DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.786#0209
192 VOLTERRA.—The Museum. [chap. xli.
another source of the high social civilisation of the Etrus-
cans4—and there are children of various ages standing
around, sometimes embracing each other; pictures of
domestic felicity, such as are rarely seen on the monu-
ments of antiquity. The usual musicians are present—
subulones, with the double pipes; citharistce, with the lyre ;
and players of the syrinx or Pandean pipes—all, as
well as the banqueters, crowned with garlands of roses.
Tables, bearing refreshments, stand by the side of the
couches, together with scamna or stools, on which the
musicians stand, or by which the attendants ascend to fill
the goblets of the banqueters, elevated as they are by lofty
cushions.5 Just such tables and stools are often repre-
sented in relief against the bench of rock on which the
body or sarcophagus was laid in the tomb—the banqueting
hall of the dead.6
The most interesting scenes, because the most touching
and pathetic, are those which depict the last moments of
the deceased. A female is stretched on her couch ; her
father, husband, sisters or daughters are weeping around
her; her little ones stand at her bed-side, unconscious
how soon they are to be bereft of a mother's tenderness—
a moment near at hand, as is intimated by the presence
of a winged genius with a torch on the point of expiring.
Sometimes the dying woman is delivering to her friend
her tablets, open as though she had just been recording
her thoughts upon them. This death-bed scene is a
favourite subject. It may be remarked that the couches
4 See Vol. I. p. 286. his sons, which happened at a ban-
5 Inghirami, I. tav. 72, 73, 82 ; VI. quet. Another, he thinks, represents
tav. Y. 3 ; Micali, Ital. av. Rom. tar. Ulysses in disguise, at the banquet of
37, 38 ; Ant. Pop. Ital. tar. 107 ; Gori, Penelope's suitors. Inghir. VI. tav. F.
III. cl. 4, tab. 14. Two of these ban- « See Vol. I. pp. 59, 272 ; Vol. II.
quet-scenes Inghirami takes to repre- p. 40.
sent OEdipus pronouncing a curse on
another source of the high social civilisation of the Etrus-
cans4—and there are children of various ages standing
around, sometimes embracing each other; pictures of
domestic felicity, such as are rarely seen on the monu-
ments of antiquity. The usual musicians are present—
subulones, with the double pipes; citharistce, with the lyre ;
and players of the syrinx or Pandean pipes—all, as
well as the banqueters, crowned with garlands of roses.
Tables, bearing refreshments, stand by the side of the
couches, together with scamna or stools, on which the
musicians stand, or by which the attendants ascend to fill
the goblets of the banqueters, elevated as they are by lofty
cushions.5 Just such tables and stools are often repre-
sented in relief against the bench of rock on which the
body or sarcophagus was laid in the tomb—the banqueting
hall of the dead.6
The most interesting scenes, because the most touching
and pathetic, are those which depict the last moments of
the deceased. A female is stretched on her couch ; her
father, husband, sisters or daughters are weeping around
her; her little ones stand at her bed-side, unconscious
how soon they are to be bereft of a mother's tenderness—
a moment near at hand, as is intimated by the presence
of a winged genius with a torch on the point of expiring.
Sometimes the dying woman is delivering to her friend
her tablets, open as though she had just been recording
her thoughts upon them. This death-bed scene is a
favourite subject. It may be remarked that the couches
4 See Vol. I. p. 286. his sons, which happened at a ban-
5 Inghirami, I. tav. 72, 73, 82 ; VI. quet. Another, he thinks, represents
tav. Y. 3 ; Micali, Ital. av. Rom. tar. Ulysses in disguise, at the banquet of
37, 38 ; Ant. Pop. Ital. tar. 107 ; Gori, Penelope's suitors. Inghir. VI. tav. F.
III. cl. 4, tab. 14. Two of these ban- « See Vol. I. pp. 59, 272 ; Vol. II.
quet-scenes Inghirami takes to repre- p. 40.
sent OEdipus pronouncing a curse on