l 1 'i'S&>V V V ; I VfP; 4ft at^ si P V w cp I p TOUR SEPULCHRES OF ETRURIA ; IN 1839. MRS. HAMILTON GRAY. " Ere yet decay's effacing fingers Have swept the lines where beauty lingers. Go bend thee o'er the illustrious Dead." SSHttf) Numerous Illustrations. THIRD EDITION. LONDON : J. HATCHARD AND SON, 187, PICCADILLY. 1843. LIST OF ENGRAVINGS. Page MAP OF VEII . . . . .79 PLAN OF THE POSITION OF ANCIENT ETRURIA . 130 RESTORATION OF AN ETRUSCAN NECROPOLIS . 165 GROTTA DEL BARONE, AT TARQUINIA . . 176 GROTTA DELLE ISCRIZIONI . . .179 DITTO ...... 183 - TOMB OF CAMERA DEL MORTO, &C. . .187 GROTTA DEL TRICLINIO . . .188 GROTTA DELLA QUERCIOLA . . .192 TAZZA FOUND AT TARQUINIA . . . 193 GROTTA DEL CARDINALE, TARQUINIA . . 196 ■ GROTTA DEL CARDINALE, PROCESSIONOF SOULS, &C. 198 FRIEZE ON PILLAR IN GROTTA DEL CARDINALE . 203 GROTTA DEL TIFONE .... 207 GROTTA DEL TIFONE, PROCESSION OF SOULS, &C. . 211 CYCLOPIAN GATE AND WALLS . . . 238 MAP OF CORNETO, ANCIENT TARQUINIA, AND THE NECROPOLIS . . . 259 VI LIST OF ENGRAVINGS. RESTORATION OP A TOMB AT VULCI . . 301 REMAINS OF CUCUMELLA AT VULCI . . 303 MAP OF AGYLLA OR CERE . . . 341 RESTORATION OF THE MOUND OF THE REGU- LINI GALASSI TOMB . . . 345 VIEW OF THE INSIDE OF THE WARRIOR'S CHAMBER ..... 345 PLAN OF THE REGUL1N1 GALASSI TOMB . 348 TOMBS AT CASTEL d'aSSO . . . 396 VALLEY OF TOMBS AT CASTEL d'aSSO . . 407 RESTORATION OF THE TOMB OF LARS PORSENNA AT CLUSIUM .... 464' MONUMENT OF R. L. CEC1NA AT VOLTERRA . 492 TOMB OF AN ETRUSCAN MONARCH . . 529 CONTEXTS. Chapter I. — Introduction. — Page 1. Object of the work and motive to its publication — Vague ideas and inadequate conceptions of Etruria hitherto prevalent in this country — Dr. Butler, late Lord Bishop of Lichfield and Coventry, an eminent exception — Campanari's exhibition of Etruscan monuments in London 1836-37 — His collection purchased by the British Museum — Arranged sorrily there in a hall between the Egyptian antiquities and the Elgin marbles — Creditable interest taken in this collection by the middle orders of British visitors — Prosecution of the author's investigation — Etruscan tour — Cavaliere Micali at Pisa — Difficulties in the way of a lady investigating Etruscan re- mains on the spot — Rome, and its dealers in antiquities — Scarabei — Remarkable scarabei in possession of the author — Four styles of art used in cutting them — Lectures of the Archaeological Society — Cavaliere Kestner — Dodwell Museum — Discovery of the Regulini- Galassi tombatCervetri — CavalieriPalin and Campana — Kircherian Museum — Museo Borbonico and Gregoriano — Cavaliere Visconti— Remote antiquity of Etruscan vases ; question whether made in Etruria or imported from Greece — Four varieties of style — Classi- fication of the vases with reference to form, colour, and design — Etruscan emblems — Nomenclature of its divinities — Modes of re- storing injured vases —Etruscan bronzes— Personal beauty, dresses, Vlll CONTENTS. and sports of the Etruscans — Etruscan tombs and cemeteries — English inadequate appreciation of them — Etruscan coins — Private collection of Etruscan miscellaneous curiosities — Shops of Vescovali, Capranesi, and others. Chapter II. — Veil — Page 79. Opening of a tomb by Capranesi in the necropolis of Veii — Twenty vases found in it — Tomb evidently rifled before — Last rifling of tombs on record, a. d. 527, in the reign of Justinian — Veii destroyed by Camillus b. c. 450 — Rome and Etruria, their similarities and differences — Modes of sepulture very different — Pozzo Michele, the site of our Scavo — Proofs of its previous violation — Want of proper system in regard to tombs already excavated — Mode of detecting the exact locality of a concealed Etruscan tomb — Relicts of ancient Veii — Sir W, Cell — Ignorance oi the later Romans in regard to Veii — Meagreness of historical notices relative to it — Mount of Musino — Its altar and Salian priests — Isola Farnese — Historical Sketch of Veii. Chapter III. — Monte Nerone. — Page 120. Colli Tufarini — Conical hills at Monterone — Duchess of Sermoneta — Etruscan, Pclasgic, and Cyclopean architecture — Theory respect- ing the contents of Etruscan tumuli — Correspondence of one with an Egyptian pyramid. Chapter IV. — Tarquinia. — Page 130. Tarquinia the capital of ancient Etruria — Obligations of Rome to it — Historical notices of it — Tagis and Tarchon — Comprehended Vol- tumna the scat of the national council- -Union for a time of Rome and Tarquinia under one government — Demaratus and Tanaquil — Lucius Tarquinius — Emperor Claudius — Brazen tablet found at Ly ns — Painted sepulchres and warrior's tomb at Tarquinia— Pyrgi CONTENTS. IX — Corneto — Cardinal Fesch — Corsica colonized by the Etruscans — Carlo Avolta — Tarquinia a distinguished city in early Christian times ; had its own bishops — Etruscan necropolis — Nine tombs open to inspection — Grotta del Mare — Grotta della Biga — Grotta del Barone — Grotta delle Iscrizioni ; valuable historical inscriptions in it — Camera del Morto — Grotta del Triclinio — Grotta della Querciola ; unique tazza brought from it by the author, illustrating the Etruscan funeral feasts — Grotta del Cardinale, the earliest dis- covered — Cardinal Garampi's letter to Tiraboschi — Grotta del Tifone ; remarkable representation of a procession of the dead — Grotta Intagliata — Lord Kinnaird — Turchina — Cyclopean walls — Two cathedrals — Palazzo Vitaleschi now the Inn — Palazzo Brusehi ; Singular and important marbles there — Cavaliere Manzi— Account of Tarquinia by Sir W. Gell. Chapter V. — V \fLci.— Page 269. Extraordinary discovery by Lucien Bonaparte, Prince of Canino — Parure of Etruscan jewellery worn by the Princess Canino — Chateau Musignano — Unique Egyptico- Etruscan antiquities — Ponte Labadia — Site and history of Vulci — Micali — Necropolis — Cucumella — Vulcian code of honour. Chapter VI. — Toscanella. — Page 306. Perilous pilgrimage from Corneto to Toscanella— Signor Campanari — His genuine hospitality — Remarkable ring belonging to Prince Albert's maternal grandfather — Excavations by Campanari — Etrus- can eggs, survivors of a funeral feast celebrated some two thou- sand years ago — Tuscanian vases inferior to those of Tarquinia —Tomb of the Velthuri — Grotta della Regina— Church of San Pietro— Specchii, or Etruscan looking-glasses — Portrait of the author's Guardiano. X CONTENTS. Chapter VII.— C^re or Agylla. — Page 340. Three distinct existencies and names of Cervetri — Arciprete Regulini — Discoveries by Regulini and General Galassi — Galassi's grave- Tombs in Greece visited by the Rev. Heathcote Campion— Canina's chronology of the Etruscan tombs— Signor Calabrese — Italian farmhouse — Palazzo Ruspoli — Great necropolis — Banditaccia — Historical and geographical notices of Cervetri — Theory by Canina — Italian dinner at the Arciprete's — Remarkable ancient wine- vessel in his garden — October the best month for such excursions as the author's. Chapter VIII. — Castel D'Asso. — Page 394. Viterbo — Admirable picture by " Sebastian del Piombo" — Ruins of Castel d'Asso —Wonderful valley, resembling the " Biban el Melek," or Valley of the Kings in Egypt — Account of Sir W. Gell probably inaccurate? — Castel d'Asso generally not sufficiently appreciated — Adventure en route — Emotions on first sight of the sepulchres of Castel dAsso — Remarkable inscriptions on primitive cavern sepulchres — Unrivalled interest of the whole scene — Annual fair anciently held at Castel d'Asso — Moral reflections upon Castel d'Asso, and places similar to it. Chapter IX. — Clusium. — Page 424. Close of the author's tour — Monte Fiascone — Orvicto — Italian inn — Best mode of making oneself comfortable in foreign inns — Cathedral of Orvicto — Religious festival — Representations in fresco of the tall .iiid judgment of Antichrist — Citta del Pieve — Chiusi — Politeness (.1 the Clergy — Their collections of Etruscan antiques — Grotta delle Monache — Deposito degli Dei — Deposito del Gran Duca — Deposito dipinto the painted vault; remarkable frieze — Tomb ,i Porsenna the only Etruscan sepulchre celebrated in ancient ,,, v — Four tumuli claim to be considered thai "I Porsenna — V.irro's description — Museums at Chiusi — Distinguished collection of Signor Casuccini — Beautiful monument of the Larthia of ' Ihiusi Sarteano and its canopiu urns — Grand duke ami grand (Inches-. CONTENTS. XI of Tuscany ; their affability and christian excellence— Honoured and adored by their subjects — Coquetry of an Italian housemaid — Historical notices of Chiusi — Disquisition on Etruscan genealogies and pedigrees. Conclusion. — Page 500. Brief notices of the chief places and cities of old Etruria not par- ticularized in the foregoing chapters — 1. Those situated in Tuscany — 2. Those in the papal states — 3. Those in the kingdom of Naples —Etruscan remains in the Palazzo Vecchio of Florence — Fiesole — Arezzo — Cortona — Roselle — Sienna— Volterra — Populonia — Saturnia — Gubbio — Macerata — Perugia — Assisi — Todi and Norcia — Terni — Faleria, Nepi and Sutri — Bolsena — Cossa — Albano — Tusculum — Rome, the pupil of Etruria — Etruscan alphabet. Appendices.— Pa ge 525. Vase illustrative of an Arabic or Persian poem — Baker's tomb — Carmen Arvale — Avolta's warrior's tomb — Tarquinia — Corneto — Vulci — Castel d'Asso. TOUR TO THE SEPULCHRES OF ETRUEIA IN 1839. CHAPTER I, INTRODUCTION. It has been suggested to me, that if I wish to interest the reading public in the contents of this work, I ought first to w r rite an introduction to the Sepulchres of Etruriabeforedescribingthesepulchres themselves, on account of the very little which is as yet known in England upon the subject, and the inducements that exist to visit Etruscan remains. 1 have been desired to state our reasons for making this tour, and why we thought or expected such and such things at such particular places ; and what other people may look for and hope to find at the same ; and I the more readily comply with this suggestion, because no one has felt more acutely than myself the pain of going through a museum or visiting a ruin, wholly ignorant of its objects and history, with an uncommunicative and learned person, or with a party of the initiated who talk to B I INTRODUCTION. one another in a sort of free masonry, and who, even when most wilHng to instruct, generally suppose a vast deal of previous knowledge in the person they address — hence they refer to manners and customs of which you have never heard, prove a variety of things of which you never even suspected the exis- tence, and use terms that convey to your mind no idea. You are accordingly obliged to admire what appears extremely ugly, to ascribe all sorts of value and merit to half-broken, tarnished, hideous things, which in your secret soul you think would have been far better thrown away, and to pretend to instruction which you never had even the opportu- nity of acquiring. In short, your anticipated great pleasure proves really a great bore, whilst you are ashamed to own almost to yourself that it is so, and would willingly store your mind with the informa- tion that would make it otherwise, if you could. I never found this easy in any case, but in regard to Etruria in particular it is needful to have the guid- ance of another if we would understand and estimate her remains, so scattered are the sources which treat of them, and so meagre the streams of knowledge which singly they supply. Fortunately, on this subject the author lias enjoyed the first advantages which Italy can now offer, and only regrets for the reader's sake that the want of a better capacity and better memory have not produced more worthy fruit. Such as it is, the British public are entreated to accept of, and excuse it. The recollections of this Tour will he followed up by a brief account 5 INTRODUCTION. 6 of the history of the Etrurians, their manners and customs. Etruria used to present itself to my mind as one of the many nations of Italy, enjoying a degree of barbaric power and greatness prior to the Romans, and which had left of itself some few traditions in Roman history, and some widely-scattered remains in the fragments of a stupendous masonry. I thought of it in the same category with the Equi, the Volsci, and the Rutuli, and considered its fall and extinction before the conquering arms of Rome as a matter of course. It was during this blissful state of ignorance, in the summer of 1837, that wo were honoured with a visit from the late most la- mented Dr. Butler, Bishop of Lichfield ; a man of whom it is hard to say whether his learning, benevolence, or cheerful resignation under suffer- ing, most adorned his high and holy station. As we were discoursing of the late marvellous disco- veries made by Rosellini in Egypt, he awoke our curiosity by comparing it with Etruria, and giving us an account of what he had lately seen at Campanari's Exhibition of Etruscan tombs then open in Pall Mall, which he advised us by all means to visit on the very first opportunity. He spoke of funeral feasts and games, which were painted in the sepulchres — statues which were carved upon the coffin-lids — crowns of gold that had been buried with the dead, and vases, and ornaments, of which he had been a purchaser to a very large amount, particularly of a pair of ear-rings belonging b 2 4 INTRODUCTION. to a priestess, of large pendant carbuncles set in the purest and most delicately wrought gold. We did not then know that the bishop was him- self proprietor of the finest private collection of Etruscan objects in England, and perhaps out of England also, if we except the Cavaliere Campana's in Rome, the Prince of Canino's, and two or three besides at Chiusi. We ourselves can boast of some scarabei, such as the bishop had not, and of some tazze which excel any in his museum, but as a whole there were few who could compete with him even in Italy, and in some articles he surpassed the British Museum. It is with sincere regret we learn that, he has willed this splendid monument of taste and erudition to be dispersed and brought to sale.* We went to London a kw weeks after his most gratifying visit, and forthwith proceeded to Cam- panari's, not now to be seen, as the British Museum, to their honour, purchased the collection, and, it, is said, intend to arrange rooms for the instruction of J heir countrymen, in the same way as Cam- panari's were arranged. May this report prove true. We found that the kind bishop had not re- lated to us the half of what we were to see. In one room were the vases for sale, of various sizes from • Before these pages went to press, this Sne collection was already Bold, or r ather given away, by auction. An exquisite little Tazza ot Kola manufacture which was Bold for £46, was the only EtruBcan object which brought a proper price, and that was possibly owing t<> i! morocco case ' INTRODUCTION. very large 'o very small, of beautiful and graceful forms, made of red clay, with black figures or drawings upon them, generally highly polished, light of weight, and exhibiting either grotesque satyrs and fauns, or mythological and heroical subjects ; but, for want of knowing the Etruscan manner of expressing them, the gods and heroes were to me all one with the creatures that sported long tails and hoofed feet. I was puzzled also by seeing a ware which had always been considered peculiar to Magna Grecia, coming in such quan- tities from within seventy miles of Rome, and still more puzzled to observe upon the vases, subjects evidently Greek, though with something grotesque in the style of representation. After wondering sufficiently at this, we were shown into sundry small chambers lighted by torches. There were two of these united in one place, and four in another, with immense stone coffins ranged along the sides, which bore upon their lids the figures, in alto relievo, of men and women ; all being, as appeared to me, of colossal size and great beauty. They were in a half sitting posture, as if reclining upon a sofa, and supported by cushions ; the elbow resting upon the sofa or bed, whilst the hand supported the head of the figure. These figures were sometimes leaning upon their right sides, and sometimes upon their left, according to the side of the grave on which the sarcophagus had been placed, the back of the head being always towards the wall. Upon moving the lid downwards, we saw in one of these coffins a 6 INTRODUCTION. wreath of ivy, and in another a wreath of bay, both of pure gold; in another lay a helmet and spear> in another a lance, and in each something either of gold or bronze, the genuineness of which it was so difficult either to believe or disbelieve, that we were quite bewildered. Where had these things lain undisturbed through so many ages ? and how was it possible that objects of such size and gran- deur could have been concealed so long ? how came they never to be discovered before ? and what gave rise to their discovery now? I must say I was almost terrified at the figures when I first saw them, for by the dim firelight there appeared so much dignity in their attitudes, and severe majesty in their countenances, that I fancied they seemed to reprove our intrusion upon their solemn and sacred rest. There they lay, not with a look of death, but as if they had a tale to tell, if there were any one present willing to listen, and worthy to understand. The countenances were all different, bearing the impress of portraits ; and there was one, a young priestess, over whom I could have wept, she looked so innocent, so young, and so mournful. She was supposed to be a priestess from her ivy crown which still remained, and her rich ornaments and apparel, which 1 be- lieve had been sold. She was not the lady of the bishop's ear-rings, but, as Campanari asserted, wore carbuncles of a much smaller size, and of the shape represented on her statue. She had bracelets of a serpent shape sculptured on her arms, and rings INTRODUCTION. / upon her fingers ; and, like all the other statues^ she bore in her hand a small patrea, either to re- ceive an offering, or to intimate that the funeral feast was already commenced. Having seen these tombs, we were conducted up- stairs into other small dark chambers, I think four in number, but all separate from each other, and lighted in the same manner. They were without sarchophagus or ornament, but had described upon the walls a series of the most spirited and lively coloured paintings. In one was a Triclinium, a man and woman richly dressed being seated toge- ther as if presiding over some grand entertain- ment, with piles of vases and tazze near them, dancers and players upon instruments on each side, and servants waiting to carry round viands and wine. In another chamber was a chariot race, in another horses caparisoned and dancers, in ano- ther a fight, all expressed with a grouping and a spirit which was Greek, and a mannerism which was Egyptian. We again stared at each other, and asked, " Can these things be real ? and who, and what, were the people that executed them ?" I forget if we saw any inscriptions either in the painted chambers or on the ponderous coffins. I think not ; neither do I remember any on the vases which then stood for sale. Over the small doors that entered into these tombs we saw dif- ferent words written — over one, " Vulci," over ano- ther, "Tuscania," over two or three, " Tarquinia," and I think there were other names. I asked the 8 INTRODUCTION. meaning of the words, and was told that they were the names of the several cities in which these paint- ings were to be seen, and from which the other objects were taken. We inquired the site of these cities, and Campanari said that most of them lay in the neighbourhood of Civita Vecchia, and none of them more than a day's journey from Rome. Happy did we feel that we were going to Italy, and might have an opportunity of visiting them. The account which we gleaned from Campanari of their dis- covery or resuscitation was much as follows. That he himself lives in the ancient Tuscania, now Toscanella, about forty miles from Civita Vecchia, in the very heart of the ruins of many forgotten cities of old Etruria, and that by a mixture of reading, imagination, and tradition, he came to the fixed persuasion that he whs surrounded by ancient cemeteries, in which, could they be examined and excavated, much treasure and many valuable relics would still be found. He joined in company with a few others to support the expense and undertake the search ; he got the government to guarantee to them the profits of their speculation, with the single restriction that the Pope should have the first choice of purchasing whatever was found, and also might, if he chose, forbid the sale of it out of Italy. Under these conditions they began their work, and the results were before us. He stated that the objects we saw were found continually, and in great quantities, particularly vases. I confess 1 felt disappointed to hear that quantities of these INTRODUCTION. 9 vases were found, having the common English feelings that things are desirable and valuable in proportion as they are rare, and not considering that what was drawn out of tombs two thousand years old, and of a manufacture which no longer exists, must ever be limited in quantity, and there- fore that the greater this limited number, the more valuable, because the more sure must be their tes- timony in an historical or mythological point cf view, and the more proof have we that they were the native production of that people of whose graves they form the standing ornament. For instance, it is certain that a few of these vases have occasionally been found in the tumuli of Crim Tartary, and examples of them are even said to exist in some ancient graves in Norway ; yet, on account of their very rarity, we believe that they were never made in those countries, and that the Tartars and Nor- wegians never worshipped, and possibly never even knew the names of the gods and heroes thereon represented. We simply regard them as part of the spoil taken in war by the dead chief in whose grave they were found, and we suppose that the high estimation in which he held them, or the prowess by which he won them, caused them to be consecrated to his remains. We could not be sceptical as to the genuineness of Campanari's vases, but we conversed long and with doubt concerning the sculpture upon his sar- cophagi, his bronze armour, golden fillets, precious ornaments, imaginary priests and priestesses, and b 5 10 INTRODUCTION. above all, concerning his painted tombs. We had no doubt that they were highly coloured and much embellished to please a British public ; yet with every abatement that we could make, there still remained details in them that indicated a degree of wealth, luxury, and refinement, which might in- deed have existed in Babylon and Nineveh, but which we could not concede to a nation of whose annals we had heard and read so little as of Etruria. The famous races of Britain seemed there to find their type. The racers and race-stand, the riders with their various colours, the judges, the spectators, and the prizes, were all before us. Gar- ments of the most graceful form, finest texture, and brightest hues, were upon their eminent personages and dancing girls ; and besides these, there had been presented to us that highest, and in old times rarest sign of a people's civilisation, a thing un- known to early Greece and Rome, thai the man and woman should sit together at the same table and preside in common at a public feast. We were unbelieving, like most of our countrymen, in the truth of these things; and because we could give no solid reason why they might not have been, though we had remained ignorant of them, our understandings and imaginations were alike per- plexed. 1 may in ibis place mention the loss which the public are sustaining in not being able still to visit these interesting monuments arranged as we saw them. After having not only verified them all our- INTRODUCTION. 11 selves, but having witnessed scenes that appeared to us even still more wonderful and worthy of re- presentation, we went, on our return to England, into the British Museum, wishing to feast our eyes once more on the glorious relics of a nation past away. What was our disappointment to wander through the rooms the first day, and see no appear- ance of any collection from Campanari. The very few objects which we did recognize, viz., bronzes and scarabei, being so mingled with Greek and Roman remains, as to be undistinguishable without very close observation, and a previous knowledge of their peculiar style. How much better are those matters arranged in Rome and Florence, where each nation has a cabinet to itself, and where written or printed directions give some history of the object under consideration ! The British Museum is a feast to the learned, but foreign museums are in- struction to the ignorant ; and very much trouble must be taken, and many prejudices be abandoned, before we can equal them in that respect. Certainly what is intended to be a national treasure should not only be open to the nation, but should be so ar- ranged as to instruct the nation. The second day of our visit to this very noble and rich institution, we considered beforehand where the monuments of Etruria, if placed at all, must na- turally be found, and we decided that they must come between Egypt, the oldest of nations, and Greece, her best known child. Here we accordingly sought, and in a large disorderly-looking hall, lead- 12 INTRODUCTION. ing from the Egyptian to the Elgin marbles, we espied what we were seeking. Ranged along the wall in melancholy confusion and neglect, without a place in the catalogue, or any indication to the curious of their origin and history, lay in silence our Etruscan friends. They looked indeed as if they felt that they were in a strange country, cold, com- fortless, and far from home. The fantastic vaults of Campanari, with their elevated beds and mysterious gloom, his gay-painted tombs and variety of orna- ment, were no more to be seen. In short, the long and ugly line of stone coffins placed one against another in that room give no more idea of the se- pulchres of Etruria than the broken columns and isolated statues in the Egyptian Hall give of the grand palace of Karnac. The recumbent statues look much as their originals might have done, had they, when alive, been brought as prisoners to the Druid Isle. They have an air of supreme unhappi- ness and desolation, and it were a sin to have de- stroyed Campanari's beautiful show, if we are to have no better substitute than what we saw when we visited the British Museum in September 1839. It may not, I hope, be irrelevant here to notice the great and very unexpected pleasure which we ex- perienced in witnessing the interest which the middle order of people testified in the collection be- fore them, and the knowledge and improvement they were evidently anxious to gain from their visit to the Museum ; for as one of our small party ex- plained and enlarged upon the different relics in the INTRODUCTION. 13 different rooms, we had more than once quite a circle round us, who listened with an earnest and respectful attention. But to return to the steps by which we were led on to make our Etruscan tour. We had been a very short time in Italy before we had the advantage of meeting with the Cavaliere Micali at Pisa, and forming his acquaintance — a man known to Europe as the author of a learned and clever history of " Italy before the time of the Romans," and latterly of a history of the ancient na- tions of Italy, with superb illustrations, which is To be seen in, I believe, all the public libraries on the continent. We did not then know that he had per- sonally visited most of the ascertained ruins of Mid Etruria, and that he had been himself the discoverer of many painted tombs, in company with our lamented friend the late Baron Stackelberg. In his society I could not help in my mind wandering back over the history of Pisa during the thirty centuries of its exist- ence, an existence the history of which we trace, not from the witness of the living but the dead. Pisa was for many centuries an Etruscan town, and we were at that moment enjoying a conversazione in the house of one of her present noble families, the Marchesa Aula, whose name, " Aula," is Etruscan. How far back they really trace their genealogy, and from what stock they spring, I know not ; but this name is inscribed in more than one ancient grave not far from them, and my mind seemed to look upon Pisa thirty centuries ago, with a palace perhaps on that 14 INTRODUCTION. very spot, and an Aula it may be for its master, or at least amongst its guests. Its halls lighted up and filled with a company of old and young, a people learned, warlike, polished, and richly attired, assem- bled as we were at a festive entertainment, and en- joying the accompaniments of music and dancing. Their coffins were, perhaps, some in Britain, some in France, some in Bavaria, scattered some into this city, and some into that, and their still existing spirits where are they ? These ancient inhabitants were heathens and idolaters, worshippers of dead men and their images ; still then, as now, they had amongst them characters great and noble — still then, as now, righteousness exalted the nation, and sin was the reproach and became the ruin of the people. But these things, and the various fates of Pisa, are for another place. Micali told as that there would be difficulties in the way of a lady visiting the tombs, on account of the wildness of the country, and the want of accommodation on the road, but strongly advised our gentlemen at all hazards to make the tour. Our next information was gained in Rome. Here we found the shops of all the dealers in antiquities filled with vases, bronzes, curious marbles, scarabei. and other gems, bassi relieviand sculpture of more or less merit, from the excavations making in Etruria. The Bcarabeus is a stone cut in the form of a cer- tain beetle, which was worn by the ancient Etrus- cans, and by several other ancient nations, particu- larly the Egyptians, as a charm. They saw in it INTRODUCTION. 15 an image of the Creator, because it forms a ball of earth with its hind legs, in which it deposits its eggs, an emblem of the world instinct with divine influences ; and wearing it was tantamount to for- mally placing- themselves under almighty protec- tion. The scarabeus was to them what the crucifix is to the Roman Catholic ; and as almost all the Etruscan scarabei are engraved, the engraving of Hercules, Mercury, &c, took the place of Sant Antonio, Santa Theresa, and other mediators. The engraving was of the Lar, or patron saint, or of the thing for or against which protection was especially desired. Hence we found as objects to be depre- cated Cerberus, the two-headed dog of Geryon, the Chimera, the fate of Capaneus, and, with many other subjects, the Evil Genius, not unlike a Merry Andrew, concerning which the superstition was, that the uglier the figure, the safer the person wear- ing it. Amongst their sacred protectors we found Mercury, Bacchus, Hecate, all patrons of the dead : Pollux, Cadmus, Ajax, Tarens the founder of Ta- rentum, Tages the great native lawgiver, and others. Hercules was a very favourite Lar, and we found him and most of his labours often engraved. Of things placed under divine protection were warriors, and war-steeds, commerce signified by Hercules or a Genius crossing the water on vases of oil or wine, or of the beautiful manufacture which bears the Etruscan name, and every variety of the public games, namely, combats of men and of animals, and races by horse or by chariot. We found them en- 16 INTRODUCTION. graved sometimes with the whole subject, and the charioteer, and sometimes with two, three, or four horses represented abreast. The most curious scarabei are those with inscrip- tions, possibly the wearer's name, or some word of mystic meaning. All the Etruscan words can be read, but the meaning of scarcely any of them is as yet known. The next in curiosity are those with Egyptian figures, usually Isis and Horus, and they are found in the graves of most ancient structure. The writer has a very remarkable one, found atChiusi, made of plasma di smeraldo : the subject of it " Isis nou- rishing Horus, or Truth teaching Time.'" Also ano- ther, which was the wonder of all Rome, a Moorish lady's head much ornamented, a proof of Etruscan commerce with lands further south than Egypt, where the national features were Circassian. The Furies are represented in the tombs as negroes, with the features and complexions of that race, but this scarabeus is more like a portrait of some great queen who was numbered afterwards among the Lares of Etruria. It is highly ornamented with necklace and ear-rings, whilst the Furies are always represented with snakes twined round the head. Some of the Etruscan Scarabei are without engraving, and such are supposed to have belonged to men who were too poor to afford them otherwise; but J have seen a few of such exceeding beauty that I am not con- vinced of this being the case. They differ from the Egyptian both in form and material, but wen worn like them <>n the finger and the neck. Tin INTRODUCTION. 