Today I was awake enough to go and attempt the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  It’s something that I’ve wanted to see since I learned that they had an enormous Egyptian wing.  As you guys obviously know by now, I’m a big fan of ancient Egypt so there was no way I’d miss out on this opportunity!  But once I got in the doors, I was overwhelmed.  The museum is even bigger than I’d thought so I decided to head to the Greco-Roman wing first, thinking I’d hit the Egyptian section later.  Wrong!  I got to the museum at 11:00 and left at 5:00 and that was barely enough time to appreciate everything in that wing from the Romans, Greeks and Etruscans.

One of the things I was constantly and consistently amazed by was the quality of metal work displayed in the early Greek civilization.  I believe these are some Minoan or Cretan gold fragments and they’re even more impressive up close.  The beautiful amount of detail the ancients managed on these tiny little gold pieces is fabulous.  Later on their gold work gets even more intricate but even in their early civilization they created just amazing works of art. Continue reading →