SCULPTURE. is different with sculpture. In character Etruscan sculpture lacks beauty of style, poetry, and imagination. It is essentially utilitarian and material. Stone, bronze, and terra-cotta were used at a very early date. It is either in the tombs, as at Vetulonia, or above them that the early stone sculptures are found, in the form of statues or steles carved in relief to mark the site. During this early stage (sev enth to sixth century), when Oriental influence dominated, there was a peculiar mixture of real ism and archaic style, as shown in the great terra-cotta sarcophagi at the British the Louvre. and the Papa Giulio Museum in Rome, in which the husband and wife are represented in life-size figures reclining on the funeral couch in conversation, while scenes in low relief are carved on the faces of the sarcophagus. Later, marble came into use for sarcophagi. Sometimes it was painted, as in the wonderful sarcophagus at Flor ence of the Hellenic period (fourth century); but when the burial after incineration became the rule the small carved ash-urns were produced in thousands. The largest collections are in the Vatican, at Perugia, Florence, Cornet°, etc. Their scenes are very instructive as to Etruscan myth ology, but they show a great and growing depend ence on Greek thought. Bronze sculpture was an Etrusean specialty. Even the Greeks recog nized this fact and imported the Etrusean works. This was the case not only with statues, like the Mars of Todi and the Orator of Florence. with busts like the Brutus in the Capitol. and with statuettes innumerable, but with articles of fur niture and decoration, such as candelabra, jewel cases, the famous data', and mirrors. The Fieo•n vista, with its exquisite engraved scenes, belongs to a class not found elsewhere in the artistic world. Many of the mirrors also are beautifully engraved with figured scenes.
Mixon ARTS. The Etruscan tombs, beginning in the eighth century, are tilled with a wealth of objects unparalleled except in Egypt. and excava tions do not seem to exhaust their riches. Their contents, however. do not illustrate merely Etrus can, hut ancient Oriental and Greek art as well, especially in the cities of maritime and southern Etruria. This is the ease especially with gold jewelry (q.v.) and vase-painting. It is now quite certain that a large part of what has generally been ealled Etruscan jewelry came to Etruria from (ireece• and the great majority of At tie and other Greek vases have been recovered in this way. The tombs of Orvieto (Falerii) are especially rich in Greek vases, many of them signed. It is easy to distinguish the native Et rms. can ware: not so easy the jewelry. Of the ry, arms, and armor there were two classes; that for use, and that made as a votive offering and for burial. The latter class was -extremely fra gile and light. The Etruscan women were fa mous for the amount and richness of their jewel ry-wreaths and coronets, pins, earrings, necklaces, fibulas, breastplates, armlets, bracelets, and rings. The great use of jewelry, while commenc ing as early as the seventh century, seems not to have reached its climax until the fourth century. The Vatican has a great deal of the early jewelry. The :Metropolitan Museum in New York has a fair collection of the middle and later periods. But by far the greatest in number and variety of the objects found are the earthenware vases. There is one class essentially Etruscan, with its centre of manufacture at Chiusi (elusion') ; it is the black ware with raised ornamentation called bucchero nero. There is the greatest and
most fantastic variety in form and figured orna ment in this class when compared to the sober and limited shapes of painted vases of the Greek class. The Etruscans had tried imitating Egyp tian and Phrenician ware, but with the importa tion of Corinthian painted vases in the seventh and sixth centuries and of Attic and other vases in the succeeding period, Greek mastery became supreme. The imitation is rarely perfect enough to deceive, but it is even closer than Phoenician imitations. One finds Etruscan echoes of all the Greek periods and schools of vase-painting down to the third century, including imitation of the schools of southern Italy. In all their work the Etruscans seem to have followed simply com mercial instincts and love of luxury. They had no artistic feeling. Whatever realism occasionally gives interest to their sculpture is due to the same regard for beliefs concerning the future life as are found in Egypt. The Etruscans held the pre-Hellenic attitude toward art as explanatory, decorative, and useful, not serving a higher pur pose, or for its own sake as beautiful. Therefore they missed, in their imitations, the true spirit of Greek art. It is certain that Greek artists occasionally worked for and with them. Demara tus, the father of Tarquin, is said to have been a Greek artist from Corinth. Some of the paint ings at Caere and Corneto must be by a Greek hand; also some of the terra-cotta temple sculp tures. The artistic influence of Etruria upon Rome was paramount from the time of the Tarquins to the rise of Greek influence in the third century B.C. Even after that time it still lingers in the sarcophagus reliefs and statuary.
In two other branches the Etruscans produced imitative works of no higher order—scarabs, gems, and coins. The imitation of Egyptian and Phoenician cut gems began at an early date, hut the material (paste, bone, etc.) was cheap and the workmanship poor. During the fifth century, however, archaic Greek gems were fairly well imitated, but after this period little was done. Coinage also, as in all central Italy, was late in reaching the artistic stage. The Greek silver standard (Attic standard of Solon) was adopted late in the sixth century, hut the workmanship on the Etruscan coins remained inferior.
BIBLIOGRAPHY. Dennis, Cities and Cemeteries Bibliography. Dennis, Cities and Cemeteries of Etruria (London, 1878), gives the best descrip tion of the sites and ruins of Etruscan cities and cemeteries. For an historical treatment, based on literary authorities alone, consult K. O. :Mil ler, Die Etrusker (Stuttgart, 1877) ; and for a discussion of the subject from an archaeological standpoint, Helbig, Dena prorenienza degli Elms chi (Rome, 18S3). The inscriptions were pub lished in Fabretti, Corpus Inseriptionum Doti carum (Turin. 1867), but a new corpus, Pauli, Corpus I nseri pt ion n El 11,8m:1114 ( Leipzig, s93, et seq.), includes more recent material. The most interesting philological studies have been those of eorssen, Deveke, and Pauli. The history of art is fairly well treated in Martha, L'art i'lrusque (Paris. 1889). Separate collet– dons of the sarcophagus reliefs arc to be found in Robert, Die antiken I.tarkophagen-llelicfs, pub lished by the Deutsches Archmologis•hes Institut (Berlin, 1890-97) ; and of the mirrors in Gerhard, El rusk ische Spicgel (4 vols., Berlin, 1841-67).