17 ancient Egyptian scarabeus was either quite plain or inscribed, and was made of smalto, basalt, or por- phyry. The modern Egyptian, i. e. the Egyptian scarabeus of Roman times, was generally engraved in a rude manner, and made of amethyst, garnet, lapis lazuli, and various precious or semi-precious stones. The Etruscan is always of cornelian, onyx, sardonyx, agate, or jasper. One I have named of plasma, one I have seen of jacynth, and a very few, which are certainly genuine, of a coarse semi-trans- parent amethyst. From having observed that this charm was rigidly confined to a certain range of stones, opaque in Egypt and semi-transparent in Etruria, I had long felt convinced that some reli- gious superstition was connected with the material of which it was made; but what that could be never struck me until I saw that, even when the amethyst was employed, it was only such crystals of it as were semi-transparent — the reason then appeared to be evident. These stones were prescribed in order to express that the nature of the Creator was but dimly known to us, his ways but half understood, his works but half seen. Only his power and goodness are fully bodied forth, the one being the reason why we seek his protection, and the other our ground for believing that it will be granted. The Egyptian, whose scarabeus was older still, and always opaque, of smalto, jasper, basalt, durit, or porphyry, would intimate, that to him the nature of the Creator was incomprehensible further than those two attributes of which his amulet was emblematic. Precious stones 18 INTRODUCTION. were not used until the scarabeus began to be regarded as an ornament chiefly, and its ancient meaning was forgotten. As scarabei existed long- before we have any account of idols, I do not doubt that they were originally the invention of some really devout mind, and they speak to us in strong language as to the danger of making material sym- bols of immaterial things. First the symbol came to be trusted in, instead of the Being of whom it was the sign, then came the bodily conception and manifestation of that Being or his attributes in the form of idols ; then the representation of all that belongs to spirits, good and bad ; then the deification of every imagination of the heart of man, a written and accredited system of polytheism, and a monstrous and hydra-headed idolatry. Many scarabei exist of a date both anterior to Abraham and cotemporary with him, and we know of no ido- latry so early as this period, except that of the host of heaven. Job speaks of no other, neither does the first part of Genesis. In Abraham's days the one supreme God seems to have been worshipped both in Phoenicia and in Egypt. Charms were the first steps to materialism, and we begin to read of idols in ihe days of Jacob. It is said that the Pelasgians had no idols when they first appeared in Greece and Italy, and the Romans had none until the time of their fourth king. Both the primitive Pelasgians and primitive Romans had ;i god whose holy name was not pronounced, and I doubt not it was a tradi- tion from Jehovah of the Hebrews, afterwards Jove. INTRODUCTION. 19 Jovis pater Jupiter. The Etruscan " Tina" or su- preme ruler, Tinai, is but another form of Adni, A. d. nai, the Hebrew for Lord or God. # The styles of art used in cutting- the scarab eus are four. First, and probably oldest, the Egyptian emblem. Second, The Etruscan proper, consisting of a set of round holes which always reminded me of our burlesque black figures made out of five dots. Third, the Greek style, so beautifully executed that the locality alone determines it to be native, and the date of which is about the foundation of Rome, when Demaratus and his people came into Italy from Corinth. And fourth, the decadence, which is an abortive attempt at something fine, a large head and a small body, or limbs and body out of all propor- tion, like our sculptures and engravings of the middle ages. Indeed, this sort of disproportion and grotesqueness is so much the character of their sculpture, that until I saw the Greek style in the scarabei, some rare gems, and a few most exquisite specimens in bronze, especially those now belonging to General Ramsay and the Cavaliere Campana, I did not believe that the Etruscan art ever rose higher. In all its manufactures, of whatever nature, these four epochs of Egyptian, native, Greek, and the decline, are distinctly visible. A few years ago scarabei used to be much falsified in Rome, especially those of the Greek or Egyptian style, and these were chiefly cut in onyx, the Roman jewellers having got a quantity of onyx beads from the East Indies, * In oriental languages the D and T are synonymous. 20 INTRODUCTION. which were found to answer well ; but neither this imposition nor the imitation or false recomposition of vases was a trade in 1838 and 1839. The few false ones we did meet with were all such as had been made some years since ; and as to the vases, besides that there are sure methods of detection, because no modern vase will stand the test of aquafortis, the ancient and genuine can be pur- chased for less money, or for very nearly as little, as it would take to make a successful imitation. We found that all the principal dealers had bought or hired land for themselves in the burying places or on the sites of such Etruscan cities as were in the Roman states. Capranesi had excavations at Veii, Vescovali and Basseggio at Tarquinia, Fossati in Sabina, Depoletti, Dedominicis, and others in various scattered parts. Even some of the convents shared in the speculation, and the hospital of the Borgo di San Spirito, called often " il piu gran S ignore di Roma," had more possessions in these newly-discovered treasuries than all the rest put to- gether. The prince of Canino owns whole cities, and those, moreover, which contain the greatest number of the finest specimens that have yet been found. Prince Ruspoli and the Duke of Torlonia have part of Cere, the most ancient of all the settle- ment-^ and in that respect the most interesting. All the collectors know Campanari, and substantiated his report. Our next, and by far our most important step in the march of intellect and acquisition of knowledge, INTRODUCTION. 21 was to attend the lectures of the Archaeological Society at the Capitol, and here we found an epitome of all we desired to search into, not of Etruria only, but of every nation in communication with it. His- torical antiquity of every description is the subject of steady incmiry and discussion in this society. Here are found samples, not only of all the different kinds of vases and the different productions of each Etruscan city, but to our joy we once more saw painted represen- tations of Campanari's tombs, and met members of the society who had visited them themselves, and who could give us letters and instructions for the same tour. Amongst our kindest friends Avas the Cavaliere Kestner, Hanoverian minister to the court of Rome, who not only often allowed us to visit his own inte- resting collection, but took the trouble to explain to us the distinctive marks of difference between the Etruscans and the Egyptians, in points of very near resemblance. Cavaliere Kestner has probably the most valuable collection of Egyptian scarabei in the world. It would be folly in me to attempt to raise the fame of the Archaeological Society, or to think that anything I could say would add a gem to the chaplet of such men as the Cavaliere Bunsen, then Prussian minister in Rome ; Dr. Lepsius, pro- fessor of Egyptian antiquities; Dr. Braun, pro- fessor of works of art in sculpture and engraving ; Canina, the celebrated architect ; Dr. Abeken, Dr. Meyer, and others whom we had the privilege of hearing lecture; but this I may say, that it ought to be attended by every English stranger in Rome 22 INTRODUCTION. to whom learning is not a bore, and who desires to wander with a seeing eye and understanding mind through its storied streets, its amazing ruins, its magnificent galleries, and its unparalleled Vatican. Here we saw casts of all the famous engraved gems, and plates of all the best statues and most noted ruins in Greece and Egypt, Italy as it now is, and Italy before the Romans. In short, it is impossible for me to express of what use this society was to us, in enabling us to view with interest the objects antiquity around us; and Etruria being a subject wholly new, it was upon it of course that we received the newest and fullest light. We went into the Dodwell Museum at the foot of the Capitol in order to have another illustration of the similarity and the differences between Egypt and Etruria, but here, as in the British Museum, one is sadly lost without a guide, the remains of different countries being placed upon the same shelf, and very carelessly and superficially described in the catalogue. The first time we went, we exceed- ingly enjoyed our visit, having a kind and learned antiquarian as our guide. The second time we saw cursorily, admired little and learned less, being ourselves the most instructed of the party. In this museum there is one most interesting Egyptian papyrus, representing the state of the soul after death and during judgment, in a manner which exactly coincides with the Etruscan mythology. There is also a very remarkable vase which, in the estimation of those who trace all European civili- INTRODUCTION. 23 sation to Greece, is the most curious in Europe, and the model after which all the Etruscan were made. It is small, of a pale-coloured clay, and was found in a tomb amid the ruins of Corinth. It is much broken, but one side is quite perfect, and upon this two different styles are represented, but I should say in exactly the same manner, and by the same hand. The bowl is covered with Egyptian imaginary animals, such as sphynxes and griffins in three or four colours ; and on the part above, be- tween the bowl and the rim, is a border of heroes fighting, in black only. They are much in minia- ture, and are done with great spirit, and each hero has a name written over him in Greek letters, these names being, as far as they remain, of chiefs in the Trojan war. The learned were delighted at the discovery of this vase, for it explained to them at once that Demaratus, the Corinthian, had carried this form of the plastic art with him when he fled from his native city to Tarquinia, and that thence it had spread into the rest of Etruria. To me, I confess, this was not a satisfactory explanation. The Greeks had, no doubt, themselves learned from the Egyptians, as almost all the vases now found in their country testify, and had copied Egyptian models, as the sphynxes and griffins prove, and they had afterwards beautified these vases from their own elegant and embellishing imaginations, which improved every art upon which they tried their powers. That this Dodwell vase is of a very early date, and a sort of transition from the Egyptian •24 INTRODUCTION. to the heroic style, I do not doubt ; but I do greatly doubt whether in this the Etruscans were not the masters of the Greeks, rather than vice versa. Heroic vases are the prolific manufacture of Etruria, while they were ever scarce in Greece, bearing a very high price, and mentioned along with bronzes as being an article of commerce be- tween the two nations; and, moreover, heroic vases have been found in Etruscan tombs of much older date than Demaratus : those, for instance, found at Cere in the Regulini Galassi tomb. The Greek letters also on the Corinthian vase did not appear to me either the oldest style of writing or of reading that language; whilst the letters of the Etruscan inscriptions are, I am assured, only the oldest and now almost forgotten form of the Greek. These Greek letters, be it remembered, were taken ori- ginally from Phoenicia, and the Phoenician and oldest Hebrew were almost if not altogether iden- tical ; but more of this hereafter. The present Hebrew letters are supposed to date from the Baby- lonian captivity. It was about this time that we found Rome filled with amazement, and all her wise men occupied in speculations, about the stupendous discovery of the Regulini Galassi tomb at Cervetri. We maj call it stupendous, for we nia\ use this word to a child's toy, when upon it depends some mighty result. The Arciprete Regulini had discovered this extraordinary tomb, and General Galassi, one of the officers of highest rank in the papal army, INTRODUCTION. 25 had bought from hiin the articles therein found. The English used to call it " Galassi's grave." All these articles are now purchased by the go- vernment, and are to be seen properly and separately indicated in the Gregorian Museum ; but in 1838 they were exhibited in the general's own house, and having obtained his permission to visit them, he was, like most of his countrymen, so polite and courteous as to explain them to us himself. If we had been surprised at Campanari's exhibi- tion, we were amazed almost beyond credibility at the general's. Here we saw an immense breast- plate of gold, which had been fastened on each shoulder by a most delicately wrought gold fibula, with chains like those now made at Trichinopoly. The breastplate was stamped with a variety of arabesques and small patterns, as usual in the Egyptian style. The head had been crowned with fillets and circular ornaments of pure gold, and a rich mantle had covered the body, flowered with the same material. In this grave also had been found a quantity of arms, round bronze shields with a boss in the centre which was stamped, spears, lances, and arrows ; a bier of bronze, as perfect as if made a year ago; a tripod, with a vessel con- taining some strange looking lumps of a resinous substance, and which on being burnt proved to be perfumes so intensely strong, that those who tried them were obliged to leave the room. There were many small images, perhaps of lares, or of ancestors, in terra cotta that had been ranged c 26 INTRODUCTION. in double lines close to the bier ; also some large common vessels for wine and oil, and some finely painted vases and tazze, with black figures upon a red ground, which had been consecrated to the dead. There were wheels of a car upon which the bier had been brought into the sepulchre, and many other things which I do not remember ; but the wonder of all these treasures was a sort of inkstand of terra cotta, which had served as a schoolmaster's ABC. On it were the Etruscan letters, first in alphabet, and then in syllables, and both the letters and the syllables are the same as the oldest form of the Greek. It was deciphered by Dr. Lepsius, and is the key to all we at present know, and will be the basis of all we are ever likely to know, of the Etruscan tongue. How it came to be buried with a mighty prince, in order to teach such elements to us, the pigmies of five and twenty or thirty centuries later, it is difficult to imagine, but so perhaps it may have been ordained by Pro- vidence — " Who sees with equal eye, as God of all, A hero perish or a sparrow fall." And we reap the benefit of it. Who shall scan the counsels of him, who brings down the pride of the proudest of nations, and forces them to set a tri- butary people free — not by arms or battle, but by swarms of flies and lice? I confess, that along with this thought, many others of a less worthy charac- ter, and yet not inconsistent with human folly and INTRODUCTION. 27 divine overruling, came into my mind. Had it been placed there to teach Charon to spell, in case he should not understand the language of the de- ceased ? Might it not have been to that Chief him- self a foreign language, which he had mastered with difficulty, and used with triumph ? Was it, perhaps, the humble memorial of some magna- nimous action ? or might it not have been the primer which had belonged to an only and dearly beloved child, taken from him by an early death ? We had one other idea, and it is perhaps the most probable. At the period when this tomb was constructed, Cervetri was called Agylla, and the Agyllans were a colony of Pelasgians from Greece mingled with the aborigines. May not this mighty man have been himself a priest as well as prince? May not Pelasgian Greek have been the language consecrated to the priesthood ? and may he not have desired that a specimen of that holy tongue should be laid beside his corpse 1 If not a priest, may he not have been some introducer or restorer of learn- ing amongst his people ? Perhaps king, priest, and historian, all in one. Certainly, an inkstand and a horn-book seem strange furniture for a warrior's grave, and would have astonished the bold barons of our middle ages not a little. But be this as it may, this humble article is likely to prove to Europe, what the stones of Alexandria and Rosetta have been before it, the dictionary of a lost language, and the interpreter of an extinct race. In a memorandum made immediately upon quit- c 2 28 INTRODUCTION. ting the general's house I have noted that upon this inkstand were four alphabets engraved, and after each the syllables, — thus, ba, be, bi, Sec, ma me, mi, and so forth ; that one of these is in the oldest or archaic form of the Greek alphabetic letters, and that hence connexion is likely to be traced and demonstrated between the Egyptian, Etruscan, and Pelasgic. The paterse for making libations had Egyptian figures stamped upon them, and the worship is supposed to have been Persian ; at least this was the view taken of it by the Archaeolo- gical Society. We saw one gold necklace of round beads with perfumes attached to it like lozenges. The bracelets were broad, worked in figures, and in the centre of each was a relievo figure of a woman standing between a good and evil genius, as if to take her choice, though probably awaiting her doom. The breastplate was worked or stamped in figures of good and evil genii, and had a small necklace above it, besides the chains. The head ornament was made up of two discs, a larger and a smaller, with straight fillets be- /*-., tween them, which might represent £1 the sun and moon, with the earth between, thus : Two straight lines - in Egyptian hieroglyphics, always mean the native country, i. c. the two soils of Upper and Lower Egypt. The upper disc had birds stamped upon it, cocks and ducks. The centre was a double fillet, which was fixed upon the head with pins, and INTRODUCTION. 29 the lower disc had upon it dogs. The perfumes were composed of galbanum, myrrh, and frankin- cense, mixed together. The vases were chiefly in the Egyptian style with strange animals, but some of them had figures, and on one was represented a nuptial procession, a subject which is very rare. The lecturer at the Archae- ological Society was inclined to regard some of these ornaments as Phoenician, and one of our party was echoed by us all when he remarked, " These orna- ments differ from each other, either by a thousand miles or by a thousand years. They are either the workmanship of centuries very remote from each other, or they are specimens of periods of a very different refinement." We visited, by favour, the museum of Cavaliere Palin, once ambassador from Sweden to Constanti- nople ; and this was probably the most conclusive to which we had access, for proving the connexion of the earliest civilized nations with each other, and the great similarity of their remains, such, for instance, as Assyria and Egypt, Hindostan and Phoenicia, Greece and Etruria. But for reasons which it would be too long to detail, it is not easy to say at this moment what may or what may not be proved, by the collection of that learned and ac- complished gentleman. His museum was an ar- chaeological assemblage, embracing a wider range of objects than any we saw elsewhere. Cavaliere Campana kindly invited us to see his collection of antiquities, entirely Etruscan ; and it 30 INTRODUCTION. was a treat such as I had little expected, and a sight to which I am not capable of doing justice. It was the more interesting to me, because the principal part of the objects were found upon his own ground, and many of them were disinterred in his own presence; though he also spends large sums upon the purchase of whatever appears to him desirable for its rarity or historical value. In the first room were a set of long and narrow coffins, all of terra cotta, and all with portraits of the deceased in alto relievo on the lid. The effigies in the stone coffins have usually one limb raised in an uneasy manner, but the limbs of these, as far as I recollect, were all straight, and appeared larger than life. Each one had the patera in his hand, and each was so highly ornamented, as to justify the reputation of the Etruscans for their great love of gold and silver, and precious stones. The heads of all were crowned with diadems or fillets representing gold. The women were adorned with necklaces, rings, armlets, bracelets, and ear- rings ; — the men with immense torques round the neck, chains and wrought clasps upon their mantles, and rings upon their fingers. Some had also arm- lets, which reminded us of the Sabine soldiers, who went into battle with their armlets on, they having adopted the military dress and discipline, and in- deed most of the laws and customs, rites and cere- monies of the Etruscans. These figures were also clothed with the toga, which was introduced into Rome from Etruria. Cavaliere Campanahad some large vases, but they were from Sabina, and none INTRODUCTION. 31 of them of the finest kind. In another room we saw some exquisite bronzes, an art in the manufac- ture of which the Etruscans excelled all nations, as we know from the testimony of the Greeks them- selves, and may judge from the specimens remain- ing. Here was also a large collection of terra cotta, an art the perfection of which was certainly native, and, as some writers think, even original. We saw friezes of surpassing richness, lithographs of which an artist was then engaged in making, for the purpose of laying before the public ; heads, and profiles as votive offerings, beautifully modelled ; water-spouts, and many other articles. One of the most curious objects in this collection was a terra cotta infant in swaddling clothes, taken out of a tomb, and which must have been placed there in commemoration of a very interesting cir- cumstance in the life of the warrior by whose corpse it lay. His funeral obsequies had been per- formed whilst he was yet alive. It may have been that he was in a swoon or trance, from which he awoke before the sepulchre was closed, or still more likely, that he had been reported dead whilst fighting away from his country, and hence funeral rites had been decreed to him, whilst, in effect, he was only missing from his companions, perhaps a prisoner, or having made some very narrow escape, so that he could not return before the last cere- monies were over. In such a case amongst the Greeks, no man could re-enter the temple of the sods until he had been washed and swathed like a 32 INTRODUCTION. new-born infant, emblematic of beginning life anew ; and as this was the command of the oracle at Delphi, with which the Etruscans were in constant communication from the very earliest times, it is scarcely to be doubted that this image was made and laid in the grave as a testimony to such an oc- currence ; the more so, as no funeral honours what- ever were allowed to infants. I must not omit to mention, amongst the terra cottas, one very fine bust from Falerii, now Civita Castellana ; and also the bassi relievi on the sarco- phagi, the subjects of which were all, as I was told, from Etruscan mythology, and evinced a beauty of manner and refinement of apprehension which could turn even common things to noble purposes. I give this on the authority of others, for though I saw them, I was not permitted to examine them, but was hurried on into the other rooms ; and I did not at that moment feel satisfied whether it was on account of our limited time, or of the subjects themselves. In the same cabinet with the infant we saw a glass spoon, but it strikes me that it was Roman. In another room, arranged not unlike that of the Gregorian Museum in the Vatican, we saw the gems and ornaments of this once wealthy people, the chief of which were a chain of eight or ten SCarabei richly set in gold, and which had been worn from shoulder to shoulder; many searabei rings, with gold circlets through them; a chain, which, under other circumstances, I should have INTRODUCTION. 33 called Trichinopoly, with a richly worked gold orna- ment at the end of it ; a brooch of gold filagree as delicately wrought as the ornaments from China ; three pairs of gold earrings, each wrought in figures of animals or genii, and of superlative beauty, and a scarabeus which I for long after coveted, though I am told that my own with the same subject is su- perior as an engraving ; but this was such a perfect stone that we were never tired of admiring its beauty. It was formed of the umber part of a sardonyx, a stone much in vogue amongst the ancients ; it was without a blemish, and the subject upon it was Cadmus overcoming the dragon which opposed his building Thebes. The Cavaliere is said to have four thousand bronze coins, besides some hundreds of gold and silver, but how many of these are Etruscan I do not know ; for, much to my regret, we never returned to see them, as we were asked to do by their liberal-minded owner. The rarities of his collection which as- tonished me most, were three small and most ele- gantly formed beakers, of smalto or semi-transparent glass, the colours being blue, white, and yellow, in Vandykes. The form was the most finished Greek, while the manufacture was identical with Egypt, and each stood upon a small and graceful stand of filagree gold. These stands, and the gold mount- ings, I took to be the Cavaliere's own tribute to their value and beauty ; but was told that they were fastened as I saw them, each upon its own stand in the tomb. These and General Galassi's are surely c 5 34 INTRODUCTION. specimens of the gold and siver tazze of Etruria so much renowned among-st the Greeks. As to the glass, I once afterwards saw the same sort at Corneto, found in a tomb at Tarquinia, but the vase was of a rude form in comparison, and very much broken, and even for the fragments the owners asked prices which were quite extravagant. The richest collection existing of Etruscan coins is that in the Jesuits' College, called, from the name of its founder Father Kirch er, " the Kircherian Museum ;" but as the rules of the order precluded my admission into their house, I can only give an account of the most remarkable curiosities there from the description of others. Amongst all the various branches of science which have advanced with rapid steps during late years, none has made greater progress than the numismatic, or study of money and coins, from the learning and perseverance with which it has been pursued by the Jesuits. They have arranged and classified the coins of Italy prior to the Romans, and contemporary with the earliest ages of the commonwealth, with an exact- ness and erudition that not long since seemed a hopeless desideratum ; and amongst their well- known and honoured names, that of Father Marchi now stands foremost, as the man who lias devoted himself with the greatest zeal and ability to this pursuit, and whose unwearying researches have been crowned with the most brilliant success, so that he has now formed a collection of asses, the ancient current coin, which for number and value is quite INTRODUCTION. 35 unique. He has lately published an account of this collection, with engravings of the different series of asses therein contained, and to this, of course, I would refer every one who desires to be learned on the subject; whilst those who are content to know little rather than nothing, will, I hope, accept of such a description as I can give them of the assis in ge- neral, and of the extraordinary specimens of that coin which all gentlemen may have the privilege of visiting in the Jesuits' College. In Upper and Central Italy, all the most ancient money was of copper or bronze, and it principally, in- deed almost universally, consisted of the assis, (which weighed exactly twelve ounces, or one pound troy,) and its five subdivisions of semis or half; tertians or third ; quadrans or fourth ; sextans or sixth ; and uncia or ounce. These originally weighed exactly what their names denote ; two ounces, three, four six, and one, being the respective proportions of twelve. They are all now rare, and from time and use considerably diminished in weight. The most common is the assis of Servius Tullius, introduced into Rome by this monarch from Etruria, and which is fused and not stamped, and has upon it the head of Janus. Of this series the marks are as fol- lows: — the semis has the head of Jupiter with anS, the tertians that of Minerva with four dots, the quadrans that of Hercules with three dots, the sextans that of Mercury with two dots, and the ounce or uncia, with Minerva again, and one dot ; and all of them bear on the reverse side the prow of 36 INTRODUCTION. a ship, which is the emblem of the nation whence they came. When the value of copper greatly increased, in consequence of the diminution of mines and the vast consumption of metal, it being em- ployed both for necessary and ornamental purposes, the assis was much reduced in weight, and accord- ing to Pliny it had long before his day been brought from twelve ounces to two, some writers say even to one. It is probable that this reduction was gradual between the second and third century of the city ; and though many asses and their subdivisions have been found greatly and ridiculously reduced, none, I believe, have come down to us in their lowest state. I should conceive three ounces to be the least weight of any existing as, and eleven ounces is probably the greatest. We ourselves have a perfect series both of the large and of the reduced assis, and in the latter the as weighs about six ounces, and only the as and the semis are fused. The other subdivisions of the reduced series are stamped, which obtains generally throughout the reduced coins, and is one proof of a date consider- ably posterior. Father Marchi has collected specimens of no less than forty different mints of Italian nations prior to ]{<>me, or contemporary with the foundation of the city ; and in ] rare, that one in our possession is supposed to be unique ; it was found at Cervetri, in a tomb excavated by the Duke of Torlonia, and pre- sented to us by the amiable and obliging Signer VEIL 87 Spada of Torlonia's bank. Enamelled vases and lachrymatories are found in many tombs, but all of them bearing the forms, the colours blue and yellow, and the character of Egypt ; and none of them those of Rome. Probably the early Romans retained their Latin modes of sepulture, burning the ashes, and placing them afterwards in small rude vessels, like those huts which we saw in the Museo Gregoriano, and which had been found at Alba Longa. Besides the probability that this was the manner of interment followed by the Latin Romans, the very great vene- ration in which all the ancient people held their dead, and the customs of their forefathers respect- ing them, incline me to believe that, under the kings, graves were never violated, and under the republic very rarely ; more particularly as orna- ments and gold were forbidden in Rome, and the buried arms of the conquered not needed. I am inclined to place the violation and destruction of all the graves, with the exception of those mag- nificent structures belonging to princes, such as Porsenna and Aruns, at a much later period, and either under the effeminate barbarians of the em- pire, or the rude barbarians of the north — men who through ignorance and pride, or through vanity and impertinence, had no veneration for antiquity ; and whose love of destruction or thirst for gold had ob- literated those sacred feelings which everywhere attach to the last resting-place of man, most espe- cially to those few adorned feet of earth accorded to such as in their day were the lords of hundreds 88 veil of men and hundreds of acres. Respect, even with the savage, usually attends the effigy of pomp and power passed away for ever. The oldest Roman tomb with which we are ac- quainted is that of Scipio Barbatus, on the Via Appia, close to Rome, and it is also the nearest approach we know to the sepulchres of Etruria.