Dig Uncovers Sculptures of Emperors

It's not often anymore that digs in Rome yield exciting results, yet such is the case with a recent find announced by Italy's culture ministry.

Seems a team of archaeologists have found, in an ancient fountain, a group of marble sculptures of some large import and value, specifically because they contain marble heads that represent members of the imperial dynasty of the emperor Septimius Severus.

He it was who brought stability and a bit of respectability back to the emperor's throne after the free-for-all reign of Commodus (made famous in the relatively recent Ridley Scott film Gladiator) and the Year of the Five Emperors. Severus it was also who made the empire a military monarchy: The commander of the largest of Rome's armies, he was named emperor by his troops and set about making the army more of a force than the Senate in Roman government.

This emperor also started a dynasty, named after him (Severan Dynasty), and it is those emperors who are represented on the sculptures just dug up.

The way in which imperial officials were buried in those days suggests to modern historians that the sculptures, found on land that also contained the remains of an expansive villa, represent the onetime presence of someone very important indeed. (Also found in the dig was a statue of Zeus.) Mere plebeians didn't have money to either buy or bury such sculptures, so the owner of the villa and the burial ground must have been wealthy or at least influential.

The sculptures will soon reside at the Diocletian Baths, under the auspices of the National Museum of Rome.

Leonardo Exhibition Goes High-tech

Now this is a good use of 3D technology.

The Franklin Institute, in Philadelphia, is opening its doors on an exhibition of the paintings and drawings of Leonardo, and modern technology will be very much the star of the show.

OK, we've all gazed into the crystal ball to try to divine what Leonardo was thinking while he was painting The Last Supper. Turns out the folks at the Franklin Institute have some surprises in store for visitors, including results of digital restoration that clearly show something new — some fish and orange slices on plates on the table and a bell tower towering in the distance.

The buzz will most certainly be on the touchscreens, though, which can reveal not only a 2D representation of crossbows, flying machines, and robots that sprung from the fertile mind of the genius Leonardo but also a 3D simulation of what those things would have been like in real life. (Some of the inventions never made it off the page, so this will be a first indeed.)

One thing sure to stop people in their tracks will be a representation of the famed Mechanical Lion, a gift to King Francis I of France in 1515.

Also on display will be pages from Leonardo's famed Codex Atlanticus, his book of drawings in which he wrote backwards. Surely that touchscreen technology can be used to flip the writing and read what the true Renaissance Man had to say without getting out a pocket mirror.

More here.