DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.18720#0027
SARCOPHAGUS FROM CAERE.
Pis. IX.—XI.
IN the Papa Giulio Museum at Rome there has recently been acquired from Caere
a terra-cotta sarcophagus, having on the lid a group of a man and woman
reclining together. In point of artistic style this sarcophagus may be assigned to
about the same date as the specimen in the British Museum here published, though
the details are more minutely finished and the style somewhat more refined in the one
at Rome. On the other hand, it has no reliefs nor any decoration on the body of the
sarcophagus. In the Louvre there has long been on exhibition another Etruscan
sarcophagus in terra-cotta, having a similar group of a man and woman reclining on
the lid in much the same archaic manner, but again without any reliefs on the body of
the sarcophagus.1 The Louvre specimen is richly coloured.
These three sarcophagi, though differing in point of style and execution, appear
to be more or less contemporary, the differences of style and execution being due
probably to the idiosyncrasies of Etruscan artists working under the foreign influence
of Greek art. To this question it will be necessary to return; meanwhile all three have
this in common, that they present us with the earliest known type of a group of two
reclining figures on the lid of a sarcophagus. That is a phenomenon with which we
are familiar in later Etruscan and in Roman art. It can now be traced back to near
600 B.C. But what was its origin?
The idea, doubtless, is that of a man and woman reclining at a banquet, as we
see them in the archaic painted tombs of the Etruscans, and, indeed, on the reliefs of
the Museum sarcophagus (PI. X.). Apparently the group on the lids of the sarcophagi
has been simply abstracted from one of those scenes of funeral banquets; but the
frequency of these scenes in early Etruscan art is not sufficient to prove that the
origin of the idea was Etruscan. There was a time when it might have seemed so,
but the finding of a number of terra-cotta sarcophagi at Clazomenae has opened up a
new possibility, the issue of which time alone can show.
Assuming, as it seems fair to do, that the group in the round on our sarcophagus
was derived from the older conception of a similar group in relief or in painting, we
have next to consider the difficulties of the situation. These life-size figures had to be
1 Mon. dell' Inst. vi. pi. 59; Annali, 1861,
p. 390 ; Musie Napoleon III. pi. 80. In the
British Museum is a terra-cotta urn in the shape of
a small sarcophagus having an effigy of a female
lying on the lid, while on the front of it is a narrow
band of reliefs representing a central group of two
lions attacking a bull, with a Satyr reclining at each
end.
Pis. IX.—XI.
IN the Papa Giulio Museum at Rome there has recently been acquired from Caere
a terra-cotta sarcophagus, having on the lid a group of a man and woman
reclining together. In point of artistic style this sarcophagus may be assigned to
about the same date as the specimen in the British Museum here published, though
the details are more minutely finished and the style somewhat more refined in the one
at Rome. On the other hand, it has no reliefs nor any decoration on the body of the
sarcophagus. In the Louvre there has long been on exhibition another Etruscan
sarcophagus in terra-cotta, having a similar group of a man and woman reclining on
the lid in much the same archaic manner, but again without any reliefs on the body of
the sarcophagus.1 The Louvre specimen is richly coloured.
These three sarcophagi, though differing in point of style and execution, appear
to be more or less contemporary, the differences of style and execution being due
probably to the idiosyncrasies of Etruscan artists working under the foreign influence
of Greek art. To this question it will be necessary to return; meanwhile all three have
this in common, that they present us with the earliest known type of a group of two
reclining figures on the lid of a sarcophagus. That is a phenomenon with which we
are familiar in later Etruscan and in Roman art. It can now be traced back to near
600 B.C. But what was its origin?
The idea, doubtless, is that of a man and woman reclining at a banquet, as we
see them in the archaic painted tombs of the Etruscans, and, indeed, on the reliefs of
the Museum sarcophagus (PI. X.). Apparently the group on the lids of the sarcophagi
has been simply abstracted from one of those scenes of funeral banquets; but the
frequency of these scenes in early Etruscan art is not sufficient to prove that the
origin of the idea was Etruscan. There was a time when it might have seemed so,
but the finding of a number of terra-cotta sarcophagi at Clazomenae has opened up a
new possibility, the issue of which time alone can show.
Assuming, as it seems fair to do, that the group in the round on our sarcophagus
was derived from the older conception of a similar group in relief or in painting, we
have next to consider the difficulties of the situation. These life-size figures had to be
1 Mon. dell' Inst. vi. pi. 59; Annali, 1861,
p. 390 ; Musie Napoleon III. pi. 80. In the
British Museum is a terra-cotta urn in the shape of
a small sarcophagus having an effigy of a female
lying on the lid, while on the front of it is a narrow
band of reliefs representing a central group of two
lions attacking a bull, with a Satyr reclining at each
end.