* It is of great extent, excavated in the rock, and containing six or more sarcophagi. The door, I believe, consisted of one or two stone leaves, and was arched, having a lintel and door-posts with a cornice outside, but the roof is very inartificial, and there is no sign of painting within the tombs ; neither, I believe, was anything but lamps and lachrymatories discovered besides the skeletons, several of which were laid in one sarcophagus. There is no ledge projecting from the rock in the inside of the Scipios' tomb as in the rudest of the Etruscan, and no preparation made for ornamental furniture. Even in later days, when some vast and celebrated Roman family sepulchre was painted, we find none of the richness, the variety, or the his- torical paintings of Etruria ; no portraits, no feasts nor games, nor illustrations of domestic manners ami customs. In all these things Etruria claims sis- terhood with Egypt, and a singular distinctness from Rome. The Roman tombs and cemeteries, of any celebrity, are all, I believe, of later times, when riches and luxury were permitted to any extent amongst the people. Wc have then the renowned sepulchre * It is of Etruscan architecture. VEIL 89 of the Nasoni, which, being hewn in the rock like the Etruscans, was arched about eight feet high, and contained all round arched niches for funeral urns, (not sarcophagi,) with paintings above and between the niches. But these paintings were partly ideal, partly emblematic, and throw no light upon the man- ners and customs of Naso's days ; the principal figure was a herdsman drawn with great spirit, carrying a goat upon his shoulders, and the outlines of whicli may still be seen. Next in order comes the sepulchre of the freedmen of Augustus, behind the tombs of the Scipios, in which are some arabesques in fresco ; and lastly the famous chain of family cemeteries for slaves and freedmen, the lately discovered columbarj in the Pamfili gardens. Here again is fresco, and some very minute and pretty painting, but almost all fanciful, not throwing light upon either history or mythology, but only showing the state of art at that particular period when they were executed, and which was so late as the reign of Trajan, a.d. 98. Besides arabesques, there are a man leading a giraffe, peacocks, pheasants, and other fowls and animals. The baker's tomb, with statues in it of himself and his wife, at the Porta Maggiore, and Count Lozano's tomb at the Porta S. Lorenzo, with fine bassi re- lievi upon three noble sarcophagi, were, discovered whilst we were at Rome.* But though the statues in the one, and the subjects of sculpture in the other, bear much resemblance to Etruria, the rnan- * See Appendix B. 90 VEIL ner of executing them was different, and not to be mistaken. This dissertation may seem out of place to my reader, but when we stood around our newly-exca- vated tomb we were naturally led into all these and many more disquisitions, in order to convince our- selves that what we explored was genuine Etruscan and not Roman — probably, a tomb of the oldest formation, and not of the latest — carefully noting that it was excavated, and not built ; that it con- sisted of one chamber only, and was not painted; that it had contained a large sarcophagus, and probably bronzes, lamps, and armour — all of which the hand of the spoiler had carried away ; and as we lifted out the only remnant of its ancient orna- ments — the numerous vases — -some of them of very large size, and handsome shapes, and all painted, though they were covered with mud, it was with in- describable interest that we saw the gentlemen bear- ing them down to the brook, to wash them with their own hands ; not suffering the labourers to touch them. I beheld from the top of the hill, men of rank, and talent, and learning, divided into groups of two or three, absorbed in this occupation, bending over their prizes, and scanning with eager and anxious eyes each figure and device as it became distinctly visible; and though we were disappointed in the quality of our vases, it was a proof of their antiquity that we found so many without a single historical or mythological figure upon any one of them. VEIL 91 The name of the site of our " scavo," as the Ita- lians call an excavation, was " Pozzo Michele," or Michael's well ; why so called I cannot think, as it lay upon a steep dry slope. It has since struck me that the name might be Poggio Michele — the " steep of Michele," and that Pozzo might be the rustic manner of pronouncing it. We all agreed that it had been previously opened, because the vases showed that it had been tenanted, and the marks of the sarcophagus, and the absence of bones or ashes, that it had been spoiled ; but we might have known from another sign that it had fallen a prey to previous antiquaries or treasure hunters, from its having no doors. Every Etruscan unvio- lated tomb, as yet discovered, is most artificially closed by one or two immense stone leaves. Each leaf is a single stone curiously jointed and hinged, and so very exactly closed, that it is difficult to open without breaking, and in the greater number of in- stances the doors are broken to pieces and thrown away, or perhaps carried off to build up the first sheep wall, or the nearest shepherd's hut. The doors of our tomb had been destroyed, and the space filled up, according to the usual fashion, with loose stones. One stone was wanting; at the top, about the size of a man's hand, either because it had never been put in, or because it had been so loosely and carelessly, or so hurriedly done, that it fell inwards, and in consequence the bottom of the tomb presented mud instead of clean dry tufo. After we had completely rifled this tomb, it would 92 VEIL probably the next day be rilled up to restore the ground for sheep-grazing, and in a fortnight Pozzo Michele would look as green and undisturbed as it did the day before we opened it. In fifty years time the men who opened it, and those who saw it opened, will be no more : Capranesi's excavations will be for- gotten or doubted, and some new projector and antiquity hunter will very possibly re-open this grave to find that it has been already spoiled. Thus it happens with many magnificent Roman sepulchres in the immediate neighbourhood of Rome. I believe that no excavations whatever were undertaken until the French began to disinter the ancient Forum, and the triumphal arches of Rome itself, which were half filled up, and ob- scured with earth. Yet even during this short period, since knowledge has spread, and research and avarice have been awakened, half the opened tombs are forgotten, and now are re-excavating by English gentlemen and noblemen who spend their money to be disappointed. The first excava- tions we heard of were undertaken by Cieorgio in 1810. When anything very remarkable or very beautiful lias been found, information of late years has been given to the Archaeological Society, and some of the members have copied the curious ob- ject, and preserved an account of it in their Annals ; but no plan has over yet been made of the ground explored, so as to obviate the probability of re-ex- cavating a formerly, perhaps very recently, opened and rilled tomb. Indeed the present system is to VEIL 93 forget all about them as soon as possible. Besides this, they were, in the first instance, almost all ex- plored by dealers in antiquities ; men who cared much for profit, but nothing for science : and there- fore those observations, the most interesting to so- ciety in general, of the style of architecture, the objects found accumulated together, and their era, were never made, and in the greater number of instances can now never be ascertained. In Roman Etruria the ground that has been opened is as yet well known, because, with scarcely an excep- tion, it is either in the hands of a very few dealers, such as Capranesi, Campanari, Fossati, Basseggio, or of eminent collectors like Cav. Campana, or of the Prince of Canino. It is the same in Tuscan Etruria and in Neapolitan, at least as far as our in- cpiiries went ; but when this generation shall have passed away, what is there to preserve the memory of the ground which they hired, searched and filled in again ; and who is to say what was found in any particular tomb, and what bronzes or sculp- ture in marble or alabaster, what vases or terra cotta vessels, what figures in stone or clay, what scarabei engravings or gold ornaments are cotera- porary, and were found together ? Any of the first-rate dealers will tell you at once that such a vase, or marble, or bronze, came from Veii Etrus- can, or Veii Roman ; from Cere, Volci, Yiterbo, &c. ; but what tomb they came from, and what other objects were found with them, what might be the date of the tomb, and why such a date is 94 VEIL assigned, in nineteen instances out of twenty they are unable to tell you. Fortunately for science and for history, and for knowledge in general, the attention of some learned and powerful minds has at last been awakened to the subject: the richest and finest tombs opened since a.d. 1827 have been made known to the Archaeological So- ciety, and laid open to their inspection before they were destroyed, and their contents removed : and some of the dealers and some of the private collectors are themselves studious men. Amongst them we can name with honour Cavaliere Campana, Capra- nesi and Campanari, and many are following in their wake. Still a more general attention to the subject is desirable, for as yet those who put science on a par with gold, and do not get the tomb opened solely for its treasures, and then fill it in again, are the exceptions and not the rule. After leaving Pozzo Michele, we divided our- selves into two parties and sat down on the summit of the hill, our vases being laid near us, to eat and to drink where the varied baked meats had been often feasted on, and the rich wine had flowed, many thousands of years before us ; and I thought, as I looked on the smiling faces around me, " As it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be in the days of the Son of man." We arc as they were, and we shall bo as they arc. " O that we could so number our Porta di Fidena ; 4, Porta di Flaminia ; 5, Porta Capena ;<>, Porta del Fiume ; 7, Porta del Ruscello ; 8, Portadi Sutri ; and 9, Porta Nepcte,or PonteSodo; * Pliny says tli.it Tarquinius Priscua wrote a book " De Hctrusca Disciplina." VEIL 101 with the roads leading- to them. Now the greater number of these roads are obliterated, and their fine Etruscan pavement lies in powder upon the cart and carriage ways around. The idle neglect that has attended Veii is remarkable. Whilst the Roman colony yet occupied the ancient Forum in the reign of Adrian, a. d. 117, Florus could write, "Who now knoweth the situation of Veii ? In our annals alone is it to be found." And yet four miles of wall, the foundations of which were perfect, presented themselves within a few yards of that portion which was inhabited by his own people! Propertius, with more correctness and not less poetry, tells us that in his day the shepherds fed their flocks within the ancient walls. " Nunc intra muros pastoris buccina lenti cantat. '' The imperial Romans got out of acquaintance with Veii the ruin, and Veii the village, because the Via Cassia, constructed in a. u. c. 628, which superseded the Via Vejentina, led them near it instead of through it, and they gradually arrived at a poetical doubt that it had ever existed. Modern antiquaries, misled by them, and by a spirit either of invention or contradiction, threw aside the authority of Strabo, who placed it truly twelve miles from Rome, and that of tradition, which still retained its site where it had ever been, and placed it at Civita Castellana, ou the authority of an inscrip- tion found at that place, but which appears to have been carried thither. I should mention, perhaps, before leaving the subject of the ruins, that near 102 VEIL the Porta Portusa, on the present farm of Vac- carreccia, there is a large tumulus, which, if not the memorial of a battle, or erected to blockade the city, is, probably, according to Gell, the monu- ment of some king, and very likely either of Pro- pertius the founder of the city, or of Morrio- Servius tells us, that Propertius, king of Etruria, in common with the men of Capena, founded Veii. We talked long upon all that is known of the his- tory of this celebrated town. It was not mentioned by Virgil among the great cities in the days of JEneas, and was not in the league, consequently was not a place of note at that time, and must have risen into power between the Trojan war and the foundation of Rome. Like some of the other towns, its inhabitants appear to have been a mixture of Pelasgi and aborigines, or, as Miiller thinks, of aborigines and Etruscans. It once had a history, but the Etruscan annals being all destroyed after the reign of Claudius, what now remains to us is the few notices scattered through the Greek and Iloman authors, and not easily put together. It is said to have been founded by a king named Proper- tins, to have had a king who established the Salian dances in honour of Mars, and who had terraces made upon a neighbouring mountain for the ceremony ; a king Morrio, descended from Neptune by Alesius ; a king Tibris, from whom the Tiber received its name i Miiller) — a king Vejo, a king Meralus, and, thirty years before the time of Cainillus, a king Lars Tolumnius. Others say that it was governed by VEIL 103 Lucuraones or governors, elected yearly. It is cer- tain that Tolumnius ruled long ; and it seems proba- ble that throughout Mid Etruria, the most distin- guished for courage or ability amongst the Lucu- raones were often re-elected, and many sometimes have been made dictators for life, and thus called kings. It is also certain that their rulers were elected, and not hereditary. It was a king who carried on the war against Caraillus, whom some authors call also Tolumnius. The people marked the foundations of their city by drawing a ridge with the plough round it, an operation which, though not impossible, must have been very difficult along the borders of the rocky cliffs. Perhaps we ought to state, that this hill consists of a table-land, four miles in circumference, which descends abruptly by a steep precipice to a stream, the Formella on one side, and the Cremera on the other. In ancient times, these were rivers, but now in summer they run dry, and the Cremera has been greatly reduced by the draining of the lake of Baccano. We saw in the distance the curious mount of Mu- sino, six miles from Veii, and regretted that we could not visit the various terraces that surround it. The first broad terrace supports a cone, which is sur- mounted by a second terrace, supporting a second cone, and this again is crowned by the ruins of some circular edifice of large dimensions. Tradition says that here stood an altar, which in early times was always placed upon a cone ; and near this spot is still a small wood of oaks regarded with superstitions 104 VEIL fear by the natives, but whether as a place conse- crated, and therefore not to be profaned, or as haunted, we could not unravel. Gell says that the altar erected here was that of Venus, " the AraMutiae, called also Murtise or Mur- cial, in Etruscan ;" but Turan was the usual name of Venus, and the name of Musino is more probably taken from Mamers, which was the name of Mars. From Mamers the Romans made Mavors, or Marte. No doubt the terraces were made for the Salian priests to hold their ceremonies, and run round the altar ; but how in honour of Venus we did not com- prehend, seeing that the Salian games were instituted in honour of Mars only, unless there may have been here a double altar, and Venus may have received honour as the consort of Mars. The original insti- tution was of twelve priests, who wore painted parti- coloured garments and high bonnets, with a steel cuirass upon the breast, a buckler in one hand, and a rod in the other ; and they were called Salii from saltando,leaping, because they leaped or danced round the altar, striking their rods upon each other's buck- lers, and singing hymns in honour of their god. Their feasts were so sumptuous, that the Romans, amongst whom Numa is said to have introduced these ceremonies, called their grandest, entertain- ments " Da pes Saliares." Their chief was called Lt Praesul," or " Magister Saliorum ;" — he led the band, and the rest imitated his steps and motions. We hear also of Salian maids who may have sacri- ficed to Venus. Sex! us Pompciiis says, that the Vir- vi;n. 105 gines Saliares were associated sometimes with the Salii ; that they wore a kind of military garb called " paludamentum," with high round bonnets like the Salii, and that they performed sacrifices with the pontifices. He says, however, that they were hired. Servius tells us that the order was instituted by Mor- rio, king of Veii, and that there were colleges of the Salii at Preneste and Tusculum before they were intro- duced into Rome. Micali says that they, and the Arvali who so much resembled them, were instituted for po- litical purposes ; they were all noble, and composed a college in which the three seniors governed the rest, under the namesofPraesul, Vates,and Magister. They danced to the sound of the sacred trumpet, striking- first the earth and then their bucklers, and repeating the dances and songs three times. They were intro- duced into Rome by Numa, as Plutarch tells us, to heal a pestilence. The Monte Musino had very likely long suggested the idea, which he attributed to Egeria, or Political Wisdom, his muse, who is said to have given him the counsel, along with a sacred target of bronze, which the gods sent from Jupiter — alias which he had procured from Veii. He was commanded to make eleven others exactly like it, so that it might never be stolen, as no one would know which of the twelve was the real pattern from heaven. Veturius Mamurius, who made the eleven copies, would appear from his name to have been an Etrus- can. The targets were oval, with several folds closing over one another,*" — they were worn upon * On a grave lately discovered of a Pontifex Salii, they have been F 5 106 VKir. the elbow, and called " Ancylia." In the month of March the Salii carried these bucklers through the city, and were clothed in a short scarlet cassock, fastened by a broad belt, clasped with brass buckles. On their heads they bore a copper helmet ; they were famous for the elegance of their dancing, and sang the Carmen Saliare, which is said to have been the same with the Carmen Arvale. Some of us had seen a " Carmen Arvale" still extant.* It is written in verses of four lines, and reads very musically, though it is in such old Latin as to have been unin- tellmible in Cicero's time, and we have no trans- lation. Numa's college of the Salii were called Salii Collini, because they had a temple on the Qui- rinal hill. Tullus Hostilius founded another col- lege of these men, in pursuance of a vow he made whilst fighting against the Sabines, and his Salii were called " Salii Palatini," because established upon the Palatine In the short notices of the Veientine kings, we find them fighting with Romulus during the days of their highest splendour and civilization, and he conquered from them the Septem Pagi, or seven villages, upon as many heights near Rome. Veii had made war to retake Fidenee, which being unable to do, she was obliged to yield the Septem Pagi, and, ac- cording to some writers, all the land between Veii and the Tiber, to purchase a peace of one hundred years ; Pound represented in the shape of the ordinary long Etruscan shield, M it in painted <>n tlie vases. * See Appendix C. 8 VEIL 107 a treaty which was not kept, in whatever way we may count the years. The inhabitants of the ceded portion were admitted to citizenship, though not allowed to vote. Tarquinius Priscus, when he divided the peo- ple into thirty tribes, gave a family name to each, ex- cept the Veientian. Servius Tullius was engaged in war with the Veientians, probably to keep the Sep- tem Pagi; and Tarquinius Superbus gained over them such signal victories that they were forced to acknow- ledge his superiority, and to be forward in the homage paid hirn by many other cities of Etruria, viz. present- ing to him an ivory throne, a sceptre, a golden crown, and a triumphal robe. The assignment of these things as the attributes of rank and power, is very ancient amongst mankind, and the symbols of kingly dignity remain the same now that they were 2,300 years ago, amongst that people upon whose dust we were then reposing. Will any one walk over our dust 2,300 years hence, and perhaps curiously lionising the ruins of London, talk of our British customs, and find that their ways are the same as ours were ? The Roman senate decreed these same articles to Por- senna when he granted them peace, therefore it is probable that what came from Etruria was returned to it again. Porsenna having conquered the Septem Pagi, restored them to Rome, they were again re- conquered, and seem not to have come any more under Roman dominion so long as Veii existed. The next thing we hear of is the war of a. r. 271, which lasted with intermissions for nine years, dur- ing which time the Romans once established them- 108 veil selves upon the Cremera, near the very gates of Veii, and the Veientians possessed themselves of the Ja- niculum up to the very walls of Rome. It is said that at one time the Romans were so pressed by other enemies, that they had no levies to spare to defend them against Veii, wherefore Kaeso stepped forth, head of the family of the Fabii, and said, " Commit it to my charge to defend the frontiers against Veii. I and my family will do it at our own cost." This was joyfully accepted by the senate, and the family or tribe of the Fabii issued forth, consisting of 306 men, and established themselves on the Cremera, near to the city, and fortified them- selves so that they could not be dislodged, and were a thorn in the side of their enemies, and a check upon all their movements. At length came the day when all the Fabii were accustomed to meet and hold a great sacrifice to their patron god on the Quirinal hill, and they thought, " Surely we may go forth in peace; the enemy will nut attack us when we go to our family sacrifice." But the Veientians laid wait for them beyond their camp, and attacked them, and slew the whole number except one, a boy, who escaped to Rome to tell the talc The Etruscan league now helped Veii, and the Romans, unable duly to avenge themselves, con- cluded a peace for forty years. We could not go to see the camp of the fabii, which the mosi learned antiquaries are now agreed was at La Valca, on the left bank of the Cremera, and which effectually prevented the reunion of Veii and Fidenae, lying VEIT. 109 between these two cities. Ruins of what may have been the fort are still existing. We were forcibly reminded of this part of their history, because our lovely walk conducted us to Isola Farnese, where former antiquaries had placed the camp of the Fabii, and where many superficial guide-books place it still ; not considering first, that it is not upon the Cremera, and secondly, that no po- sition could have been taken up by so small a force directly in view of their powerful adversary, and almost within arrow-shot from the walls. The Isola is a most romantic rising ground, with cliffs and streams round it, and presents to view a sweet quiet looking hamlet, with an inn (whither we had sent our horses ;) and a fortress of the middle ages, now belonging to a princely family of Rome. The in- habitants are all shepherds and vine-dressers, and to us were very civil. About three weeks afterwards forty of them were taken up as leagued banditti, and brought to Rome. The master of the inn was one of their leaders, and said at times to have given his guests human flesh to eat — detected by a young- surgeon, who found a finger in his plate ; and the landlord who came out to us at Fossa was captain of the band. We thanked God for our safety, for it was late in the evening, and had they attacked us, we should have made but a poor defence. We might easily have fallen into their hands, for an accident happened to our carriage, driving from Isola to the high road. We became separated from •our party, and had far to walk, during which time 110 VEIL we were met in a narrow lane by several mounted Contadini, covered with togas, and armed with long- iron-shod poles, who stared at us with surprise. We did not, however, know our real danger, and only felt uncomfortable. They rarely touch the English, for three reasons : 1st, because they fight before they yield ; 2ndly, they never carry money except on a journey ; and 3rdly, the whole body make such a fuss, should one of their countrymen be injured, that it always threatens destruction to the bandits. Isola has formerly been a burying ground, both Etruscan and Roman, but the tombs are all rifled. The rocks are perforated in every direction, and here may be seen columbarii and sepulchral chambers without number, and of every form. Towards the other side of Veii, between it and Torre del Quinto, about the Arco di Pina, were the tombs of the kings, and several tumuli covering the slain in battle ; also some very fine Roman sepulchres, built by rich sub- jects under the empire, on an Etruscan model. In 317 a. r. we again read of a notable war be- tween Veii and Rome. Fideme, a colony and con- stant ally of Veii, had been conquered, and all the chief offices in it of course were given to the Ro- mans. The Fideneans, finding their yoke intole- rable, and it was ever heavy to be vanquished, rose and massacred their masters; after which the ring- leaders lied 1o Veii, and the city and cause of Fidense were taken under its protection. When the Romans sent ambassadors to Veii in order to ex- plain the matter, the king, a proud and fierce man VEIL 111 named Lars Tolumnius, caused the ambassadors to be slain, and the war was carried on with asperity, and ended in the reduction of Fidense to the Roman yoke, and a peace with Veii for twenty years. Lars Tolumnius was slain in battle, and his royal gar- ments, which must have been very magnificent, to judge from the quantity of pure gold found now interwoven with the garments of Etruscan princes in the tombs, were carried as trophies to Rome. In a. r. 348 comes the most exciting period of their history, and its close, which shook the power of Etruria to its centre, and ushered in the fall of all her cities, before that empire which was destined to subdue the whole known world. The war began, as usual, by Veii supporting one of her old van- quished colonies, which had violently thrown off the Roman yoke, and for two years it consisted chiefly of a series of skirmishes, without much advantage on either side. In 350 a. r., however, both parties became more in earnest, and Veii was besieged. At the begin- ning of the war the Veientians either had, or else had elected a king, and sent to Voltumnia, the great seat of the national council, to beg assistance and alliances. It is said that the diet were angry at the despotic power and unusual privileges which Veii had accorded to her chief; or more probably at the tone she assumed, in the terms which she wished to make ; and having no reason to think the struggle unequal, they left her to fight her own battles. She was accordingly assisted only 112 VEIL by Capena and Falisci, now Civita Castellana, and such was her success, that in 356 her troops were beneath the walls of Rome, and that city was in an asonv of terror. The women crowded the tein- pies, and made the air ring with their cries ; and the men elected Camillus dictator, and as many as were able followed him to war. He beat back the enemy, and, advancing close to Veii, renewed the siege. His army was encamped about the Arco del Pino, and he is said to have drawn double lines round the city, and still to have made no progress. At this time the lake of Albano suddenly rose to an immense height above its usual level, so that the water flowed over, and threatened to devastate the plains below, upon which the Romans sent to the oracle at Delphi to know what to do in their great trouble and distress, and to ask what should be the success of their arms, and what devices they could use against their enemies. One of Camillus's sol- diers had been intimate with an old warrior of Veii, whom he saw upon the walls, and with whom he entered into conversation — either complaining that they made no way, or boasting of his general and his resources. " Ah !" said the old man, "ye think to take Veii, but we have a sure prophecy that Veii shall never fall until the lake of Alba overflows into the sea no more." The Roman enticed this old man beyond the wall-, and then seizing him, carried him prisoner into Camillus's camp, where he was made to repeal what he had said respecting the des- tiny of his city. Some say that by bribes he was VEIL 113 induced to tell the Romans how they might accom- plish the prophecy ; but though this is not impro- bable, we shall in charity hope it was not true. The Romans themselves say that their ambassadors, returning at this time from Delphi, brought the same answer as the old prophecy, and moreover added, " Ye must make the waters of the lake to flow into your fields and gardens, and so disperse and consume them, that they shall flow into the country, and not into the sea." I give the story as it was told by a very learned member of our party, and as it is to be found in Roman history; and it was especially interesting to us, who were then sit- ting opposite the silent green hill of once warlike Veii, and who had visited and examined the great work on the lake of Albano, viz. the Emissario by which it was drained. There is a tunnel through the hill on which Castel Gandolfo stands, two miles in length, made by the Romans, but the architec- ture is Etruscan, and not unlike the Cloaca Maxima in Rome. It has never been repaired since the days of Camillas, and perfectly attained its end. It is more than one hundred feet below the ancient level of the lake ; and since it was finished, the lake of Alba has never reached the sea. The legend says that it was finished in three years and a half; but as only two workmen could work in it abreast, and it would now take ten years, which several historians say was the length of the siege of Veii, I am inclined to credit the latter version. It is very likely that 114 VEII. the counsel was given by the Roman augurs, through the medium of the Sibylline books. It is most probable that the lake of Alba over- flowed in a. r. 352, when the Romans sent to the oracle, and were desired to drain it, which they might commence by Etruscan workmen ; and in 356 or 7 the idea might strike Camillns of entering Veii by a mine, which he may have planned and worked by the experienced miners from the Emissario, and hence may naturally have arisen the legendary con- nexion between the draining of the lake and the fall of this famous city. Certain it is that Camillus, coupling the prophecy with the fate of Veii, at length conceived that if he could undermine it as the waters of the lake were undermined, he should conquer. He accordingly got some of the miners into his army, and commenced a mine or cuniculus, i. e. a covered passage, which should issue at the temple of Juno, within the citadel. The situation of his com- mencement was probably at that mass of stone which now lies close to the Via Vejentina at La Valca. He worked undiscovered, and after having lain for three years and a half before the town, he had the delight of hearing that all was ready for his grand attack, and he led his troops through the mine. The king- was at the very time sacrificing in the temple, and the priest said," Courage, O king, for the god is pro- pitious, and there is victory to him who shall offer the entrails upon the altar.'' Camillus, hearing this, burst in, felled the poor king to the ground, and VEIL 115 seizing the entrails, offered them up himself. His soldiers opened the gates to the Roman army — in a few hours the garrison was destroyed, and the town sacked. In a few days Veii, which contained 100,000 people, was levelled with the dust, to rise no more. Camillus is said to have looked upon the ruins of the beautiful town from the citadel, and to have wept. It was in size equal to Athens, and larger and finer than Rome, the walls being four miles in extent. It was full of the ornaments of a rich, civilized, and luxurious people, and was famous for its chariot games, and its works in bronze and terra cotta, — particularly domestic ornaments, the chief of which now remaining are water-spouts and tiles, moulded as masques, or as the heads of ani- mals, commonly lions, of very fine workmanship, and portraits which were hung as votive offerings in the temples. One famous chariot from Veii of terra cotta surmounted the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus in Rome. The story is thus given in Plutarch's Life ofPublicola, who was one of the first con- suls of Rome about 500 years b. c, and who dedi- cated the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus, on the top of which it was placed. This temple, wholly Etruscan in its architecture, was commenced by Tarquinius Priscus, and finished by his grandson Tarquin the Proud. " About that time," says Plutarch, " Tarquin making preparations for a second war against the Romans, a great prodigy took place. This prince, while yet upon the throne, had almost finished the temple of Jupi- 116 VEIL ter Capitolinus, when, either by direction of an oracle, or some whim of his own, he ordered the artists of Veii to make a terra cotta chariot, which was to be placed upon its top." This was a usual custom with the ancients, and such chariots were called Fastigia. Soon after this, Tarquin lost his crown. The Etruscans, however, moulded the chariot, and set it in the furnace Upon this the clay, which usually contracts, swelled itself out to such a size and hardness, that it was with difficulty drawn out, and ever after the furnace was disman- tled. Now, as the unusual swelling of any sub- stance was considered an omen for good, the augurs were of opinion that this chariot, betokened power and success to the people with whom it should re- main, and therefore determined not to give it up to Rome, saying that it belonged to Tarquin, and not to those who had driven him from his kingdom. It happened that a few days afterwards there was a chariot race at Veii, which went off in the usual manner, excepting that, as a charioteer named Rntu- manus, who had won the prize, and received the crown, was gently driving out of the ring, the horses took fright without any visible cause, and either by some direction of the gods, or some turn of fortune, ran away with their driver at full speed towards Rome. It was in vain that he pulled the reins, or soothed them with words; lie was obliged to give way to their career, and was whirled along till they came to the Capitol, where they threw him f the hill there was again a ditch, but no massive masonry ; and hence we as- MONTE NERONE. 