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[Tieno]

Marble with a top covered in gold.

I woud love to see a realistic mockup of that

 

[siddx]

I wonder how many people realize that the Easter Island statues were supposed to have hats and eyes.

Well not exactly. Some had hats (pukaos/topknots), and some had eyes. But not all were meant to. The ones with eyes were for specific areas of importance, such as Ahus or religious centers. And the hats were not universal and is theorized that they were merely decorative.

Also after the moai obession, the islanders moved on to a birdman religion.
...
And then got slaughtered by the Europeans through slave trade and disease.

One of the most amazing places I have ever been.

 

[lostinblue]

We've known this for decades.

I learned it at school even, not to mention hearing/reading it at museums ever since I was a kid.

 

[Chao]

The pyramids were covered in marble originally, right? I can't remember if it was marble or something else. They were also smooth, not step-like.

Yeah, marble. And the top was made of gold so it would reflect the sun and look awesome.

I woud love to see a realistic mockup of that

Maybe even cooler than that

 

[Lamel]

I was amazed by the pictures but this stole the show:

http://cache.gawker.com/assets/images/comment/8/2010/08/850fa86e483bb6520a4aee91e6cc342e/340x.jpg[/IMG



[B]WWII color pictures do that to me after being raised on b&w film & photos[/B].[/QUOTE]

mind blown

 

[Lamel]

We've known this for decades.

I learned it at school even, not to mention hearing/reading it at museums ever since I was a kid.

Edit: Sorry for double post.

 

[Fimbulvetr]

If this is true and isn't old news, why haven't things like god of war shown statues painted?

And with the egyptian pyramids being "blindingly white", why aren't they shown to be that way in movies that show egypt back then?

I hate how movies and stuff choose not to be accurate.

Coconut effect.

 

[G-Fex]

Amazing and mind blowing I had no idea.

Of course they wanted to paint them, they wanted them to look all neat and since I guess colors were new they made them all epic looking I guess? I can't imagine what the Sphinx looked like colored.

 

[Enosh]

I wonder how many people realize that the Easter Island statues were supposed to have hats and eyes.

easter island statues build by russians confirmed

anyway
I have the same feeling on this issue as with pluto not being a planet
I don't care what science says
greek statues were white and pluto is still a god damned planet!

 

[Kurtofan]

easter island statues build by russians confirmed

anyway
I have the same feeling on this issue as with pluto not being a planet
I don't care what science says
greek statues were white and pluto is still a god damned planet!

Pluto will always be a planet,no matter what.

 

[XiaNaphryz]

Well not exactly. Some had hats (pukaos/topknots), and some had eyes. But not all were meant to. The ones with eyes were for specific areas of importance, such as Ahus or religious centers. And the hats were not universal and is theorized that they were merely decorative.

Also after the moai obession, the islanders moved on to a birdman religion.
...
And then got slaughtered by the Europeans through slave trade and disease.

One of the most amazing places I have ever been.

Pretty sure most of the population loss was due to them fighting over themselves, long before the Europeans showed up.

There's a pretty good write-up covering their history in the book Collapse, written by the author who did Guns, Germs, and Steel.

Pluto will always be a planet,no matter what.

Never understood this sort of thinking. May as well say that the Earth will always be flat and the center of the universe while you're at it.

Definitions can change in science - it's always happened.

 

[Eteric Rice]

Weren't the tips of the pyramids supposed to be solid gold or something?

 

[Guardian Bob]

No, they always looked crumply and cracked. That was the style back then. :/

Also their buildings and such were painted. Roman statues and Michelangelo were sometimes not painted. Also:

 

[Stumpokapow]

thought it might be relevant

thought it might be relevant

 

[koam]

Did the rain remove the bow and arrow?

I'm calling BS on this, there are too many differences between the left and right images.

 

[Zophar]

Most Ancient Greek statues were actually made of bronze, not stone/marble. The marble ones you see are usually Roman replicas.

edit: Hah they even have a statue of Augustus among the photos of "Greek" statues :lol

 

[G-Fex]

Pluto will always be a planet,no matter what.

Really? did you visit there? Do you know for a fact it's a planet?

 

[BitchTits]

Awesome yet creepy.

 

[Chao]

Did the rain remove the bow and arrow?

I'm calling BS on this, there are too many differences between the left and right images.

They applied UV light and the statue grew a bow and arrows. In other words, magic.

 

[siddx]

Pretty sure most of the population loss was due to them fighting over themselves, long before the Europeans showed up.

There's a pretty good write-up covering their history in the book Collapse, written by the author who did Guns, Germs, and Steel.


Never understood this sort of thinking. May as well say that the Earth will always be flat and the center of the universe while you're at it.

Definitions can change in science - it's always happened.

