etruscan tomb

Conventions of Etruscan Painting in the Tomb of Hunting and Fishing at TarquiniiAuthor(s): R. Ross HollowaySource: American Journal of Archaeology, Vol. 69, No. 4 (Oct., 1965), pp. 341-347Published by: Archaeological Institute of AmericaStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/502183 .Accessed: 23/03/2011 13:29

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unlessyou have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and youmay use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use.

Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at .http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=aia. .

Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printedpage of such transmission.

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

Archaeological Institute of America is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access toAmerican Journal of Archaeology.

http://www.jstor.org

http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=aia

http://www.jstor.org/stable/502183?origin=JSTOR-pdf

http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=aia

Conventions of Etruscan Painting in the Tomb of

Hunting and Fishing at Tarquinii R. ROSS HOLLOWAY

PLATES 75-82

Since their discovery in 1873, the frescoes of the inner chamber of the Tomb of Hunting and Fish- ing at Tarquinii have seemed a unique, almost anomalous experiment in the history of Etruscan tomb painting (pls. 75-77, figs. 1-4).1 They are a continuous panorama, carried around four walls, of the seashore and the teeming wild life sought there by the hunter and fisherman. For the first time in the art of Greece and her cultural depend- encies man is reduced to a small figure placed on a low horizon line below a wide expanse of sky. This sudden enlargement of physical space is a major step in the development of ancient painting, and it is important to ask how it came about within the conventions of Etruscan tomb painting at Tar- quinii.

THE TOMB

The Tomb of Hunting and Fishing was probably decorated in the last decade of the sixth century B.c. Its frescoes are clearly later than the earliest example of Tarquinian tomb painting, the Tomb of the Bulls, and they are contemporary with the important group of tombs that belong to the close

of the century.2 The paintings of the inner chamber are only the more remarkable part of the decorative program.

From the dromos one passes through a narrow vestibule into the outer chamber of the tomb. This is a small room, approximately 4 x 5 m., but slightly larger than the inner chamber, which is again reached through a small vestibule (cf. the plan, pl. 75, fig. i).' As is usual in the sixth and fifth century painted tombs at Tarquinii, the ceiling of both chambers slopes upward from the side walls and meets at a broad horizontal band, running length- wise on the line of the dromos and vestibules in each chamber, which suggests a ridgepole.

The painting, again conforming to normal practice, assists the suggestion of a structure (cf. pls. 75 and 76, figs. 2 and 5). In both chambers, the ridgepole is painted bright red, and the band at the top of the side walls and below the gable open- ings above the doorways is decorated with ten horizontal stripes of red, brown, blue, and white. In the inner chamber a series of garlands hang from this band. In the outer chamber this position is occupied by a pattern of interlaced leaves and fruit. The garlands of the inner chamber emphasize the tangibility of the band. The sloping ceiling is left undecorated in the outer chamber save for a number of dots of red paint irregularly placed. In the inner chamber, this area is covered by a pattern of alternating four leafed flowers and cross-hatched squares.

The following abbreviations will be employed: MonPitt for Monumenti della Pittura antica scoperti in Italia, Leisinger for H. Leisinger, Malerei der Etrusker (Stuttgart n.d.), Pallot- tino (1937) for M. Pallottino, Tarquinia (MonAnt 36, 1937); Pallottino (1952) for M. Pallottino, Etruscan Painting (Geneva 1952); Romanelli for P. Romanelli, Tarquinia (Itinerari dei Musei e Monumenti d'Italia no. 75, Rome 1954); Weege for F. Weege, Etruskische Malerei (Halle 1921).

1 The Tomb is fully published by P. Romanelli, Le Pitture della Tomba della "Caccia e Pesca" (MonPitt, Sez. I, Thr-

quinii, fasc. II, Rome, 1938). 2 The chronology of Pallottino (1937) cols. 337-347 for the

painted tombs of the sixth and fifth century is as follows: (i) Tomb of the Bulls, 540-530, (2) Tomb of the Inscriptions, Tomb of the Augurs, Tomb of the Pulcinella, 530-520, (3) Tomb of the Dead Man, Tomb of the Lionesses, 520-510, (4) Tomb of the Baron, Tomb of the Sea, Tomb of the Bacchantes, Tomb of the Dying Man, Tomb of the Old Man, Tomb of the Painted Vases, Tomb of Hunting and Fishing, Tomb of the Ta- rantola (pediment group only preserved, cf. NSc [19051 78), 510-500, (5) Tomb of the Chariots, ca. 500, (6) Tomb of the Leopards, Tomb of the Citharist (now lost), 490-480, (7) Tomb

of the Triclinium, Tomb of the Funeral Couch, 480-460, (8) Tomb of Francesca Giustiniani, Tomb of the Querciola, no. I, Tomb of the Pulcella, after 460. A convenient statement of chronological problems is given by P. Ducati in StEtr 18 (1939) 203-219. Full bibliography for the individual tombs is collected by Pallottino