125 cended to the summit. On the top of the cone was a body of workmen, mining, as it were, downwards in loose earth, under the eye of an engineer; for in a ll the cones the principal tomb is usually situated directly below the apex, or very nearly so at various degrees of depth ; and the minor tombs are at a lower elevation, and round the sides of the cone, not far from the base. All those who were conversant with Etruscan or ancient Greek sepulchres, felt cer- tain that some more noble grave was concealed to- wards the centre, and most sincerely did we wish that th e spirited Duchess might be right, to encourage her in the inarch of discovery ; but nothing that we saw gave indications that such was likely to be the case. It is the theory that in these tumuli, the centre and higher grave belonged to the prince, high priest, or lucumo ; and that the surrounding graves were those of the chief officers of his dynasty, almost always military, as the arms buried with them show ; and the state of Italy, before it was subdued entirely by Rome, rendered necessary. The tumuli of Cervetri have gone far to confirm this theory, and as yet have certainly offered nothing to disprove it. We descended the hill upon the west side, and here were taken to a deep well. The boy who was our guide, and w r ho had been let down by ropes, said that at the bottom it was quite dry, and led into a vaulted gallery, at the end of which was another well — the gallery being broad enough to admit of two abreast. Two workmen had descended after him, and let him down the second well, which 126 MONTE NERONE. exactly resembled the shaft of a mine, as did the first; here was another gallery, which, after going so far, and always leading into the hill northward, had ceased to be worked any further. In short, the gallery ended in nothing, and was not even broader at the further end than at the commencement ; but was like a work stopped in its progress, which I believe it to have been. The wells and galleries were hewn out of the tufo, like the lower tomb; though all that we saw was rich loose soil, artificially brought there to cover the labour and build up the hill. Now was this work Egyptian ? which, substituting the cone for the py- ramid, it most closely resembled, as wells and gal- leries of this identical disposition have lately been found in the tomb of Cheops ; or was it Greek ? the early sepulchres of which nation were a mound rest- ing upon a wall of broad stone, as seen at Mycene, and who themselves said that they had derived their civilization from Egypt, though we moderns are pleased to say otherwise : or was it purely Etruscan, and were the wells and galleries intended as the be- ginnings of a labyrinth, like many of the tombs of North Etruria ? Oblivion, answer these things, when thy great book shall be unclosed. Even the labyrinth partakes of Egyptian origin; and so docs the principal chamber, being placed in (he principal tumulus. It struck us upon the spot, that whoever the tomb had formerly belonged to, he had begun it, like the Egyptians, during his life, intending to make a magnificent work, which should MONTE NERONE. 127 perpetuate his name to the end of time. Probably he began it, Egyptian like, upon coming to his pro- perty or rank, and it was never finished. He died in battle in some distant land, the state covered it in, and probably placed his arms upon the top, like the lion upon the British tumulus in the field of Waterloo — such being; the common custom of the Etruscans — and thus the mound was left. Poor, vain man ! The Romans as little knew his name, or at least as little preserved it, as have their own annals the names of those whose lordly tombs still line the Appian way. As this tumulus was not erected over the remains of men slain in battle, and was not the burial-place of some mighty stranger, who died in fighting upon the coast, (for then it would have been hastily and completely finished,) I am inclined to assign to it a very high antiquity, both from the form of its architecture, and from its evidently having been a work of time, from its paintings, its sarcophagus, and its wells and gal- leries. It is but fair to add, that future discoveries may throw further light upon it, as Carlo Avolta Gonfaloniere of Corneto, probably the most expe- rienced man living in the working of these tumuli, said that the duchess had not taken the proper way to discover the princely grave, did such exist, and that she was merely wasting her money in the down- ward mine. He once talked of going to Rome to speak to her upon the subject, but I think he never executed his intentions ; and I believe that no princely grave is there. We sat down opposite this 128 MONTE NERONE. hill, and its twin sister of exactly the same form, looking at them, and musing; upon them. Why did a chief of Agylla choose to be buried so far from the sepulchres of his own people? or was the mound erected for the head of some usurping; dynasty who mingled not his dust with the native princes? or was it for the chief of some friendly allied tribe, who re- quested that he and his officers might find a resting- place there? Was it, perchance, the grave of some heroic governor of Pyrgi lost at sea ? — or may it have belonged to the Lydians, who tried unsuccess- fully to settle themselves upon this coast? Vain indeed were our conjectures ; as the only finished grave had been opened and robbed, probably long before Latin history was written. Had inscriptions in any character been found in this tomb, they would greatly have assisted in determining its date and nation ; but few knew the inestimable value of writing ; and the more we see, whether of the dead or of the living, the more clearly do we perceive that no fame is lasting, whether for dominion, or pomp, or talent, or excellence, unless it is recorded. This hill was the nearer of the two to the inn where our horses were resting, and around it are many wells and excavations of uncertain meaning; indeed all the ground looked 1o me like tumuli plundered and overthrown: and the Duchess's hill would pre- sint sh the same appearance in a few years, did she neglect to cover it in again. Is it, probable that some ancient city, the very name of which finds no place in human history, can once have; stood close to these mounds ' MONTE NERONE. 129 We had no time to make further research ; but it may be worth an antiquary's while to examine bet- ter all the ground in this vicinity ; for late years have brought such things to light, that now it is difficult to say, with respect to the nations prior to Rome, what may, or what may not have been. No one of understanding can look upon these graves, and think lightly either of the knowledge or of the power of the old Italian people. I do not mean to intimate that this tumulus was of Egyptian workmanship, nor that any in Italy were so ; but I think it is one of the many monu- ments which will go far to prove either the common origin of nations, or that the civilization of Greece and Asia Minor did really come from Egypt ; and in this view I was glad to have visited it, and I think its history worth recording. G 5 130 CHAPTER IV. TARQUINIA. This we regarded as the most interesting portion of our Etruscan pilgrimage, for besides Tarquinia's claim to our attention as the capital city of original Etruria, it was identified in our recollection with the most exciting period of early Roman history. We are informed by Livy, that Rome received from Tarqninia a race of powerful kings, and was in- debted to them and their Etruscan mother country for many of the arts of refinement, badges of magnificence, substantial improvements, and rites of religion, which contributed to build up her rising grandeur. The crown and sceptre, the ivory throne, the robe of honour, and the colleges of augurs and aruspices, with their rites of divina- tion, and their solemn unfolding of the future, all came from Etruria; while the stupendous cloaca, a work which has never been surpassed, and which astonishes us even among the ruined masses of im- perial magnificence, was begun and completed by i he polished Etruscan race who governed the Roman state. TARQUINIA. 131 The additional, and in some respects new lights, which are thrown upon the early ages by the historical research of our own time, serve to tighten the connecting link between Tarquinia and Rome, and lead us to believe that the infant mistress of the world not only received for her king an able and powerful Tarquinian Luc u mo, but was, through Tarquinia, united for a season as an integral part of the great Etruscan common- wealth, and probably formed one of the barriers of central Etruria towards Latium. But it is injus- tice to Etruria to feel for her merely an interest reflected from an upstart state of robbers and out- laws. She raises her crowned head hoary with anti- quity far beyond what we have been accustomed to consecrate as time-honoured, and beckons us to quit for a moment the crumbling monuments, whose grandeur, comparatively modern, are our memorials of the wrecked Republic and the fallen Empire, in order to learn of her in those secret chambers where she still displays the unperished remains of arts and luxury and wealth belonging to ages passed away. With reverence we approached the site of the capital of original Etruria, the ancient mistress of Rome, the lawgiver of central Italy, where Tages inspired the priests with the wisdom of his religious discipline, and where Tarchon instructed the rulers in a political system which endured for many centu- ries of glory. The history of Etruria is involved in obscurity, and we can but grope our way darkly, 132 TARQU1NIA. indebted for our pittance of knowledge to such lights of incidental information as have been here and there preserved. But within the last twenty years much attention has been directed to the eluci- dation of these by men of great historical knowledge and philological learning, who have devoted them- selves to the pursuit. The materials on which they have to work have been hitherto daily increasing, and will continue to do so up to a certain point, for fresh tombs are constantly discovered with occasional inscriptions on the walls, and containing carved sarcophagi, and painted vases, covered with my- thological, heroic, and domestic subjects. But as yet our information is dark and unconnected ; the language can be read, but its meaning can only be guessed at, and it probably remains for the antiqua- rians of another centurv to arrange the information which the spirit of discovery now abroad is extract- ing from the abodes of the dead, and which may show the vanity of many theories now in fashion. It was in the midst of this puzz!e of unsatisfied curiosity among the ruins of Tarquinia that we first learnt rightly to appreciate one whom we had hi- therto regarded with aversion and contempt, that rare mixture of learning, stupidity, dulness, sense, and folly, the Emperor Claudius. One of the niosi severe losses which historical literature has sustained, is that of the twenty books which ho wrote on a subject so mysterious ; and a single sentence of one of his imperial orations, which has been strangely recovered in modern times, opens up new and most TARQUINIA. 133 important views of the politics of Etruria, and of its influence on early Rome. Whatever we do know of the history of this peo- ple leads us to regard the territory* of Tarquinia as of principal importance in their state, and the centre of their commonwealth. Here it was that in the early days of the world a husbandman was plough- ing- in the field, when Tages, the youthful demigod, the grandson of Jove, with a child's face and a sage's wisdom, suddenly emerged from the deepest furrow. The cries of the astonished rustic soon collected a wondering crowd. The fame of the event flew far and wide. The Lucumones of the people of Etruria speedily assembled to the spot, and carefully noted down the verses of Tales' sacred son^. There in a metrical form he delivered to them the rules which should guide them in the right performance of sacrifice, in the auguries from lightning and the flight of birds, in the examination of the entrails of victims, and in all the parts of the religious dis- cipline which was afterwards established throughout Etruria. No sooner had the mysterious boy solemnly announced his oracle to the heads of the people, than he laid him down and died ; but his words were destined to live and to form the moral and religious code of the Etruscan nation. He to whom the sacred discipline of Tages was more par- ticularly imparted, was Tarchon, a descendant of the ancient Lucumones of the land, and, as some say, the identical husbandman who ploughed up the * Voltumna, the seat of the National Council, was in the territory of Tarquinia. 134 TARQUINIA. oracular little genius. To him is ascribed the formation of the Etruscan commonwealth into twelve states ; and it would appear that this number possessed a sacred importance, for not only did original or central Etruria consist of twelve govern- ing cities, but the same division obtained in the northern and southern branches of the great com- monwealth, which during the zenith of her glory she established on the banks of the Po and in Cam- pania, but which, prior to the destruction of the nation, sank, the one under the smooth tongue of the Greeks, or the rough sword of the Samnites ; the other under the powerful assaults of the Gauls. Of the original commonwealth, in its twelve-fold division, Tarquinia was the head ; and this pre- eminence, as well as its existence in the time of Tages, and its being the city of Tarchon, vindicate its antiquity as probably surpassing that of the states to which it gave the law, and over which it main- tained its authority for eleven ages, as metropolis alike of the political constitution and religious dis- cipline of the great national league. Hut that which renders the name of Tarquinia most familiar to us, and which perhaps has served to rescue it altogether from oblivion, is an episode, and one possibly of but small lasting importance in the history of the city, — I mean its connexion with Homo, and the union of both lor a time under one govern- ment. The story is so well known, that I should ask the reader's pardon lor introducing it in its popular form. When Cypselus established Ins tyranny in TARQUINIA. 135 Corinth, one of the leaders of the aristocratic party, Demaratus by name, fled from his native land, and settled in the flourishing Etruscan metropolis. He seems to have been a man of good taste as well as opulence, for he brought with him in his train a band of artists, cunning in the plastic and pictorial arts, by whom he increased the industry and im- proved the manufactures of the city of his adoption. For it is evident that the names of his accompany- ing artists Ev%eip, and Evypa/ufiuc, " cunning hand," and " clever pencil," as we may translate then^ designate a craft or trade rather than two indivi- duals. I have noted this incident in the industrial history of Etruria, because we have elsewhere adverted to it. But the Etruscan government was a strict aristocracy, excessively jealous of all en- croachment, and Demaratus, though nobly born and wealthy, was still regarded as an interloper, and his son Lucumo, as Livy calls him, was never permitted to gratify his ambition, which led him to aspire to the highest honours of the state. He and his wife Tanaquil, an Etruscan lady of high family, were unable to brook this obscurity ; and resolving to go to a place where a novus homo might at least be sure of a fair start among his fellows, they migrated to Rome. It is interesting to trace national pecu- liarities, and to mark the influence which women must have exercised in Etruscan society, as well as the grave and important nature of their education, from the curious incident which befel this migrat- ing pair at the Roman gate. An eagle brought 136 TARQU1NIA. them a mysterious message from the sky. Tanaquil, with the spirit of her ancestor Tarchon, immediately applied to the portent those rules of the discipline of Tages with which she had been imbued from her cradle, and assured her husband of future royalty. The prediction probably worked its own fulfilment, and in a few years the ambitious Lucumo was seated on the Roman throne as king Tarquinius. Splendour, civilisation, extended sway, and ty- ranny, seem to have marked this Tarquinian govern- ment of haughty aristocracy. The Romans, in time, ground under the oppression of a foreign dynasty, made an attempt to rid themselves of it ; or as Livy tells us, the descendants of holy king Numa and good king Ancus rose up and slew the royal Lucumo. But the attempt was abortive, for the throne was forthwith mounted by Servius Tullius, another Etruscan, intimately connected by education and alliance with the Tarquinian family. He, however, adopted a policy totally dissimilar to that of his predecessor, and in all things raised the condition of the people at the expense of the aris- tocracy ; so that, long after kings were expelled, the golden days of liberty under good king Servius were fondly contrasted by the Romans with the despotism oftheir republican government. But the Tarquinian family and aristocratic faction could not brook tins popular monarchy, and Servius was assassinated !<» make; way for one who swore, that if Tarquinius Priscus had smitten the people with rods, he would smite them with scorpions. Tarquin the TARQUINIA. 137 Proud restored all the pomp of his race, and reigned with all their power, until the Romans, after being galled by a long series of oppression, at length burst forth in vengeance upon an odious scene of tragedy, and the tyrant was hurled from his throne, and with his partisans banished for ever. Thus, according to the Roman version of the tale, an Etruscan grandee from Tarquinia settled in Rome, where he became king under the name of Lucius Tarquinius : and some of their historians add, that all the twelve cities of Etruria afterwards paid him homage, and acknowledged the superiority of him and of Rome, by investing him with the royal insignia, which they thenceforward retained for the Roman chief magistrates, and permitted to those illustrious citizens who were honoured with a triumph. The magnificence of these sovereign symbols strikes us, when compared with the sim- plicity of costume of the Grecian authorities about the same period, and of the Spartan kings. Among them are the jsomp of the lictors with their fasces, the ivory curule chair, the toga pre- texta, the diadem called Etruscan corona, which was a garland of oak leaves with jewelled acorns held over the head of the triumpher, the golden embroidered tunic, the ivory sceptre surmounted by an eagle, and the golden bulla, which afterwards became the common ornament of the Roman youth of senatorial and equestrian rank. But this sup- posed homage paid by all Etruria to the king of Rome seems to be impossible, for Etruria was at 138 TARQUINIA. that time in the very zenith of its prosperity and power. Yet still the vain tradition of some writers of Roman history (Dionysius for instance) may serve as a key to the truth. Tarquinia is the his- torical and traditional centre of Etruria, and was the bond of union to the state under a supreme head, a union which was founded by Tarchon, a Tarquinian, and here within the province the respective Lucumones of the different cities assem- bled to learn the sacred doctrines of Tages. It is highly probable that Tarquinia retained its supre- macy for many ages, and that its Lucumo was fre- quently elected chief or king of the whole Etruscan commonwealth; and it is no less probable that youth- ful Rome also belonged to this confederation, toge- ther with a portion of Latium, weakened at that time by the recent destruction of Alba. It is natural that Tarquinians of distinction may have lived at Rome, and we may, if we please, adhere to a belief in the personality of two Lucii Tarquinii, the Tar- quinian governors of Rome. Yet the suspicion is apt to suggest itself that the proper name of Lucius is neither more nor less than the Roman way of rendering the official title of Luciano, and that Tarquinius denotes the authority of the Tarquinians ; for it would be unique as a Roman family name, no Roman gems having ever taken its nonicn, but only its cognomen, from a country or city. According to this conjecture, Priscus and Superbus would be mere epithets descriptive of the commencement and intensity of the Tarquinian domination, of which the TARQUINIA. 139 two great Roman kings, thus deprived of their per- sonality, would be mere types and figures. But be this as it may, the period when these monarchs ruled, or of which their names are descriptive, is one of great historical importance, and may be traced with the utmost probability. Until then the Latine- Sabine city of the Roman Quirites was unimportant, but after being incorporated with the great Etruscan league and made its southern bulwark, it became a place of importance, adorned with aqueducts and temples, and fortified by ramparts (Tarquinius agger.) Under the Tarquinian rule the conquests of the Romans extended over the Sabine country to Collatia, Corniculum, Crustumerium, Nomentum, &c. ; and in their civil polity the strictest aristocracy was established, while their equestrian games and their reverence for the Delphic oracle were a natural consequence of their connexion with a city whose earliest annals tell of Tyrrhene-Pelasgic colonists, and which had in later times received Demaratus and his train from Corinth. But the supremacy of Tarquinia over Etruria was not always undisputed. The period of peace and splendour was followed by one of intestine commo- tions, when the army of Coeles Vibenna traversed the land. The invaluable sentence of the emperor Claudius, so long buried underground, and disco- vered in modern times, throws considerable light upon the history of ancient Etruria, and upon that of early Rome. It is recorded in the 11th book of the annals of Tacitus, that in the year of the 140 TARQUINIA. Christian era 48, the chief men of Gallia Comata presented a petition, that they and their countrymen might be received into the number of Roman citizens. Claudius himself did them the honour to advocate their cause before the senate, and, as a motive to grant their request, he gave the instances of strangers who had founded the most illustrious Roman races, and who had ruled with honour the Roman commonwealth. His own race, the Claudian, said he, came from Sabina, the Julian from Alba, the Porcian from Tusculum. It, however, appears, that Tacitus, in the account which he gives of the speech of Claudius, has omitted some of the most illustrious of the examples which were cited ; for foreigners were mentioned as having succeeded to native princes, Numa to Romulus, Tarquinius Priscus to Ancus Martius, and Servius Tullius to Tarquinius. In the year 1528, some workmen were digging near the church of St. Sebastian at Lyons, and found a brazen tablet upwards of five feet long and four feet broad, on which was engraved the imperial oration, which had thus been preserved by the gratitude of the Lyonese Gauls for the instruc- tion of remote posterity. I transcribe that portion of the inscription which bears upon the present matter — " Quondam reges hanc tenuerc urbem, nee tamen domesticis successoribus earn tradere conticit. Sujirrvenere alieni ct quidam externi, ut Numa llo- mulo suecesserit ex Sabbiis veniens, vicinus (///it/cm, sed tunc ewternus ; et Anco Martio, Priscus Tar- quinius propter temeratum sanguinem, quod patre TARQU1NIA. 141 Demarato Covin thio natus evat ut Tavquiniensi matve genevosa sed inopi, ut qua tali mavito necesse habuevit succumbeve. (Note the pride of the great Etruscan houses, who looked upon a polished aris- tocratic Greek as a mesalliance!) Cum domi vepel- levetuv a gevendis honovibus postquam Horn am mi- gvavit regnum adept us est. Hide quoque et jilio nepotive ejus (nam et hoc intev auctoves discvepatj insevtus Sevvius Tullius, si nostvos sequimuv captiva natus Ocvesia, si Tuscos, Coeli quondam Vibennce sodalis Jidelissimus, omnisque ejus casus comes. Postquam vavia fovtuna exactus, cum omnibus veli- quiis Cozliani exevcitus Etvuvia excessit. Montem Ccelium occupavit, et e duce suo Ccelio ita appellatuv. Mutatoque nomine (nam Tusce Mastavna ei nomen evat) appellatus est ut dixi, et vegnum summa cum veipubliccB utilitate obtinidt." " This city was formerly governed by kings, who were not always succeeded by natives, but some- times by strangers and even foreigners. Thus Numa succeeded Romulus, and was a stranger, though he came from the neighbouring Sabine country. Thus, after the traitorous death of Ancus Martius, Tarqui- nius Priscus was called to the crown, the son of Demaratus, a Corinthian by a Tarquinian mother of illustrious birth, but compelled by poverty to make an unequal alliance! Being excluded from the pos- sibility of distinguished preferment at home, he migrated to Rome, where he obtained the royal dignity. Between Tarquinius Priscus and his son or grandson (for authors are not agreed as to this) 142 TARQU1NIA. Superbus, Servius Tullius reigned. According to the Roman tradition, he was the son of Ocresia, a captive ; but if we are to believe the Etruscan ac- counts, he was the most faithful friend and compa- nion in every vicissitude of Cosies Vibenna. After suffering many changes of fortune, he quitted Etruria with the remnant of Vibenna's army, and coming to Rome, he occupied the Ccelian Hill, which he thus named in memory of his former general ; and changing his name, for in Etruria he had been called Mastarna, he was raised to the Roman throne, and as Servius Tullius governed the state with the happiest success.' 1 The important light which is thrown by these few words on a most important period of Etruscan history, makes us deeply regret, that the twenty books of the imperial author's work have not been preserved ; for doubtless, though they contained the suspicious statement of the victors regarding the vanquished, there must have been in them a vast store of curious matter. It is probable that the powerful Etruscan chief Coeles Vibenna, whom Claudius mentions, was a native of Volsinia, (Bolsena,) and led his army from thence ; because the peculiar goddess of Volsinia was Nortia, the Etruscan Fortuna, and she was in after times the patron divinity of Vibenna's lieute- nant, and friend Mastarna, after he mounted the Roman throne under the Dame of Servius Tullius, and named, in compliment to his old commander, one of tin; hills of the city, Coelian. With the TARQUINIA. 143 remnant of this army Mastarna obtained possession of Tarquinian Rome, and has been handed down to grateful posterity as a good and patriotic king, the foe of tyranny, and the vindicator of the liberties of the people. He must have been an Etruscan of a different political party from that of the Tarquinian Lucumones, to whose aristocracy he opposed the con- stitution of the census and of the Exercitus Urbanus. His government, which continued to be regarded by the Roman people with such affectionate regret, must have been overthrown by the Tarquinian party, who, as is denoted by the commonly received reign of Tarquinius Superbus, re-established their authority with redoubled severity. The final banish- ment of the Tarquins from Rome was in all proba- bility no isolated event, but was contemporary with the loss to Tarquinia of her supremacy over Etruria, which she never recovered, but continued thence- forward a city of reduced importance. And we may even hazard the conjecture, that he who broke the yoke of Tarquinia was no other than Lars Porsenna, king of Clusium, who, if he had been friendly to the Tarquinians, would certainly have re-established their sway in Rome, at the time when he was so completely master of the city as to compel a sur- render of every particle of iron, ploughshares excepted. Another proof of the contentions by which Etruria was at that time distracted, may be adduced from the foreign policy of the Clusian and Tarquinian parties. The Tarquinian ruler of Rome sought no permanent shelter in Etruria, but went 144 TARQUINIA. to Cumse, a powerful city of Magna Grecia, and made its tyrant Aristodemus his heir. Thus the Tarquinians appear to have been on a friendly foot- ing- with the Greeks, while the king of Clusium was at open war with them ; for while his son Aruns Porsenna attempted to found a sovereignty in La- tium, and for that purpose made war on Aricia, he was repelled and slain by a Cuman army under Aris- todemus. Of this event, the curious tomb which stands between Albano and Aricia is considered to be an Etruscan monument. Thus the early days of Rome, with which we are accustomed to associate so much interest, are in- separably connected with the brightest period of Etruscan history ; and the great capital of the world herself, as we shall afterwards see, was ori- ginally raised from her humble station ofaniud- walled bivouac of outlaws on the Palatine, to a populous, adorned, and fortified city, by the arms and the arts of those Etruscans whose memory she afterwards endeavoured to bury in unjust oblivion; even as a proud parvenu seeks to make the world forget the existence of the ancient but decayed family to whose influence he owed his first step on the ladder of prosperity, but in whom he sees an unpleasant remembrancer of his humbler fortunes. Our curiosity had been much excited about Tar- quinia by the account of its painted sepulchres which was given us by our amiable and accomplished friend Chevalier Kestner, the Hanoverian minister TARQUINIA. ] 45 at Rome, who a few years ago himself discovered several of the most beautiful of those which are now shown, in company with one whom we had well known and greatly esteemed, and whose untimely fate we had lamented — the Baron de Stackelberg. We also heard a most marvellous tale of a warrior who had been found in his tomb clothed in a full suit of armour, and crowned with gold, during an excavation which had been conducted some time ago by Signor Carlo Avolta Gonfaloniere of Corneto, in company with the late Lord Kinnaird. As Avolta eagerly gazed through a crevice above the door upon this mysterious chief of the ancient world, he saw the body agitated with a sort of trembling, heaving motion, (which lasted a few minutes,) and then quickly disappear, dissolved by contact with the air ; and when at length he penetrated into the sepulchre, all that he found on the stone couch of the Lucumo was a handful of dust, a few fragments of his armour, his sword, and his golden crown. Chevalier Kestner kindly fur- nished us with letters to this enthusiastic and veteran lover of antiquity, of whose polite atten- tion and desire to communicate whatever he thought might interest us, it is impossible to express too high a sense. Our journey from Rome to Civita Vecchia would have been tiresome and ugly, but for the delightful day and the common interest which we all took in the antiquities that are to be found upon the way. There was first Monterone, close to where we baited H 146 TARQUINIA. the horses; then ancient Agylla, now Cervetri, known from the large white palace of Prince Ruspoli, which is seen in the distance, and lies within its walls; and lastly, the fortress of San Severa, a few miles further on, upon the sea-coast, which was the ancient Pyrgi or Pyrgos, so called from a Greek word, signify, ing " towers," because it was flanked with tower s towards the sea. This, though now a small and bleak-looking fort in a most dreary country, was once the far-famed port of Agylla, full of war and merchantmen, terrible to her enemies, respected by her friends, and carrying on an extensive com- merce with Carthage and Phoenicia, Greece and Egypt. Twice from hence a fleet went out, bear- ing treasures and offerings to Delphi ; here upon the sands were martial games carried on — here stood the renowned and wealthy temple of Elytia — and here, at times, was the residence of the kings of Agylla. It was a favourite retreat of the Roman grandees during the first age of the empire ; and was founded, according to Strabo, long before the Trojan war, keeping up its consequence until after the fall of Veii. Its site is determined by Strabo, who mentions it as situated between Ostia and Cossa, upon the sea-coast, one hundred and eighty stadia, or twenty-two miles, from Gravisca ; and two hundred and sixty stadia, or thirty-two miles, from Ostia. Now as both the port of Ostia and that of Gravisca, at the mouth of the Mignonc, are well known, it is easy to fix the position of Pyrgi. Gravisca was the port of Tarquinia, but TARQUIN1A. 147 I have not heard of any excavations there, and it is probable that her wealthy dead were all buried at Tarquinia. Let it here be observed, that as I write for the ignorant and pleasure-loving traveller, and not for the learned and antiquarian, I do not stop to prove my positions, nor to tell how, in my own mind, I became convinced of the various facts I assert. But if any one wishes to know my sources of authority beside the classics, they have principally been Canino's work on Caere, Micali's History of Italy, and MUller's Etriisker ; but better and fuller than them all, the Archseological Society of Rome, to which every new discovery is made known, and whose information is, therefore, always likely to be the freest from theory, and the nearest to truth. At St. Severa, all that now remains of ancient days is some fragments of old wall which belonged to the great temple of Elytia, and the buildings lately brought to light by the Duchess of Sermoneta. The port was situated on the eastern side of the present tower, and the forum in which the games were held lay between it and the road. There was also a large market-place or piazza, as the Italians call it, for exchange and merchandise. Dionysius tells us that Pyrgi had an arsenal and a large square, where the merchants met for traffic, near the port, and where all the goods brought by sea were deposited. It is extremely likely that they had a wharf, and (from ancient descriptions) custom-houses and warehouses, just as we have. h 2 148 TARQUINIA. Its great prosperity began as soon as the Siculi, a barbarous but native people, had been fairly driven out of Italy into the island which bears their name, three generations before the siege of Troy; and its fortunes were at the highest during the reign of Tullus Hostilius, when much treasure and many ornaments were added to that glory of their country, the great temple of Elytia. Pyrgi was in this age a many towered and redoubtable port, the earliest and best known to the Greeks of any in Italy ; and some writers have even supposed that from it the lords of Italy were called Tyrrheni, or the tower-building people. After the conquest of the Siculi, the Agyllans sent from Pyrgi a treasure or thank-offering to Delphi. This is men- tioned by Strabo, and repeated with confirmations by Pliny ; and it was of such high antiquity, that the record of gifts to Delphi, seen by Pausanias, did not go back so far. From this time the navy of Pyrgi was renowned among the Greeks as be- longing to pious, brave, and honest men, who adored the gods and hated piracy, which indeed they seized every occasion to keep under, and were the guardians of the sea along this part of the Tyrrhene coast. The men of Pyrgi are mentioned in the tenth book of the iEneid as having assisted TEneas when he was at war with Mezentius, the cruel Tarquinian tyrant, who had conquered Agylla or Caere. Pyrgi, therefore, was considerable enough in those days to maintain its own liberty against a very able and conquering chief, and she doubtless TARQUINIA. 