What are comparanda?
Ancient objects often lack a title and aritst's names are rare. Likewise the culture and date can be unclear. Researchers get around these obstacles by finding as many similar pieces, or comparanda, possible; as the number of similar objects increases so does confidence in the attribution of date, location, and subject.
How to find comparanda:
1. Start with the collector or the museum
2. Search museums with major Egyptian, Roman or Greek collections
3. Search other reliable image collections
Allen Memorial Art Museum
For objects in the AMAM check their collection catalogs, listed in the Allen Memorial Art Museum Objects research guide and especially their "E-Museum" catalog (select "Collection" in the search box). Some objects are accompanied by essay, bibliographies, etc.; follow links labeled More Information or View PDF :
Museums with major collections of ancient art
- J. Paul Getty Museum
Getty is a cultural and philanthropic institution dedicated to the presentation, conservation, and interpretation of the world’s artistic legacy. It is composed of four constituent programs: Getty Conservation Institute, Getty Foundation, J. Paul Getty Museum, and Getty Research Institute - The Louvre, Paris
Links to the collection of Le Département des Antiquités grecques, étrusques et romaines
The Louvre’s collections site offers a full-text search engine with the advanced search form. Filter search results by date of creation, collection the work belongs to, where the work is located, category of work, artist/maker; themed albums; and an interactive map to find works on display in the museum. Search results can also be exported as a flat file (CSV). - Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY, NY
+ Egyptian Art – A collection of approximately 26,000 objects of artistic, historical, and cultural importance, dating from the Paleolithic to the Roman period (ca. 300,000 B.C.–A.D. 4th century). More than half of the collection is derived from the Museum's 35 years of archaeological work in Egypt.
+ Greek and Roman Art - Comprises more than thirty thousand works ranging in date from the Neolithic period (ca. 4500 B.C.) to the time of the Roman emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity in A.D. 312. It is among the most comprehensive in North America. - Staatliche Museen zu Berlin
The Berlin State Museums (German: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin) are a group of institutions in Berlin, Germany, comprising seventeen museums in five clusters, several research institutes, libraries, and supporting facilities. They are funded by the German federal government in collaboration with Germany's federal states. The central complex on Museum Island was added to the UNESCO list of World Heritage Sites in 1999. By 2007, the Berlin State Museums had grown into the largest complex of museums in Europe. - Petrie Museum of Egyptian ArchaeologyWith over 80,000 objects the Petrie Museum is one of the largest collections of Egyptian and Sudanese archaeology. From initial search results use Search History to "Refine" an earlier search.
- British Museum Collections
The British museum's collections – among the largest and most comprehensive in the world – recall a time when their Empire controlled 24% of the world's land and 23% of its people. Although there are over two million records in the database it only covers about half of the collection.
Areas of comparison
Find comparanda that share one or more of the following characteristics with your object:
1. What? What type of object? What materials were used?
2. When? Century / decade / year? Dynastic/Stylistic period?
3. Where? Geographic location? Culture (ex: Upper Rhine, Egyptian Rome)
4. Subject / Iconography?
Identify attributes and then their meaning:
TYPE (ex: satyr)
THEME or SUBJECT (ex: 12 labors of Hercules),
MOTIFS or SYMBOLS (ex: Head of Janus)
What is iconography?
Iconography is the process of identifying, gathering and interpreting themes, motifs and symbols. In western European art Iconography, (interpreting the meaning of subjects and symbols), begins with the ancient period; the study of ancient iconography is important for iconographic research throughout western art.
Useful image collectons
- JSTOR images (formerly Artstor)
High quality images of the fine arts (painting, sculpture, printmaking, and drawing), photography, architecture and new media including Film, Audio, Video, Performance Art and Digital Art
Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae (LIMC)Call Number: Art Library, Reference N7760 .L49 1981ISBN: 3760887511Publication Date: Zürich: Artemis, c1981-1997LIMC is the most comprehensive resource available for depictions of mythology of classical antiquity. An international effort, with contributions from almost 40 countries, essays use ancient sources to describe the mythological figures and scenes depicted in the accompaying plate volumes. Scenes, symbols, and motifs described are indexed to reproductions in the plate volumes, which attempt to reproduce, or at least document, all known depictions of myth in the classical world.
Essays are written in the language of the scholar: English, French, German and Italian. A limited number of objects are reproduced online via Digital LIMC: https://weblimc.org/page/home