Mosaic Fragment with Grazing Camel

Across the Byzantine Empire, one of the most common ways to decorate public buildings and elite homes was with mosaic floors made up of tesserae: small pieces of stone, ceramic, or occasionally glass. They were designed to accommodate the ways a viewer’s perspective changed while walking over the composition. The placement of figures could also help guide people through architectural spaces. The camel in this mosaic wears a bell around its neck, indicating that it had an owner, whose foot appears in the bottom-right corner of the fragment. Camels were particularly important for trade, as they could carry substantial weight over long distances.