Before beginning this week's blog, I wanted to comment that it's been such a privilege to meet and get to know authors both at conferences, signings, and online. To have such fantastic writers as guests on my blog is humbling and a true delight. I also love writing blogs myself, since it's a way to comment more in-depth about material pertaining to my books. Please... should anyone have a topic they'd like to see covered, don't hesitate to ask! And now, let's take a look at the statues and busts!

This week, we're going to meet some of my book's characters face to face, as we observe some common things to look for in Roman statury and busts.

In mosaics and wall-paintings, even common people could often afford such decor within their domestic or business space. However, when it comes to portraiture, it was usually just the rich and famous who were favored with such art. Eve d'Ambra, in her excellent book, Roman Art (1998) stated, "Commissioning and erecting a portrait was a serious political act. To be awarded a portrait erected in the city center at public expense would mark the culmination of a career studded with civic honors and achievements carried out under intense scrutiny and in keen competition."

That being said, there was also a market for private portraiture, and wealthy Romans often made use of this avenue to grace their homes and leave likenesses of themselves for posterity.

Since my story begins toward the end of the Roman Republic, I want to start by covering Roman Republican likenesses. The thing to look for in Republican Roman statues and busts is VERISM--realism. Are there wrinkles, warts, blemishes? Does it look as though it really is a real-life portrait? The picture above right is Pompeius Magnus, Caesar's great rival who was defeated at Pharsalus. Note that he looks like just another guy off of the streets. His hair is tousled, and there are lines of middle age around his mouth and on his forehead. Here's a man who was one of Rome's most celebrated generals and Republican portraiture did what it always purported to do. It humbled him, making him ordinary.

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​Probably the first statue one sees at the Palazzo Massimo in Rome is this phenomenal Athena from the late Republican Period (60's-40's BC). And another superb thing about this cult statue is that the paint job SURVIVED! By some miracle we at least get a glimmer of what a painted statue may have looked like two-thousand years ago. And the detail is stunning. The goddess's eyes are piercing and she's crowned with dark hair, as many Greek maidens undoubtedly were.

More and more, as I visit ancient sites and have opportunity to view ancient art, such as this, I see scholars seeking to determine what colors various statuary once were, so that recreations can be made. When few traces of paint are visible, this is done with the use of lasers. Amazingly enough, some statuary still has traces of paint, or like this incredible Athena, the paint has miraculously survived.

Another of the most famous statues of Roman art has to be the Prima Porta Augustus. Prima Porta is located just outside of Rome, and Livia, Augustus's wife owned a lovely villa there. This statue of her husband (Octavian Caesar, for my readers) was discovered inside. ​It now abides within the overcrowded and oft-times difficult to access Vatican Museum, but is worth seeing. Some years ago, it was scrutinized by scholars, seeking to discover what its paint-job might have looked like. This recreation on the right is what they came up with. It also led me to changing Octavian's hair color in my story from blond to reddish-blond.

It makes me wonder whether generals always painted their breastplates. For those of you who enjoy scholarly reading and hunger for more about the Roman world--specifically the Augustan period, be sure to pick up Paul Zanker's The Power of Images in the Age of Augustus. It's  loaded with the meanings and symbolism that Octavian (the original spin-doctor) used in his propaganda.

Sculpture during Augustus's reign changed dramatically. It really doesn't matter whether you visit museums in Egypt, Rome, Greece, Israel, or Croatia. Throughout the entire Roman world, there was one likeness of Octavian Augustus which never aged throughout his reign. My husband, who openly admits he's no expert on Roman art can now walk inside a museum anywhere in the world and point out a bust of Augustus! There's one treasue inside the Capitoline Museum that I personally love to view whenever I visit. It's a bust of Octavian as a very young man. In fact, he's sporting a beard, so it may have been sculpted right after Caesar's assassination. It's the only likeness of him I've seen that is veristic, prior to his spin on sculpture.

Augustus started a trend in Roman art. From about 30 BC onward, verism took a backseat to the youthful, Greek-like portraiture of the Julio-Claudian Age and lasted well into the mid-1st century AD. No more wrinkles, warts, and blemishes. From then on, it was viral handsome men, feminine, lovely women... and they were never portrayed as "aged".

