- chapter 50: Etruscan jewelry –
constructed of two hemispheres originally enclosing a bead of colored glass, and others
with pendants cut from rock crystal, or the tooth of an animal the upper part of which
was inserted in a sort of gold case decorated with fi ligree and/or granulation, alternating
with bars as separating strips. Tomb II of Sodo Tumulus II offers us the rare example of
amber pendants in the shape of a scarab, supported by cylindrical bars decorated with
granulation, and still other types, more common, were in the form of a pinecone, acorn,
grape-cluster, or a ram’s head.^42 Also known are a number of pendants in the shape of the
head of a lion or Acheloos, the river god endowed with apotropaic virtues. The Louvre
preserves a beautiful example of the latter in which the fi ne granulation and fi ligree are
used with extreme dexterity to make the beard and curls of the hair, constructed with a
smooth spirally twisted wire and punctuated by a granule of gold.^43
Archaic fi bulae are abundant but less varied than before. We are dealing essentially with
fi bulae with a bow a sanguisuga and an elongated catch-plate adorned with granulation,
fi ligree and vegetal patterns, sometimes with a covering of fl owers in gold foil, to which
can be added at the end of the catch a fi gure in the round of an animal (lion, bird, hare)
or fantastical animal (winged lion, sphinx) in part at least attributed to the workshops of
Vulci;^44 also there are fi bulae with swollen bow or of the Certosa type.^45
The oval signet or “cartouche” rings with incised, carved or repoussé decoration,
divided into registers according to Phoenician fashion or forming a single scene in Greek
fashion,^46 are decorated with fi gures of animals real and imaginary or with actual narrative
scenes infl uenced by Greek myths in a style close to that of the vases of the Pontic Group
or the Group of La Tolfa, themselves of East Greek descent.
The bracelets are mostly simple rings of gold, open or closed. The closed bracelets
can be adorned with rings carrying a decoration in granulation or fi ligree.^47 The open
bracelets are usually adorned at their ends by lion protomes.^48 Some rare examples were
made in glass, such as a blue glass bracelet found at Vulci in a set of funerary offerings
datable to the end of the sixth or beginning of the fi fth century bc (Fig. 50.7).^49
The crisis following the naval defeat of the Etruscans off Cumae in 474 bc and
primarily affecting the centers of southern Etruria, causes the impoverishment of the
funeral offerings of this region, but quickly enriches the inland centers and the Tiber
Valley, which benefi t from the referral of commercial traffi c to the Adriatic route, and
Figure 50.7 Bracelet from Vulci. End of the sixth–beginning of the fi fth century bc. Rome, Museo di
Villa Giulia, inv. 59791 © Soprintendenza per i Beni Archeologici dell’ Etruria Meridionale.