(1937). 3 The plan is from Romanelli, op.cit. (supra note I) p. 2, fig. 2. Since no dimensions are given in his text, the following measurements taken from his plan and section (p. 3, fig. 3) may be useful. Dromos, length 7.2 m.; depth of tomb floor below ground level, ca. 3.0 m.; outer chamber, 5.1 x 3.9 m., vertical ht. side walls, 1.91 m., total ht. 2.35 m.; inner chamber, 4 x 3.1 m., vertical ht. side walls 1.72 m., total ht. 2.27 m.

342 R. ROSS HOLLOWAY [AlA 69

The figured decoration of the outer chamber has two parts. In the pediment above the doorway lead-

ing to the inner chamber is a scene of the return from the hunt, notable for the prolific vegetation surrounding the hunters. On the major frieze of the walls above the dado there is represented an evenly spaced series of trees (pls. 76-77, figs. 5-6). The

grove is a sacred setting because the trees are laden with fillets and other offerings among which are pyxides, mirrors, and necklaces. On the ground stands at least one amphora, and among the trees dancers are performing to the accompaniment of a flutist. The representation of trees and shrubs around the walls of the tomb chamber is important from the beginning of tomb painting at Tarquinii, as we know it in the Tomb of the Bulls (pl. 78, fig. 7). The sacred grove, with offerings and dancers, is also a commonplace scene in contemporary and later tomb painting.4 In the Tomb of Hunting and Fishing, however, the figures are dramatically reduced in proportion to the trees. The reduction of the human figure has not been made without some embarrassment to the artist. The saplings of such contemporary tombs as the Tomb of the Paint- ed Vases have become trees, but in the process the scale of the offerings has not been changed-with the result that the fillets, mirrors, and pyxides are Gargantuan in proportion to the little figures dancing beneath them.

The attempt to put man in proper relation to a natural setting has far greater success in the inner chamber. Here the entire wall area has been cleared for the landscape, and the banquet scene, almost a necessity in the program of Tarquinian tomb painting from the late sixth century on, has been relegated to the pediment at the far end of the chamber. The middle of the matching pediment on the opposite wall is largely cut out by the doorway leading to the outer chamber, but in the free area at either side of the door, there is a leopard. Other- wise, over the entire wall area from the floor to the striped band below the ceiling there is a continuous scene of fowling, fishing, and swimming by the seashore.5 Even the customary dado is omit- ted.

On the left wall (pl. 76, fig. 3) there is a tiny island from which two youths are diving into the sea. One has just dived; the other is climbing up to take his place. Their activities are watched by a group in a rowboat. Dolphins leap from the sea while overhead pass flocks of birds. On the rear wall and on the right side wall (pls. 75 and 76, figs. 2 and 4) the scene changes to hunting and fowling. On both walls the fowler plies his sling from an island or low shore while the occupants of a rowboat cast their lines for fish or turn their spears against the water fowl."

The elements of these pictures are all to be found in Greek vase-painting.7 But their existence in the tradition of Greek drawing in which the painters of the Tarquinii tombs were schooled does not mean that any Greek painting existed as a proto- type of these scenes. Archaic Greek art never produced anything like the effect of this open sky filled with passing birds, the expanse of water, the low horizon, and the isolated small human figures. Black-figured vase-painting scenes of ships on the open sea come nearest, but the crucial effect of the open sky is always lacking.8

THE ISOLATED FIGURE

The small and isolated human figures of the Tomb of Hunting and Fishing have their genesis in Etruscan painting. In the Tomb of the Bulls, painted about 530, the small frieze of the main chamber, placed above the two doorways and the Achilles and Troilus panel, is already symptomatic of the development we find in the inner chamber of the Tomb of Hunting and Fishing (pl. 78, fig. 7). The decoration of this frieze consists of two bulls, one anthropocephalic, and two groups of humans engaged in sexual intercourse. The bulls and the groups of human figures are placed irregularly at some distance from each other. Their scale is small, and it is only the low frieze they occupy which pre- vents them from creating an effect similar to that of the inner chamber of the Tomb of Hunting and Fishing.

