Etruscan Mirrors

Acknowledgements; Abbreviations; Catalogue of Etruscan Mirrors and Handles in Northeastern Collections; Amherst, Massachusetts: Mead Art Museum, Amherst College; Bryn Athyn, Pennsylvania: Glencairn Museum, Academy of the New Church; Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania: Ella Riegel Memorial Museum, Bryn; Mawr College; Newark, New Jersey: Newark Museum; New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Art Gallery; Northampton, Massachusetts: Department of Classical Languages and Literatures, Smith College; Norton, Massachusetts: Watson Gallery, Wheaton College; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: University Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Pennsylvania; Mirrors of Doubtful Antiquity in Philadelphia, Nos. 37-39; Mirrors formerly in the Classics Department Collection, University of Pennsylvania, but now lost: Poughkeepsie, New York: Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center, Vassar College Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Art Museum; Mirrors of Doubtful Antiquity in Princeton, Nos. 46-48; Providence, Rhode Island: Rhode Island School of Design Museum Worcester, Massachusetts: Higgins Armory Museum; Worcester, Massachusetts: Worcester Art Museum; Figures (1-55); Photographic Credits; Appendix - Chemical Analysis Results; Indexes.

Thanks to the increasing multidisciplinary approach to the analysis of votive contexts, a meaningful amount of information about both archaeological finds and associated faunal remains is available, giving way to interpretations about cults and sacrificial practices. This paper deals with the filling of different categories of “cavities” included in Etruscan sacred areas: the deep ones providing a connection with the underworld (mainly holding a primary hydraulic function); the wide ditches and the artificially delimited hollow spaces. In spite of the uneven quality of published data, this paper attempts to discuss and highlight their possible meaning and common distinctive features, taking into account their stratification, the sequence of operations involved and the evidence of specific rituals performed during the definitive land filling.

Updated attached exel file only, 3.09.2024. Updated to include corrections of mirrors. One mirror carries the name TIRANAII (Tyrhenni).  It is the oldest extant document containing the name Herodotus referred to and may predate Herodotus' "Histories." The Etruscan Glossary A spreadsheet presents 2,800 individual words from the major extant Etruscan texts. The texts contain a total word count of 6,000+ words, about 4,000 of which are repetitious. The Etruscan Glossary also sheds light on Etruscan declension and conjugation patterns that are similar to Latin, French & Italian. The glossary accounts for all of the 6,000+ words in the texts, including  the Zagreb Mummy wrapping and important grammatical and mythological data contained in Etruscan mirrors. Each word in the glossary has alphanumeric locators showing exactly where they are used in the cited texts.

Acknowledgments; History of the Collection of Etruscan; And Praenestine Mirrors in Oxford; Catalogue of the Mirrors; Ashmolean Museum (1-24); Claydon House (25); Pitt Rivers Museum (26-27); Appendix: Laboratory Analysis of Metallic Content; Abbreviations.

This fascicle of the Corpus Speculorum Etruscorum, which has been long in the making, is a collaborative effort between colleagues and friends: Evelyn Bell and Helen Nagy. Evelyn Bell contributed the catalogue entries on the mirrors in the Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley, and the Frank V. de Bellis Collection at San Francisco State University. Helen Nagy was responsible for the catalogue entries on the mirrors at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; the J. Paul Getty Museum; the Santa Barbara Museum of Art; the Art Museum at the University of California, Santa Barbara; and the Seattle Art Museum.

Analysis of the chemical composition of the mirrors is an invaluable tool to help scholars determine where the mirrors were manufactured and whether or not they are Etruscan, Roman, or even authentic works of art. Six of the mirrors in Berkeley were analyzed, while the remaining twelve were unfortunately either too fragile or corroded to allow for sampling. The mirrors in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the J. Paul Getty Museum, the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, the University of California, Santa Barbara, and the Seattle Art Museum were tested, the one at San Francisco State University was not. Jesse Obert, a scholar and doctoral candidate at the University of California, Berkeley, has ably summarized the results of these analyses.

Helen Nagy, Evelyn E. Bell
Etruscan Mirrors
West Coast Collections. Corpus Speculorum Etruscorum. USA 5
Drawings by Barbara Forbes

Corpus Speculorum Etruscorum. USA, 5
2021, 182 pp., 71 ill. b/n, 92 tav.
Hardback with Dust Jacket, 23 X 32 cm
ISBN: 9788891321855
ISSN: 2612-467X

Within the thriving production of Etruscan bronze mirrors, it has been possible to identify a small group that, in our opinion, is particularly influenced by Attic red-figure pottery. These mirrors are decorated with complex mythological scenes and have a specific feature: a figured border. This case study attempts to analyze whether or not this decoration reflects the Etruscan conception of the cosmos (Sky, Earth, Ocean/Underworld). Furthermore, it aims to highlight how this phenomenon concerns not only the iconography, but also the structure itself of the decoration. It is a matter of great interest that also involves, for obvious reasons, the organization of the Etruscan bronze workshops.

