- Maurizio Sannibale –
is present in Egypt from the Early Dynastic to the Late Period. Linked to the concept
of kingship, with the function of ensuring protection and incorruptibility to the bodies
of the dead, it comes to be adopted in the Syro-Palestinian region and the Near East, in
conjunction with the political and military expansion of the New Kingdom (Dynasties
XVIII–XX, 1550–1070 bc). Considering the historical and decorative repertoire,
it is likely that this reached Etruria through Levantine mediation.^23 The iconography
associates motifs of different origins: from those more generically Near Eastern (winged
woman with or without a lotus fl ower) to those from the Syro-Phoenician region (like the
“Lord of Animals,” griffi n, Phoenician palmette), while the repertoire of fantastic animals
(chimaera, pegasus) looks to Greece instead. Even the geometric pattern of hatched
triangles, otherwise seen as a citation from the “indigenous” proto-historic repertoire,
may portend a more ancient and widespread legacy, since it is repeated unchanged even
on Egyptian funerary masks of Ptolemaic cartonnage.
The pectoral was relevant to the deceased woman who was placed in the main chamber
of the tomb, where, through a window, ritually left open, we witness the epiphany of the
deifi ed dead, as befi ts a goddess or a queen, associated with the ancient oriental motif
of the “Lady at the window” as an announcement of a sacred event. In the Regolini-
Galassi Tomb, hanging on the side of the window was the ajouré silver and wood situla,
which recalls symbolic ties with water in this container of ancient lineage (Fig. 6.12).
The origin of the form goes back to the ancient Near East and Egypt, where it was used
since the second millennium bc. It is precisely in Pharaonic Egypt that the situla appears
closely connected with a particular ritual that also extended to funerary cult; it was used
as a container for the holy water of the Nile but also for milk, from which follows a
shape vaguely imitating a breast, thus signifi cantly related to the concept of regeneration.
In Assyrian reliefs the cylindrical situla is a constant attribute of the winged genii
represented as touching the Tree of Life, in a propitiatory action. It therefore seems very
signifi cant that, in an atmosphere as educated and receptive as at Cerveteri, even in the
sixth century urns that boast a row of breasts along the bottom edge are made.^24
In the East, the techniques maintained a sort of ritual immutability, because they
were bound to objects with sacred and symbolic purposes, where their very construction
Figure 6.12 Situla in silver ajouré, originally over a wooden body. Cerveteri,
Regolini-Galassi Tomb. Museo Gregoriano Etrusco 20471. Photo © Musei Vaticani.