Thus the reduction of scale of the human figure, like the importance of the natural setting, is not

4 E.g. Tomb of the Painted Vases, Tomb of the Leopards, Tomb of the Triclinium.

5 The loculus in the rear wall seems to have been installed at a later time. In the rear left corner of the chamber there are four depressions in the floor, apparently intended for the feet of the original funeral bed (cf. pl. 75, fig. 2).

6 The suggestion of religious allegory in the paintings has

been effectively countered by P. Romanelli, op.cit. (supra note I) p. I6.

7 For an exhaustive treatment of the paintings from this standpoint, cf. L. Banti in StEtr 24 (1956) 154-161.

8 Compare the vases illustrated by L. Casson, The Ancient Mariners (New York 1959) pls. 5 and 7.

1965] CONVENTIONS OF ETRUSCAN PAINTING 343

unique in the Tomb of Hunting and Fishing but part of the development of Etruscan tomb painting. We may now inquire how this development took place within the architectural conventions of that art.

THE ARCHITECTURAL CONVENTION

The most persistent convention of the Etruscan rock-cut chamber tomb was that it must mimic an architectural structure.9 There were two ways in which this requirement was satisfied. The struc- tural details could be carved in the rock from which the tomb chamber was cut (cf. pl. 77, fig. 8, Caere, Tomb of the Cornice, sixth century B.c.). When figure painting was added to such chambers, as was done at Caere, Clusium, or Volsinii, it was merely a frieze adorning an architecturally articulated wall.'o The effect is well illustrated by the Tomb of the Hills at Clusium (pl. 78, fig. 9). But the entire decoration of a tomb could be painted. This be- came the unique style of Tarquinii, and the activity of the tomb painters at Tarquinii produced a fun- damental change in the conventions of tomb architecture.

For this reason the earliest known painted tomb at Tarquinii, the Tomb of the Bulls, is a precious document because it shows a transitional phase at the beginning of the new style. An older system of tomb painting is exemplified by the Campana Tomb at Veii, where designs of orientalizing pot- tery and textiles have been transferred to the walls of the tomb."1 Like the designer of the Campana Tomb, painted more than a half century earlier, the artist of the Tomb of the Bulls borrowed a panel from the repertoire of Greek vase-painting.12 He placed this scene, Achilles' ambush of Troilus, between the doorways which lead from the main chamber to the two inner rooms (pl. 78, fig. 7). The painting is still simply the ornamentation of a wall. Nevertheless, the trees and shrubs painted

on the auxiliary panels already foreshadow the groves of the later Tarquinii tombs, and the frieze with bulls and groups of human figures above the doorways and the Achilles panel, as we have re- marked above, is also a forerunner of the small isolated figures and wide vistas of the Tomb of Hunting and Fishing.

The group of tombs which immediately follow the Tomb of the Bulls and which occupy the last quarter of the sixth century show the new program of decoration fully developed. The painting has two functions. As before, it takes the place of carved architectural details." It also now supplies the fres- coed scenes of banqueting, dancing, and sport which, as Poulsen and Pallottino have argued con- vincingly, picture the contemporary Etruscan funeral celebration.'4

The relation of these two constants in the painted decoration of the Tarquinian tombs seems to have attracted little attention. But Pallottino has suggested that at least in two cases the painted architecture is part of the painted scene. This is a very different situation from the Tomb of the Bulls or the painted tombs at Clusium where the figured scenes are still painted decoration added to a wall. Pallottino's observation is worth pursuing.

The Tomb of the Lionesses, painted about 520- 510 B.c.,

is a small trapezoidally shaped chamber which is entered abruptly from a sharply descend- ing dromos (pl. 79, fig. o)."1 To right and left there are four impressive figures of banqueters, so

large that two of them occupy the entire open space of the major frieze along each side wall. On the end wall three lively dancers perform around a

great ceremonial crater. The architectural setting of this tomb is painted with great care. The ridgepole and its support in the pediment are indicated. In each corner of the chamber, and in the center of each of the long sides, a Tuscan column supports the pitched roof. The giant banqueters are as much

9 On the rockcut chamber tomb cf. most recently M. Demus- Quatember, Etruskische Grabarchitektur (Deutsche Beitriige zur Altertumswissenschaft no. i1, Baden-Baden 1958).

10 For the published material from Caere cf. M. Moretti in MonAnt 42 (I955) cols. 1052-1135; for Clusium cf. R. Bian- chi-Bandinelli, Le Pitture delle Tombe archaiche (MonPitt Sez. I, Clusium, fasc. I, Rome 1939); for Volsinii (Orvieto) cf. M. Marella Vianello in Antichita I (1947) Iff.

