Mosaic

===Greek and Roman===
{{main|Roman mosaic}}
{{further|Mosaics of Delos}}
[[Bronze Age]] pebble mosaics have been found at [[Tiryns]];{{sfn|Dunbabin|1999|p=5}} mosaics of the 4th century BC are found in the [[Macedonia (ancient kingdom)|Macedonian]] palace-city of [[Aegae (Macedon)|Aegae]], and the 4th-century BC mosaic of [[The Beauty of Durrës]] discovered in [[Durrës]], [[Albania]] in 1916, is an early figural example; the Greek figural style was mostly formed in the 3rd century BC. Mythological subjects, or scenes of hunting or other pursuits of the wealthy, were popular as the centrepieces of a larger geometric design, with strongly emphasized borders.<ref>{{cite book |last=Capizzi |first=Padre |title=Piazza Armerina: The Mosaics and Morgantina |year=1989 |publisher=International Specialized Book Service Inc.}}</ref>
[[Pliny the Elder]] mentions the artist [[Sosus of Pergamon]] by name, describing his mosaics of the food left on a floor after a feast and of a group of doves drinking from a bowl.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Fowler |first1=Harold North |last2=Wheeler |first2=James Rignall |last3=Stevens |first3=Gorham Phillips |title=A Handbook of Greek Archaeology |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mr_iiuv86Y4C&pg=PA538 |access-date=24 October 2012|page=538
 |year=1937|publisher=Biblo & Tannen Publishers |isbn=978-0-8196-2009-5}}</ref>
Both of these themes were widely copied.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.classics.upenn.edu/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php?method=did®exp=649&setcard=0&link=0&media=1 |last=Struck|year=2009 |first=Peter T. |title=MOSAICS |publisher=Upenn |access-date=24 October 2012}}</ref>

Greek figural mosaics could have been copied or adapted paintings, a far more prestigious artform, and the style was enthusiastically adopted by the Romans so that large floor mosaics enriched the floors of [[Hellenistic]] [[villa]]s and [[Ancient Rome|Roman]] dwellings from Britain to [[Dura-Europos]].

Most recorded names of Roman mosaic workers are Greek, suggesting they dominated high quality work across the empire; no doubt most ordinary craftsmen were slaves.  Splendid mosaic floors are found in Roman villas across [[North Africa]], in places such as [[Carthage]], and can still be seen in the extensive collection in [[Bardo Museum]] in [[Tunis]], [[Tunisia]].

There were two main techniques in Greco-Roman mosaic: ''[[opus vermiculatum]]'' used tiny ''[[tesserae]]'', typically cubes of 4 millimeters or less, and was produced in workshops in relatively small panels which were transported to the site glued to some temporary support. The tiny ''tesserae'' allowed very fine detail, and an approach to the illusionism of painting.  Often small panels called ''emblemata'' were inserted into walls or as the highlights of larger floor-mosaics in coarser work.  The normal technique was ''[[opus tessellatum]]'', using larger tesserae, which was laid on site.{{sfn|Smith|1983|pp=116–119}} There was a distinct native Italian style using black on a white background, which was no doubt cheaper than fully coloured work.{{sfn|Smith|1983|pp=121–123}}

In Rome, Nero and his architects used mosaics to cover some surfaces of walls and ceilings in the ''[[Domus Aurea]]'', built 64 AD, and wall mosaics are also found at [[Pompeii]] and neighbouring sites.  However it seems that it was not until the Christian era that figural wall mosaics became a major form of artistic expression. The Roman church of [[Santa Costanza]], which served as a [[mausoleum]] for one or more of the Imperial family, has both religious mosaic and decorative secular ceiling mosaics on a round vault, which probably represent the style of contemporary palace decoration.

The mosaics of the [[Villa Romana del Casale]] near [[Piazza Armerina]] in [[Sicily]] are the largest collection of late Roman mosaics ''in situ'' in the world, and are protected as a [[UNESCO]] [[World Heritage Site]]. The large ''villa rustica'', which was probably owned by Emperor [[Maximian]], was built largely in the early 4th century. The mosaics were covered and protected for 700 years by a landslide that occurred in the 12th Century. The most important pieces are the ''Circus Scene'', the 64m long ''Great Hunting Scene'', the ''Little Hunt'', the ''Labours of Hercules'' and the famous ''Bikini Girls'', showing women undertaking a range of sporting activities in garments that resemble 20th Century [[bikinis]]. The [[peristyle]], the imperial apartments and the [[thermae]] were also decorated with ornamental and [[mythological]] mosaics.<ref name="UNESCO casale">{{cite web |url=https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/832 |title=Villa Romana del Casale |website=UNESCO World Heritage Centre |access-date=15 August 2013}}</ref> Other important examples of Roman mosaic art in Sicily were unearthed on the Piazza Vittoria in [[Palermo]] where two houses were discovered. The most important scenes there depicted are an [[Orpheus mosaic]], ''Alexander the Great's Hunt'' and the ''Four Seasons''.

In 1913 the [[Zliten mosaic]], a [[Ancient Rome|Roman]] mosaic famous for its many scenes from gladiatorial contests, hunting and everyday life, was discovered in the [[Libyan]] town of [[Zliten]].  In 2000 archaeologists working in [[Leptis Magna]], [[Libya]], uncovered a 30&nbsp;ft length of five colorful mosaics created during the 1st or 2nd century AD. The mosaics show a warrior in combat with a deer, four young men wrestling a wild bull to the ground, and a gladiator resting in a state of fatigue, staring at his slain opponent. The mosaics decorated the walls of a cold plunge pool in a bath house within a Roman villa. The gladiator mosaic is noted by scholars as one of the finest examples of mosaic art ever seen – a "masterpiece comparable in quality with the [[Alexander Mosaic]] in [[Pompeii]]."

