414 Nancy T. de Grummond
Figure 27.1 Etruscan tomb painting with reclining male banqueter. Tarquinia, Tomb of the
Lionesses, ca. 530BCE. Courtesy of Scala/Art Resource, NY.
with long braids hanging in front and in back (for other blonds as well as dark-haired
Etruscans in tomb paintings, see Briggs 2002: 163). The facial features, however, are
not likely to constitute a true portrait, but rather partake of a formula for representing
the male in Etruria in Archaic art. It has been observed that the formula used—with
the face in profile, showing almond-shaped eyes, a large nose, and a domed up profile
of the top of the head—has its parallels in images from the eastern Mediterranean. But
these features may show only artistic conventions and are therefore of limited value for
determining ethnicity.
In tomb paintings through the centuries (sixth–third centuryBCE), women of high sta-
tus appeared elegantly, though not extravagantly, dressed and bejeweled. In the Archaic
period, the fashion of thetutulus, a tall hair style rather like the beehive, covered with a
cap and veil, gave a distinctive look, along with pointed-toe shoes (also worn by males;
the fashion went out by around 475BCE). In the Middle period of Etruscan culture (ca.
450–300BCE), hair was worn bound up in back by a snood, with a diadem or wreath
in front. As may be seen in an Etruscan mirror of ca. 350BCEdepicting the adorn-
ment of the bride Malavisch (Figure 27.2), the fashion “look” featured an abundance
of jewelry—necklaces with large and clunky pendants or fine matched beads, earrings
of a disc or grape cluster shape, diadems, bracelets, and armlets with bullae. Sometimes
Greek-style earrings were worn, a rather modest type with an inverted pendant pyra-
mid, but these only serve to bring out the contrast between the women of Greece and
Etruria in this period; images of Greek female dress normally show very few, and incon-
spicuous, accessories (Castor 2010: 32). In other words, it would have been relatively