149 assisted Caere soon after to throw off his odious yoke. In the expedition which the Carthaginians and Etruscans made together to dislodge the Phocians from the town of Alalia in Corsica, a.r. 214, whence they would have ravaged the whole island, the ships of Pyrgi had by far the principal share, and afterwards they stoned all the prisoners whom they brought home. It is probable that the hatred which caused this violent proceeding also prompted them to leave the bodies uninterred, the consequence of which was a dreadful pestilence. The legend says, that every one passing the Phocians who were stoned, became lame, mutilated, and apo- plectic, so that in great trouble the Agyllans sent a second time a solemn embassy to Delphi, accom- panied with rich gifts, to inquire what they should do to avert the plague ? The oracle desired them to perform a grand funeral for these their enemies, and to celebrate for them every year games, par- ticularly races of naked men on horseback, which was accordingly done; the bodies were removed, the air was purified by incense and perfumes, the art of making which was here eminently understood, and the plague ceased. These games lasted at least one hundred and fifty years, and were in existence in the time of Herodotus. Again, we hear of Pyrgi in the days when Va- lerius and Manlius were consuls of Rome, a.r. 401, and when Dionysius, tyrant of Syracuse, took it into his head to supply his treasury by robbing the rich and magnificent temple of Elytia. I do not reraein- 150 TARQUINIA. ber where I have read an account of this temple, bat it was the largest, the finest, and the richest in all Etruria, and particularly sacred amongst her tribes. Diodorus says, that Dionysius, finding his money short, equipped sixty triremes under pre- tence of cruising and destroying pirates in the Tyr- rhene sea, but in reality with a view to sack a mag- nificent temple, which was held in great veneration at Pyrgi, the Port of Agylla. He arrived in the harbour at night, and having disposed his men in order, he commenced an attack upon the astonished town at break of day. It was noted that but few troops were there at this time to resist him; a notice which seems as if some kind of standing army were kept up along the coast, otherwise we should rather wonder at there being any resistance. He soon made himself master of the town, and spoiled the temple of treasure to the value of more than a thou- -mid talents. The men of Agylla came in haste to the rescue, but Dionysius defeated them, made many prisoners, and devastated the country : he then re- turned to Syracuse with a booty in gold of five hundred talents, besides the other large spoils that he had taken. This is told us by Diodorus Siculus, and by Aristotle. An able modern writer remarks, " This circumstance, whilst it shows us the great wealth which the men of Agylla or Caere had acquired in remote ages, BO as to be able to adorn their temple with such riches, shows us also the State <>!' weakness to which they were reduced in the days of the Roman republic, when they were TARQUINIA. 151 not powerful enough to oppose with success the troops brought by Dionysius, (which could not be very numerous,) nor to prevent his ravaging their lands." To me it merely proves what havoc may at any time be made in a country, when surprised by an enemy, without any regular army kept up to defend it. The destruction thus made in the land would be much felt, and a matter of great lamen- tation in those days ; for though now little better than a desolate moor, it was then covered with vineyards, and famous for its wine. Fire would destroy the vineyards in a few hours, without sup- posing much hard fighting on either side, or any long-continued depredation. It was probably an affair that, from first to last, did not continue above eight-and-forty hours ; a thing rendered still more likely when we consider the immense advantage which Dionysius had at first, in having obtained immediate possession of the towered and walled city. Every Etruscan city was surrounded by walls, but Pyrgi was particularly celebrated by the Greeks on account of them, having them perhaps of peculiar beauty, or of extraordinary height, or strengthened by an unusual number of towers ; and while they called seaports in general, X^^i/, or port merely, they called Pyrgi eiriveiov, or em- porium for ships of magnitude, with arsenal and piazza. Servius says that Pyrgi was a powerful fort in the days when the Etruscans exercised piracy in those seas, that is, at the period when they fought 152 TARQUIN1A. against Mezentius, and, according to Virgil, assisted ^Eneas. Pyrgi at that time was not reckoned as belonging to the Etruscans, but it joined their con- federacy along with Caere immediately afterwards. The goddess Elytia is called Leucothoe by the Greeks, and Mater Matuta by the Romans. She was a maritime divinity, and no slaves were ever permitted to enter her temple. She was the nurse of Bacchus, and was supplicated in behalf of all re- lations except a man's own children, because, when yet a mortal, she had been most unfortunate in having lost all of hers. Nothing is known of the later history of Pyrgi separate from that of Caere, excepting that, after the fall of its parent city, it dwindled into a Roman fort, and then rose to be the site of Roman villas, and a bathing place. The Itinerary of Rutilius contains this verse, descriptive of it in his day : — "Alsia pradegitur tellus : Pyrgique reccdunt, Nunc vilhe granites, oppida parva prius, Jam Cferetanos dcmonstrat navita fines, JEvo deposuit nomen Ajrylla vetus." Traces still remain of the road which led from Pyrgi to Agylla, now called Cervetri. As it is con- structed in the Roman manner, it is most probably the ancient road restored by the Romans. It passes by a few of the very wonderful and most ancient se- pulchres of Agylla, in the tumulus form, but it never had any Roman tombs constructed by its side, and it entered Agylla by the north or prin- TARQUIN1A. 153 cipal gate. The via Campana went along the sea- coast from Pyrgi to Alciam, and the via Aurelia ran between Pyrgi and Agylla, leading from Rome to Centum Cellee, or Civita Vecchia, along which we were going. We changed horses at Civita Vecchia without en- tering the town, to escape a troublesome searching of luggage ; and past experience having taught us to avoid the discomfort of the inns there, we resolved to go in one day from Rome to Corneto, and there to establish our head-quarters at a clean and well- kept country inn, where some of our party had lived during a former excursion to Tarquinia. I cannot, however, pass Civita Vecchia without making ho- nourable mention of the shop of Signor Pucci, from whom we purchased one of the most curious vases in our collection, which had been a prize of a victor in the horse-race, representing on one side his ar- rival at the goal among the judges of the race, and on the other a sharp contest between Hercules and Mercury for the honours of the Palaestra, allegorical of strength and skill striving for the mastery. Beyond Civita Vecchia there are no post-horses, though it is probable that there will be when the Grand Duke of Tuscany finishes a magnificent highway, which he is making through the Ma rem ma to lead from Florence to Rome. The road to Cor- neto is good however, and very pretty, having the Mediterranean, with several islands and headlands, on one side, and at some distance on the other a range of very picturesque mountains, famous for h 5 154 TARQUIN1A. alum mines, and the chosen retreat of wild boars. High upon one of these hills stands a considerable village, called, I think, " Alumina," which is a great resort of the Roman gentry in summer, from the purity of the air, and a certain mineral water which is said to be very beneficial; and all this neigh- bourhood is visited from time to time during the winter by parties of foreigners, who come to shoot the wild boar, and who are generally most hospi- tably received by the land agents and farmers of the country. At certain seasons it is densely peopled by bands of peasants, who come from a great dis- tance to dig and sow, or, it may be, to reap the land, and when their labours are over, return home. Such is the migration that, during the dead or not work- ing time of the year, according to Signor Avolta, the town of Corneto contains nine thousand inhabit- ants, and, during the time for working the land, not more than four. One of our party, who had been on these boar-hunting excursions, told me that the farmer with whom he was quartered had with him a band of thirty shepherds, who slept round the court- yard, after the manner of the ancient Tuscans, and whose employment all day was milking and tending the Hocks, and making cheeses and ricotta (a sort of curd) from the milk of goats and ewes, and that their food never was anything else, morning, noon, and night, all the year round, but this same ricotta, excepting twice a week, when they lasted upon meal porridge, or polenta and lentils. JJe said that they were Umbrians, TARQUINIA. 155 and kept themselves most clannishly distinct from all the other peasants, having a pride in their an- cient country, which has never changed its name from the earliest records; and also in their descent, a thing much prized hy all classes in Italy. He de- scribed them as tall, powerful, and handsome, such figures as we see depicted in the ancient tombs ; and men of that proud and high stamp of character, who are above robbery, cruelty, and meanness. I knew that our companion was neither loose in his asser- tions, nor hasty in his conclusions ; and I knew that he had had the means of ascertaining pretty fairly the character of these men, from his residence among them, his habits of observation, and his fluent Italian ; but I did greatly doubt the accuracy of this constant feeding on ricotta, and endeavoured to give it an explanation in my own mind, but I afterwards found what he told me to be strictly and literally true, and it has probably been the food of central and southern Italy ever since her history was written, and her soil inhabited, being the simplest and cheapest food I ever heard of, and most nutritive, if we may judge from the appear- ance and strength of those who feed upon it. Some- thing of the kind I have seen in the highlands of Scotland, but by no means so light, or so palatable as what the people make in Italy. We travelled on by many scattered woods of the cork oak, which I in ignorance mistook for stunted ilex, and went on ruminating about the malaria, which now infests this part of the country, blasting alike man and 156 TARQUINIA. tree, until awakened from my dream by the in- formation of one of our more intelligent com- panions, who related to us the laws under which the cork is cut, and the amount of profit yearly made of it by the papal government. At length we greeted the city of Corneto, walled and towered, upon a considerable height, command- ing an extensive view, and overlooking the sea. There is a beautiful walk round the town, beneath the walls, which reminded me much of Stirling- Castle in Scotland, and the city has five gates, the one by which we entered being very narrow. It contains an old castle, a large town- house, two cathedrals, a bishop's palace, and several churches, all well worth visiting, and many of them adorned with the pillars, marbles, and sculptures of old Tarquinia, relics, perhaps, of ancient fanes and of a picturesque, though detestable idolatry. I know nothing that proves more strongly than the idolatry of the heathen, how "lo the pure all things arc pure, and to the froward all things are froward." For whilst the elegant and classical mind can find in their superstitions the most elevating allegories, the vulgar certainly not only believed that the dumb idol could hear, see, think, feel, and work miracles, but that the vilest, the impurcst, and above all, the fiercest passions of our nature, were godlike and divine. I believe it would advance Christianity more than many a sermon, if ( Ihristians, when gazing on these things with an earnest pity, would ask themselves," J low do I, or how do my people, differ TARQUINIA. 157 from those prosperous and magnificent pagans ? Do we deify nature, human works, and human pas- sions? or are we amongst the few who keep the law, and while we render unto " Caesar the things which are Caesar's," " render unto God the things which are God's?" These thoughts were, I believe, suggested by seeing monuments of paganism used in constructing and beautifying christian churches. The old cathedral of Corneto, with its high tower, has been surmounted by four Tarquinian horses, of which one is all that now remains, the others having been struck down by lightning, which in- deed has for the present seriously injured the church, and caused it to be abandoned. It is a very old building, attributed to the eighth or ninth century, adorned with many exquisite specimens of early Gothic, and with a cupola of such fine proportions, that Bramante is said to have taken it as the model of that of St. Peter's at Rome. Corneto is called the " Queen of the Maremma," and the " brightest jewel in the Pope's crown," because, in all the wars between the Guelphs and Ghibelines, it uniformly took the papal side, and, in reward of its fidelity, a member of the sacred college is always a Cornetan. It first became an episcopal see after the death of the fourth Bishop of Tarquinia, when the progressively rising suburb took the place of the already fallen town. Cardinal Fesch was the bountiful protector of a convent of nuns here, celebrated for their beautiful embroidery, and his body and that of Madame 158 TARQUIN1A. Letitia his sister, the mother of Napoleon, now lie side by side in the plain little chapel of these poor nuns. The cardinal, with his great wealth, founded a church at Ajaccio in Corsica, and when it is completed, the two bodies will be re- moved thither, and deposited in his own vault. Corsica was first colonized by the Etruscans, and I smiled, as the thought entered my head, that per- haps that terror of Europe, stern despot, and able lawgiver, Napoleon Bonaparte, the impress of whose power was written in characters of blood and fire even here, might, in the chances of fate, be descended from some long-forgotten sire of old Tarquinia. That this family was originally Tuscan, and that some branches of it are still existing in Tuscany, does not render the idea less probable. We entered Corneto at exactly half past twenty- three o'clock, a method of counting strictly adhered to throughout the Roman States, greatly to the puzzle of an English brain, but which the Gon- faloniere assured me was infinitely preferable to the English method, and also more exact, for every day when the sun sets you know what o'clock it is, viz. exactly twenty-four ; whereas in England no one ever knows without trouble at what hour " the orb of day bathes his red forehead in the main." The people of the Roman States now, are much disgusted at the idea of the sun setting every day ai a different hour. On arriving, we eagerly sought out the com- fortable little inn where we intended to establish TARQUINIA. 159 ourselves. But to our dismay we found that it was full, so we were obliged to turn to a magnificent baronial pile of the middle ages, called the Palazzaccio, which looked doubly imposing in the dusky twilight ; and driving under its ample arched gateway, we halted in its courts, surrounded by various stories of Saracenic looking galleries, and loudly called for Padrone and Camerieri. No one for some time appeared, until at length a squalid wretch peeped from behind a pillar, and was fol- lowed by the Padrone, a man whose unprepossess- ing exterior was not improved by intoxication, a rare instance of that vice in Italy. He hic- cupped a welcome, and proceeded to usher us up a broad flight of marble steps, across Gothic corri- dors, into one or two dingy chambers, from the beds of which he had evidently a moment before dislodged a band of wagoners. In despair at this unpromising reception, we returned to the shelter of our carriage in the court, while one of our party desired to be conducted to the Gonfaloniere Carlo Avolta, with whom he had formerly been ac- quainted. A great municipal meeting had just been held at the Hotel de Ville, where this worthy magistrate was still to be found. His greeting was a cordial embrace, and a prompt offer of assistance ; and hastening to the carriage, he conducted us to a comfortable private house, where some of our party procured bedrooms, while the rest were invited to revisit the little inn where we had at first been refused admission, but from whence the already 160 TARQUINIA. arrived guests were in some unaccountable manner made to vanish, and where we were supplied with as many rooms as we required. After this little episode concerning the realities of life, we again fell into our dreams and speculations about ancient Etruria, and were glad to be guided as to the method of following them out by the enthusiasm and kindness of Carlo Avolta, in whom centres the rarest union of essential requisites which a cicerone can possess ; long experience, a warm imagination, unwearied energy of mind and activity of body, the most perfect cordiality of disposition, and polite and gentlemanly attention. He left us to repose after the fatigues of the day and the scramble of the night, and arranged for us a plan of sight- seeing during the next few days, which enabled us to visit thoroughly the sites of Tarquinia, Tuscania, and Vulci. When Etruria was finally reduced under the yoke of the Roman commonwealth, Tarquinia shared the fate of Vulci, Cfere, and other great cities, and, stript of independence, its importance soon dwindled away. Its ancient Lucumones made way for the magistrates of the lloinan municipia, which raised its head over the ruins of the once mighty Etruscan capital, and the ancient lords of the soil were dis- lodged from their possessions, or even became the serfs of their upstart successors. How long Tar- quinia existed in this fallen state is a matter of doubt. That it continued to be a place of some importance after the establishment of Christianity, is proved TARQUINIA. 161 from the names of its bishops, who appear on record as Episcopi Tarquinienses ; and we have no certain knowledge of the time when it ceased to be inha- bited, and fully shared the fate of Nineveh, Babylon, and Tyre ; cities with which, during the long course of its prosperity, it contemporaneously flourished. But after it was reduced under the Romans, its existence must have been a mere lingering; on the mouth of its tomb. According to historical notices upon which we can depend, Corneto was then Cortnessa, a suburb and fortified castle belong- ing to the capital, and no doubt, as the metropolis sank into decay, the suburb rose into importance, peopled by an Etruscan race, the wreck of the ancient inhabitants of Tarquinia, who in this ob- scurity sought shelter from the upstart insolence of the Roman municipia. Time at length levels all things, and the Romans found the force of this truth when Goth and Greek disputed the possession of their own capital. During the convulsions of that miserable period of barbarous violence, Roman Tarquinia fell, and found no chronicler to record its destruction. Those who escaped the sword, and its probable accompaniments of fire and famine, joined themselves to the Etruscan colony which had been silently making a progressive increase. The Tarquinian bishop carried his pastoral staff a few miles onwards, and the proud capital of Etruria ceased even to be the shadow of a shade. All was gone, Tarquinian glory, Roman civic consequence, and christian metropolitan dignity, and thence- 162 TARQUINIA. forward nothing remained but the ruins which crowned the rocky ridge of the steep hill, and formed a touching object of picturesque beauty and melancholy association to the Cornetans. Ere long this too vanished, the ruins dwindled to sub- structions, and these also disappeared from their rocky foundations, which, except to a very narrow examiner, are alone left to tell the tale of the magnificent load they once bore. And it is probable that this tale would long ere now have become as much the subject of learned doubt as that of Veii, and that we should have had some transplanting the Etruscan capital hither, and others thither, while others again began to dispute whether such a place had ever existed ; did not the voice of truth make itself to be heard from the tomb, and direct us to seek for departed grandeur in the long and narrow house to which all living, whether glorious or base, are so rapidly tending. Cardinal Garainpi, the Bishop of Corneto and Monte Fiascone, says, that in his time, a. d. 1780', the hill called Turchina, or Tarquinia, was an im- mense plain entirely covered with ruins, the remains of a distinguished city which had bishops of its own, until the invasion of the Saracens in the seventh, eighth, or ninth century ! ! He says that Tarquinia is supposed to have been destroyed by the Saracens, and that the opposite hill of much more difficult access, near Corneto, then began to he peopled. It was first called Corgnitum, perhaps from the quantity of pebbles or corgnali abounding TARQUINIA. 163 on it. The population of this place he believes to have subdued Tarquinia, until it became the terri- tory of the Cornetani, who subdued what was left of the ancient city in a. d. 1307. A diligent antiquary might arrive at more certain history from records still remaining in Corneto. There are inscriptions in the old cathedral which give the date of the change of bishops, but which I did not copy, and which the cardinal appears never to have consulted. His testimony is valuable for what he saw himself, and for what was told him by those to whom he applied, but he appears to have been no antiquary, and but little of a scholar. In ancient Tarquinia, the city of the living- covered the rocky ridge of one steep hill, while the necropolis, or city of the dead, crowned the summit of an opposite hill, separated from the former by a wide and deep valley, and extending over a broad table land which overlooks the sea, and which, though now distant several miles, probably in these early times covered a considerable portion of the present flat coast. Modern Corneto, then probably an outwork or castle attached to the city, occupies a point which commands a fine view of both, from which it is equidistant about two miles. The ac- companying map or sketch may be the best way of explaining their relative position, which is of some importance with a view to a right understand- ing of the subject. The day after our arrival at Corneto we devoted to the tombs of Tarquinia, and we drove to the 164 TARQUINIA. distance of about three miles from the town, until we found ourselves in the midst of a dreary moor now called Monterozzi, which is all that remains above ground of the once superb necropolis or burying-ground. It is extremely rugged and un- even, and every now and then we saw traces of some little mounds, and, still more frequently, holes on the surface like the mouths of pits, sometimes openings like doors down into the ground, and oc- casionally flights of steps half concealed. We found only one architectural remnant above ground, a low round tower, which in shape and circumference reminded us of the tomb of Cecilia Metella on the Via Appia, but which had probably never risen much above its present height, but had been sur- mounted by a conical mound of earth, according to the common Etruscan fashion. We entered by a door below the present level of the ground, and found ourselves in a vault which had been the receptacle of the dead. We visited some other less perfect specimens of the same style, and it is probable that this was the prevailing form of Etruscan monuments in general, but that they varied in size according to whether they were in- tended to receive a single body, a private family, the head of a great race with its numerous branches, or a mighty ruler of the land, with his ministers and followers, such as the immense and once splendid tomb at Caere, of which the Regulini Gallassi cells formed a part. The one which we are now con- sidering must have been of very moderate size, and TARQUINIA. 165 contained few if more than one body ; but it is in- teresting from its superior state of preservation. We saw the substructions of others, with several entrances which had been the doors of distinct tombs. An Etruscan necropolis must have had a striking effect, crowded with such monumental mounds, crowned with lions or sphynxes, and based upon foundations of solid masonry, with doors all round, and having cope-stones adorned with lions, sphynxes, and griffins. In the major part of these monuments, by which the cemeteries of the Etruscan cities were filled, it is probable that the mounds were artificial, and raised after the surrounding wall had been built. But in the case of large tumuli, such as that which con- tained the Lucumo at Agylla, who must have been great as Mezentius himself, or that nameless one at what is now called Monterone, at the door of which the Duchess of Sermoneta was in vain attempting to knock, not having even found it when we were there, it is evident that advantage had been taken of a natural hillock, which was pared down and trimmed into right conical shape and sepulchral fashion, and surrounded with a massive wall, by way of base, which contained the doors into the various funereal chambers. The grandee in whose honour all this preparation had been made, reposed like a Pharaoh in a pyramid in the centre part of the hillock ; and it is a point which I have heard disputed, whether his grave was anterior or pos- terior to those below. It was at all events frequently 166 TARQUINIA. the intention to keep secret the resting-place of the most illustrious dead, as the duchess has found to her cost ; for while the inferior tombs round the base were easily discovered, she was obliged to slice down the entire hillock in order to find the mysterious central chamber, and as yet, eight months since, in vain. To my mind, at this time, the idea of the chief tomb being anterior was ridiculous, and not very unlike the supposition of the primo piano of a house being anterior to the base; but I mention it, not only because I have since entirely changed my views, but because I then heard it, maintained by men of learning and experience, whose opinions are always entitled to respect. Signor Carlo Avolta informed us that the necro- polis of Tarquinia was computed to extend over sixteen square miles, and that judging from the two thousand tombs which had of late years been opened, their number in all could not be less than two millions ! What an extraordinary idea this gives of the dense population of ancient Etruria ! for though the necropolis of Tarquinia may have been a favourite spot for family sepulchres, even beyond the pale of its own immediate citizenship, it is sur- rounded on all sides by cemeteries scarcely inferior in extent to itself, Tuscan ia and Vnlci and Mon- talto, without naming Caste! d'Asso, which we shall afterwards describe as having probably been the Westminster Abbey of Central Etruria. Truly, the voice from the dead, which these princes and TARQUINIA. 167 Lucumones of the early world send forth, tells us great things of their potent sway over a numerous people, and leads us to contrast the desolation and barbarism of imperial, and still more of papal Italy, with the flourishing state of things which must have existed there when the world was young. We now often see a few squalid emaciated indivi- duals, half scared away by pestilential air, and half starved with insufficient food, straggling over the barren waste, whose only trace of real habitation is to be found in the records of its former inhabitants, dead three thousand years ago. This was dreadfully the case at Psestuni, but in a measure it is true of every place where the malaria prevails. The ancient inhabitants must have been a populous, wealthy, and, to judge from their paintings, a merry and somewhat epicurean race, who knew how to make the most of the good things which the home of their fathers produced, before the Roman sword brought with it the malaria, and sent, conscriptions and pes- tilence to depopulate the land. These were bright and sunny days in old Etruria, when every man sat under his own vine, and under his own fig-tree, when Tages taught how to read fortunes from the swoop of an eagle's wing, and when Tarchon pre- sided on the magisterial bench. Of the great number of tombs which have of late years been excavated in this immense and rabbit warren-like necropolis, only nine have been preserved and committed to the charge of a custode for the in- spection of the curious. Few of the others discovered 168 TARQUINIA. in our day have been remarkable for paintings, or have differed from the usual character of tombs, but were important from their contents only, and there- fore, when rifled, have been filled up, or left to neg- lect. It is worthy of notice, that those which contained the most valuable materials, such as painted vases of high price, and ornaments of gold or of bronze, did not seem to be of the very highest order in other respects, and were not painted ; and that the beautifully decorated tombs which unques- tionably belonged to the persons of most exalted rank were invariably empty, having been long since the prey of the spoiler. Thus, the lowly cottage stands, while the high towers fall. Tradition con- tinued to mark the graves of the illustrious Lucu- mones, which were visited for the sake of plunder when the day of spoliation came, while those which were less known as depositories of precious contents have come clown unscathed even to our time. But it is not easy to answer the question, when was this season of spoliation ? Has every now and then, during past ages, a spirit of inquiry arisen on these subjects like the one which now prevails, and have the bronze, and the gold, and the terra cotta stores been the prize of this curiosity ? This is very im- probable at Tarquinia, except at chance times, and on a very small scale, when a proprietor or a pea- sant happened to light upon some object of value in the course of his labours. Were they, then, pillaged by the greedy, usurping Romans during the latter end of the republic, when Etruria was finally TARQUINIA. 