NB! · Archaeology · Art · Museums

Apropos the Scythians, here is a sumptuous crescent-shaped necklace: a royal pectoral with sculpted lions' heads at its ends and openwork relief figures of animals, plants and people, 4th century BC

Silver bowl with gilded relief figures of two bearded warriors and ram-head handles, shown against a dark background.

NB! · Archaeology · Art · Museums

Scythian silver bowl with gilded figures of two warriors, 4th century BC

Two Scythian warriors in conversation on a bowl with a spherical base and ram's-head handles. Silver, gilt. 4th century BC.

Wooden writing desk with a wheel of rotating shelves and a blue upholstered armchair in a room with a chequered marble floor.

NB! · Art · Museums

Italian 18th-century desk with rotating shelves for working with documents

An eighteenth-century invention you will want to own today. A magnificent desk by Italian craftsmen, made for working with documents

NB! · Aristocracy · Art · Monarchies · Heritage

The Vladimir Tiara and Its Owners: 1 – Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna, 2 – Mary of Teck, 3 – Elizabeth II

NB! · Art · People · Humour

Bad hair day of Arthur I'm better than your wife, after all Rimbaud

Bad hair day of Arthur *I'm better than your wife, after all* Rimbaud. A drawing by the celebrated artist Henri Fantin-Latour (1836-1904), who had Russian roots on his mother's side and was known for his independence

Coming Up · Art · Books · Observations · Heritage

A series of notes on artworks and cultural treasures lost in the war, for Victory Day

For some time I have been studying the subject of cultural losses in the war years, and for Victory Day I have decided to prepare a series of notes on the treasures of art and culture that our country has lost. Over the weekend I shall share the stories that

NB! · Archive · Art · Heritage

American soldiers at Neuschwanstein, where 21,000 works of art were brought from France

Family portrait in an interior: a mother in a teal dress at a harpsichord, the father beside her, four children and a dog on a red carpet.

NB! · Art · Observations · Mores

Family portrait by Troost and the depiction of children as small adults

Troost, family portrait. The children have faces like grown-ups. It is not that nobody knew how to paint a child's face; a child was simply regarded as a small adult. A great deal has been written about this in the history of childhood

NB! · Architecture · Art · Humour

The Screaming Sculpture from Jacques Cœur's Palace in Bourges (15th Century) Bears a Striking Resemblance to the Figure in Munch's Painting

NB! · Art · Museums · Mores · Rome

Carriage of the Portuguese Ambassador to the Court of Pope Clement XI, Eighteenth Century, the Work of Italian Craftsmen

NB! · Faith · Art · Observations · Humour

John the Baptist and Jesus in the Wombs of Their Mothers

John the Baptist and Jesus in the wombs of their mothers. The subject is slightly alarming, isn't it? When, in the fifth form, I drew something similar, an infant in the belly with a cigarette, for a school wall newspaper on the dangers of smoking, I was censured

NB! · Archive · Faith · Art · Science

This tortoise from the Michael Mahzor (Jewish codex of the early fourteenth century) may, oddly enough, correspond to the astronomical scorpion, Akrav, and relates to the prayer for rain