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​In the mid to later Imperial Period, styles of statuary seemed to revert back a ways to the late Republic. Again, verism became important, but one of the tricks to determing a statues age (unless it was an older piece that was  reworked, of course), is by looking at the eyes. In this bust of Caracalla, note that his pupils have been carefully drilled. That's usually a sign that a bust or statue is of a later date. 

Caracalla is another Emperor of Rome who's fairly easy to recognize. When I studied Roman Art while working on my Masters, I was told to "look for the X on his face!" That was the trademark of Caracalla.  And if you're still looking it's right in the middle, where his eyes and nose join. One can easily tell what type of guy he was. He's the Emperor who has successfully made it through history as perpetually pissed-off!

For a final sample, I wanted to share another personal favorite. Here is Commodus, the Emperor so delightfully played by Joachim Phoenix in Gladiator. Though he did sometimes fancy himself as a gladiator. When you're fairly insane and you're the Emperor of the world's most powerful nation, you can pretty much pretend to be whatever you want.

Sometime during his 2nd century AD rule, Commodus had himself memorialized as Hercules. There's plenty of outstanding symbolism here, showing who he was imitating. Atop his head is the lion skin, with it's paws on his chest. And of course, he's carrying a club. 

These later works from the Imperial court often show the artist's unbelieveable talent, as is the case here. Housed inside another favorite museum of mine--the Capitoline, visitors are able to walk right up into Commodus's face and get pretty much as close as one dares. It's the Bernini-like chiseling and depth perception in this bust that astounds me. Every curl has been articulately carved and the detail is mind-blowing. And it's so polished and shimmery. In such pristine condition, it's hard to imagine that it's as old as it is.

So, I'll stop here, hoping you've enjoyed this little tour of Roman statues and busts. Do let me know if you have ideas or subjects you'd like me to touch upon in the near future.

Next week, we'll get to hear from one of the world's most PROLIFIC authors. Griff Hosker is a master of writing historic adventures and has touched upon many periods. We'll be introduced to his most recent project, which I'm sure some of you will want to pick up.

Have a great week and READ ON!

Writing about my own ancestors has been a remarkable journey. Holding their documents, sitting with their portraits, and reading their words of hope, dreams and sorrows is an emotional process. And, knowing what lies ahead as they share their thoughts can be very harrowing. But, as a writer, realizing that these people lived and loved much the same way as we do today can also give me great joy as I tell their stories. It is an honor to bring them alive for today’s readers and remind us that we all have the same dreams and desires, even with centuries between us.
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The Lydiard Chronicles, my historical fiction series, is named after Lydiard Park, the St.John ancestral home in Wiltshire. Full of portraits and memorials of my family, Lydiard House and adjacent Church of St. Mary's is a writer’s dream. Elizabethan monuments, Jacobean portraits and medieval wall paintings all provide a rich tapestry of images, calling across the ages for their stories to be told.

The characters in The Lydiard Chronicles are all real people, and their stories are drawn from a memoir from the 1660s. By fate—or maybe design—I came upon Memoirs of the Life of John Hutchinson many years ago in Nottingham Castle. Written by Lucy St.John’s daughter, Lucy Hutchinson, her vivid story of her mother brought my ancestors to life, and I was determined to honor the truth of her account of my seventeenth century family. As I researched more, I made the decision to only use contemporary sources to inform my fiction, and so as I read letters, court pleadings, dispatches, their voices started to come alive. And, as I immersed myself more in their world, they became part of my life. Because they were real people, and connected to me, I felt I had an obligation to interpret their lives authentically, while at the same time describing human behaviors that transcend time and place.

The first in the series, The Lady of the Tower, takes place in the early 1600s. The Tower of London is infamous for the famous prisoners it housed, the horrific torture that took place within its walls, and the tragic executions witnessed on Tower Green. But along with the kept must be the keepers, and the story of my ancestress, Lucy St.John, is that of The Lady of the Tower – the wife of the Lieutenant of the Tower.

Lucy first moved to the Tower in 1617, with a two year old baby boy and no warning that her life was about to change so drastically. She married Sir Allen Apsley after a heartbreaking betrayal by one of King James’ courtiers. Lucy hoped for a quiet life, marrying an older man and bringing up his two children. All that changed when her sister Barbara married Edward Villiers, brother to the Duke of Buckingham. The Duke, George Villiers, was the favorite of King James and his son, Prince Charles, and with that came the power to bestow all kinds of riches on his friends and relatives. As a result, Lucy’s husband was granted the position of Lieutenant of the Tower and moved the family into The Queen’s House, his official residence.

