ARCHAEOLOGICAL MUSEUM, Alexander Mosaic

Unfortunately, not a single painting remains from the great painters of antiquity. We must content ourselves with their names, such as Zeuxis or Parrhasius, and descriptions of their works and the techniques they used. One of these techniques consisted of placing many small tiles of equal size on a concrete bed to form a mosaic that was similar to a rug in the center of the floor.

Some examples of this type of "stone painting" can be seen in Pompeii, especially in the House of the Faun, which has given us many panels and a large work, the famous mosaic that depicts the Victory of Alexander the Great in the Battle of Issus.

One thing that is certain is that this mosaic was made in the first century BC; this is the only representation of the battle and it's more than five meters wide and consists of about four million limestone tiles. Although it is a Roman copy, and was made to be placed on a floor, this mosaic helps you understand what a great Greek mural painting probably looked like....