Engraved bronze mirrors are among the more numerous artifacts left behind by the Etruscans, providing us with much information about both the people who created these objects and those who owned them or gave them as funeral offerings, as well as their knowledge of Greek myths and Etruscan sacred and secular customs. 1 From the late sixth century BCE on, bronze mirrors became a standard part of the personal effects of the well-to-do Etruscan woman, and of the roughly three thousand mirrors that have survived until the present day, about half are engraved with decorations, and approximately three hundred are inscribed with names. 2 While their owners were living, these mirrors would have been used for cosmetic purposes, but what would be the purpose of burying mirrors with the deceased? Was it simply a matter of providing the dead with their own possessions for use in the afterlife, as would have been the case in a culture like that of the Egyptians, or did the mirrors serve some religious or ritual purpose, as well?

Etruscan cities facing the sea-Caere, Tarquinia, Vulci, Populonia, and Pisa-as well as those located farther inland, such as Roselle, Vetulonia, and Volterra, rose, except for Populonia, on raised mounds or spurs at a certain distance from the sea, with which they were connected by watercourses. Along the coast of southern Etruria, harbors exploited the presence of lagoons and other natural basins connected with the sea. Rivers mouths provided good shelter for ships and boats; rivers also penetrate inland and thus are useful as navigation channels. Settlements at river mouths developed from the seventh century BCE onward, following the main stream of urbanism. Trading posts were thus located outside the biggest urban centers but dependent on them, so that a binomial relationship was created between inland "powers" and specialized places on the coast, called “ports of trade” or emporia. The concept ofharbor is denoted in Greek sources with terms like limen (harbor environment), or hormos and epineion (anchorage, inner harbor). Technical literature in Latin oflater periods, especially portolans (pilot's books including nautical maps) and Itineraria, distinguishes between portus (an artificially protected area with installations easing ships’ access; cf. Vitr. 5.12.1), and statio or positio navium (minor landing site) and refilgium (small berthing place). According to literary sources of the Roman period, along the Etruscan Tyrrhenian coast there were twenty-eight landing sites at regular distances of around four to eight kilometers from Porta to the mouth of the Fiora River. The problem of identifying the named sites is not completely solved, because of coastal variation, the dearth of archaeological evidence, and frequent errors in the transcription of distances. It is not simple to distinguish archaeologically between landing sites and constructed harbors, although we know that ancient seafaring did not need specially built berths or docks. It seems certain that harbor settlements that already existed in the sixth century BCE, such as Pyrgi, Castrum Novum, Gravisca, Regae, Orbetello, Talamone, Populonia, and Pisa, differed in importance from the sites at the mouths of rivers that were natural berthing places. One may identify some recurrent elements. First of all, the choice of site, which was almost always the mouth of a river or a lagoon in the absence of a bay. In comparison with other areas of the ancient world, major Etruscan cities did not rise on the coast, although each had its own port(s) to which it was connected by a highway. Another remarkable element is the frequent close relationship between such epineia and extra-urban sanctuaries, both of which are direct expressions of the power of the city with respect to the external world.

Una recente ricerca condotta presso l'Archivio Centrale dello Stato di Roma ha consentito di reperire alcuni preziosi documenti 1 , rimasti sorprendentemente finora inediti, che chiariscono le circostanze e le coordinate topografiche della scoperta della tomba di Lubriano che ha restituito il noto specchio con Hercle ed altre divinità.

Bibliographie de Miklós Szabó / 11 DÁVID BARTUS Les manches de couteau à représentation de gladiateur de l'époque romaine / 27 MICHEL BATS Les dédicants gaulois du sanctuaire d'Aristée de la chôra d'Olbia de Provence (Hyères, Var) connaissaient-ils le gallo-grec? / 51 TOMASZ BOCHNAK Les fourreaux chagrinés en Pologne / 55 LÁSZLÓ BORHY COREG, Legio VII Claudia, Ala I Contariorum milliaria civium Romanorum -Neue Angaben zur Militärgeschichte von Brigetio: Spolien eines Steinkistengrabs aus dem Gerhát-Gräberfeld / 65 ZOLTÁN CZAJLIK Les possibilités de la prospection aérienne conventionnelle en Hongrie / 79 NICOLA BIANCA FÁBRY Uno specchio con "Lasa" alata dalla necropoli di Monterenzio Vecchio nell'Appennino Bolognese / 97 DÉNES GABLER Keltische Namen auf Sigillata -Töpferstempeln von pannonischen Fundorten / 105 ALFRED HAFFNER Scheinbar unscheinbare Prunkgräber der Frühlatènezeit / 121 GILBERT KAENEL Bracelets à oves creux sur le Plateau suisse / 133 PÉTER KOVÁCS Turris Ferrata and emperor Probus' death / 147 FRANCISCO MARCO SIMÓN On the confrontation and cultural integration of the Celts in the western Roman Empire / 151 MARC MAYER I OLIVÉ La presència d'honors de la dinastia Antonina a Tarraco / 159 CLAUDE MORDANT-MAFALDA ROSCIO Variabilité des pratiques funéraires à la fin du Bronze moyen/Bronze final initial (XIV é -XIII é s. av. J.C.) en France orientale, de l'Ile-de-France à l'Alsace / 169 PÁL RACZKY-ALEXANDRA ANDERS "A colourful message": a special grave of the late neolithic Tisza culture / 193 ZSIGMOND RITOÓK Poeta doctus / 203 GILLES SAURON La Rankenfrau à Lepcis Magna / 213 MARTIN SCHÖNFELDER Speisen mit Stil -zu einem latènezeitlichen Hiebmesser vom Typ Dürrnberg in der Sammlung des Römisch-Germanischen Zentralmuseums in Mainz / 223 DÁNIEL SZABÓ Éléments méditerranéens dans le répertoire de céramique de l'Îlot des Grandes Forges à Bibracte / 235 KÁROLY TANKÓ Late Iron Age Settlement in the Vicinity of Ménfőcsanak (Road no. 83 and Bevásárlóközpont) / 249 LŐRINC TIMÁR Les reconstitutions possibles des constructions de l'Âge du Fer, découvertes à Ráckeresztúr / 261 KATALIN VANDLIK La patère du Peintre de Femme-Éros / 273 DANIELE VITALI Un elmo di bronzo tra le carte d'archivio di Giovanni Gozzadini / 277 PAULA ZSIDI Eine Militärbüste aus Aquincum / 285