Once within the Tower, Lucy became a witness to history. She took care of Sir Walter Raleigh in his later years, encouraging his alchemy experiments by lending him her henhouse as a workshop. And, in an ironic twist of fate, Lucy became the guard of Frances Howard, Suffolk’s sister, when she was imprisoned in the Tower after instigating the murder of Thomas Overbury.

Along with the duties of organizing food for the prisoners, Lucy was also responsible for their physical wellbeing, as best she could.  According to her daughter’s diary, “to all prisoners that come into the Tower she was as a mother. All the time she dwelt in the Tower, if any were sick she made them broths and restoratives with her own hands, visited and took care of them, and provide them all necessaries; if any were afflicted she comforted them, so that they felt not the inconvenience of a prison who were in that place.”

I was also able to include many medicinal recipes within the novel that come from Lady Johanna St.John's Recipe Book (above), part of the Wellcome Foundation collection in London. Lady Johanna (left) was Lucy's niece, and since so many recipes were handed down and exchanged within the family, I felt it no stretch of the imagination to think some may have been Lucy's.

Once I had completed The Lady of the Tower, I realized that the story of Lucy and her family could not end. I set about writing the story of her children, Allen and Luce. Again, back to the Memoirs, Lucy Hutchinson’s extraordinary first-hand account of the English Civil War. The second book of The Lydiard Chronicles is named “By Love Divided” and follows the family into war. Lucy St.John embraced the Puritan cause and yet her son chose to fight for King Charles.

Writing about conflict and war from the perspective of those whose lives are gradually torn apart was harrowing, for I could see what lay ahead for them. It was important to me that although as a fiction writer I could foreshadow conflict and sorrow, I should also convey the day-to-day emotions of love, life and joy that permeated their lives. Luce’s accounts of dancing, music and happiness, falling in love and bearing healthy children were as important to me as the battle of Edgehill and the tragedy of a hero’s death. Based on these contemporary diaries, letters and documents, By Love Divided tells of the heart-wrenching choices my family faced, and how they remained loyal to each other through the conflict of civil war.
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In the third book of the series, Written in Their Stars, we travel with three cousins – Lucy Hutchinson, Frances Apsley and a new character, Nan Wilmot, wife of the Earl of Rochester. Through the challenges of Cromwell’s Commonwealth to the Restoration of King Charles, these women fight for their own future — and England’s. As courtiers, rebels and spies, they emerge from the shadows of history to reunite the family and look to the future.

                                                                                       The six St. John sisters in 1615.

​The St.John family motto is Data Fata Secutus, which translates approximately to “Following his allotted fate”. When I’m researching, writing or simply going through my days and a thought enters my head, I feel it might have been my destiny to share these voices of the past.
The Lydiard Chronicles are on sale worldwide through Amazon, Kobo and other retailers.

​Author Bio
​
Elizabeth St.John was brought up in England, lives in California, and spends most of her time in the 17th Century. To inspire her writing, she has tracked down family papers and residences from Nottingham Castle, Lydiard Park, and Castle Fonmon to the Tower of London. Although the family sold a few castles and country homes along the way (it's hard to keep a good castle going these days), Elizabeth's family still occupy them - in the form of portraits, memoirs, and gardens that carry their imprint. And the occasional ghost. But that's a different story...

www.elizabethjstjohn.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ElizabethJStJohn/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ElizStJohn
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/elizabethjstjohn/
Elizabeth St. John's books: https://geni.us/AmazonElizabethStJohn

In my last blog, we looked pretty deeply at the four different styles of Roman wall-painting, as differentiated within discoveries  near Mt. Vesuvius. It never ceases to amaze me how these pieces survived over twenty or more centuries. 

The same can be said of mosaics, though due to their composition, vivid colors and delightful artistry are preserved even more so than wall-paintings. Mosaics are my favorite medium of Roman art. The intricacy and bold designs that artists from so long ago employed, boggle my mind and ever make me yearn for more. 

