DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.5253#0679
ETRUSCAN "ASH-CHESTS."
641
This intensely realistic turn of the Etruscans, and their lack of poetic and
artistic feeling, is most evident in the numberless "ash-chests" or small sar-
cophagi, of which there are four hundred collected in the museum of Volterra
alone. These may be divided broadly into two classes. The one decorated
with very low relief, representing scenes from real life, expressed in archaic,
conventional forms, like those on the cippi described above, seems to show the
old Etruscan spirit, as yet little affected by contact with the Greeks. The
second great class includes those in which the myths of the Greeks have been
appropriated, and free forms attained. 1234 This class, doubtless, belongs to the
age when Roman dominion prevailed. These reliefs are often high, and rep-
resent mythic scenes, and those from
real life. Strange winged spirits now
most frequently appear, bearing snakes,
torches, and the like. In the mythic
scenes adapted from Greek story, form
and idea have become barren of poetic
beauty, and give, to use Brunn's admir-
able figure, the impression of poetry
translated into limping speech, "pocsia
tmdotta in orasione pedestre." The more
bloody and terrible scenes in myth are
chosen, doubtless, to intimate the fear-
fulness of death and the terrors of the
"ifcnio. Thus we find represented by
preference the myth of Telephos threat-
ening to kill the child Orestes on the
altar (Fig. 265), the sacrifice of Iphige-
neia, Paris threatened by his brothers,
etc. Certain given types of figures are
here grouped again and again most
Mechanically, with no sign of an indi-
vidual artistic development of the myth, such as characterizes the works of
even modest vase-painters in Greece. The Paris threatened by his brothers,
and the Telephos of the altar scenes, are the very same figure differently
placed ; and the same is true of the Priam and Agamemnon, these being
single cases out of very many. In the composition and forms, there is a
lack of sound underlying principles, a clinging to the mere outward appear-
ance. The artists seem to have used statuette models, which they arranged
to suit the myth they wished to illustrate. These puppets, storming against
each other or falling, they copied into relief without any regard to its stern
laws, sometimes in full front view, sometimes coming out of the background,
or even rushing against it. Where it was impossible to express every member,
Fig. 265. Etruscan " Ash-chest." Telephos threatens
to slay Babe Orestes at Altar. Munich.
641
This intensely realistic turn of the Etruscans, and their lack of poetic and
artistic feeling, is most evident in the numberless "ash-chests" or small sar-
cophagi, of which there are four hundred collected in the museum of Volterra
alone. These may be divided broadly into two classes. The one decorated
with very low relief, representing scenes from real life, expressed in archaic,
conventional forms, like those on the cippi described above, seems to show the
old Etruscan spirit, as yet little affected by contact with the Greeks. The
second great class includes those in which the myths of the Greeks have been
appropriated, and free forms attained. 1234 This class, doubtless, belongs to the
age when Roman dominion prevailed. These reliefs are often high, and rep-
resent mythic scenes, and those from
real life. Strange winged spirits now
most frequently appear, bearing snakes,
torches, and the like. In the mythic
scenes adapted from Greek story, form
and idea have become barren of poetic
beauty, and give, to use Brunn's admir-
able figure, the impression of poetry
translated into limping speech, "pocsia
tmdotta in orasione pedestre." The more
bloody and terrible scenes in myth are
chosen, doubtless, to intimate the fear-
fulness of death and the terrors of the
"ifcnio. Thus we find represented by
preference the myth of Telephos threat-
ening to kill the child Orestes on the
altar (Fig. 265), the sacrifice of Iphige-
neia, Paris threatened by his brothers,
etc. Certain given types of figures are
here grouped again and again most
Mechanically, with no sign of an indi-
vidual artistic development of the myth, such as characterizes the works of
even modest vase-painters in Greece. The Paris threatened by his brothers,
and the Telephos of the altar scenes, are the very same figure differently
placed ; and the same is true of the Priam and Agamemnon, these being
single cases out of very many. In the composition and forms, there is a
lack of sound underlying principles, a clinging to the mere outward appear-
ance. The artists seem to have used statuette models, which they arranged
to suit the myth they wished to illustrate. These puppets, storming against
each other or falling, they copied into relief without any regard to its stern
laws, sometimes in full front view, sometimes coming out of the background,
or even rushing against it. Where it was impossible to express every member,
Fig. 265. Etruscan " Ash-chest." Telephos threatens
to slay Babe Orestes at Altar. Munich.