- chapter 59: Science as art –
50 Normally, the polyvisceral plaques are not designated by gender. An important exception is a
plaque from Tarquinia (Baggieri 1999, 97 Fig. 19), because here is shown below the intestinal
loops and a uterus an organ which can only be the urinary bladder. This is an identifi cation
of major importance, since such objects when shown separately are often misunderstood as an
isolated testicle (Baggieri 1999, 62 fi g. 57). The opening shows that there is a hollow body,
which is clearly seen in radiological investigations (Recke, 2008, 61 Fig. 7).
51 Comella 1981, 771–775. Generally Papini 2004, attributes this to the economic and cultural
integration of central Italy during the Roman expansion into the Greek-Hellenistic world.
The donors come, in the view of Torelli 1976 and Pensabene 1979, from the class of the
plebeians. Critical to this Söderlind 2005, 363, notice of fi nds with anatomical votives in a
purely Etruscan context, and Glinister 2006.
52 In Cales or Lucera, while in formally independent cities like Capua, Falerii or Tarquinia such
specifi cally Roman customs are not adopted for the votive heads. Pensabene 1979, 217–222;
Söderlind 2002, 381; Söderlind 2005, 359–365.
53 Söderlind 2005, 362; Glinister 2006, 30–31.
54 For example, anatomical votives from Veii in the De Medici Collection, today in Florence
(Delpino 1985, 19–21). For early treatments, such as J. P. Tomasini, De donariis ac tabellis
votivis liber singularis (Padua 1654), which was more concerned with the inscriptions
accompanying votive offerings, but also illustrated uterus- hand- and head-votives, see the
compilation in Tabanelli 1962, 4–6.
55 L. Stieda, Anatomisches über alt-italische Weihgeschenke (Donaria). Anatomisch-Archäologische
Studien II (Wiesbaden 1901).
56 For example, of the approximately 6,000 votives discovered in 1885 in the Vignaccia
deposit at Cerveteri, of which 800 objects went to the Phoebe A. Hearst (previously Lowie)
Museum, Univ. of California, Berkeley, these consisted entirely of fi gural terracottas (heads
and fi gurines), which expresses the taste of the times, cf. Nagy 1988.
57 We name Alexander 1905, Holländer 1912, but also Tabanelli 1962. Still in the tradition of
this sort of research is the exhibition “Speranza e Sofferenza nei Votivi Anatomici dell’Antichità
(Ancient Anatomy in the Art of Votive Offerings)” 1996 in Rome, see Baggieri 1999.
58 Bonghi Jovino 1965; Bartoloni 1970; Bonghi Jovino 1971; Vagnetti 1971; Torelli-Pohl
1973; Fenelli 1975; Bonghi Jovino 1976; Comella 1978. Earlier: Bartoccini 1940, 241–298.
59 Comella 1986; Bartoloni –Benedettini 2011.
60 Turfa 2006, 90–115; Glinister 2006, 10–33.
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