- Ulf R. Hansson –
Figure 51.1 Banded agate scarab depicting two Roman salii, inscr. appius alce. Late fourth or early
third century bce. Florence, Museo Archeologico Nazionale, inv. 14400 © Soprintendenza per i Beni
Archeologici della Toscana.EARLY IMPORTED WORKS AND
IMMIGRANT ENGRAVERSPrior to the introduction of new techniques for engraving harder stones in the second half
of the sixth century bce, there are few examples of indigenous stone seal production.^10
Three gems in softer serpentine (hardness 2.5–5 on the Mohs scale) deserve to be
mentioned. The earliest one is a scaraboid fragment found in the so-called edifi cio beta in
the Pian di Civita complex at Tarquinia and datable to the late eighth or early seventh
century bce;^11 the other two are a scaraboid and a pendant seal found in the destruction
layers of the earliest palace at Poggio Civitate, Murlo, and datable to the late seventh
century bce.^12 These and numerous fi nds of imported scarabs and scaraboids in the larger
Etruscan and Faliscan centers show that such types of objects were circulated in the area
at least from the early eighth century bce onwards, when they begin to appear in burial
contexts.^13 Imported material includes late ninth- and eighth-century bce scarabs and
scaraboids in various materials of Egyptian, Syro-Phoenician and/or Island manufacture,
and late eighth-century bce red and green serpentine scaraboids and scarabs belonging
to the so-called Lyre-Player Group, which were carved by North-Syrian or Cilician
engravers, possibly also by gem-carvers active on the island of Rhodes.^14
In the late third and fourth quarters of the sixth century bce, scarabs in hard, semi-
precious stones attributed to East Greek workshops also begin to surface in Etruria.
Where these early works are concerned, it is virtually impossible to distinguish imported
stones from those that may actually have been engraved by immigrant Greek craftsmen
active in Etruria, or for that matter by local gem-carvers trained by immigrants. Several
of the gems in John Boardman’s Greek Robust Style have allegedly been found in Etruria,
and there is good reason to assume that at least some of these gems were actually carved by
engravers active there. This has been suggested to be the case with the so-called “Master of
the London Satyr” (Fig. 51.2).^15 These early gems from the last three decades of the sixth
century bce present affi nities with works in other media made by Ionian artists who arrived
in Etruria following the Persian invasion of their East Greek homelands. But Greek and
Etruscan glyptic soon developed along different lines, making identifi cation somewhat
easier. The beetle sides of Etruscan scarabs are generally more detailed, carefully cut and