Ancient texture. #1

Tarxien Temples.... more

by Andy i Za

Buy the Original Digital Art

Price

$5

Dimensions

3000.000 x 4512.000 pixels

Title

Ancient texture. #1

Artist

Andy i Za

Medium

Digital Art - Digital Art - Photograph

Description

Tarxien Temples.
The Tarxien Temples are an archaeological complex in Tarxien, Malta. They date to approximately 3150 BC. The site was accepted as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1992 along with the other Megalithic temples on the island of Malta.
The Tarxien consist of three separate, but attached, temple structures. The main entrance is a reconstruction dating from 1956, when the whole site was restored. At the same time, many of the decorated slabs discovered on site were relocated indoors for protection at the Museum of Archaeology in Valletta. The first temple has been dated to approximately 3100 BC and is the most elaborately decorated of the temples of Malta. The middle temple dates to about 3000 BC, and is unique in that, unlike the rest of the Maltese temples, it has three pairs of apses instead of the usual two. The east temple is dated at around 3100 BC. The remains of another temple, smaller, and older, having been dated to 3250 BC, are visible further towards the east.
Of particular interest at the temple site is the rich and intricate stonework, which includes depictions of domestic animals carved in relief, altars, and screens decorated with spiral designs and other patterns. Demonstrative of the skill of the builders is a chamber set into the thickness of the wall between the South and Central temples and containing a relief showing a bull and a sow.
The large stone blocks were discovered in 1914 by local farmers ploughing a field. After the accidental discovery of the nearby Tarxien hypogeum in 1913, the proprietor of the land underneath which the temples were buried figured that the large stones that were continually struck by workers' ploughs may also have had some archaeological value. On that notion, he contacted the director of the National Museum, Sir Themistocles Zammit, who began to dig even on his first inspection of the site, where he discovered the center of the temple compound. It was not long before Zammit found himself standing in what appeared to be an apse formed by a semicircle of enormous hewn stones. Over the course of three years, Zammit enlisted the help of local farmers and townspeople for an excavation project of unprecedented scale in Malta. By 1920, Zammit had identified and carried out restoration work on five separate but interconnected temples, all yielding a remarkable collection of artifacts, including the famous "fat lady" statue, a representation of a Mother Goddess or a fertility charm.

Uploaded

March 5th, 2018