169 enslaved ? This is also improbable, for the Roman greed of gain, and unfeeling regard lessness of the rights of others, would in this case be counteracted by superstition, which threatened the violator of the sepulchre with punishment from the avenging infer- nal deities, and by the resistance which such an act would certainly have excited amongst the people. Tarquinia, though indeed subdued and at times in- sulted, counted, to the last, consuls and senators of Rome amongst her native chiefs. Were these tombs then emptied of their treasures in later times after the conversion of the empire to Christianity — when cupidity was relieved from the restraints of consci- ence, and when the tomb of the heathen claimed no tender respect as a place of holy rest ? This is much more probable, and would point out the reigns of Theodosius or Valentinian as being about the time when it is likely that the most valuable tombs of Tarquinia, and indeed of Etruria, were visited and plundered. It is, moreover, matter of history, that this was the case in the mass, whatever may have been the date of opening any one grave in particular. I may mention another theory, which, if it does not convince me, I am yet disposed to receive with some respect, as it is that of the veteran Avolta, viz. that the most precious of the Tarquinian tombs were rifled neither by conquering Romans nor by rapacious Christians, but by the hands of Etruscans them- selves, at a time not long subsequent to their erec- tion. He thinks that that the architects who made the tombs preserved the secret of their entrance, which i 170 TARQUINIA. was afterwards used by themselves, or handed down in their families, offering a tempting gratifica- tion to greed, or preventive of poverty. This opinion, I confess, appeared very fanciful ; for this species of pillage could not, without detection, have been carried on in the wholesale way, which alone would account for the emptiness of so many recepta- cles of the dead, besides that the sacredness of the last resting-place was one of the deepest feelings cherished in the breast of every old Italian. Travelling over this immense necropolis on foot, and being in danger at every step of tumbling into some pitfall looking grave, we arrived at length at the top of a flight of twenty steps which led to a tomb called, from its aspect in the part of the necro- polis where it is situated, " GROTTA DEL MARE." The doors of this and of the other tombs have the same general character. They are not built of stone, but consist of one or two large slabs cut out of the tufo, and stand directly opposite the flight of steps anciently formed in the rock, which led to them from the upper level. This tomb consists of two small chambers, about fifteen or sixteen feet long and ten wide, with a door ornamented with lines of red, blue, and yellow, and over the door are two figures of leopards. The inner chamber has a vaulted roof divided by a beam, and is diced on each side in white, red, and blue. The colours are in native ochres ; and so indeed are all the paintings in all the tombs which are not in fresco. Both the cham- TARQUINTA. 171 bersof this tomb have a broad stone ledge all round them, on which rested the sarcophagi, or it may be (if it is one of the most ancient tombs) the dead body itself, clad in armour, or dressed in robes of cere- mony. The fashion seems to have been universal in Etruria, that the corpses should be deposited in a vault, most anciently perhaps without a coffin ; but in general in a stone or terra cotta coffin, with a lid of the same material, or of baked clay, surmounted by an image of the deceased. In this part of Etruria, it is very rare to find a burnt body, but further north, about Chiusi, Cortona, and Volterra, bodies, both buried and burnt, are constantly found in the same tomb, so that both modes of disposing of them must have existed contemporaneously, unless we suppose these different modes to mark differences of date in the generations of the family occupying the tomb, the earlier ones being buried whole, and the later ones burnt. The reason of doubt rests chiefly upon the very ancient urns, found in curule chairs within the territory of Chiusi, which prove that per- sons of curule rank were burnt in very remote times. Perhaps it was the mode of sepulture amongst the Umbri. We quitted this tomb and again traversed a portion of the great necropolis, teeming like a rabbit warren with holes and burrows ; but, before describing the other painted tombs, I wish to apologize for the many deficiencies in the account of them which occasionally occur. When upon the spot, I had not the remotest idea of making this tour public, and in i 2 172 TARQL'INIA. consequence I only noted such things as strike tra- vellers in general, and when after our return home I was induced to make these daily ■perishing and most interesting tombs better known to my countrymen, then, indeed, I was grieved to find how little I had studiously remarked, and how much I had forgotten. Those who honour this work by taking it as a guide, will, I hope, excuse the mistakes that may occur as to position, size, or minute items of decoration. They do not affect the general character of the tombs, and will, I hope, be found few and unimportant. The next tomb which we visited was discovered in 1827, and is called " GROTTA DELLA BIGA," on account of the principal subject represented on its walls, which is chariot races. It is cut out of the tufo, and has a door similar to the Grotta del Mare. It is a square chamber of about sixteen or seventeen feet in dimension ; the roof is vaulted, with a painted beam across it, and diced in red, white, blue, and black, ornamented with wreaths of Bacchic ivy. Over the door are represented two leopards and two geese, both of which animals are sacred to Bacchus,* the president of the funeral feasts. The walls are divided into two compartments, an under and upper one, on which are painted different classes of sub- jects. To the right, of the door, in the lower part, ;n e represented three dancers and four dancing girls, • The learned antiquarians in Italy call this god Bacchus, but it always appeared to me a most inappropriate name, lie is the great god of departed spirits, the same as Osiris of the Egyptians, and often called by the Etruscans themselves Tina. TARQUINIA. 173 who are animated by the sound of the double flute, which one of them plays. The dancers are clothed in a short light tunic, which leaves free play to their limbs, and the ladies' dress is at once airy and elegant, being a rich but slight robe, with a beauti- ful border embroidered in stars, and agitated to and fro by their rapid and fantastic movements. They have ornamented sandals on their feet, and chaplets hanging from their necks, while the men are bare headed and barefooted. Their feet are twinkling about in rapid motion, and their extended hands beat time, in the still scarcely obsolete Italian fashion, as an accompaniment. Between each dancer stands a tree of olive or myrtle, sacred to the dead. In the upper compartment all is bustle and prepara- tion for a chariot race. The Circensian games are here in full activity. There are five chariots, some already starting, guided by their charioteers, and some in the act of being yoked. At the end is the stand for the spectators, with the velarium or awning folded back, to be used if necessary, and having two stories, the one above for the more noble and distinguished spectators, the ladies being dressed in tunic and cloak, and with head-dresses, the men in mantle without tunic ; and the one below for com- pany of inferior note, the people, or plebs. On the side of the wall opposite the entrance, the under compartment represents the funeral banquet, with three couches, and on each a man and a woman lean- ing on rich cushions ; the elegant dresses and highly ornamented furniture indicate the rank and wealth 174 TARQU1NIA. of the deceased. All are crowned with myrtle. Two are raising the goblet to their lips, while the rest are about to eat eggs, with which the Etruscans used to commence their repasts. There is the usual accompaniment of a flute-player, and there are two youthful attendants, the one with a myrtle branch, and the other with a goblet. Five ducks, an animal sacred to Bacchus, are waiting at the foot of the table for the crumbs. In the upper compartment there is a continuation of the stands which we have described on the other wall ; but here, instead of chariot races, the spectators are entertained with various gymnas- tic exercises and games, such as wrestling, playing with the cestus, leaping, equestrian tours de force, &c. Above these compartments, there is a third sub- ject just beneath the vault of the roof, viz. a bracket surmounted by a large vase, on each side of which stand two women with dishevelled hair, one hold- ins; a small vase and the other a sacrificial instru- ment, as if about to pour out a libation. On each side of these is stretched a man leaning on double cushions, the one bearded and crowned with myrtle, the other beardless and crowned with olive. On the wall, to the left of the entrance, the under com- partment represents a group of dancers, and the upper, gymnastic sports, such as boxing, throwing quoits, hurling the lance, and foot-races, all similar to those which have been already described on the other side. In this, as in the other painted tombs, besides the real door, there were painted doors on the sides, and at the upper end, opposite the en- TARQUINIA. 175 trance ; and these were of a red colour, and studded with white spots, not unlike the heads of immense nails. In painting the tombs, they began by cover- ing the tufo walls with a preparation of sand, on which they scraped the outline of the subject, and in many instances now the colour is fading, but the out- line is distinct, and enables us to trace perfectly the design. It is much to be desired that a series of exact copies of all these curious paintings were made while they are yet in some degree of preservation, for, to judge from past experience, they will ere many years disappear. When they were first dis- covered, accurate copies of a few of them, as they then stood, were taken to adorn one of the halls of the Gregorian Museum, as we have already men- tioned, and since then, decay has been making sad progress ; for we looked in vain for some of the ob- jects which had attracted our attention in the copies, and began to accuse them of inaccuracy, when I saw that all the colours were already effaced from those parts where once the subject had been depicted, though the outlines may still with attention be dis- cerned. We were able to procure only two prints of them from the Archaeological Society in Rome, showing how they appeared when first discovered ; and a third was presented to us by Carlo Avolta. It is given as the frontispiece, and is taken from the Grotta del Tifone. We next visited the " GROTTA DEL BARONE," so called from having been discovered by our poor 176 TARQUINIA. friend Baron Stackelberg in 1827. All round the walls of the chamber, which is about sixteen feet square, there is painted a broad tri-colored ribbon of yellow, blue, and red, and below this there is a series of men with horses in various attitudes and occupa- tions, some standing mounted, some riding along, and some dismounted and leading. The horses are red, black and blue, and of the form of the present Dongola breed. The Etruscans used colours conven- tionally, representing things in certain relations and positions ; for instance, in the picture of a race, blue mis'ht be the colour used to mark the winning: horse. The colours are decaying, but the outline is easily made out, for it has been traced prior to painting upon the sand which covers the tufo wall. At the upper end two figures of unequal size are represented, and one of them is making an offering to a divinity. They have a stiff Egyptian look. Over the door, on each side of it, are a sea-horse and a dolphin. There were more figures and occu- pations in this grotto, and I regret not to give a better description, but I dare not trust my memory further.* Our next visit was to the GROTTA DELLE ISCRIZIONI, DISCOVERED IN 1828, so called on account of a great number of inscrip- tions in the Etruscan language, which are to be seen on the walls, and which give it much additional * Sir William (Jell says tliat in one ofthe tombs there is a paint- ing of riding at the ring, and tin- game of singlestick. They may possibly be her. ' u InterL TARQUINIA. 177 interest. The situation of this tomb is very ro- mantic. It was not, like some of the others which we visited, in the centre of the flat table land which forms the necropolis, but it was in the face of the steep rocky hill which forms the limit of that ne- cropolis to the inland, and overlooks the broad valley which separates it from the ridge and height on which formerly stood the city of Tarquinia. We paused as we entered the door of this tomb, cut out of the tufo rock, like all the others, and viewed the interesting prospect before us, the site of Etruria's ancient capital. We looked for traces of buildings, but we could distinguish nothing more than the rocks which had served for substructions : not even a vestige of masonry was visible. Stand- ing at the gate of the city of the dead, we in vain tried to discover what had been once the city of the living, and thought the enduring reality of the one, and the evanescence of the other, a fitting type of mortal existence. The site of one of the mightiest cities of ancient Europe can scarcely be discovered ; her works of piety and ornament, her solemn temples, her solid aqueducts, her magnificent theatres and forum, the trophies of her glory, her triumphal arches, and stately colonnades, all crumbled in the dust, and not even appearing above the rocks which supported them :* the form of her government and the vicissitudes of her his- tory being a curious question of antiquarian doubt * All these buildings had a real existence in Tarquinia, as we learn from Vitruvius. i 5 178 TARQUINIA. and speculation, and the story of her downfall wrapped in mystery. All that now remains to tell of her greatness is the receptacle in which she deposited her dead. The inscriptions in this tomb give us some insight into its history. The first is a long semicircular line of letters thus Priestess Caesanna and may be translated — " The Mtuesaa calls these games in honour of the Lar deceased." " The glory of his age, the protector of our temples and our com- merce." Following this, comes the funeral pro- cession. First, the newly-elected Lar Matuesius, perhaps brother to the priestess — then the families of the Lucumones who are his nearest of kin, or whose offices oblige them to bear a part in his funereal train. One individual only is given of each family, on account of the confined space in which they are represented. Here we see the Lenea and the Pompey, both very noble houses of Tarquinia. Following them the Prince Aruns Athvinacna representing the younger branches of the ruling house. Aruns means a cadet prince. After this come the Laris Phanuris or sacred mourners for the king, and the Velthuri or pre- sidents of the various games and sacrifices. These games arc racing, wrestling, and boxing ; the sacri- fice is a blue fish to the manes of the departed. The races are contested by the royal guard, here called " Laris Larthia," or " Guardia Nobile." The wrestling is between Nuccrteles, or Nicotelcs, and '///'//// ////// , /'/r;s /r, /■< '7< Side 11',///. O o u o i o o o o O O O O J O J w» O o /,'//// ////,/■■ wit&ill /A /:/!// /i//i, TARQUINIA. 179 " the Greek" perhaps some celebrated freedman or slave. The boxing is between Anthasi and Verenes the son of Mea. This at least is a probable version of the story, and satisfied us after a very long and careful study of this tomb. The deceased Lar him- self is not mentioned amongst the inscriptions, for his name and simple epitaph would be deeply en- graved upon his ponderous coffin, which lay with his likeness at full length upon the lid of it, on one side of this painted chamber. It is difficult for me to explain the inscriptions without bringing forward more learning than will be acceptable to the general reader, but I will make them as simple and intelligible as I can. On entering the Camera delle Iscrizioni, we per- ceived above the door two tigers, as if ready to spring- on the bold violater of the repose of the tomb, and on either side a faun with a cup in his hand, lying- recumbent on a frieze, composed of party-coloured lines, which go all round the chamber, and at the foot of each faun stands a goose. On the right hand of the door the sacrifice is represented. A naked and beardless youth, with a nondescript in- strument in his right hand, stoops over a sort of gridiron, on which he is about to roast a bluish fish, which he holds in his left. Opposite this youth stands a naked old man with a beard, who appears to command him, and who holds in one hand a lono- rod, perhaps the badge of his priestly dignity. Over his head is written VELTHUR. Suspended from the wall are two fillets or chaplets, with which 180 TARQUINIA. it was common for the ancients to ornament their tombs. The inscription is as follows : — -^ This being read from right to left may be thus z' rendered — 4/ CIVESANAMATVESICALESECE : n EVRASVCLESVASPHESTEHICHVACHA. "^ These words should be divided thus — HJ Civesana matuesa, calesece [T EURA, SUCLE, SUAS, PhESTEHI, ChUACHA. f\) " Caesana Matuesa," both noble patrician names ® of Tarquinia. She was a priestess, for no other ~* woman could call the games. This lady, " Cale- sece," i. e. convocavit, called the games. The in- T scription is placed over a herald with a long sceptre, > but the termination of the names shows that he ixL was sent by a woman. Stackelberg reads the name ^ Cives Ana, &c. i. e. " Citizen Ana ;" the priestess Ana a citizen ; possibly the first who called games after Tarquinia, was admitted to the citizenship of Home, n. c. 280. Most antiquaries, however, think that this tomb cannot be of so late a date. The names of Ana, Matuesa, and Caesanna, we learn from Cicero and from many inscriptions, to have been noble families of this place. That " Cives" in Etruscan means citizen, we learn from Varro. " Eura," probably " glory," from the Hebrew — an element which abounded in Etruscan. TARQUINIA. J81 " Sucle,"— saeculum— age. " PHESTEHI," or, as Sir William Gell reads it, " PHESTHIU," probably the same as PHISTHV — the old name of Paestum — or the " Sea-Port." CHVACHA, the same as x octl X ea(7rfa ' °f tne Greeks, offerings to the dead. Sir William Gell reads it FANA, a Fane, a sacred place, or temple. Hence, " Glory of his age, and of the sea-ports, and Temples ;" i. e. " Protector of Religion and Commerce." Sir William Gell gives the inscrip- tion in this form : ^v\**vv\ 0*39 >a:\*3n>:i>A(i vat or reading it backwards thus — NAMA TPECI CALESECE ; EURAKFKLESFAS PHESTHIU. FANA. The other reading, however, appeared to us the more correct, as we made it out by the help of an extract from Baron Stackelberg. On the left side of the door are two figures, both naked, one with and the other without a beard, be- side a table, whereon they are playing at dice. The one, bending over it, anxiously observes the throw, while the other stands opposite, ready to advance the point which he has gained. The dice and the points are not seen, because the table is hollow. On the rig'ht hand wall of the chamber there is a false door, on one side of which is represented a couch with cushions, embroidered in various colours. A bearded figure, with his waist covered with a blue band, and with both his arms clasping five olive 182 TARQUINIA. twigs to his breast, seems hastening to obey the order of another person, who has the head adorned with two fillets, and is clad in a long mantle, with this imperfect inscription £3 j J y\fa 3*s| or VE . . . ANIIES, conjectured to be the name Velthur Annius. The name VELTHUR is so common, and always given to persons in authority, that it appears to indicate some office or rank, and most probably meant president or governor. On the other side of the door, a figure inscribed \//\ y\ \/ /\ or PUNPU, the Roman Pompeius or Pomponius, our Pompey, dressed in blue, and with red buskins, has his hands filled with vessels, and is preceded by a person dressed in red striped with black, who carries on his shoulders a vase, and in his hand a tazza, and who is inscribed 3 \\ ^f-3-f- or TETIIE^ or TITILIUS. Another figure, with a chain round his neck, and sharp pointed shoes, seems to be hurrying him forward, and has over him the in- scription, 414*1/4 HR O/J Sd or ARATHVI- NACNA, that is, according to some, Arrunti- nianus; according to others, Arthuinacena. Gell reads it Ar Arithreikeie, or Aruns Arithreike — the young prince or representative of the cadet princes The next name is writtcn,23/l Vi 3/ ria^Hv/Rrl or AVILEREC IENIIES, or LENEUS— a cog- nomen adopted from Etruria by the Gens Popilia in Koine. Vermiglioli tells us that the houses of Laiinu and the Punpu possessed some of the noblest tombs in Tanpiinia. The next name is f/tr//// //>/// ■ A;,;/ /'■///. /, 18.\ \//// ///"/// Ufifitr /:>/// /;/ //'/ Grvtta —r- ■ TARQUINIA. 183 aa^^ Oq^vJ or LARTHMATVES, or LARTH MATUES :— The new sovereign Matues, or the person appointed to represent him in this ceremony. He is naked, and wears buskins, bear- ing in one hand a tazza for an offering, and in the other two fillets. He has a necklace on his neck, another garland upon his right arm, and another upon his cap. He bears altogether four garlands, and may be represented naked, as the greatest mark of sorrow, or, as I have sometimes hoped, allegorically. The upper end of the room is divided by a false door, on one side of which is a group, consisting of a naked female dancer, with a gold and jewelled necklace, an azure fillet on the head, with blonde and short hair, and red pointed buskins. The in- scription avqVM48 £IS4^ or LARIS PHA- NURIS, probably refers to the flute-player by her side, with red fillets, buskins, and mustachios. PHANURIS, some learned men think, relates to a fane or temple. Hence a tomb, where yearly games were held, or prayers were made, might also be called Fanum or Fanu, and LARIS PHANURIS may mean "Mourner in the fane of the Lar, or sovereign." Next comes ano- ther female dancer, naked, with superb necklace and red peaked buskins, with this inscription, 13/3 H3 / '.1 3 \J /834 or AEPHLA, perhaps aei QiXt}, always friend, a fitting name for a faithful four-footed companion. On the other side of the door are four naked beardless youths, mounted on coursers, and ad- vancing the one after the other, as if to the race- course, preceded by a herald, who is inscribed with the name W/O^fB^ or VELTHUR, director of the course. The first of these cavaliers only is named *[l[0 *\ WQI ^ 4>l or LAMS LAR- THTA, guard of the Lar or Larthia. " Guardia nobile." The horses are red, and two of them have blue tails and manes. It is worthy of notice, that the Delphic oracle used sometimes to com- mand a procession of naked men on horseback, in order to appease an offended divinity, as at Pyrgi, already mentioned, where they were ordered to atone for the murder of the Phocians. Above the door, various animals, lions, stags, and leopards, are re- presented. On the other side-wall are painted, on one side of the door, the continuation of the equestrian pro- cession ; and on the other, two wrestlers in a very spirited attitude. Over the one is written the name 3V3^S7VHorMC:i{Ti:i,K,orNIC0TELES; and over the other, 313^113 or EICRECE, in which some learned Italians have read ^ I>a\^^OlOAQA Ar— Arithreike. The next, | ^ I ^| I ^j which he conjectures to mean vioi, or filli, or sons. Beyond Punpu he describes a man in a red robe with two fillets round his head, each set with what may represent pearls or silver balls, and which he supposes to be a royal or sacer- dotal crown. The name he reads ^^\J 1 1A/J MILES, or ^ 3 / 1 H NIIES ; another is present- ing to him two branches of laurel. We had not Gell's book with us, and did not observe this crown. Next to him comes an Athleta, and next to him the Herald of Ana Matuesa. In this sepulchre we rested and ate our baked meats, pouring forth a libation to the memory of departed greatness as we closed the door, and sallied forth on our way to the next sepulchre of the mighty and the great unknown. Striking was the contrast, when having thus become familiar with so much of the appearance, dress, manners, and customs of the ancient Tarquinians, we saw, on emerging from the tomb, once more before us, the naked and desolate site of the ancient city, the once splendid home of those whose faces we had jusl been scanning, and whose names we had been attempting to decipher. The next tomb that we visited is called CAMERA DEL MOKTO, DISCOVERED BY CAV. MANZI, in is:}:5. It is very small, not exceeding ten feet in TARQUINIA. 187 length ; but it is most interesting from the affect- ing scene of domestic manners which it exhibits, the preparation of a dead body for its last resting- place, and the piety of the daughter and friends of the deceased. The paintings remain only on three walls of this chamber ; those on the side of the entrance, which consisted of fabulous animals, being obliterated. On entering, we were struck with the graceful figure of a girl clad in a mantle and tunic, having jewelled ears and pointed buskins, with hair dishevelled, and in an attitude of grief, who per- forms the last sad offices to an aged man. He, vene- rable from his white hair and beard, is laid out on a bed of state ornamented with purple, and covered with a tunic, which reaches midway down the leg, and is joined to a hood like that of modern friars, coming over his head, which rests on a double pillow. Above the lady is written (\^ \ Z^AMflT or TANARSIRA, in which we may perhaps find a union of the Greek words OavaroQ and tepd, death and sacred, in allusion to the pious task of this young mourner, who performs the sacred obsequies of her deceased parent. To watch the last moments as well as to close the eyes and mouth, to wash the body and to anoint it, was always the child's office. And here she is assisted by a son, or some very near relation, who touches the knees of the corpse with his left hand, his right being raised to his head, with the expression of lively sorrow, while he bids his last adieu. In a similar attitude of affliction another man naked and bearded stands beside the 188 TARQUINIA. bed, perhaps a brother of the deceased, who sympa- thizes with the grief of the children. A fragment of an inscription v/3M3or ENEL, is all that remains. The usage of the Etruscans to honour their dead with dancing and music is not here forgotten. The very chamber of death is represented as not with- out this somewhat incongruous accompaniment ; while on the middle wall a dancer is introduced, who to the sound of the flute pours out a liba- tion beside a large vase ornamented with fillets, placed in the centre of the picture ; and two more dancers are represented, one of whom is empty- ing a tazza. These figures are naked, and have coronets or Circlets on the head, on the arm, or in the right hand. Funereal wreaths or chaplets are hung round the walls of this tomb, and here and there are seen to depend from the branches of young olive trees, as was common among the an- cients, who hung them upon this plant, which they regarded as sacred to the dead. I have already mentioned this funeral scene as being copied in the Gregorian Museum. GROTTA DEL TRICLINIO, OR MARZI. Quitting this house of mourning, where we saw that the affections and feelings were the same three thousand years ago as they are to-day, we entered a mansion of a very different character, the house of feasting, where ascene of splendid and luxurious revelry is less appropriately depicted in the silent abode of the dead. "Camera dei triclinii e del (/'/<* Paye /88 ( c TARQUINIA. 189 ballo" — chamber of feasting and dancing. Here is a full display of Etruscan magnificence in dress, furniture, and all the accessories of sumptuous living. The roof is vaulted, and ornamented with divers colours, and divided in the midst by a beam which is gracefully twined with branches of bacchic ivy. Above the frieze opposite the entrance are two men, both in an attitude of supplication, and above the door itself are two panthers, the usual guar- dians of the tomb. At the side of the door are two youthful horsemen seated sideways upon their steeds, very slightly dressed, and with lances in their hands. The picture of the middle wall represents three couches, each containing a man and a woman. In front of two of these are tables covered with vases, and in front of a third is a large vessel out of which wine is poured into smaller vessels, to be handed round to the guests by a young slave. The party-coloured coverings of the tables and couches are very beautiful, as well as the splendid festal dresses of the guests and their crowns of ivy and olive. An attendant richly dressed is playing on the double flute, whilst the guests are turning to- wards each other in various attitudes and with lively gestures, and seem much more occupied with the pleasures of society than with those of the table ; but the feast is already begun, for one of the ladies is in the act of breaking an egg, and one of the gen- tlemen is receiving a cup of wine. The ladies are adorned with rich necklaces and bracelets. Oint- ments and perfumes also, so essential to the luxurious 190 TARQUINIA. habitsof theancients, are not wanting to this banquet. The clatter of the dishes, and the smell of the meats, have attracted to the feast atame leopard, a partridge, and a cock, which are assiduously picking up the crumbs of good things. Above the couches hang crowns or chaplets, with which the guests at the end of the entertainment used to adorn their heads, necks, and arms, when they took their luxurious siesta, or further indulged in the pleasures of the goblet. The funereal feast being concluded, the dance commences. The ballet consists of eight persons, and the musicians are two, a player on the lyre and one on the double flute, but even they take a part in the dance. The prima danzatrice moves her hands as if she had castanets, while the last holds a wreath of ivy, with which most of them are crowned. They are all handsomely buskined, and accompany the dance with a lively movement of the head and arms, which reminded me of the tarantela. Signor Avolta, however, claimed it as the original of a dance which had been handed down in this part of the country even to the days of his youth, but which has now fallen into disuse: he told me he had danced in this manner when he was a boy, but conplained that now French dances and French fashions were obliterating all their national customs. The dance, however, I am told, i-^ still kept up in Campania. The dresses of these dancers are of the most splendid material, embroidered with minute stars, and adorned with party-coloured garnitures ; their necks are orna- TARQUINIA. 