A specific genre of Roman mosaic was called ''asaroton'' (Greek for "unswept floor"). It depicted in ''[[trompe-l'œil]]'' style the feast leftovers on the floors of wealthy houses.<ref>{{cite web | url=http://www.ascsa.edu.gr/pdf/uploads/hesperia/147437.pdf | title=A mosaic floor from a Roman villa at Anaploga | access-date=3 February 2014}}</ref>

<gallery widths="220" heights="220" class="center">
File:Deer hunt mosaic from Pella.jpg|[[Stag Hunt Mosaic]] from the ''House of the Abduction of Helen'' at [[Pella]], [[ancient Macedonia]], late 4th century BC
File:The Abduction of Persephone by Pluto, Amphipolis.jpg|A mosaic of the [[Kasta Tomb]] in [[Amphipolis]] depicting the abduction of [[Persephone]] by [[Pluto (mythology)|Pluto]], 4th century BC
File:Delos Museum Mosaik Dionysos 05.jpg|A [[Hellenistic art|Hellenistic Greek]] mosaic depicting the god [[Dionysos]] as a winged [[daimon]] riding on a tiger, from [[Mosaics of Delos|the House of Dionysos]] at [[Delos]] in the [[South Aegean]] [[Administrative regions of Greece|region]] of [[Greece]], late 2nd century BC
File:Palazzo dei gran maestri di rodi, sala del cavalluccio, mosaico della ninfa sull'ippocampo, da kos, periodo romano, 02.JPG|A [[Hellenistic period|Hellenistic Greek]] mosaic of a [[nymph]] riding on a marine creature, from the [[Palace of the Grand Master of the Knights of Rhodes]], [[Hellenistic Greece|Greece]], 2nd century BC
File:Centaur mosaic - Google Art Project retouched.jpeg|This centaur mosaic was found on the site of the Roman emperor [[Hadrian|Hadrian's]] [[Hadrian's Villa|Villa]] near [[Tivoli, Italy|Tivoli]], [[Italy]]. [[Altes Museum]], Berlin.
File:Mosaïque d'Ulysse et les sirènes.jpg|Roman mosaic of [[Odysseus|Ulysses]], from Carthage, 2nd century AD, now in the [[Bardo Museum]], [[Tunisia]]
File:Dom dramaturga.jpg|''Cave canem'' mosaics ('[[Beware of the dog]]') were a popular motif for the thresholds of [[Roman Empire|Roman]] villas
File:Mosaic.woodchester.arp.750pix.jpg|A small part of ''The Great Pavement'', a Roman mosaic laid in AD 325 at [[Woodchester]], [[Gloucestershire]], England
File:Gladiators from the Zliten mosaic 3 cropped.JPG|The [[Zliten mosaic]] showing [[gladiators]], 2nd century AD
File:Silchester mosaic.jpg|Roman mosaic found at [[Calleva Atrebatum]] (Silchester)
File:GiorcesBardo56.jpg|A Roman mosaic depicting the wedding of [[Dionysos]] and [[Ariadne]], with [[Silenus]] and a [[satyr]], 2nd century AD, [[Tunis]], Tunisia
File:Mosaico Medusa M.A.N. 01.JPG|A mosaic showing [[Medusa]] and representational figures of the four seasons, from [[Palencia]], Spain, made between 167 and 200 AD
File:MosaicEpiphany-of-Dionysus.jpg|Epiphany of [[Dionysus]] mosaic, from the Villa of Dionysus (2nd century AD) in [[Dion, Greece]]. Now in the [[Archeological Museum of Dion]].
File:Bikini mosaic.jpg|[[Villa Romana del Casale]] of [[Piazza Armerina]], 4th century AD
File:Ancient Roman Mosaics Villa Romana La Olmeda 000 Pedrosa De La Vega - Saldaña (Palencia).JPG|Late Roman mosaics at Villa Romana [[La Olmeda]], [[Spain]], 4th-5th centuries AD
File:Villa Romana de La Olmeda Mosaicos romanos 002.jpg|Detail of a princess of [[Skyros]] (from a larger scene of the ''[[Iliad]]'' depicting her and [[Achilles on Skyros|other princesses]] fawning over [[Achilles]] as [[Odysseus]] looks on), from the villa of [[La Olmeda]], Spain, 4th-5th centuries AD
File:P1170845 Louvre jugement de Pâris Ma3443 rwk.jpg|[[Judgment of Paris]], marble, limestone and glass tesserae, 115–150 AD; from the Atrium House triclinium in [[Antioch-on-the-Orontes]]
File:Cirta mosaic.jpg|''Triumph of [[Poseidon]] and [[Amphitrite]]'' showing the couple [[thiasos#Other thiasoi|in procession]], detail of a [[Roman mosaic|mosaic]] from [[Cirta]], [[Africa (Roman province)|Roman Africa]], 315–325 AD, [[Louvre]]
File:Mosaico di Orfeo da Cagliari - Museo Archelogico di Torino.jpg|Mosaic of Orpheus from Caralis, modern Cagliari (Italy), now in Archeological Museum of Turin
File:House_of_the_Neptune_Mosaic_(7254084220).jpg|House of the Neptune Mosaic Casa di Nettuno ed Anfitrite (Ins. V) - Triclinium (dining room) decor
File:Antep_erased2.jpg|(Gaziantep Museum of Archeology)([[Zeugma, Commagene|Zeugma]])
</gallery>