oualata, Mauritania remains a notable tourist attraction today. An hour-long documentary was made about the muralist women of Oualata who decorate these houses, titled “En attandant les hommes”, in 2007 by director Katy Ndiaye.
Seewww.walata.org if you plan to visit. Below are some extra pictures of the city (one of them shows muralists at work). Enjoy.
5. Leo Africanus, The History and Description of Africa and of the Notable Things Therein Contained: Volume 1, pgs 124 and 128, published by B. Franklin, 1896
For the next week I will be sharing the African-centric photography of Paola Viesi. Ranging from captures of the African social atmosphere, Ethiopian Christendom, to portraits of Tuareg Berbers and more.
Here is her story:
“Paola Viesi is a professional photographer working mainly in Africa.
After classical and humanistic studies in Rome and a nearly fifteen formative years at Olivetti, works for ten years as a Human Resources Top Manager at Telecom Italia, Italy’s main telecommunication company.
With the intention of living a second life, she decides for early retiring to follow her great passion for travelling and the arts. After a first trip to Ethiopia, she moves to Addis Ababa, where she is based since 2002, spending most of her time travelling in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Ethiopia sparks her interest for culture, art and people. Starts travelling extensively throughout the country taking photos with a special aesthetic touch and a sense of classical beauty.
After the success of her photos for UNESCO’s Communication Campaign for the return and the re-erection of the Axum Obelisque, she starts a five years collaboration with Ethiopian Airlines, Africa’s largest airline, travelling and taking pictures in 16 Sub-Saharan countries.
Known for her fearless and long expeditions, her attraction to people takes her travelling to remote places, where she starts taking pictures of great gatherings to holy places with her capacity of capturing magical and unique emotional moments in people’s lives in her vibrant portraits.
In 2007 starts a fruitful collaboration with Slow Food, travelling and focussing on Rural Communities and Fishery Projects, documenting many differents Slow Food projects and Presidia throughout Africa.
After 150.000 kilometers mainly on rough roads travelling with her car in 30 African countries, her intention is only to continue to travel more throughout the world, taking more pictures of people, places, unique events and artwork with her tireless creative energy.”
Oualata (also known as “Walata”), located in Southeast Mauritania, is one town out of a string of 4 in total, coined by UNESCO as the Ksour (ksar - singular, ksour - plural; a Maghrebi Arabic term meaning “fortified village”) of Ouadane, Chinguetti, Tichitt and Oualata. The city of Oualata became a popular caravan city, a trading hub, between the 12th and 16th centuries CE. [1] Today it is renowned for its decorative vernacular houses.
The medieval Moroccan traveler and scholar, Ibn Battuta, wrote of his stay in Oualata in his Travels in Asia and Africa 1325-1354, saying:
“Thus we reached the town of Iwalatan [Walata] after a journey from Sijilmasa of two months to a day. Iwalatan is the northernmost province of the Negroes, and the sultan’s representative there was one Farba Husayn, ‘farba’ meaning deputy [in their Ianguage]. When we arrived there, the merchants deposited their goods in an open square, where the blacks undertook to guard them, and went to the farba. He was sitting on a carpet under an archway, with his guards before him carrying lances and bows in their hands, and the headmen of the Massufa behind him. The merchants remained standing in front of him while he spoke to them through an interpreter, although they were close to him, to show his contempt for them. It was then that I repented of having come to their country, because of their lack of manners and their contempt for the whites.
…Later on the mushrif [inspector] of Iwalatan, whose name was Mansha Ju, invited all those who had come with the caravan to partake of his hospitality. At first I refused to attend, but my companions urged me very strongly, so I went with the rest. The repast was served–some pounded millet mixed with a little honey and milk, put in a half calabash shaped like a large bowl. The guests drank and retired. I said to them, ‘Was it for this that the black invited us?’ They answered, ‘Yes; and it is in their opinion the highest form of hospitality.’ This convinced me that there was no good to be hoped for from these people, and I made up my mind to travel [back to Morocco at once] with the pilgrim caravan from Iwalatan. Afterwards, however, I thought it best to go to see the capital of their king [of the kingdom of Mali, at the city of Mali].”
He seems to have met an hateful sentiment against “white” North Africans from someone within the city. Nonetheless, he did not hate the blacks. Also by his own account (and as seen in the next excerpt), this city was inhabited by the Masufa Berbers, a tribe not known much about. The demographics of Oualata, being mostly black, could mean the Masufa are one of the few heavily black Berber tribes (the main most notably being Tuareg people), or they simply could have been the typical “white” Berbers.
University of Georgia historian Timothy Cleaveland notes in his book Becoming Walata: A History of Saharan Social Formation and Transformation (2002), on page 176, that the city was inhabited by a mix of the original Mande-speaking peoples (also inhabited by Soninke people as well), and later migrations of Zenaga-speaking Berbers, followed even further down the line by Arab or “Arabized” nomads. Although, he notes that the composition of the population didn’t change very much. [2]
The famous Israeli historian and expert of African Islamic history Nehemia Levtzion says in his book Ancient Ghana and Mali (1973) on page 147 that “Walata” had a mixed population of [”white”] Berbers and “Sudanese”; blacks. On pages 80 and 158, we read that it fell from its trading popularity to the city of Timbuktu in the second half of the 14th century. [3]
This is what Ibn Battuta had to say of his stay in the city of Oualata, its men and the quality of their women:
“My stay at Iwalatan lasted about fifty days; and I was shown honor and entertained by its inhabitants. It is an excessively hot place, and boasts a few small date-palms, in the shade of which they sow watermelons. Its water comes from underground waterbeds at that point, and there is plenty of mutton to be had. The garments of its inhabitants, most of whom belong to the Massufa tribe, are of fine Egyptian fabrics.