That was the initial belief, but more recent research shows very few members of the population died from violence during that time. Which would hint at the civil war involving statues being destroyed far more than actual violence. Or that they all destroyed their own statues when they moved to the birdman religion. That was one of my favorite things about being there, so many theories, so many mysteries. Guns Germs and Steal was a great book but it's terribly out of date concerning some cultures. And with the lack of clear historical records on the island and relative lack of research, any book written about the island will be out of date within a few years.

 

[Dynamite Ringo Matsuri]

Sony Santa Monica needs to retcon the God of War series to reflect this.

 

[XiaNaphryz]

Guns Germs and Steal was a great book but it's terribly out of date concerning some cultures.

Collapse was written several years later, though granted it's also rather old now (2003 I believe is the print date). Thinking about the book more, I believe it actually states that it's more likely most of the population was lost to starvation once most of the resources were used up (due to cutting down most of the trees, soil erosion affecting crops, etc), and that the island must have had a quite larger population than what the first Europeans reportedly saw in order to support and feed a multi-faceted society that could afford to spare the people to build the statues. Any additional in-fighting would have happened due to the food situation.

 

[gerg]

If this is true, then I'd say they've improved with time.

 

[SUPREME1]

Lol. No.

Some yeah, but not all.

 

[ConfusingJazz]

Lol. No.

Some yeah, but not all.

They were. And they were supposed to be fitted with jeweled eyeballs. The statues taken out of the ground in the 19th century still had paint on them, but it quickly disappeared after exposure to light and air. Most scientific analysis has proven that unpainted statues were actually the exception, not the rule. Hell, the entire Parthenon was painted over.

Same with the Romans. Hell, Caligula had all the statues in the forum wear what he was wearing whenever he went out in public.

 

[ConfusingJazz]

Here is what the Parthenon originally looked like:

Scientists retrace Parthenon’s brilliant hues

 

[viciouskillersquirrel]

I thought this was known for years?

A meme a millenium and a half in the making is not undone in mere decades.

I echo the sentiments of other posters in this thread, however: the statues do look a LOT better unpainted. Maybe it's because of long-standing cultural association but there's something regal and magestic about the human form frozen in cold marble. It's as if it turns a person into one of the gods... or something.

 

[the_log_ride]

Mind blasted to oblivion.

 

[ConfusingJazz]

A meme a millenium and a half in the making is not undone in mere decades.

I echo the sentiments of other posters in this thread, however: the statues do look a LOT better unpainted. Maybe it's because of long-standing cultural association but there's something regal and magestic about the human form frozen in cold marble. It's as if it turns a person into one of the gods... or something.

Actually, they were noticed in the 19th Century, but once exposed, they would quickly fade. Art historians and archeologists back then thought much like us: That is tacky as shit.

Except they had the power to dismiss it altogether.

 

[jmdajr]

Apocalypto!

these pyramids in Mexico were painted too!

 

[Monocle]

I've been aware of this for some time. It's interesting to see the statues' original pigmentation, but I find the bare white marble of the reproductions much more beautiful.

I like how the Augustus of Prima Porta is on that page, by the way. :lol

easter island statues build by russians confirmed

anyway
I have the same feeling on this issue as with pluto not being a planet
I don't care what science says
greek statues were white and pluto is still a god damned planet!

You do realize assertions like this carry no weight outside your own head, yes? You can't expect reality to yield to your personal preferences. Planet is a designation that carries no meaning beyond the way scientists define it, and to say Greek statues were white is factually incorrect.

 

[oracrest]

edit: Hah they even have a statue of Augustus among the photos of "Greek" statues :lol

Well, the artistic practices are the same, so it's not that big of a deal.


The "colored" images they are showing are probably a bit flat compared to what a real painted statue looked like. They had some good painting techniques back then...

 

[Enosh]

You do realize assertions like this carry no weight outside your own head, yes?

I do

You can't expect reality to yield to your personal preferences.

I don't

 

[ilikeme]

known since for ever (10? 15? 20? years)

 

[Treo360]

Weren't the tips of the pyramids supposed to be solid gold or something?

The pyramidion was a highly polished Granite. The cool thing about the Pyramids of Giza was that not only where they smoothed out, but may have been covered in large hieroglyphs themselves.

 

[Jangaroo]

I just noticed Mona Lisa is wearing some kind of shawl on her head. Mindblown.

 

[oracrest]

The one that blew my mind were the pyramids were actually polished and bright enough to be seen at night.

You can still see a remnant of the outer layer of polished stone that used to cover the entirety of the pyramids at Giza, but just at the top of the tallest one. Even then, it's still pretty beat up.

 

[Joel Was Right]

Marble with a top covered in gold.

Would love to have seen that. Can you imagine it under the African sun? Gorgeous image in my mind right now.

They don't build them like they used to anymore

easter island statues build by russians confirmed

anyway
I have the same feeling on this issue as with pluto not being a planet
I don't care what science says
greek statues were white and pluto is still a god damned planet!