191 mented with costly collars, their ears with pen- dents, and their arms with bracelets. The youths are divided from the dancing girls by olive and myrtle trees, covered with chaplets, in the branches of which are perched various birds ; while hares, wolves, deer, and other animals, are jumping up to the stems, or gamboling below in evident enjoy- ment of the feast. The vase placed on the ground is filled with wine, to be drunk by the dancers in honour of Bacchus. In this grotto, when first opened, stood a very large and handsome sarco- phagus in travertine. The effigy upon the lid re- presented as usual a man very richly dressed, and wearing all sorts of ornaments ; he held a libation cup in his hand, and a greyhound was leaping up towards it. I believe the coffin was empty. It was taken away, copied and engraved, and the original was sold. It is to be observed that all the animals in this frieze are sacred, and that the plant next to the flute-player is a lotus with fillets hanging from it, as there are also from two of the olive trees, and these fillets have a deep fringe — some suppose that they were prizes for the best dancer, the best player, and the best javelin thrower — others think that they were merely to mark the rank of the deceased. The olive, the myrtle, the lotus, and the ivy, were all sacred plants. Speaking of this tomb, Signor Carlo Ruspi says, that had the damp which covered the walls soon after its first exposure to the air been carefully wiped off, and the whole been then washed 192 TARQUINIA. over with aqua reggia, the whole of the colours would have been preserved. GROTTA DELLA QUERCIOLA, DISCOVERED IN 1832 BY CAV. MANZI AND SIGNOR EGEDIO QUERCIOLA. A tomb more splendid than any which I have yet described, is that which from its subject I will call " Camera del triclinio grande," but which is on the spot called delta querciola, and of which I have given a very accurate drawing, procured from the Archaeo- logical Society. None of the paintings are shaded. This camera is much larger than any of those already mentioned, being, I should think, about twenty feet square. Nothing can exceed the ele- gance of the forms, the richness of the dress, and the beauty of the ornaments. The principal subjects on the side-walls are highly adorned dancers of both sexes, and at the upper end there is a magnificent banquet with festal tables, luxurious couches, and sumptuously attired guests. But, as will be seen from the picture, the devastations of damp, neglect, and the outer air, have already destroyed nearly one half of the principal subjects, and the whole is going rapidly to decay, so that ere long it must be totally obliterated. It is much worse preserved than any of the Others, which is extremely unfortunate, as from its size, tin- variety of its subjects, and the beauty of its execution, it is even more valuable and curious than the rest. Beside the principal groups, there are smaller and subordinate subjects in differ- ent com pari iiients. There is a well-preserved naked TARQUINIA. 193 figure of an elderly man who seems to be seated on the ledge of a bath, or, as some of our party thought, was about to be offered up in sacrifice. There are friezes representing* boar-hunts, the chasseurs being of different ranks, and with appropriate arms. There are also other friezes with equestrian figures appa- rently throwing the javelin, but these were so much defaced that we had great difficulty in ascertaining what they were. At the end of one wall is a buffet filled with vases, and interesting as showing how the ancients themselves disposed them. Three of the guests at this feast appear to be listening to the praises of the dead, which were always sung on these occasions. Two are drinking wine to his memory, and two I suppose to be an afflicted mother consoled by her remaining son. This tomb is copied in the Gregorian Museum, The description and the drawing of a tazza of great beauty and unique style, whichcomes from this necro- polis, and which we were so fortunate as to procure at Corneto, may serve to illustrate the funeral feasts which are represented on several of these tombs, The red colour and natural and elegant character of the figures show that this tazza is of the later Etruscan period, after the native style had received the impression of Greek art, and the inscription which is round it of ku\oq >} 6 Trace, " may the boy be beautiful," makes it probable that it adorned the tomb of a young man. The subject painted on it is a funeral feast. In the hollow part of the tazza there K 194 TARQUINIA. is a figure of a man, who, from his air of business and his walking-stick, seems to be going on an errand which requires despatch. He is probably the messenger sent to invite the guests to the enter- tainment ; and round the lower part of the tazza, where generally the greatest elegance of design and beauty of execution are displayed, we have the guests already assembled at the festive board, in full enjoyment of the good things of the ban- quet. There are six male figures, loosely dressed, reclining on couches, and supported on richly em- broidered cushions. One of them is playing on the flute ; several of them have goblets in their hands, and all seem engaged in the most animated discourse, which they render more impressive by strongly marked gestures. Two lamps are suspended over their heads, and the more substantial dainties have been removed to make way for the wine-cup, in which, as it is a bachelor's party, they seem to be in- dulging pretty freely. The thing that gives a peculiar value to this tazza is the extraordinary collection of drinking cups displayed on the table, around which they are reclining, and which show the giver of the feast to have been a man curious in goblets, and an amateur of odd shapes. Besides Miinc elegantly formed tazzc, not unlike the one on which all this is represented, and some other vessels, there arc drinking cups, like what are now in use amongst ourselves, made of buffalo's horn, and Others of the mosi fantastic appearance, such as a pair of boots and a pair of sandals ! One great TARQUINIA. 195 value which vases and tazze have to an antiquarian, is, that they supply an important desideratum to our acquaintance with the early inhabitants of Greece and Italy, as they give us an infinity of domestic details, and pictures of ordinary life, of which we must otherwise have continued in igno- rance ; while others open up a nobler range of my- thological knowledge and heroic tradition, and place before us gods, demi-gods, and heroes, in the conventional forms, dresses, attitudes, and accom- paniments which were conceived and executed by the ancients themselves, and are therefore to be relied on for correct classical propriety. Many of the shapes represented on this tazza, and particu- larly the boots, we have since seen in various mu- seums. They are all drinking vessels, made of terra cotta, usually unpainted, but they are genuine Etruscan, though many similar ones in shape, use, and material, are found in Egypt. There remained yet two of the tombs of this im- mense necropolis to be explored, and we found them to differ essentially from all the rest, and to possess some common resemblance, though varying widely in style. The first that I will mention is the GROTTA DEL CARDINALE, which, of all the tombs now shown, was discovered the earliest, and derives its name from a cardinal who many years ago interested himself in its pre- servation. His name, Cardinal Garampi, Bishop of Corneto and Monte Fiascone, we could not learn at 196 TARQUINIA. the place itself, strange to say, but I have since found it in Tiraboschi's " storia della Litteratura Italiana," together with his letter, giving- the his- torian a description of the grotta when lie first visited it in May 1786. The miserable neglect in which this interesting monument of antiquity is now left, shows that none of the present members of the sacred college know or care about it : and the decay into which all the Tarquinian tombs are rapidly falling, makes us wish to see some influen- tial person appointed by the government to under- take the task of saving them from utter destruction. I could not help wishing that the cardinal or bishop of Corneto were charged with the preservation of them as part of the duties of his see. We descended a flight of steps, and advanced by a short passage cut in the rock to the entrance of the tomb, a spacious chamber in which our flam- beaux only made darkness more visible. I should think it about forty feet square, and the roof, which is low, is supported on four very massive square pillars, which rise without base from the ground, and is ornamented with that peculiar sort of decoration of which the best specimen is to be found in the roof of the Pantheon at Home, i. e. a square medallion, with foliage in the centre. This does not cover the entire roof of the grotto, which appears never to have been finished ; some parts of it being without any ornament, and also some portions of the sides having been rudely cut out of the living rock, and not having yet received the preparation of sand TARQUINIA. 197 on which the paintings are elsewhere sketched. 1 say sketched, for this is the proper term respecting them, as they differ essentially from the coloured and more finished drawings of the other tombs. The style, moreover, is light and free, rather be- tokening the meridian or the decline of art than its rise. This circumstance, together with the unfi- nished state of the tomb, and the ornaments which appear on the roof, would incline me to assign it a place among the later tombs of Etruria, that is to say, not earlier than the last of the Roman kings. But during the seventy years which have elapsed since it was opened, so much has been done to deface and spoil it, that it is very difficult to form an accu- rate opinion. The square pillars that support the roof are very rude, without base, and with a sort of fillet round the top, beneath which are painted leaves in three colours, red, blue, and yellow. No sarcophagi remain in this tomb, but it was doubtless originally full of them, there being a broad stone ledge all round on which they were placed, and in some parts two rows of such ledges, one above the other. Notwithstanding the doubt which I have expressed as to the very remote antiquity of this tomb, it is interesting to see that the beautiful ornament I have described on the roof, and which was not introduced into Rome until the very end of the republic, was known and used in Etruria at least several centuries earlier. A part of the roof is formed in a different style, with broad stone beams cut across, which is probably more ancient, and resembles the older se- pulchres of Tarquinia and Vulci. The probability 198 TARQUINIA. is, that this tomb was the work of different ages, enlarged and adorned according to the use that was made of it during successive generations, and that it was still unfinished at the destruction of Tarquinia, when the family to which it had belonged became extinct. It was then abandoned, forgotten, and filled up for nineteen centuries, until opened by the cardinal, who gave it its name, and then, after his death, it was again left to the destruction of rude shepherds and idle boys, or of barbarous and un- thinking foreigners. The wall on the right side of the entrance alone retains any trace of paintings, and these are rapidly fading. They consist of friezes of figures drawn in a very spirited manner, but small, perhaps afoot high, and sketchy, not shaded, and the colours scarcely distinguishable. There is one figure which, if it had been drawn in our day, might have passed for the Pope. He is robed in white, with a conical-shaped white tiara on his head, and from a seat of state he seems to be with one hand giving his blessing. Another most remarkable frieze consists of a pro- cession of souls to judgment; and among these one group in particular attracted our attention. It re- presents the soul of a person who had in life been of doubtful character, much both of good and evil being attributed to him; and in his case ihc nicely balanced scales of justice tremble. He is dragged in a car before the judge by two winged genii, the oik; good and the other evil, who arc contending for the exclusive possession of him. In the eagerness TARQUINIA. 199 of dispute the car stops, they cannot draw it on, but remain stationary to mark the uncertain reputation of the deceased. The evil genii are represented as black, and all the spirits wear a cothurnus, or buskin of that form, which was sacred amongst the Etrus- cans to immaterial existences, especially the genii of darkness, death, and sleep. It is not winged, but peaked like wings in a sheath, and reaches midway up the leg. The genii are all winged ; and the souls, of which there are many, have no wings. Only two are represented in the plate, because only a small part of the subject is given ; but in the tomb there was a long procession, each bearing some in- strument as a symbol of his profession. Only a small part remains, travellers having thought proper to break off and carry away the stucco, and, no doubt, what we saw will soon follow. It was the idea of the Etruscans that the soul preserved after death the likeness of the body it had left, but that it was composed of thin elastic air, and clothed in airy white. The good genius wishes to proceed, with the two souls represented, to the gate of happiness ; but the evil genii who claim them seem more in number, and the one who stops the car wishes to turn it into the gate of misery, by which an evil genius is already sitting and waiting for its return. The difference of representation betAveen this and the " Tifone," to which we afterwards proceeded, is very remarkable ; for here the evil genii were not frightful, though black, bore no serpents, and their hammers were of a different form from the usual hammers of death. 200 TARQUINIA. This allegorical drawing forcibly reminded us of the miserable state of those who have to look forward to a strict and impartial justice, accurately dealing its rewards or punishments, according to their merit or demerit. Alas ! if thus weighed in the balance, should not we all be found wanting:? A visit to the tombs of heathenism brings home to us, with pecu- liar force, the consolations of Christianity.* Micali, who visited this extraordinary tomb in 1808, gives a much fuller account of it than I have done, because it was then much more perfect, and he says that he was grieved and astonished to see the ravages which damp and barbarous strangers had made when he returned to visit it in 1830. When he first saw r it, the upper part was surrounded by indented coloured lines representing a cornice. This we also saw. He says that all the painting was * This contrast struck me forcibly, when, after returning from Tar- quinia, I entered the first gallery of the Vatican, of which one side is encrusted with early christian epitaphs, taken from the Roman cata- combs. Here every word and figure pointed to a sure and better hope ; the IN PACE thc'x'or PRO CIIKISTO, the good shep- *X herd, the dove with an olive branch, the word ixOvs- No spot can be more interesting to the christian traveller than the catacombs them- selves. They are now, as all know, the burying places of the first Roman Christians, but they were made by the Etruscans seven hundred years II. (J. to carry on their great works in early Rome, and conti- nued through a long succession of ages to be the quarries out of which the city was formed- The fish was a hieroglyph of the early Christian, because its name in (.reek, Icthus, gave the initials J, Jesus, C. Christ, Th. Theou, of God, U. uios, Son, S. Soter, Saviour. TARQUINIA. 201 on a thick coating of stucco, and that the frieze or band already alluded to contained more than a hundred figures, giving the whole history of an un- judged soul after death. The procession began with the good genii, who were white, and who were said to have been the guardian angels of the person during life. They carry in their hands a thin stick or wand of office ; then come the souls, and the evil genii follow — i. e. those who accuse the soul before the judge; and in this grotto they were all black, carrying great hammers with which to beat and bruise those who were delivered over into their power. They are all dressed in a particular manner, the garment being braced with a girdle, and not reaching lower than the knee. The souls were all clothed in white, and were supposed to preserve the image and likeness which they wore in the body, only to be thin and shining. They are so far all alike, and all subject to the same law of being j udged according to the deeds done in the flesh, that the person raised upon a car was looking for sentence upon the very same principles with the work-people, who walked with spade and pitchfork before or after. The slave and the lord, the freeman and his former master, were all on a level there. The rider in a chariot had no privilege beyond the walker, and was the only one stopped. This painting had eight doors, each supposed to lead into a different division of Hades : the first into either darkness or fire, and the last into life ever- lasting, and in the doorway of some of them stood k 5 202 TARQUIN1A. genii with torches, waiting for the arrival of the souls. This mythology of the different degrees of purifi- cation or punishment was Egyptian, or at least resembles most closely what is found delineated and described in the Egyptian funereal papyri. I saw a complete representation of this subject on a very old papyrus in the Dodwell Museum, and it leads one to ask, with no small interest, whence the heathen derived so much light, mingled with so much darkness? It was doubtless a glimmering of primeval truth handed down through much and increasing obscurity by patriarchal tradition, and receiving, it may be, a more correct shape from time to time by intercourse with those who were more deeply imbued with right notions on religion. Thus Abraham may have recalled Pharaoh and his subjects to a knowledge which they were forget- ting, and the influence of Job may have for a time restrained the idolatry of Arabia. The Scripture tells us, and all history assures us, that the existence of another state was known to man from the be- ginning. The Egyptian, Arabian, Phoenician, Etruscan, and early Greek theology, all were de- rived at first from the same source, and became cor- rupted each in its own manner, according to the genius and moral force of its own nation. When standing in those tombs, and looking upon such :i scene of the world to come, ;is we were then spelling by torch-light from the walls, it. is impossi- ble to help wondering at and admiring the quantity of truth and knowledge that remained amongst this TARQUINIA. 203 ) m TARQUINIA. 203 ancient nation, particularly when we remember the state of God's own people, who, though they never, down to the Christian era, had a cessation amongst them of visible communion with the world above, through prophets and miracles, yet in our Saviour's time had many of them become so degenerate, as to doubt and dispute " if there were angel or spirit." Truly such men, like natural brute beasts, to whom they level themselves, are made, as the Scripture says, to be taken and destroyed. I will defy any one not to entertain some of these feelings in the grottos of the Cardinale and the Tifone. Above one of the walls Micali saw many epitaphs in black letters, of which he made out Velcia, Felce or Felchial, 30^38: V4I0V38: the family or order to which the tomb had belonged, but we could scarcely decipher them. On the upper part of the pillars, just beneath the leaves, are still visible combatsof gladiators. The figures are small, but done with great spirit, and in various positions of victor and vanquished, defender and defended. The same subject is found represented in the same manner upon a frieze in the temple of Phygaleia. I did see them, but I could not have done so, had not Avolta positively traced some of the forms with his fin- ger, so anxious was he that we should make them out. Some of them are on a black ground, and they bear the short sword, like what we have seen extracted, in excellent preservation, from the tombs of Vulci, and ornamented with gold. It is like a large two- edged dagger. 204 TARQUINIA. I regret to say that the Grotta del Cardinale has no door, and no care whatever has been taken of it. Probably after the death of its original protec- tor, it was long ago so much spoiled as to deprive Avolta of the heart even to attempt its preserva- tion. As there is no guard at the entrance, the in- terior is filled with filth and rubbish, while the walls are scratched over with charcoal; and the curious and minute friezes of figures are almost defaced. It is grievous to see this in Italy, and it always ap- peared to me quite irreconcilable with the innate love its peasantry in general have of works of art, and their exquisite appreciation of the appropriate and the beautiful in all styles. I was even surprised when the love of gold overcame this sense ; and I still think that where we saw things destroyed from the love of mischief, it must have been the work of strangers. It was positively edifying to see poor Agapeto's despair when he found the fine painting on the side of this tomb scratched over with char- coal, the late work of a Russian artist, who, to the credit of his country, had been sent hither to copy it. He need not have left behind him so barbarous a memorial of himself. I was consoled, and so was Agapeto, when Avolta, though nearly equally vexed, announced that it could be cleaned away, and should be done. 1 almost think he said something of plac- ing a door even yet at the entrance, and not allow- ing foreigners to remain there alone, and I hope I am right; for obliterating or defacing such paint- ings is surely depriving the public of historical monuments which are of inestimable worth. TARQUINIA. 205 It appears unaccountably strange that these tombs should be so neglected under the rule of a prince who has founded the Gregorian Museum, yet true it is, that for the degree of preservation in which any of them remain, we are indebted to Carlo Avolta, who has done as much as any private indivi- dual could do to that end, by furnishing them with locked doors, and setting over them a custode. Agapeto was the name of the man who conducted us, a most civil obliging contadino, with much native wit and observation, and a very considerable know- ledge of antiquity. We found him far superior to the guides at Chiusi, whom I shall hereafter men- tion, and it is a great advantage to strangers to meet with such a man. Guides to ancient ruins or re- mains ought always to be appointed by authority, and to receive a sort of education for their post. In many instances this has been done around Rome; especially at Tivoli and Adrian's Villa, and I know nothing which adds so much to the pleasure of the expedition, or the interest of the spot. It may be interesting here to insert the Cardinal Garampi's letter to Tiraboschi, giving an account of this tomb as it appeared upon its first discovery un- der his auspices. After saying that a great number of Etruscan tombs, with paintings and inscriptions, had either been filled up or destroyed, he adds, " One of these, about a mile from Corneto, has been re-opened and partially cleared of the rubbish and earth which covered it. It is a chamber seventy-two Roman palmi square, and nine palmi 206 TARQUINIA. high, all hewn out of the rock. The roof is not vaulted but flat, and to support it four large pillars have been left in the rock, each nine palmi square. This flat roof is divided into regular compartments, sometimes by long lines, and sometimes by deep squares cut upwards and ornamented, the colouring in some of which may still be seen. " All round the grotta near the roof, wherever the coating of lime which has been laid upon the stone remains, may be seen a border of indented lines in -white, representing a cornice. Beneath this comes an architrave or band, ten inches high, upon which are painted games and processions of winged genii, many of whom carry axes or hatchets, raised aloft like great hammers. Here and there are bigas, with sometimes figures in them, and in one of them is an urn of an oval shape like an ossuario, or urn containing ashes. " In another part there is a boat, and considering the whole, it appears to me that we may see in it some allegory relating to the state of souls when separated from the body. " In some places the colouring is still visible, and the red, yellow, and green, arc better preserved than the other colours, but generally the figures are dark or shaded, but so that the outlines and the drapery are well distinguished." GltOTTA DVL TIFONE, OPENED ISY CAV. MANZI in 1833. The last Tarquinian tomb that we visited was the 7 \/ >/"■// "/■■ e © © © © ; © © {en tht TARQUINIA. 207 " Grotta del Tifone? so called from the painting of Typhon which adorns the square central pillar. It is, like all the others, a chamber excavated in the tufo rock, and is larger than any except, the " Grotta del Cardinale," being eighteen paces in length, and sixteen in breadth. The roof is supported on one solid square pillar, and all around the chamber there are three rows of stone seats or ledges, rising one above another in the form of steps, on which are deposited a number of stone sarcophagi. Eight of these now remain, having recumbent figures on the lid, of which two are whole and six broken, and eight have been removed. In one place there is an excavation made further into the rock, for the recep- tion of another body — so full had the tomb once been, that even three ledges did not suffice for all its tenants. Before entering the tomb, I was so much startled as to shrink back ; for the moment the door was opened, the stern, dignified, and colossal visage of an Etruscan chief stared me in the face. He looked as if he had just raised his head from the placid, majestic repose in which he lay, like the guardian of the sepulchre, and I could almost fancy he frowned on us as unwelcome in- truders on his last resting place. To me he seemed to ask, What business hast thou here ? The dim twilight favoured the illusion, and in none of the other tombs did we so completely feel ourselves strangers come to pry into the long-forgotten homes of the mighty dead. Most of the other sarcophagi have sculptured likenesses of their "208 TARQUINIA. tenants on the lid ; but none seemed so true to nature, or so majestic, as this one. Among these departed grandees, we discovered the dust of a visitor who was perhaps more an intruder than ourselves, — a Roman amongst the lords of Tarquinia! A curious instance of the victor identifying himself with the most sacred, exclusive, and private things of the vanquished, if victor indeed he were, and we busied ourselves with framing some pretext for this violation of sepulchral propriety. Had he ob- tained a grant of the estates belonging to the family who once owned this vault; or was he not much more probably of the same kindred with them ? A Tarquinian who had ruled in Rome, and there were many such, and who, when he died, chose to have a Latin epitaph. Though the essence of his power was the citizenship of Rome, he may have felt, like Mecaenas, not the less proud, that his ancestors commanded mighty legions, and that some of them were once powerful kings in his native Etruria. Re this as it may, there he was, a Roman amidst Etruscans, like a Norman con- dottiere invading the vaults of a long line of Saxon carls, or a Moorish chief mingling his dust with that of pure grandees of the seed of Pelayo. There was also in this tomb the sarcophagus of a Roman lady, i. e. of a lady whose name is written in Latin characters, of the 5th or 6th century of Home, with her eftigy on the lid, in the same style of dress and position, but in a later manner of execution than most of the others. We considered TARQUINIA. 209 it by far the most modern, and we do not know that it stood in its ancient place, because it has probably been moved into its present situation for ornament, and is out of its own peculiar numerical place amongst these lordly generations. I do not remember the name, and, at the time I saw it, I had not sufficient knowledge of names to have dis- cerned whether she were an Etruscan married to a Roman, or whether she were a Roman married to one of the Lucumones, and allowed a place amongst her husband's kindred. This tomb, if it did not belong to one great family, is supposed, as well as the Grotta del Cardinale, to have been the burying-place appro- priated to public officers — a little Westminster Abbey ; but what corner of the abbey it typified, the want of all its accompanying vases, arms, and orna- ments, renders us unable to determine.* How greatly we lamented that it had not been publicly protected! The mere showing of these two grottos unscathed would, I am sure, have made Corneto by this time a place of general resort, and would have brought the community in the long-run as much, or much more, money than the sale of all their contents has ever done. The square pillar in the centre is very massive, and lessens towards the top, which is sur- mounted by a fillet. Just beneath the fillet there is a large stone ledge or table, which I took for a sacrificial altar : it adds wonderfully to the solemn effect of the tomb. The Typhon which appears on the other three sides, seems to be the good, and not the bad angel of death ; and he must have some * See Appendix E . 210 TARQUINIA. Etruscan history as yet unknown to me. He is not the evil genius ealled Typhon by the Egyptians, for he has nothing about him either of the wolf or the crocodile ; neither is he the Typhon of the Greeks, but a winged genius above, and serpents below, the heads of which express time, and the tails eternity. They, like human life, have a beginning, but no end ; and are merged in an undying and intellectual spirit. This was a favourite method of represen- tation anong the Etruscans. It is to be seen upon many of the sarcophagi at Chiusi, and upon a beau- tiful scarabeus of cornelian, which we purchased, engraved in the best style of art. It was truly an awful thing to look upon the altar and the Genius, and the cold, calm, stern effigies, and coffins around — Roman and Etruscan mingled together. But a still greater anomaly, of a different descrip- tion, soon diverted our attention from the dead to those who seemed living on the walls, such was the freedom and grace with which they were de- picted. Our eyes were rivetted on an extraordinary miniature procession which occupied a small portion of the wall to the right of the entrance. A drawing of it accompanies this description, but neither the one nor the other can give an adequate idea of the beauty and nature of the original. It is miserably injured, and will very soon be totally obliterated, if I may judge of the progress of future decay from the past; lor the drawing was made a couple of years before our visit, and not much more than half now remains of that which is therein repre- TARQUINIA. 211 sentecl. It is a procession of dead, conducted by genii to their final abode of good or evil. The band is preceded by a good genius, as may be discovered from the serpents of eternity, which are twined round his head, and from the pleasing exprsssion of his countenance. He bears a lighted torch. He is followed by a number of souls, and among them, two, a man and a woman, are distinguished for uncommon beauty, a beauty which is but little discernible in the annexed drawing.* These, in the original, are evidently the principal figures in the group. This very handsome and noble looking youth is immediately followed by a monstrous fiend, in whom we recognise the most frightful develope- ment of the evil genius of Etruria, whose face and figure had been already familiar to us in scarabei and vases, The eternal serpents encircled his head, and his face had the most frightful negro exaggeration, with a brutish expression. One enormous claw was pouncing upon the shoulder of the unfortunate youth, while the hammer, the Etruscan badge of the angel of death, was raised aloft in the other. Behind him was the figure, lamentably defaced, of a female of surpassing loveliness, and in her beautiful brow and eye the most intense anguish was depicted. I shall never forget her expression of unutterable woe. To her was attached an infernal guard, similar to him who had pounced upon the youth, his brows encircled with the same serpentine fillet, and his * Vide Frontispiece. 212 TARQUINIA. features and expression exaggerated negro and brutish, only of a dark brown colour instead of a deep black. The art of the painter had invested these figures with the marks of individuality ; they must have been portraits ; but whom did they represent, ami why were they thus represented ? What, had they done, and why were they thus singled out, to be handed down for two-and-twenty ages as the prey of demons, and branded with the mark of reprobation ? I stood gazing on this group with the most intense interest, and could have worked out a romance upon the lives of these un- fortunate Etruscans. A story, and a romantic and a melancholy one, they must have had. They must have been selected to point a moral to the succeeding generations of some great Etruscan house. I could almost have fancied that Dante must have stolen into this tomb, and studied its group, before he so touchingly described his meeting with Paolo and Francesca da Rimini in the Inferno. While I gazed on those interesting figures, and wished to inquire into the story of their woe, I almost expected to have heard these plaintive accents : — • u NesBim maggoii lorc ('In' ricordarsi de] tempo ('(.■lice Nella miseria. Mm si- conoscer la pi ima radice I K'l aostri amor, tu hai cotanto affetto, Faro come colui che piange e dice." Canto . r >. TARQUINIA. 