MOSAIC ( I.. mosaiem:, (1k. AotKrcaos. om it suios. inosa ie. a'distic,relitIqg to the Al uses. goicra, Muse). branch of tine art was especially pmmincnt during the Alid die \ges. though not unknown to antiquity, and is still practiced to a limited extent. Mosaic work, whin it ?.1.t tallied full growth, had various branch es. II was used: ( 1 ) on floor": (2) on walls; (a) on detached objects. monuments or furniture. It ?•??11,i.tpd of the grouping of pieces of marble, glass, or (mantel so as to form ornamental or fignrcd compositions. In the opus sectiic the thin marble plates were cut so as to follow the out lines of the design, and it is not properly a brawl' of mosaic. ()pus icsscnoium is the best technical tern]. the I,ssellfr meaning the small cubes form ing the mosaic. Alarble cubes %Vere used for floors altogether. though glass was ocra iningled with them in the Middle Ages. I'm- wall composit inns. irchitecturaI ?let a 1141 furnit Ilre. though mat-Ides were at first used almost exeln sively. the possibility of producing a greater variety of shades in artificial enamels led to their exclusive Ilse on walls as early as the fifth century and in furniture after the eleventh cen tury. The cubes used for figures \mil. usually smaller than IISI•11 for ?*-?1,111e are as small as three millimeters, more than one hundred thousand being eontained in a square meter. cubes were mathe by ing the gold leaf between two pieces of white glass. Tilt. cult. were ?.„1„n.,1 with a 1 1 Colored glass was first cat into long n trrow slid:, and these again broken into the cubes, NtIntlt were sorted into their separate to and shades.. like printers' type. To execute a wall ettniposition the inosai• eist prepared his cartoons till' plastered as laree a see!uai of the Ivan is could be covered in 11 the mos:deist stenciled or dotted his ear to,al on to flue wet plaster and I hen rapidly fastened to it the mosaic cubes. s‘ ere tla II cited, washed, anti burnished. In the hest wort, the mil... are not a 11,1111Itely even or toljneent• so that meehanical are avoided.
( ‘1,. „„,i,.,• tipparently did not practice any kind of work: it first appears in the \ lexandrian age, probably originated In Ellypt. It came jinn prominence for its reproductions in permanent form of famous paintings on the floors of public and private buildings. We even hear that scenes
front the Trojan War were represented on Hours of the great ship of -Hier) of Syracuse. A famous tloor at Pompeii rcpresents in a grand tion a scene of _\lexander's victory at issus, Full of action and variety. Even larger and more com plicated is the Nile scene of a Moor found at l'alestriva, with its inundated city. its fishing and other genre scenes.
PoNIAN Alos.\tcs. Although the Ilomans were not ignorant of the use of glass cubes on walls, they never developed this branch of mosaic work; the fountain, and niches at Pompeii and Ilstia are almost the only surviving, examples. But in their pavements they showed the greatest variety, front the shuttle crude geometric designs in black and white to the exquisite gradation, of color and form in such works as the Capitoline doves, the landscapes front Iladrian's villa in Pointe and Berlin. the Pompeian actors by Dioseorides in Naples. the portraits of poets and philosophers at Cologne, and many more. :\lid Wa y between stand silt colossal works as the gladiator pave ment of the Baths of Caracalla. 1Zontan mosaic pavement a of artistic value have been found not only throughout Italy, but in Frame. Spain, Ger many, _Hungary, North Africa, Syria. and Asia KAM' CnrasTIAN. In the fourth century, Christian artists perceived the value for church interiors of the rich coloring and permanency of mosaic.. No form of painting so well with architecture. :\losoies were placed nearly always in the apses and (al the triumphal arches of the early Christian basilicas. and in intimr tant cases upon the walls of the nave, and some times both on the inside and outside walls of the facades. The interiors of mausoleums and bap tisteries were covered with them on dome, walls. and apse. While the tipper part of the walls was decorated in this way with ligitrt•t1 mosaic position, the geometric mosaics; or opus ,cretoh• were on the dadoes below, and the tnarlde geometrie mosaics covered the floors. In the later Al iddle Ages. the twisted columns, sepulchral 11101111111ellis. altar canopies. pulpits. chair screens, and other details were entirely inlaid in geo mtric designs. in the East and in Italy. The wealth of works is concentrated in Italy and in the purely Ilellenie world. Home and II:Ix-mum had special schools with olishoots at Naples.