Pluto will always be a planet,no matter what.

I thought I was the only one who felt that way. Pluto was robbed of it's title. But it's a contested matter last I heard, so hopefully it be regain it's glory, by Jupiters cock, it will be back.

 

[GoldenEye 007]

Most Ancient Greek statues were actually made of bronze, not stone/marble. The marble ones you see are usually Roman replicas.

edit: Hah they even have a statue of Augustus among the photos of "Greek" statues :lol

Yup. Very rare to find an original Greek bronze statue.

 

[Erigu]

I echo the sentiments of other posters in this thread, however: the statues do look a LOT better unpainted. Maybe it's because of long-standing cultural association but there's something regal and magestic about the human form frozen in cold marble. It's as if it turns a person into one of the gods... or something.

Funny, when you consider there's a good chance the exact same statues are responsible for that cultural association in the first place...

 

[Treo360]

Would love to have seen that. Can you imagine it under the African sun? Gorgeous image in my mind right now.

They don't build them like they used to anymore

Stargate had the right idea.

I thought I was the only one who felt that way. Pluto was robbed of it's title. But it's a contested matter last I heard, so hopefully it be regain it's glory, by Jupiters cock, it will be back.

Contested? Technically it's still a Planet. It's just classified as a Dwarf Planet and more specifically a Plutoid. Eris is actually larger and further from the Sun than Pluto.

 

[Loxley]

This is pretty much the first thing they teach you if you ever take an art history class that touches upon the Greek/Roman periods of art & architecture.

So yeah, I totally knew about this before it was cool man.

 

[timetokill]

So God of War should have had the same color palette as Super Mario Galaxy?

 

[victreeb3l]

Fuck man, first dinosaurs had feathers and now ancient greek statues looked like skittles? I hate modern technology sometimes..

 

[siddx]

Collapse was written several years later, though granted it's also rather old now (2003 I believe is the print date). Thinking about the book more, I believe it actually states that it's more likely most of the population was lost to starvation once most of the resources were used up (due to cutting down most of the trees, soil erosion affecting crops, etc), and that the island must have had a quite larger population than what the first Europeans reportedly saw in order to support and feed a multi-faceted society that could afford to spare the people to build the statues. Any additional in-fighting would have happened due to the food situation.

Starvation is indeed a very likely cause. When I was there, it was still very barren, with only patches of young trees that had been there for a few decades at most. Most of the people I spoke to theorized that the inhabitants had chopped down all the trees and essentially stranded themselves and removed a huge source of building material and food. Which is another theory as to why they stopped building moai. Since it's likely wood was a crucial component in moving them from the quarry to their respective locations. Problem is, between the early 1700's and the mid 1800's barely any outsiders spent time on the island, and those that did weren't treated very warmly, so not a whole lot of information about what the natives were up to were documented.

However when the slavers showed up, there were still about 3000 people left, and half were taken as slaves. Years later when they were forced to bring them back, they spread small pox among the population and by the end of the 19th century there were barely over 100 people left.

I realize the two of us are probably the only people actually reading these posts so i'll just stop with the babble now :lol

 

[jambo]

Did the rain remove the bow and arrow?

I'm calling BS on this, there are too many differences between the left and right images.

The photo on the left was taken from a lower angle, and the bow is pretty delicate and like his nose, probably broke off.

 

[Kuro Madoushi]

Chinese terracotta warriors were painted as well.

PICK UP A HISTORY BOOK, YOU HEATHENS! >:/

 

[Treo360]

Starvation is indeed a very likely cause. When I was there, it was still very barren, with only patches of young trees that had been there for a few decades at most. Most of the people I spoke to theorized that the inhabitants had chopped down all the trees and essentially stranded themselves and removed a huge source of building material and food. Which is another theory as to why they stopped building moai. Since it's likely wood was a crucial component in moving them from the quarry to their respective locations. Problem is, between the early 1700's and the mid 1800's barely any outsiders spent time on the island, and those that did weren't treated very warmly, so not a whole lot of information about what the natives were up to were documented.

However when the slavers showed up, there were still about 3000 people left, and half were taken as slaves. Years later when they were forced to bring them back, they spread small pox among the population and by the end of the 19th century there were barely over 100 people left.

I realize the two of us are probably the only people actually reading these posts so i'll just stop with the babble now :lol

Yeah I watched a special on NatGeo that covered this. A bunch of Polish Archeologists were trying to track down the exact cause.

 

[Escape Goat]

never really thought about it but it makes all kind of sense now that I do.


mind blown.

 

[sprsk]

Interesting.

Most Greek statues were uncolored bronze statues, though. Most of what we have now are the Roman copies made from marble.

Should have just posted the Harvard article. This blogger guy doesn't even mention Rome once (and has a fucking picture of the statue of Octavius right fucking there).