DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.847#0469
440 CLUSIUM.
to bring us the key, and I could not help thinking
how nicely drenched we should have been without
any shelter, had an Italian thunder-plump come on
whilst we were waiting at each separate tomb for its
own separate guide. When our little woman did
come, she was very civil and opened the door for us
in all due form, knowing about as much of the his-
tory of the tomb as the chickens at her cottage-door.
All she could inform us was, that it had belonged to
the ancients, and that there were pictures of it in
Chiusi, but whether for purchase or not she could
not say. This tomb consists of three chambers, the
first being the largest. The bodies and the ashes
are deposited in the back and side chambers, each
entering by an Egyptian formed door, and having
a ledge all round. I think that each chamber con-
tained in it only one large sarcophagus in the old
Etruscan fashion, besides numerous chests, generally
square, and of various sizes, but all filled with ashes,
and all sculptured with more or less art. In some
instances they were piled upon each other, and here,
as in the Monache, the very inferior ones were for sale
at stated and very low prices, but they did not tempt
us, after having seen the unpurchaseable specimens
of such very superior merit. They were of travertine,
terra cotta, marble, and fetid limestone, which last
is a very pretty material, but very brittle. Opposite
the door of the side-chamber is a false door, painted
like those at Tarquinia, and for the same purpose;
that is, the appearance of uniformity. The back
chamber has red and blue lines painted round it, but
to bring us the key, and I could not help thinking
how nicely drenched we should have been without
any shelter, had an Italian thunder-plump come on
whilst we were waiting at each separate tomb for its
own separate guide. When our little woman did
come, she was very civil and opened the door for us
in all due form, knowing about as much of the his-
tory of the tomb as the chickens at her cottage-door.
All she could inform us was, that it had belonged to
the ancients, and that there were pictures of it in
Chiusi, but whether for purchase or not she could
not say. This tomb consists of three chambers, the
first being the largest. The bodies and the ashes
are deposited in the back and side chambers, each
entering by an Egyptian formed door, and having
a ledge all round. I think that each chamber con-
tained in it only one large sarcophagus in the old
Etruscan fashion, besides numerous chests, generally
square, and of various sizes, but all filled with ashes,
and all sculptured with more or less art. In some
instances they were piled upon each other, and here,
as in the Monache, the very inferior ones were for sale
at stated and very low prices, but they did not tempt
us, after having seen the unpurchaseable specimens
of such very superior merit. They were of travertine,
terra cotta, marble, and fetid limestone, which last
is a very pretty material, but very brittle. Opposite
the door of the side-chamber is a false door, painted
like those at Tarquinia, and for the same purpose;
that is, the appearance of uniformity. The back
chamber has red and blue lines painted round it, but