11 G. Q. Giglioli, I'Arte Etrusca (Milan 1935) pl. 96, general view; F. Poulsen, Etruscan Tomb Painting (Oxford 1922) fig. i, detail.

12 Compare the general study of the tomb by L. Banti, StEtr 24 (I956) 143-181.

13 In the Tomb of the Leopards, Tomb of the Pulcinella, Tomb of the Triclinium, and Tomb of the Funeral Couch a longitudinal band in the center of the ceiling at the apex of the two sloping sides is carved out of the rock. The significance of this central member will be taken up at a later point in this discussion.

14 Poulsen, op.cit. (supra note ii); Pallottino (1937) cols. 322-327.

15 Dimensions 3.6 x 2.9-2.44 m., ht. of side walls 1.75 m.; total ht. 2.1 m. The tomb is fully published by P. Ducati, Le Pitture delle Tombe delle Leonesse e dei Vasi Dipinti (MonPitt, Sez. I, Tarquinii, fasc. I, Rome 1937).

344 R. ROSS HOLLOWAY [AJA 69

aware of these columns as the modern visitor, for each of them props his foot against a column shaft. Pallottino has observed that the tomb is a pavilion and has recognized the possibility that its covering might not be a solid roof but an awning."1

This interpretation can be supported by the fol-

lowing evidence. The ceiling of the tomb is painted in a checkerboard pattern of alternating red and white squares. This is not a reproduction of cof- fers or of some kind of improbable ashlar roof."7 It is the fabric of a tent carried on the ridgepole in the same way an awning is set up on the boom of a modern fore-and-aft rigged sailing vessel. The pattern can be matched on textiles on the banqueting couches in the following tombs at Tarquinii: Tomb of the Pulcella, Tomb of the Funeral Couch, Tomb of the Ship, Tomb of the Querciola, of which a detail is shown on pl. 79, fig. i i. One may compare numerous instances in red-figured vase painting, for example the cushions in the centauromachy on the neck of the volute crater by the painter of the Woolly Silens in New York (pl. 79, fig. 12).

To my knowledge, among the surviving painted tombs of Tarquinii executed in the sixth and fifth centuries only four ceiling patterns were employed. Three of these are unquestionably textile patterns. I. The checkerboard:

Tomb of the Lionesses: pl. 79, fig. 10o. Tomb of the Chariots: Weege, pl. 84. Tomb of the Leopards: Weege, pl. 14, Romanelli,

pl. ii, Leisinger, pl. on p. 50. Tomb of the Triclinium: Weege, pl. 27, Leisinger,

pl. on p. 59- Tomb of the Funeral Couch: pl. 82, fig. i7. Tomb of the Ship: M. Moretti, BdA 45 (1960)

349, fig. 6.

2. Four dot rosettes: Tomb of the Inscriptions: Weege, pl. 73. Tomb of the Augurs: pl. 82, fig. 18. Tomb of the Painted Vases: Weege, pls. 66-68,

Romanelli, pl. 31.

Tomb of the Old Man: Weege, pl. 70. Tomb of the Dying Man: Weege, pl. 72. Tomb of the Bacchantes: Weege, pl. 41. This is also a textile pattern. Compare, for ex-

ample, the dresses of the dancers from the Tomb of the Lionesses (pl. 80, fig. 13) and from the Tomb of Francesca Giustiniani (pl. 80, fig. i4). Such flowered patterns recall the dvOwae ' o-rpcouvaL, the flowered coverlets spread at an Etruscan banquet."8

3. Four dot rosettes alternating with cross hatched squares:

Tomb of Hunting and Fishing: pl. 76, fig. 3 (inner chamber). This pattern is a slightly elaborated version of 2.

The widespread use of these three patterns for ceiling decoration shows that generally, if not uni- versally, the painted chamber tomb at Tarquinii was intended to recall a tent."9 Such a tent pavilion is actually shown in the upper frieze of the Tomb of the Chariots (pl. 81, fig. I5). From beneath its cover spectators are watching a funeral celebration. This shaded stand illustrates the luxury of the Etruscans recalled by Poseidonios.20 It is a sharp contrast to the bare hillsides and open bleachers from which the Greeks watched their dramatic and athletic contests. But a covered grandstand is, in fact, more unusual from the Greek point of view than a tent used for entertaining or solemn occa- sions. We may recall the tent given to Alcibiades by the Ephesians for use during the Olympic games, the tents employed for the lying in state of the Athenian war dead of the fifth century before their public funeral, and the elaborate banqueting tent described in Euripides' Ion.21 The necropolis of Monterozzi is a good two kilometers from the city of Tarquinii. The heat of the summer and uncertain weather in the winter would have made the erection of a tent for the funeral banquet and for the spectators at the funeral games a natural precaution. We can now begin to see how the occasion of the funeral celebration was carried into

16Pallottino (I937) col. 264; (1952) 44. 17 In Greek vase-painting checkerboards are used for ashlar

masonry as well as for textiles, cf. J. D. Beazley, The Develop- ment of Attic Black-figure (Berkeley 1951) pls. 8 (2) and 9.