Despite the historic and archaeological interest which takes on the Etruscan mirrors collection of the National Archaeological Museum of Parma, an exhaustive publication concerning this subject was missing to this day. The present book intends to fill this gap. It is divided into three distinct but complementary sections. The first one, which deals with the antiquarian aspect, recounts the main steps of the forming of the collection, and proposes a historical and critical analysis based on the didactic and aesthetic requirements of the first half of the XIXth century. The second part, strictly archaeological, consists of a detailed catalogue of the different pieces, and tries to reconstitute the original cultural context particularly with a comparative stylistic study. Finally, the large number of illustrations and photographs gives the reader a direct access to the studied objects. So articulated the book offers a complete prospect over the studied materiel and over the history of the Etruscan mirrors collection from Parma.

The documentary section analyses contribution of the historic archives of the XIXth century - correspondence of the Museum Management, the register of acquisitions, the donations and the exchanges. It also covers in a synthetic way the forming history of the Etruscan mirrors collection, gradually enriched by the purchases of Greek, Roman, Etruscan and Egyptian objects on the antique market, made possible by the generosities of Duchess Marie-Louise of Habsburg. Indeed, demonstrating a vanguard cultural policy compared to the other pre-Unitarian Italian States, the sovereign's decree, October 24th 1817, had declared antiquities and excavations on the territory of Parma "useful for the State as sources of public education" and had granted them the status of "duchy". It is exactly in this public interest perspective and in this will to collect and to offer in example the antique inheritance that the Museum Director at the time, Michele Lopez, decided to create a room intended to welcome the most precious core of the Museum collections, within which the Etruscan mirrors figure. The decoration of this room, where is at present exposed the famous sculptures cycle of the basilica of the Roman municipium of Veleia, was entrusted to the painter Francesco Scaramuzza, who decorated the ceiling of wax polished paintings representing "…l’Archeologia; le Scienze e le Arti che la soccorrono e quelle che da lei ricevon lume; le Divinità, i Monumenti e i Simboli principali o più noti de’ quattro celebri popoli di cui a preferenza si occupa [Greeks, Romans, Etruscans and Egyptians]; le immagini di quegli uomini egregi i quali illustrando le antichità de’ popoli stessi maggiormente contribuirono a far progredire la Scienza" (Lopez 1844). It is a real didactic program, typical of the XIXth century archaeological mentality, to which the project of Lopez itself was certainly not irrelevant.

The archaeological study of the pieces occupies an important place. The corpus, constituted of nineteen copies, presents a rather homogeneous typology: it considers almost exclusively mirrors among which the handle and the disc are melted in a single piece, and engraved for the greater part. On the other hand, the iconographic analysis reveals a considerable variety of topics, stemming from the mundus muliebris and, more specifically, from the bridal sphere. A piece notably turns out of a quite particular interest: a mirror representing Hercules at a spring, with Filae (Iolaus) and Turms (Hermes). Indeed, following Gerhard's edition (Etruskische Spiegel II, tav. CXXVII), all the studies considered the example as lost. The analysis also allowed verifying the exact origin of the object: it was supposed to come from Cascina in Val di Cecina, according to Gehrard himself, but actually this one was discovered in the necropolis of Belora at Riparbella, in the Val di Cecina. Beyond its topographic implications, this correction is important because it allows specifying the environment of production and the context of receipt, very different from the one to which it was attributed up to here.

The last section presents in an extensive file all the pieces accompanied with photos and drawings of the front side as of the reverse of the objects, in actual size when it is possible, according to the indications supplied for the publications in the Corpus Speculorum Etruscorum. Specific indices organized by typology, chronology and zones of production can be found in there.

... 117, 1 (2005) p. 269-282. Monterenzio (prov. de Bologne) : la nécropole celto-étrusque de Monterenzio Vecchio. Anna Bondini, Philippe Charlier 1 , Thierry Lejars 2 , Venturino Naldi 3 , Stephane Verger 2 , Daniele Vitali 2, 3. (2005). ...