CHAPTER FIFTY EIGHT

MIRRORS IN ART AND SOCIETY

Richard Daniel De Puma

Yet there is no branch of Etruscan antiquities more genuinely native – none more

valuable to the inquirer, for the information it yields as to the mysterious language

and creed of that ancient race; for the inscriptions being always in the native character,

and designatory of the individual gods or heroes represented, these mirrors become

a sure index to the Etruscan creed – “a fi gurative dictionary,” as Bunsen^1 terms it, of

Etruscan mythology; while at the same time they afford us the chief source and one of

the most solid bases of our acquaintance with the native language.

George Dennis, Cities and Cemeteries of Etruria

(revised edition, London, 1878, p. lxxx).

INTRODUCTION: A BRIEF HISTORY OF

RECENT MIRROR STUDIES

W

hen J. D. Beazley, the renowned expert on Greek vases, published his only article
on Etruscan mirrors he gave it this title: “The World of the Etruscan Mirror.”^2
This may sound grandiose or exaggerated at fi rst. Surely these small, utilitarian objects
that many art historians would assign to the “minor arts” could not constitute a “world.”
But, as Beazley and others who had examined them closely realized, mirrors did indeed
provide a signifi cant window into the world of the Etruscans, despite their small scale and
often unpretentious appearance. They surely appealed to Beazley because in many ways
Etruscan mirrors document Etruscan culture in the same way that Greek vase paintings
document Greek culture. Furthermore, because we possess relatively little information on
the Etruscans from their own lost literature, the value of mirrors as documents becomes
even more precious.
In the nineteenth century Eduard Gerhard (1795–1867) took on the herculean task of
collecting, categorizing and publishing hundreds of Etruscan mirrors, many in his own
collection.^3 Several twentieth-century scholars, among them Massimo Pallottino (1909–
1995), Guido Mansuelli (1916–2001) and especially Roger Lambrechts (1927–2005),
championed the study and publication of mirrors. They were instrumental in organizing