In ancient times and modern alike, the exercise of power has not only been described and contested in writing but also represented visually. In societies where the vast majority of people were illiterate, the visible display of political authority—in paintings, statues, carvings, buildings, tombs—was surely more effective than the written word in generating broader public legitimacy for these regimes. The ziggurats of Mesopotamia, the pyramids and paintings of Egyptian pharaohs, the massive stone heads of Olmec rulers (see images on pp. 77, 78, and 86) illustrate visual representations of power within the First Civilizations. On an even grander scale, second-wave civilizations conveyed artistically their various conceptions of political authority. In doing so, rulers expressed their values and their self-image even as they created mythologies and rituals that endured far longer than those who generated these works of art and propaganda. Here we examine four such works deriving respectively from Persian, Greek, Chinese, and Roman civilization.