18s Diodoros 5.40. 19 Simple white ceilings with no design pattern are found

in the following tombs: Tomb of the Bulls, pl. 78, fig. 7; Tomb of the Pulcinella, Romanelli, p. 31; Tomb of the Baron, Roma- nelli, pl. 40, Pallottino (1952) pl. on p. 55, Leisinger, pl. on p. 43; Tomb of the Dead Man, Romanelli, p. 17; Tomb of the, Sea, Romanelli, p. 31; Tomb of the Querciola no. I, F. Mes- serschmidt in Scritti in Onore di Bartolomeo Nogara (Citta del

Vaticano 1937) pl. 36; Tomb of the Olympic Athletes, R. Bar- toccini and M. Moretti, StEtr 26 (1958) 289-295. They may well be intended to represent unadorned canvas. The irregular red dots in the ceiling of the outer chamber of the Tomb of Hunting and Fishing are more difficult to interpret. Could they be meant to suggest grommets?

20 Ap. Athenaios 4-13, P. 153, and probably the source of the similar passage in Diodoros 5.40. Covered stands in the circus were introduced at Rome by Tarquin I, Dion. Hal. 3.68.1.

21 Plutarch, Alcibiades 12.1, Thucydides 2.34, Euripides, Ion 11. 1132-1166.


the tomb not only by the representation of the

banquet and games but also by the re-creation of the architectural setting of these events. However, one other form of ceiling decoration remains to be considered.

4. The striped ceiling: Tomb of Francesca Giustiniani: Romanelli, pl.

42, Leisinger, pl. on p. 81. Tomb of the Pulcella: pl. 81, fig. i6. The sloping ceiling of the Tomb of Francesca

Giustiniani is decorated with a series of broad al-

ternating red and white stripes painted perpendicu- larly to the ridgepole.

This treatment also occurs in the Tomb of the Pulcella, and in addition the ridgepole is decorated with nine longitudinal stripes, also alternating red and white. (pl. 81, fig. 16). The ridgepole, moreover, is actually cut free from the ceiling. Similar articulation of the ridgepole is found in three other tombs of the fifth century, the Tomb of the Leop- ards, the Tomb of the Triclinium, and the Tomb of the Funeral Couch. It is wrong to assume without qualification that this articulated band is a true

ridgepole, and we shall examine it under the name "central member."

The Tomb of the Pulcella is of great importance for the interpretation of the central member because of the loculus set in its rear wall to receive an ash urn. The ceiling of the loculus repeats the

ceiling of the tomb, except that its central member is not decorated. The facade of the loculus is given the elaborate architectural decoration of a minia- ture shrine, which makes it reminiscent of the Vil- lanovan hut urn. It has a gorgoneion in the center of its pediment, a finial, a complicated raking sima and geison. Moreover, it shows that the central member is not a ridgepole but a ceiling below the peak of the roof.22

To interpret the ceiling of the Tomb of the Pul- cella as a wooden structure with eaves and a ceiling composed of a set of longitudinal beams one must confront a further problem. The sloping sides of the roof of the tomb chamber show the slight but un- mistakable concave sag of a tent. The same is true of the loculus. Thus the Tomb of the Pulcella shows us a striped tent in which there is a central

canopy (the central member) slung beneath the

peak of the tent to mask the bare ridgepole. There is no reason to hold that the loculus is intended to

represent a permanent structure. In fact a tent, supported by an elaborately decorated wooden frame- work, would be more easily portable and serve

equally well to cover the ashes of the dead man

during part or all of the funeral, as we see it here flanked by musicians participating in the ceremonies.

The Tomb of the Pulcella is not the only in- stance of an interior canopy represented in Etrus- can tomb painting. Another example is provided by the Tomb of the Funeral Couch, to which Pallot- tino has directed attention (pl. 82, fig. I7).23 Here the program of decoration is executed as follows. In the principal frieze on the rear wall of the tomb one sees a giant unoccupied funeral bed. Around it are grouped the participants in the funeral ban-

quet, who extend part way back along each of the side walls. The rest of the side walls is taken up with the performance of the customary funeral rites.