Their women are of surpassing beauty, and are shown more respect than the men. The state of affairs amongst these people is indeed extraordinary. Their men show no signs of jealousy whatever; no one claims descent from his father, but on the contrary from his mother’s brother. A person’s heirs are his sister’s sons, not his own sons. This is a thing which I have seen nowhere in the world except among the Indians of Malabar. But those are heathens; these people are Muslims, punctilious in observing the hours of prayer, studying books of law, and memorizing the Koran. Yet their women show no bashfulness before men and do not veil themselves, though they are assiduous in attending the prayers. Any man who wishes to marry one of them may do so, but they do not travel with their husbands, and even if one desired to do so her family would not allow her to go.
The women there have ‘friends’ and ‘companions’ amongst the men outside their own families, and the men in the same way have ‘companions’ amongst the women of other families. A man may go into his house and find his wife entertaining her ‘companion’ but he takes no objection to it. One day at Iwalatan I went into the qadi’s house, after asking his permission to enter, and found with him a young woman of remarkable beauty. When I saw her I was shocked and turned to go out, but she laughed at me, instead of being overcome by shame, and the qadi said to me ‘Why are you going out? She is my companion.’ I was amazed at their conduct, for he was a theologian and a pilgrim [to Mecca] to boot. I was told that he had asked the sultan’s permission to make the pilgrimage that year with his ‘companion’–whether this one or not I cannot say–but the sultan would not grant it.”
In a quite hilarious situation, Battuta is surprised by this beautiful woman and attempts to flee like a nervous boy. And he does end up leaving the city of Oualata, in frustration, for Mali to see the king, and notes that it takes 24 days to reach if the caravan pushes on rapidly. [4]
Citation 4 is the text provided by Fordham University’s IHSP.
The renowned 15th-16th century Moroccan Berber-Andalusi writer, Leo Africanus, notes in his Descrittione dell’Africathat:
“The fourth part of Africa which is called the land of Negros, beginneth eastward at the kingdome of Gaoga, from whence it extendeth west as far as Gualata.” (pg 124)
“I* my selfe saw fifteene kingdoms of the Negros: howbeit there are many more, which although I saw not with mine owne eies, yet are they by the Negros sufficiently knowen and frequented. Their names there fore (beginning from the west, and so proceeding Eastward and Southward) are these following: Gualata, Ghinea, Melli, Tombuto, Gago, Guber, Agadez, Cano, Cafena, Zegzeg, Zanfara, Guangara, Borno, Gaogo, Nube.” (pg 128) [5]
The last two citations are unrelated pieces written to explain what exactly this “Gaoga” kingdom was, seeing that it isn’t written of otherwise, for anyone interested.
The beautiful ancient city of Oualata, Mauritania remains a notable tourist attraction today. An hour-long documentary was made about the muralist women of Oualata who decorate these houses, titled “En attandant les hommes”, in 2007 by director Katy Ndiaye.
Seewww.walata.org if you plan to visit. Below are some extra pictures of the city (one of them shows muralists at work). Enjoy.
5. Leo Africanus, The History and Description of Africa and of the Notable Things Therein Contained: Volume 1, pgs 124 and 128, published by B. Franklin, 1896
Mousa Broch . ⚫Located on the island of Mousa in Shetland, Scotland. ⚫It is the tallest broch still standing and amongst the best-preserved prehistoric buildings in Europe. ⚫It is thought to have been constructed c. 100 BC, and is one of about 500 brochs built in Scotland. ⚫It stands at 13.3 metres (44 ft) and its walls are 4.5 meters (15 ft) thick. ⚫The entrance is at the ground level, and it has a staircase that goes all the way to the top. ⚫The stair begins at the second level and is reached by a doorway from inside. ⚫The borch of mousa appears twice in Norse sagas. One recounts how an eloping couple took a shelter here after a shipwreck in 900 AD. ⚫The second Saga, the Orkneyinga Saga, tells a story about the Earl Harald Maddadsson who sieged the broch in 1153 because his mother was abducted and held inside. . . FOLLOW me @Historical_grams to enjoy more and more posts about our world’s marvelous History.❤ . . #viking #borch #tower #vikings #norse #scotland #unesco #europe #shetland #audible #archaeology #history #ancient #art #world #archaeologist #discovery #historical_grams #travel #archaeological #historic #london #paris #photography #usa #museum #find #explorepage #explorepage (at Shetland Islands) https://www.instagram.com/p/CRIUIPcHAvx/?utm_medium=tumblr
Algeria.Woman dressed in a traditional blousa made of Mensouj which is an Algerian fabric from the city of Tlemcen in Northern West Algeria. She is also wearing Chedda, a typical headdress from Tlemcen composed of several elements : An embroidered Chechia, various types of diadems, a golden Meskia, pearled necklaces and earrings.
Pozdravljeni!
