- chapter 33: The imagery of tomb objects –
Figure 33.2 Tomba degli Auguri, detail (after Becatti and Magi Fig. 9).then we have an interesting tie-up between tomb decoration and objects placed in tombs,
as well as early indications in Archaic tomb painting of Underworld references.
One of the glories of the Louvre collections is the red-fi gure Antaios krater by the
Athenian vase-painter Euphronios, found in a Cerveteri tomb (Beazley 1963: 14, 2).
There are many Greek scenes of Herakles grappling and wrestling with opponents but
this is one of the few that shows the moment of death (the pupil of the giant’s eye
rolls upwards, and his mouth is open in a fi nal gasp). Was the pot, therefore, chosen
because wrestling at funeral games sometimes ended in unconsciousness or death? Did
Etruscan burial rites on occasion include human sacrifi ce? Or, as seems more likely for
most occasions, was the deceased’s need for sustenance from human blood satisfi ed by its
depiction alone?
Another way of providing for the deceased, in addition to putting objects in the tomb
or painting the tomb walls, was to represent such objects by means of relief sculpture.
Best seen in the Tomb of the Reliefs at Cerveteri (Blanck and Proietti 1986) this is
especially illuminating for us because for the tomb designer it was a time-consuming
process and needed to be carefully planned in advance. On the walls and pillars of this
tomb is represented a variety of status objects: a fan (fl abellum) and staff (lituus), also a
probable writing tablet; homely objects: ladles, knives, pickaxes, crockery (metalware
and pottery). Most importantly, almost all these items can be found in other tombs – not
just in relief or painting but also in the form of real objects. Whoever designed this tomb
knew he was not simply replicating some sort of house or a room in a house, but a tomb
of the dead. Hence there is a three-headed Cerberus on the far wall together with a snaky-
legged “Scylla,” both creatures associated with the Underworld. One could even draw the
conclusion that the iconography of this tomb suggests a space that is at one and the same
time the house, the tomb, and the Underworld.
But the point worth stressing here is that the pots from tombs are identical to those
found in domestic situations, even though it is sometimes said that in real life wealthy
Etruscans used only metalware and that the pottery found in tombs was a cheap substitute
purchased for honoring the dead (Vickers 1985–6). In actuality metal services do exist