The roof of the tomb is of great interest. It is a tent, as is shown by the typical checkerboard pattern of the sloping sides. The central member has been carved to project from the ceiling. It is decorated with three large bosses and an ivy leaf pattern. This decoration has parallels in other tombs of the period.24 The central member rests on a thin architrave carried by two columns which are

carefully shown behind the funeral bed. Further details clearly show the existence of an

interior canopy. There is detailed rendering of the

hanging edge of this canopy, fastened across the columns behind the funeral bed and carried back

along the side walls of the tomb over the heads of the participants in the funeral banquet. The detail of the edge is the same as that used for the

canopy covering the spectators at the funeral games in the Tomb of the Chariots.

Pallottino assumes that this canopy is the only awning represented in the tomb and that once we have passed the last banqueter on the side walls the covering stops. It is true that the canopy is anchored, just beyond the last banqueter, to a tall stake which does not have any connection with the

22 By this observation I do not mean to suggest that the central members of tombs with elaborately carved architectural details such as the Tomb of the Alcove or the Tomb of the Reliefs at Caere (Demus-Quatember, op.cit., supra note 9, figs. 16-17) or the Tomb "alle Croci" at Tarquinii (Pallottino,

1937, P. 50, fig. 5) are not true ridgepoles. 23 Pallottino (1952) 82. 24 Tomb of the Leopards, bosses, Romanelli, pl. 11; Tomb

of the Triclinium, ivy pattern, Leisinger, pl. on p. 59.

346 R. ROSS HOLLOWAY [AJA 69

large checkerboard pattern tent above. Still, the canopy and the tent pavilion are closely related to each other behind the funeral couch where both are supported by the two columns and the architrave that carry the central member. Furthermore, some of the participants in the funeral celebration beyond the last banqueters are unquestionably inside some structure, notably the flutist of the right side wall, who overlaps a column which stands on the bottom of the major frieze and supports a horizontal element decorated with an ivy pattern just below the checkerboard canvas. This horizontal element may well be a wooden frame to which the lower edges of the awnings are anchored.

The decoration of the Tomb of the Funeral Couch may be read as follows. The entire tomb chamber is meant to suggest an open pavilion. Its elements are the columns behind the funeral bed and along the side walls, the frame for the awnings carried by the columns of the side walls, the

sloping checkerboard awnings, and finally the run- ner, decorated with bosses and an ivy design, slung below the peak of the tent to mask the ridgepole. Inside this pavilion is a baldacchino of honor cov-

ering the funeral bed and the banqueters. Its effect is that of the covered dais familiar to the modern world.

The Tomb of the Funeral Couch is the most literal representation of the setting of an Etruscan funeral which has been preserved in Etruscan painting.25 The decoration of the side walls is especially noteworthy. We have already noted that, among the figures participating in the dances and games of the celebration, the flute player on the right side wall must be inside the big pavilion because he overlaps a column. However, it is difficult to believe that the pavilion was meant to accommodate the horses of the cortege and serve as an arena for the funeral games. The horses and their handlers on the side walls must be outside the pavilion. Since the pavilion has no wall, activities seen outside remain part of the same spatial world as the pavilion itself and the banquet held under its cover.

The representational scenes and suggested architecture of these painted tombs are two parts of an illusionistic program of decoration. In it were united the tradition of mimic architecture in the tomb and the ability of the painter to represent the scene of the funeral celebration. As far as we know, the synthesis of these elements was made only at Tar- quinii. It was first made about 525 B.c., and resulted in a scheme of decoration which sought to re-create in the tomb the view from the interior of the pavilion erected for the funeral banquet, so that the shade of the deceased might witness and even par- ticipate in the ceremonies performed in his honor.26

THE APPLICATIONS OF THE CONVENTIONS OF THE

TARQUINII SCHOOL

The advantage of this reconstruction of the conventions of tomb painting at Tarquinii can be seen if we turn for a moment to the Tomb of the

Augurs (pl. 82, fig. I8). On the rear wall of this tomb two mourners salute the doorway. The interpretation of this "false door" has caused some diffi- culty, but the scene makes logical sense once we realize that in the painted tomb we are standing once again under the pavilion of the funeral banquet. On the side walls around us are the activities of the funeral celebration outside the pavilion, and before us is the entrance to the tomb before which the mourners make their final salutation.27

The trees, shrubs, and vegetation in the tomb paintings are now placed in a new light. These natural elements connote the area outside the pavilion, just as the textile patterns of the sloping roofs of the chambers denote the tent pavilion itself.

