New England Antiquities Research Association

 

Etruscan Demons, Monsters Unearthed

Reprinted from Discovery News

 

 

 

November 5, 2003

 

Etruscan art, made of strange demons and monsters, is emerging in a Tuscan village, in what could be one of the most important discoveries of recent times, according to scholars who have seen the paintings.

Lurking on the left wall of a 4th century B.C. tomb, the exceptionally preserved monsters have been unearthed during the ongoing excavation of the Pianacce necropolis in Sarteano, a village 50 miles from Siena, Italy.

"So far we have found some scenes of banquets, snake-like monsters, demons, a hyppocampus and a sarcophagus broken in many fragments, probably by tomb robbers. We are confident to find more art as the digging goes on," archaeologist Alessandra Minetti told Discovery News.

One of Europe's most mysterious people, the Etruscans forged Italy's most sophisticated civilization before the Romans. They rose from Italian prehistory around 900 B.C. and dominated most of the country for about five centuries.

Yet mystery shrouds their history. First defeated by the Romans in the 4th century B.C., in 90 B.C., after centuries of decline, the Etruscans became Roman citizens. They left no literature to record their culture — few traces of their puzzling, non-Indo-European language survive. Only the richly decorated tombs they left behind provide a glimpse into their world.

"The newly excavated tomb belonged to a rich family, and shows that Sarteano wasn't just a countryside village, but a politically important center," Minetti said.

Vividly colored, the scenes in the tomb reflect a sinister change in the Etruscan concept of death. A fun loving and sensuous people, on the verge of decline they adopted the Greek vision of a demon-infested underworld.

"The figure with red hair is surely a death demon of some kind. This is confirmed by the black figure at her side, used by the Etruscans to characterize demons," chief archaeologist Mario Iozzo, director of the Center for Conservation in Florence and Chiusi's Archaeological Museum, told Discovery News.

With a chariot driven by gryphons, the demonic figure has probably come to hurry the soul of the deceased to the Underworld. Scholars are not sure whether the figure is Charu (Charon), normally shown as a bearded man with ruddy skin, the female Vanth, usually winged, or a totally unknown demon. They hope to find more clues as the digging continues.

Other paintings in the burial chamber are celebratory, showing joyful people banqueting — a scene more in tone with the spontaneity of the early Etruscan art.

Scholars are intrigued. "From what I can see, I can state that the painting is of exceptional quality, indeed a masterpiece of the late Etruscan style," Michael Padgett, curator of ancient art at Princeton University Art Museum, told Discovery News.

 

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