Roman families used mosaic art in both decorative and utilitarian ways. At right, is a lovely mosaic featuring a typical layout. Black and white geometric designs surround a vibrant polychrome (multi-colored) center, depicting fruit, fish, and fowl. In many Roman households, this particular type of theme would be popular in triclinia--dining spaces--since they suggested food sources/meals. Such a highly detailed piece likely came from an opulent household. 
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Early mosaics in Greece could be highly detailed too, but the stonework was composed of actual pebbles. In Roman mosaics differed, for a tessura (tiny stone/glass piece) was cut into a cube like a tiny cobblestone. The phenomenal hunting scene below is from Pella. Look carefully at the bottom of the mosaic, and you'll see that the stonework was not cut to size, but instead are natural pebbles. Since this sample comes from the Macedonian kingdom of Pella and dates from around 300 BC, some scholars believe it depicts Alexander the Great (at right) and Hephaestion, along with Alexander's dog, Peritas. Regardless, it's a stunning example of a Hellenistic mosaic.

Now let's return to Roman mosaics and take a careful look at real tessurae, cut specifically for the intended design. Below is a utilitarian mosaic. It's from Pompeii and was located at the front entry of a domus, sending an important message: CAVE CANEM--"Beward of the dog"! This mosaic is a personal favorite of mine, since I'm a dog-lover, and what's incredible, is that we STILL post warnings like this in yards. This sample was more permanant,of course--built into the floor-space of a home's entry. Yet, one wonders whether this was what the household dog really looked like? And my dog today wears a similar red color to show off his sleek, black coat.

​Earlier mosaics were simpler and usually geometrical. One excellent example (below, right) is on the Palatine--inside the House of the Griffins. Note that the artist used a sort of early tromp l'oeil, which truly creates an illusion of geometrical, stair-step depth among the cubes. No lush scenes of maenads chasing Bacchus here, but instead a sombre, refined sense of order, which certainly rings true for the height of the Republican Period, the era from which this house  comes. Though the surrounding tiles are all black/white, the central design still introduces an additional color, staying true to the Roman love for varied hues.

​​The simplicity of the outer design speaks for itself. In fact, the central geometric piece draws the eye in, leaving the simple and sometimes haphazard tile order on the outside as trivial... almost unimportant.

A famous mosaic (below left) is that of a human skull, resting precariously atop wings and a wheel. To either side are garments. One is colorful and rich, while the other is simply a bedraggled tunic made of rags. 

Used in the HBO series ROME as part of the intro sequence, this mosaic represents the fragility of fortune and the ever changing balance of wealth versus poverty... success vs. failure.

The miniscule tessurae indicate phenomenal artistry, and when one backs away from the piece, it almost looks like a painting.

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As time passed, artistic styles changed, and usually that change was subtle, as in the wall-paintings. However, with mosaics, it's a little more obvious. Suddenly, the use of fine, tiny tessurae, used previously, were discontinued in favor of larger pieces of stonework, more colorful marble pieces, instead of tessurae, and themes that varied from mythological to (later in the Empire) Christian themes--especially in basilicas and Churches.

​One example of this form from the Late Empire is pictured below, from Ostia Antica. Note how the inlaid stonework is larger and more expansive in layout. These geometric designs are so encompassing, they no longer include outer surroundings in black/white. They speak for themselves.​

Just like wall-paintings discussed two weeks ago, Roman mosaics were bursts of color. They were refined, elegant, sometimes playful or used for specific purposes to send a message. Much of my information on mosaics, is referenced from Roman Art by Eve D'Ambra. All of the photos, except the one from Pella are my own.

​Read ON, everybody!

A Desperate Situation

When young reporter Nellie Bly approached the managing editor of the New York World for a job in September of 1887, she was desperate. She’d been in the city four months and her cash had dwindled to almost nothing. At the time, she was working as a correspondent for a paper in Pittsburgh where she got her start, but the pay wasn’t regular. She longed to get hired on in the capital of newspaperdom, where the best of the best worked for the leading dailies: The Times, The Tribune, The Sun, The Herald, and the largest of them all, Joseph Pulitzer’s World. So clustered were they along Park Row in Manhattan, the area was dubbed Newspaper Row.
 
The problem was, she was a woman. The World already had two on staff and wasn’t looking to add a third.
 
So, what could a young woman reporter do when she was running out of time and money?  How could she convince the editor, John Cockerill, to change his mind?