One further convention in the decorative program should also be considered. In at least three tombs, the Tomb of the Lionesses, the Tomb of the Funeral Couch, and the Tomb of the Triclini- um, the painted dado of the walls is converted into a suggestion of the sea.28 It is painted deep blue and its top is formed into a line of stylized wave crests. In the Tomb of the Lionesses and in the Tomb of the Funeral Couch a line of leaping dol-

25 The unoccupied funeral bed is of some importance. Else- where the couches are all occupied. Is it possible that the bodies of the two persons for whom the bed is prepared were lost abroad? For the practice of preparing an empty couch for the war dead whose bodies had remained unrecovered cf. Thucydi- des 2.34.

26 Despite the importance of haruspicy in Etruscan religion, I believe that the tent pavilions of Etruscan tomb painting are completely literal representations and have none of the astral

connotations of the tent and dome studied by K. Lehmann, ArtB 27 (1945) 1-27 and E. Baldwin Smith, The Dome, a Study in the History of Ideas (Princeton Monographs in Art and Archaeology 25, Princeton 1950).

27 The same observations may be made regarding the four doors of the Tomb of the Inscriptions.

28 The number is undoubtedly larger, but the lower wall surfaces of many of the tombs have been destroyed while something of the decoration at a higher level remains intact.


phins are added above the surface. It is difficult to know whether the dolphin had a specific symbolic meaning to the Etruscans.29 But such suggestion of the sea at the base of these tomb walls also has a basis in visual observation. Anyone who has stood on the ridge of Monterozzi, where the chamber tombs of Tarquinii are situated, cannot have failed to look toward the west where the Tyrrhenian sea

gleams below his feet at the same angle of vision as the suggestion of waves and water in the tombs.

The importance of the sea in Tarquinian tomb

painting has been emphasized by the newly discovered wall paintings of the Tomb of the Ship.30 This chamber was painted about the middle of the fifth century, and the principal frieze has scenes of

dancing and celebration in the familiar pattern of the Tomb of the Triclinium. At the end of the left side wall toward the entrance of the tomb the

pattern suddenly breaks, and one sees a cargo vessel with her diminutive crew making port near a

rocky promontory (pl. 81, fig. I9). The transition in scale between the dancers and the ship is abrupt. In his preliminary study of the paintings, Moretti comments, "a breath of sea air seems to reach the dark underground room across a fissure in the tufa wall and to cancel every remaining shade of

melancholy." But in the conventions of the pavilion the dancers are outside the tomb too, and the painting merely reaches for a moment from the near distance of the celebration to the far distance of the sea.

We may now return to the program of the Tomb of Hunting and Fishing. The elaborate, two chamber plan of the tomb gave considerable freedom to its designer. He satisfied the requirements of tomb decoration with the banquet scene in the pediment of the inner chamber (pl. 75, fig. 2) and the view

through the open walls of the pavilion of the outer chamber to a grove and the funeral dance in prog- ress there (pl. 77, fig. 6). To these scenes he added

the hunting group in the pediment of the outer chamber (pl. 76, fig. 5), and finally the remarkable frescoes of the inner room. There can be little doubt that the decoration of the tomb was planned around these paintings which bring a distant view of the sea and its shore to the banqueters looking down from the pediment-as they would have looked down in life from the funeral banquet on the

ridge of Monterozzi. These paintings are not alien to the principles of Etruscan art. They are a bril- liant but logical development of the convention of the pavilion in the tomb. The future of Etruscan tomb painting, however, lay not with the Tomb of

Hunting and Fishing but with more confined views of the immediate funeral celebration. Except for a small appearance in the Tomb of the Ship, the idea of the panoramic distant vista was soon lost, and after the fifth century the coherent illusionistic decoration of the chamber tomb was also forgotten.

Something over four hundred years later illusionistic painting was to be born again when the Romans, who had given the world the visual stimu- lus of vast monumental architecture erected on con- crete vaults, demanded that their sunken dining rooms and narrow bed chambers be opened out with illusionistic painting. Once again the artistic tradition was Greek, the result Italian. Once again, illusionism in painting was to have an architectural basis. For we may be confident that the remarkable composition of the frescoes of the Tomb of Hunting and Fishing could have been envisaged only if the painted tomb was already understood as a pavilion opening freely to the world outside.31

BROWN UNIVERSITY

NOTE: E. H. Richardson, The Etruscans (Chicago 1964) appeared while this article was in the course of publication. It is a pleasure to see (pp. 116 and 198) that Mrs. Richardson has independently adopt- ed the same position regarding the program of the Tarquinii tombs that is reached in this paper.

