Moses, Henry [Hrsg.]: A collection of antique vases, altars, paterae, tripods, candelabra, sarcophagi, &c.: from various museums and collections (Mailand, 1814)

SEPULCHRES. 61

former times have been most solemnly consecrated to the
gods manes, are, on account of the subjects with which
they are ornamented, highly interesting to the scholar' and
to the antiquary; for they are of vast importance in the
study of the mythology and of the manners and customs
of the ancients, and they afford considerable information in
tracing the history of the arts. Though the sculpture is not
of the highest quality, yet it has for the most part merit
enough to attract and fix the attention of the artist and the
virtuoso.

Sometimes their external surface is adorned with a simple
fluting in perpendicular or oblique or spiral lines; some-
times they bear the representation of the front of a temple^
with its columns surmounted by a pediment; and sometimes
again they are divided into several arcades, in each of which
is one or more figures*. It is seldom that all the four sides
of the sarcophagus are sculptured; frequently no more than
one of the sides and the two ends, but most generally only
one of the sides, which was called the front. The subjects
of the bas-reliefs are in some instances the pure works of
the imagination, representing wreaths of flowers and ara-
besque ornaments f- In others they are adorned with his-
torical subjects which in no degree correspond with the so-
lemn purposes to which the sarcophagus is devoted, such

* Vide Plates 131,141. f Vide Plate 128.