Mosaic A3 looking down from west
- Description:
- Mosaic A3 looking down from west
- Photographer:
- Image capture by Edwin Brock
- Date Created:
- July 24, 1998
- Collection:
- Villa of the Birds Mosaic Conservation
- Series:
- Conservation work in progress
- Subseries:
- Early Roman Villa
- Location:
- Alexandria, Egypt and Al Iskandarīyah
- Time Period:
- Early Roman Empire
- Topic:
- Domestic architecture, Art, Greco-Roman, Geometric designs, and Altered in antiquity
- Genre:
- general views and color photographs
- Conservation Note:
- Using original documentation, the original trenches from the 1970s were retraced and re-excavated to reveal the mosaic floors. At the time, the conditions of the explorations had been quite different and much more formidable than at present. Most of the work was done in narrow trenches, reaching in places a precarious depth of 8 m below ground level. The trenches were located wherever the later architecture of the Late Roman period (houses B and F dated to the 5th-7th centuries AD) permitted it. These practical limitations had resulted in the mosaic floors from the Early Roman villa (alpha) being uncovered only fragmentarily in four separate trenches.
- Copyright Status:
- copyrighted
- Creative Commons License:
- https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/
- Local ID:
- arce_ca_vob_images_0694.tif
- Project History:
- At the heart of modern Alexandria in Kom el-Dikka lies an exceptional demonstration of Domestic architecture during the Roman Imperial period. The Early Roman villa named “Villa of the Birds” houses exceptionally well preserved mosaic floors, made of tesserae. True to its name, it contains Mosaic a-5 which depicts different bird species within seven different panels. Under the auspices of the American Research Center in Egypt (ARCE), Dr. Wojciech Kolataj and his team conserved the mosaic floors, constructed a shelter, and landscaped the surrounding area. Some related supplemental work was carried out by the Polish-Egyptian Preservation Mission, and sponsored jointly by the Supreme Council of Antiquities (currently the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities) and the Polish Center of Archaeology. Conservation work was made possible with the support of the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities (formerly the Egyptian Supreme Council of Antiquities).
- Funding Agency:
- Villa of the Birds Mosaic Conservation project was made possible with funding by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Grant No. 263-G-00-93-00089-00 (formerly 263-0000-G-00-3089-00) and administered by the Egyptian Antiquities Project (EAP) of the American Research Center in Egypt (ARCE).