29 For dolphin lore in antiquity, cf. E. B. Stebbins, The Dolphin in the Literature and Art of Greece and Rome (diss., The Johns Hopkins University 1929).

30M. Moretti, BdAr 45 (I960) 346-352. The publication of the additional painted tombs discovered at Tarquinii in the years following 1960 is naturally eagerly awaited by all students of Etruscan art.

31 The visits to Tarquinia which led to the writing of this paper were made in the company of Dr. Tony Hackens, and I am grateful to him for his stimulating companionship. Sin-

cere thanks are also expressed to the following gentlemen for help in securing photographs, Dr. Dietrich von Bothmer, Metro- politan Museum of Art, New York, Cav. Gino Filipetto, Secre- tary of the Swedish Institute in Rome, Dott. Mario Moretti, Superintendent of Antiquities for Southern Etruria, and Mr. S. Artur Svensson, A. B. Allhem Publishers, Malm6, Sweden. Clerical and photographic expenses were met with a generous grant from the Smith Fund of the University of North Caro- lina, Chapel Hill.

HOLLOWAY PLATE 75

METRI

A

1/ I1 0

A B

# ,,, ",,,. ,9,4 FIG. i. Section and plan (after MonPitt, Tarquinii, fasc. ii, p. 2, fig. 2)

A?K c~ x ~?~~:-

IFA?. ~ -~ ?::? s

i?;i?VII ;~ a:i ~", 4ts

7t

JV *C?;f?- ~" :?:--i-i. A7

FIc. 2. Inner chamber (after Leisinger, p. 20) Tarquinii, Tomb of Hunting and Fishing

PLATE 76 HOLLOWAY

FIc. 3-. Inner chamber, detail of left wall (after MonPitt, Tarquinii, fasc. II, pl. B)

FIG. 5. Outer chamber, rear wall (after MonPitt, Tarquinii, fasc. 11, pl. A) Tarquinii, Tomb of Hunting and Fishing

HOLLOWAY PLATE 77

FIG. 4. Inner chamber, right wall (after MonPitt, Tarquinii, fasc. ii, pl. ii)

FIG. 6. Outer chamber, right wall (after MonPitt, Tarquinii, fasc. ii, p. 4, fig. 5) Tarquinii, Tomb of Hunting and Fishing

Fic. 8. Caere, Tomb of the Cornice, outer chamber (after King Gustav Adolf et al., Etruscan Culture, Land and People, Malmio and New York 1962, fig. 6o)

PLATE 78 HOLLOWAY

Fic. 7. Tarquinii, Tomb of the Bulls, outer chamber, rear wall (courtesy A. B. Allhem Publishers, Malmo6)

FIc. 9. Clusium, Tomb of the Hills, outer chamber, detail (after MonPitt, Clusium, fasc. I, p. i8, fig. 18)

HOLLOWAY PLATE 79

FIG. IO. Tarquinii, Tomb of the Lionesses (after Leisinger, p. 27)

FIG. I I. Tarquinii, Tomb of the Querciola no. I, reproduction in Vatican Museum of lost original (after Scritti in onore di B. Norgara,

Cittli del Vaticano 1937, pl. xxxi, fig. I)

FIG. I2. Attic red-figure volute krater attributed to the Painter of the Woolly Silens, detail of neck (MMA 07.286.84, Rogers Fund

1907, courtesy Metropolitan Museum of Art)

Fic. 13. Tarquinii, Tomb of the Lionesses, detail of rear wall

(after Leisinger, p. 29) Fic. 14. Tarquinii, Tomb of Francesca Giustiniani, detail of reproduction in Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, Copenhagen (after

Poulsen, Etruscan Tomb Paintings [Oxford 1922]1 fig. 1I)

-1

C

00 O

o

O

HOLLOWAY PLATE 8I

FIG. 15. Tarquinii, Tomb of the Chariots, detail of Stackelberg's sketch of the original (after Weege, pl. 2)

FIG. 16. Tarquinii, Tomb of the Pulcella (after Leisinger, p. 85)

Fic. 19. Tarquinii, Tomb of the Ship, left wall, drawing after original (after BdA 45 [11960] 346, fig. )

PLATE 82 HOLLOWAY

FIG. 17. Tarquinii, Tomb of the Funeral Couch (after Leisinger, p. 78)

FIc. 18. Tarquinii, Tomb of the Augurs (after Pallottino 1952, p. 37)

etruscan tomb

Documents