Christina Kolb

An intricately beaded carpet about 6 x 5 feet in museum display

Close up of pearl beading

After my recent trip to Doha, and learning about Qatari pearl diving, I present The Pearl Carpet of Baroda, commissioned by the Maharaja of Baroda in India around 1865. It is embroidered with c. 1.5 million pearls and originally intended to be a cover for the tomb of Mohammed in Medina.

Based on curvature of the beaks, I'm going for Team Flamingo 🦩

I feel that a lot of pseudoarchaeology fans just need a better understanding of stratigraphy to get why "real" archaeologists date things the way we do.

Trying to decide what my first post should be, and figured that in the spirit of Gladiator 2 coming out, I'll post this gladiator statuette from Arles, along with a model of the Arles amphitheater, complete with bear fight. #gladiator #arles #ancientrome #romanhistory #romanart #archaeology #history