​A Bold Plan
Bly stepped out of her cab-for-hire on a crisp September morning and paid the driver with money she’d borrowed from her landlady. Minutes later she was ushered into Cockerill’s office. She’d met him once before on a story she’d written previously for the Pittsburg Dispatch. Even so, he must’ve been surprised to see her. 
 
She wasted no time in presenting him with a list of story ideas. But they weren’t the garden variety topics women journalists—few that there were at the time—tended to pursue (fashion, theater news, gossip).
 
Bly’s ideas were much bolder. They had to be in order to get Cockerill’s attention. But Bly was also a spunky young woman who abhorred the ladies’ pages. She found them dull to read and boring to write. No, the ideas she handed Cockerill required her to take on daring aliases for the purpose of getting a story that would draw attention to her and the particular brand of stunt journalism she would become known for: provocative stories that exposed the plots of the greedy and dishonest, or aroused pity in the misunderstood or marginalized.
 
Cockerill didn’t turn her down, nor did he offer her a job. Instead, he told her to come back in two weeks for his answer. He paid her twenty-five dollars and told her to go nowhere else with her list.
 
His stall tactic was most likely to seek Pulitzer’s blessing. Cockerill was Pulitzer’s right-hand man and carried more than a little power, but Pulitzer was a fanatical micro-manager involved in the minute details of his paper.

The Assignment
When Bly returned on September 22, Cockerill had his answer. He wanted Bly to fake her way into an insane asylum for women on Blackwell’s Island, a slim strip of land in the East River that was home to the city’s misfits and malcontents. She was to remain for ten days and report upon what she found when she returned.
 
For a woman who was just twenty-three, Bly had already shown a remarkable predisposition to grasp whatever opportunities that came her way and think about the risks later. Cockerill, for his part, was just the sort to dish them out without compunction. He was also, of course, testing Bly. Did she really have the nerve to execute such a bold feat?
 
He left all the planning to her. She’d have to figure out on her own how to convince nurses and doctors (and a judge and a few police officers as it turned out) that she was mad. All Cockerill promised was that, in ten days’ time, a representative of the paper would come get her out.
 
Bly accepted.

​A Place of Despair
Why the Blackwell’s Insane Asylum? For one, the island itself was just the sort of vulgar backdrop that would pique the interest of the World’s legion of readers. The island had long been known as a place of misery. A ferry ride over was often a one-way trip to hell.
 
It was home to a penitentiary for the criminal, a charity hospital for the poor and infirmed, an almshouse for the poor and disabled, and a workhouse for minor criminals, vagrants and the able-bodied poor. The women’s asylum housed the lunatic poor, where 1600 female inmates lived in a space originally built to accommodate just 850.
 
The asylum had a long history of mismanagement but in the summer of 1887, just months before Bly showed up in Cockerill’s office, some interesting tidbits had surfaced in the papers. The Times reported that two young nurses had filed charges against doctors that brought the doctors’ characters into question (a veiled Victorian reference, no doubt, of unwanted, ungentlemanly behavior toward them). Both the nurses and the two doctors were later suspended.
 
Additionally, the World alleged in two editorials that on Ward’s Island (which housed the city’s lunatic males), gross mistreatment of the inmates had taken place. Two attendants at the Ward’s asylum were indicted for manslaughter for the killing of an inmate.
 
These stories, and others, triggered the papers to call for an overhaul of the men’s and women’s facilities. However, further investigation by the press was thwarted. Those who ruled at Blackwell’s and Ward’s apparently wanted to keep their goings-on under wraps.
 
Bly’s assignment couldn’t have come at a better time.

More About Tonya Mitchell

Tonya Mitchell is the author of A Feigned Madness, the tale of pioneering journalist Nellie Bly and her ten-day undercover ordeal in an insane asylum in 1887. It will be published by Cynren Press in October 2020 but is available for pre-order here. Tonya’s short fiction has appeared in The Copperfield Review, Words Undone, and The Front Porch Review, as well as various anthologies, including Furtive Dalliance, Welcome to Elsewhere, and Glimmer and Other Stories and Poems for which she won the Cinnamon Press award in fiction. She is a self-professed Anglophile and is obsessed with all things relating to the Victorian period. She is a member of the Historical Novel Society North America and resides in Cincinnati, OH with her husband and three wildly energetic sons.


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Website: https://www.tonyamitchellauthor.com/
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Email: tremitchell.2012@gmail.com

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