213 " No greater grief than to remember days Of joy when mis'ry is at hand. Yet so eagerly If thou art bent to know the primal root, From whence our love got being, I will do As one who weeps and tells his tale." The height of the figures is not above twelve inches. The style of art in which they are executed is not Etruscan ; it resembles rather some of the best specimens of the earlier times of the empire, such as are to be seen among the frescos of Pompeii. The eyes of the Tarquinian Francesca, in particular, reminded me of those of the celebrated Achilles, or of the Juno, which are preserved in the Museo Borbonico. But, on looking up, I saw a standard raised in the midst of the procession, inscribed with Etruscan letters ; and this decided the point of its nationality, and, to a certain extent, of its antiquity. The letters are accurately copied in the annexed drawing, and when the knowledge of things ancient comes in a sufficient stream to enable us to decipher this dead language of an extinct people, then, and not until then, will the fate of Paolo and Francesca be unveiled. But then even their effi- gies will have been effaced, and no further interest can be felt in their weal or woe, innocence or guilt. Another peculiarity of the paintings of this chamber is, that they are done in fresco, not, as in the other tombs, on a preparation of sand. This, together with the more Grecian or Roman style of art, denotes, in my opinion, a work of later Etruria; but Etruscan it is, with the utmost certainty, both from 214 TARQUINIA. the inscription and from the number of sarcophagi, those of the Romans being interlopers of after times. It will be impossible to visit with any degree of satisfaction the Tarquinian necropolis in less than two days. One may indeed run over it in a few hours, but such a mode of sight-seeing will not repay the trouble of a journey from Rome. I must warn all those who have no knowledge of antiquity, who cannot, from fragments that remain, reproduce grandeur that has perished, and who are not in the habit of inferring, from what they see, a great many other things therewith connected which are invi- sible, not to expect much delight from a journey to Tarquinia, which will be to them an exertion, and lead very possibly only to disappointment. They will see nothing but walls painted with colours, not half so vivid as the copies preserved in the Vatican, or the frescos that adorn almost every Italian house of importance; and these in a little chamber not much larger than most family vaults in our own country. But to any one who has imagination suffi- cient to recall and reanimate the dust from the sepulchre, to behold it once more assume the forms and the features which have become familiar; to observe the fashions and habits of three thousand years once more revived, and upon the rocky ridge of the opposite hill to descry once more the superb edifices of the Etruscan capital, whilst the barren waste of the necropolis becomes covered with towers and tumuli, funereal effigies, sphynxes, and chimeras of alabaster and stone; to such a one, and there TARQUINIA. 215 are many such among English travellers, I should say, " hasten to Tarquinia ;" hasten and delay not. Wander over the necropolis, and summon the fune- real pomp of one of her proud chiefs. Open the gates of the city of the dead, and behold the royal lucumo deposited in his painted chamber, clad in the trappings of his rank, and surrounded by the objects of his luxury. Join the attending throng, and enjoy, if thou canst, the funeral baked meats, and drink the rich libations to the sound of the lyre and double flute. Then hie thee across the valley to the city again, ascend the steps of the terraces even to the loftiest temple, and there be- hold the inauguration of a successor in rank and office, a pomp as splendid as the other was solemn. Mark the proud array of the lictors with their for- midable fasces ; behold the ivory curule chair, and the chief who sits there enthroned, with his purple bordered robe, his golden garland, and eagle-headed sceptre. Then go on to the circus, and behold the race-stands crowded with the rich, the gay, the happy, the nobility and the beauty of proud Etru- ria ; listen to the joyous yet coarser mirth of the people ; attend for a moment to the horse and the chariot and the foot race, the boxing match and the throwing of the quoit, for thou knewest before how they all were, thou hast seen them faith- fully depicted around the walls of the secret chambers which now alone contain Tarquinia's records. Such are the pleasures which belong to one who travels with some knowledge of the past, 216 TARQUINIA. and sufficient imagination to use that knowledge in the reproduction of beautiful and mighty things long departed and forgotten. But if thou vvouldest turn thy visit to the best account, meditate for a while upon the destinies of thy fellows, men like thyself, who once formed the great nation whose ruins thou canst now with pain discover ; how they lived and moved, and died ; how their glory is vanished, their name, the very name of their nation, strikes our ear as the echo of ages unknown; and then think of thyself and thine own destiny. What is thy life ? It is as theirs has been, a vapour that appeareth for a little while, and then vanisheth away. Think well of these things, and thou wilt return a wiser man than thou earnest. GROTTA INTAGLIATA. Micali mentions another tomb which I regret to say we did not visit, as it is the only one known of its kind, and, though very much injured, must be a most wonderful thing. I shall call it " Grotta Intagliata," by way of giving it a local name. It is square, with a pyramidal roof, in the centre of which is a square aperture, terminating in a cone. There is a frieze all round of monsters, and of animals fighting, and below these a quantity of figures in procession, from five to six feet high. I suppose they are men and genii, but the subject can no longer be distinguished or discovered, un- less sonic record of it may have found a place in the old monk's book. This tomb is not painted, but 7 TARQUINIA. 217 all the figures both of men and animals are sculp- tured out of the rock. After the occupations of the day, our evenings were always spent in the company of the Gonfalo- niere Avolta, whom we found a most agreeable and useful instructor in all that related to the antiquities of his country, and an amiable and well-informed old gentleman, preserving all the vivacity and vigour of mind of youth, together with a stock of health and strength which enabled him, at the age of seventy-five, to enjoy a chasse au sanglier more than most young men. From the enthusiasm which he displayed for Etruria and the Etruscans, I fancied that we had found in him the descendant of some ancient lucumo, and I was rather disap- pointed when he told me that he was a branch of a noble family in Lombardy, which had been settled at Corneto scarcely three centuries. His attention had been early directed to the tombs by a manuscript which fell into his hands, written by a learned but poor monk, who died a cen- tury ago, and who had spent the greater part of his life in examining those to which he had access, and in recording their wonders. This work, of which I could not procure a sight, still exists, and I was informed that it contains descriptions of some tombs that were found very many years ago, but have long been forgotten, and were adorned with many curious paintings of animals, such as ele- phants, which have never been found since. He describes the grottos of the Cardinale and the L 218 TARQUINIA. Tifone, together with some others we did not see, but which are known, and his descriptions are so exact and faithful, that Avolta gives him the fullest credit for unexaggerated simple truth in all he says of such as are unknown. I hope some of my coun- trymen will see this book and translate it. Avolta's enthusiasm had soon some actual food wherewith to regale itself in discoveries of his own. In his early youth an ancient warrior had been found laid out in state, clad in the trappings of his dignity, and from time to time discoveries had since been made, on a small scale, of vases and ornaments of gold and bronze ; which served to whet desire for things of more value, and to promise greater rewards to a systematic search. The time for this at length came. Lucien Bonaparte purchased es- tates near Vulci, the principalities of Canino and Musignano ; and it was not long before he unveiled the subterranean treasures of his new acquisition. He gave the impulse, and companies were formed in Home, who, for the sake of profit, made extensive excavations in the neighbourhood of Corneto. Others were prompted by a more generous passion for antiquity ; and among these may be mentioned Baron Stackelberg, Chevalier Kestner, Lord Kin- naird, and the Gonfaloniere Avolta. The latter was soon rewarded for his expenditure of trouble and money, by an enjoyment which he says was the most exquisite of his life, — the discovery of an Etruscan monarch with his crown and panoply, and the peep which he was permitted to have of TARQUIN1A. 219 the grandeur of the ancient world before the air of the nineteenth century had dissolved its remnant. He entirely confirmed the account which I had re- ceived in Rome of his adventure with the lucumo, on whom he gazed for full five minutes from the aperture above the door of his sepulchre. He saw him crowned with gold, clothed in armour, with a shield, spear, and arrows by his side, and extended on his stone bier. But a change soon came over the figure, it trembled, and crumbled, and vanished away, and by the time that an entrance was effected, all that remained was the golden crown and a hand- ful of dust, with some fragments of the arms. Part of these became the property of Lord Kinnaird. The words of Signore Avolta require no confirma- tion to ensure my entire belief, but it may be satis- factory to my readers to know that the appearance which he saw of a body vanishing is not a thing unknown "elsewhere. And if we substitute centuries for thousands, an anecdote which I lately heard from a very respectable clergyman is a case in point. He is rector of a large town in Stafford- shire, and was one day hurriedly summoned to the parish church to behold the body of one of his predecessors, a rector who had died nearly three centuries ago, which had been discovered in opening a vault. On coming to the spot, he saw him laid out, with his face in perfect preservation ; but be- fore half an hour had elapsed, he perceived a curious movement in the face and figure, like that of sand running through a sand-glass, and the whole l 2 220 TARQUINIA. crumbled into dust. The same happened a few years ago at Dunblane cathedral, in Scotland, upon opening the grave of a bishop, who died, I think, in the year 1400. Many witnessed it. Micali mentions another grave which was opened at Tarquinia in 1823. The warrior within was seen lying on a bed or bier in full armour ; near him were two spears, some javelins, some arrows, and a short sword ; also two large round bronze shields, twelve Roman pal mi in circumference, with a rim on which rows of animals and little figures were stamped. I believe we saw all that are shown, and perhaps all that are sufficiently cleared to be entered, ex- cepting two large caverns beneath Corneto, and the " Grotta Intagliata." Cardinal Garampi, writing- in a. d. 1786, says, " All the rocks round Corneto are perforated with cavern sepulchres, the greater part of which have perished through the rudencssand carelessness of the agriculturists, except a very few which serve as shelter for cattle, or for other rustic uses. Many indeed have been filled up, to prevent their becoming a refuge for vagrants. Now in many of these, which have been from time to time discovered, there have been found paintings, and Etruscan inscriptions, and fragments of vases and statues, and other antiquities ; but, with the excep- tion of a few inscriptions not inviting to remove, they have all either been carried away or destroyed. In some which still remain only half filled up, I am assured that there are paintings and Etruscan in- scriptions'." TARQUINIA. 221 One of these, and one only, he had re-opened, the " Grotta del Cardinale," and that one he took no pains to preserve. I thought it served him right that his name should be forgotten upon the spot. He mentions incidentally another tomb, in which six heads of colossal size had been found, made of peperino ; also a torso, a hand, part of a foot, and five fragments of inscriptions in Etruscan characters, written from right to left, the letters be- ing four inches high, cut deep in the stone, and painted in red, the colour still being quite fresh. Alas ! where are they now ? In the grotta itself he saw two inscriptions, the one in green, and the other in red upon the wall. Not far from this tomb a corpse was found with bronze armour and ornaments, and with spots or stripes upon his garment of beaten gold in a zig- zag pattern, of which the cardinal procured a frag- ment. We heard of six or more different corpses which had been found in this manner, within the last fifty years, at Tarquinia. The principal family names which have been found amongst the sepulchral inscriptions are, Velcia, Vestrieii, Urinate, Festrinii, Caesennii, Marce, or Marcius, Matulne, and Sentinate. This latter tomb was opened in 1830. The name is written \^ | |/J"t"H3^ > and a branch of the same family is found amongst the magnates of Chiusi. I must now throw together a few more desul- tory remarks and recollections of these tombs. I have mentioned nine which we distinctly remeni- 222 TARQUINIA. ber, and as to which the notes and memories of the whole party agree. The Grotta del Tifone was re-discovered by Cav. Manzi, if I am right in saying that it was also known to the poor monk 150 years since, and stands described in his manuscript. The Grotta del Barone was dis- covered by Baron Stackelberg ; but there was also one called " Grotta del Ministro," excavated by the Cav. Kestner, and so named in compliment to him ; it is one of those which I have already described under another name, but I do not remember which. Many of these grottos bore two names. There was one called " Camera della Giustizia." On two sides of it were horses, but it took its name from the subject opposite the door. A man offering to a priestess, as was supposed, in favour of one of two combatants who were contending for victory before her. She turns away from the gifts, and will render justice only, not favour. I so perfectly re- member all my feelings and reflections in this tomb, that I must believe this is correct, for when a girl I used to lose half my interest in Homer's heroes, from the victor always being assisted by a divinity, which, as no one ever took the trouble to explain to me the allegory, I thought extremely unfair. It struck me, at the time we were in this tomb of justice, that the Etruscans had ideas of equity far superior to the Greeks. Here the divinity shows no favour, and turns away her head, that she may not even know on whose side the offering is present- ed. Had the (i reeks but maintained such senti- TARQUINIA. 223 ments as these, I have no doubt I should have felt all the enthusiasm for them Homer intended to inspire. I could, perhaps, have forgiven the death of Hector, and might even possibly have felt a triumph in the fall of Troy. I need hardly say that the great use of the sepulchral paintings to us is, that they show so much of the habits of thinking and feeling, so much of the religious belief, and the domestic customs of the nation by which they were executed. Constant points of resemblance, or of difference, struck me in every tomb between the Etruscans and the Egyptians, or the ancient Greeks, and constant evidences of those customs which the Etruscans afterwards taught to Rome ; the circus, for instance, with its games, and the velarium or covering which they folded over unroofed build- ings to protect them from the sun and rain, and which has generally been considered as a most in- genious invention of the Romans. It is much more remarkable that in the tombs of Beni Hassan, be- longing to the reign of Osortasen, b. c. 2082, or, ac- cording to the lowest computation, b. c. 1740, many of the very same subjects are found represented, such as funeral games, wrestling, foot-racing, and (what we afterwards saw at Chiusi) leap-frog. Also in the tomb of the General Nevothpha, processions of prisoners, in size, form, dress, and armour, exactly like the Etruscans, according to the testimony of Rosellini. As far as I could learn, the colouring is much the same, but the Etruscan ochre paint- 224 TARQUINIA. ings are done with more ease and spirit than the Egyptian, and the frescos of the Cardinale and Tifone are in a much higher style of art. They are, however, sadly defaced and sadly decayed. I have said that all the painted tombs discovered in our day have been found empty, excepting the Grotta Marzi and the Grotta del Tifone : the places, however, remain marked off where the sar- cophagus has stood. In some of them, particularly in the Grotta delle Iscrizioni and del Morto, there is even a rim all round the place, and marks where the four feet have indented the floor. There are also nails remaining in some of the walls from which the tazze and bronze shields have hung. Much did we wish to see some of the plainer tombs out of which the very beautiful black figured vases found here, the bronzes, gold -hiked swords, and various rich ornaments, had been taken ; especially we should have liked to have seen the warrior's tomb of Avolta's own discovery, but they were all filled up. As I understood the matter, the original doors had been broken to pieces or thrown inwards, and earth and stones had covered over the spot where the excavations had been made, so that fifty years hence they may all be made over again, and cause money to be spent for nothing, as no one cares to keep any plan of the ground already ex- plored. Avolta told me that whenever they came upon an unviolatcd, or, as tlicy name it, a virgin tomb, tliey found the entrance closed by a door, which fitted so closely that it might be called TARQUINIA. 225 sealed, and brought to niy mind our Saviour's se- pulchre hewn in the rock, with a great stone at the mouth of it, very difficult to move. These doors consisted either of one leaf which turned upon a pivot, or of two leaves which folded the one within the other.* Sometimes they were carved like the one on which we sat in the Camera delle Iscrizioni, and sometimes they were quite smooth and plain. Avolta said that most of these doors had another immense stone laid against them on the outside, at an angle of about 45°, and one or two which we entered had double doors. All, or nearly so, were descended by steps, though the steps upon which we walked were for the most part renewed by himself In several of the grottos, rain descends through some crevice in the rock, and snails and slugs get in, which considerably damage the painting. The chief similaritiesthatstruck mebetween Egypt and Etruria were, that their princely dead, whether king or priest, were laid in a rocky chamber, either painted or unpainted, and in a building, either of earth or stone, which represented a mountain. The style of the pictures, though not the subjects, was in some tombs thoroughly Egyptian, and in others both style and subject — the dancing, for instance — resembled early Greek. Libations were common to all the early nations. The Triclinium of man and woman together, is, I believe, in the early * Doors of the same description are found upon the tombs in Upper Egypt, and upon the sepulchres of the sons of David in Palestine. L 5 226 TARQUINIA. ages, peculiar to Egypt and Etruria. Like the Greeks, they had funeral feasts both at the home of the departed, and, as would appear from some small side-chambers attached occasionally to the sepulchre, at his grave. I cannot recollect to which tombs those we saw especially belonged. The corpse was laid with the face uppermost, and the feet towards the door, ready to walk out, as was shown us by the sarcophagi in the Tifone. The emblems of their professions were buried with them, and garlands were appropriated to them ; such as they had gained in life through skill or valour, were also laid upon them in death, to enter with them into immortality. The dress of the Greeks, as well as of the Etruscans, was of the richest and most expensive materials, so as to re- quire at last limitations by law. The egg broken at the commencement of the feast seems to have been an Etruscan custom, afterwards borrowed by the Greeks, as it was introduced very late amongst them. Funeral games, and races of naked men on foot or on horseback, were also practised in Greece, and were first known at the death of Areas, the son of Azun, and father of the Arcadians. Many kinds of flutes were used by the ancients, but I do not recollect anywhere, excepting here and in some Egyptian tombs, the double flute, and the lyre for elegiac music. In Greece the lyre was sacred to Apollo, and only used on occa- sions of joy or thanksgiving. Boxing and other 10 TARQUINIA. 227 gymnastic games to music used to be reckoned Campanian, and proper to Volturna, now Capua ; but from the evidence of these tombs, it was cer- tainly Tarquinian also, and probably obtained throughout the nation. A cone with a wall round it was used by the Phoenicians and Greeks ; of this form were the tombs of Agamemnon at My- cene, long called the treasury of Atreus, and those of Hector, Achilles, and Patroclus. In all of these, however, the bodies were burnt. The Athenians interred in the days of Cecrops, and probably in tombs of the same form, though none exist of so old a date. The height of the figures which we saw was generally from two to three feet, except in the two pillared grottos, where they were not above one foot and a half, and the colours used, besides black and white, were red, blue, and yellow. They do not seem to have known any others, and it is strange how they should have missed green. In the fresco, one genius is brown, and I thought once or twice that there was brown in the arabesques, but of the bright colours they had certainly no more than blue, red, and yellow. None of these tombs were arched, and in Athens the arch was forbidden. Most of the arts which they present to us are noted in the Bible as known, and were very likely perfected, before the flood, and familiar at any rate to the four families within the ark, and by them preserved, viz. the art of building which was 228 TARQUINIA. practised by Cain ; of handling musical instruments by Jubal ; of working in brass and iron or in metals by Tubal Cain ; and in clay, I doubt not, by Adam. As to their rich dresses and embroi- dery, skill in these things, in goldsmiths' work and in engraving, was carried to perfection in Egypt 1,500 years b. c, and perhaps six centuries earlier, as may be seen in the tombs of Beni Hassan ; and the Etruscans were in constant communication with Egypt. All the noble tombs must have be- longed to the Lucumones or nobles ; that class, out of which alone all the ruling officers, civil, mili- tary, or sacred, were or could be chosen. My own opinion of these small square painted chambers is, that they were appropriated to the Lar, or ruling- prince, among the Lucumones, both from their comparative rarity, and their beautiful adornment. They were singled out also from all the others by the first spoilers as what would afford the richest prize, and this is in all respects likely to have been the case with the tombs of the princes. When we arrived at the Grotta della Querciola, the door of it, toAvolta's infinite wrath and consternation, was open, and inside lay a man's shirt and coat; there was also part of a ladder, and part of a chair. It was evident that some one had been there, some " birbante," as our guide called him, who either wished to make it a home, or a repository of stolen goods. The dress, which was in very tolerable con- dition, we delivered to the police, with whom, for aught we know, it still remains, the possessor never TARQUINIA. 229 daring to reclaim it. Avolta had the door fastened, and to our no small amazement, when we returned to this grotto three days afterwards, we found that it had again been broken into, and a quantity of firewood laid down. I never heard whether the transgressor was discovered, but he was supposed to be some sheep-stealer in hiding, a style of de- predator not uncommon thereabouts. In this grotto is represented that peculiar kind of dancing which Dionysius mentions as being practised by the Greeks at funerals, and called Satyria, from the extravagant motions of the dancers, and a representation of which is to be seen in a very old Greek basso relievo over a door at Villa Albani. The whole of the Tarquinian cemetery belongs to the Borgo S. Spirito, and is let out for excavations and for sheep-feeding. Lord Kinnaird's excava- tions were near the Grotta del Triclinio, and a scavo costs, as Avolta told me, from 45 to 1500 or more scudi, according to the number of men employed, and the difficulty or ease of reaching the tomb. Those who knew this immense necropolis many years ago, say, that it has anciently been laid out in streets and squares like the opposite city, and in imitation of it, which appears to have been the rule in all the burying grounds, and which would add doubly and trebly to the interest of any one that could be discovered uninjured. In Tarquinia the roads that led to it, and the four gates, are still discoverable. I can easily imagine my unlearned reader asking how I know that Tarquinia had four 230 TARQUINIA. gates, and a fortress, and a temple, and terraces, and a splendid forum, and magnificent colonnades, things which we are accustomed to associate either with Greek art, or with later times : we know it, my reader, because these things were characteristic of every Etruscan city long prior to Rome, and were introduced into Rome from Etruria. The Tuscan order took its name from this ancient people, who used the Doric also ; and the forms of their temples, forums, and houses, are quite well ascertained. We go upon record, and not imagina- tion, when we describe them to you. From the tombs of Tarquinia five thousand vases have been taken out since 1815, and the value is now just one-half of what it was at first. Fossati, Campa- nari, and Candelori, ten years ago, I was told, cleared forty thousand scudi in three months by their excavations. Of the tombs opened, not one-tenth, and perhaps not above one-twentieth, are virgin ; but many which have been spoiled in ancient times, are still worth a second search. I understood Avolta, that wherever the door was broken, the tomb had certainly been rilled ; but in former times it was done with much more respect than now, for the chamber or grotta had been reclosed, so as to prevent the rain and soil from ruining it. The painted cham- bers were found dry and clean, with 1 heir colours brilliant, and in some the sarcophagi remained untouched, as in the one at Monteronc, and in the Grotta Marzi ; and in many there are quan- TARQUINIA. 231 titles of vases, as in the one we opened at Veii ; the imperial or gothic thieves having only taken away such articles as were prized in their day ; gold and jewels, scarabei, which the Romans wore for orna- ment, and very fine vases or tazze. At Veii we found, as I have said, about twenty vases, every one of which, though coarse, was worth something ; and in the opened and reclosed tombs of Tarquinia, Vulci, and all around, are found such bronzes, arms, and terra cotta, as former barbarians or antiquarians thought it not worth their while to remove, though very well worth the trouble now. Broken vases, in particular, of the rarest beauty, are found ; and these are put together in Rome and Naples with so much art, that the joinings and restorations can only be detected upon careful examination by very prac- tised hands, and to foreigners in the mass are quite invisible. I could never perceive them, though they were shown me ; but I had great satisfaction in finding that every dealer saw them, and could point them out at once. Such vases sell in both capitals for nearly, if not quite as high a price, as if they had been found unbroken. They reason that the pieces of a broken vase are as genuine and ancient as those of an unbroken one ; the clay as fine, the enamel as bright, the subject and the inscription, if any, as valuable ; therefore its being broken or unbroken is a mere fancy of the purchaser, and if you pay in the one case for the rarity of a whole vase, you must pay in the other for the time, and labour, and skill, of the mended or restored one. The only important 232 TARQUINIA. part of the matter is to ascertain that the restorer has altered and added nothing of his own ; also that all the pieces put together belong to the same vase, and that your vase is not one made up of many others, even though all the pieces may be ancient. We had once a vase of great beauty and immense size offered to us, found in Tuscania ; it was of the finest clay, of the oldest style in black and white figures, and with a very fine enamel. We discovered that the back of the vase was antique ; the front with the leading subject was the painter's, i. e. the very clever restorer's fancy, and the rim, of great beauty and rarity, had been brought from General Galassi, being one of his many fragments from Cere. There was not one antiquarian who saw this vase, who did not immediately guide his finger along the modern part, and we returned it. It was so beautiful that we really did so with sorrow, and I must do the dealer the justice to say, that he never from the first praised it as we thought it de served, that he never denied its being much restored, and that he immediately and without dispute gave us back our money when we told him that such a vase could not be shown as a specimen of the art of the ancients. Caprancsi is quite above these arts, and I do nut think he would be easily tempted to lose his high character. I do not say this to disparage others, many of whom treated us very handsomely and never attempted to deceive us, but merely to show that he was one whose union of know- ledge and probity nobody ever distrusted ; and Dedo- TARQU1NIA. 233 minicis, with his very, small collection, is, I believe, another. As the most reasonable and obliging dealer in Rome, and as a man who has most beau- tiful things, I cannot omit our good friend Vesco- vali ; neither do I like to pass over Fossati, Fre- diani, a very civil little man in the Corso, and Basseggio, whose collection of vases is certainly the richest, and at very moderate prices. A friend of ours has a fragment of a most beautiful vase from Tarquinia, of the finest enamel and with letters, which he picked up there in a tomb. Cav. Kestner has two most valuable vases, the first of which, consisting of sixteen pieces, he purchased from a peasant at Tuscania, and when it came to be put together, it was perfect, with the exception of one piece. This the minister did not supply, choosing rather to keep his vase imper- fect ; but a year after he purchased another basket- ful of fragments from another peasant, who had found them at Monte Fiascone. I forget how many pieces he found, but I think thirty-seven ; of these thirty-six made another beautiful vase, and the thirty-seventh exactly supplied the vacant place of the vase he had purchased the preceding year. According to the testimony of the peasants, the tombs in which these fragments were found had both been opened before, and in that case we must suppose the man who had rifled the one to have carried part of his spoil into the other, and there to have left a broken piece which he thought super- fluous. I confess it appeared to us much more 234 TARQTJINIA. likely that the Toscanella Contadino had joined with some others to rob a tomb at Monte Fiascone, and that they had afterwards divided by guess the spoil ; but I do not know what evidence the Cavaliere may not have had that his men spoke truth, and " le vrai n'est pas toujours le vraisemblable," — a fact which one is constantly learning in such expeditions as these. Two of the finest vases of the King of Naples were in an in- credible number of pieces, and have been so well joined that no defect is perceptible, but all the pieces are genuine, and were found together. We had always understood that Lord Kinnaird had been exceedingly disappointed in his excava- tions, and Manzi even places it upon record, and says it was owing to the unskilfulness of those who worked for him ; but Avolta, who knew very well the result of all his operations, utterly denied this, and says, on the contrary, that he considered him- self well repaid, and that he found articles of equal rarity and value. Among other things he carried away the sword adorned with gold, and the golden crown of Avolta's still undissolved warrior. Corneto is surrounded on all sides by graves of its ancient inhabitants, Roman when not Etruscan. The Greeks often buried their re- nowned and honoured dead in the very centre of the city, and the Romans, when they did not do the same, erected their tombs by the highway ; but the Etruscans seem always to have appro- priated and probably consecrated as much ground TARQUINIA. 235 to the dead as they did to the living, on the same regular plan, and on a rising ground or rising grounds opposite. The present town of Corneto is excavated all round with sepulchral caves that have been for ages open and empty, and many great families, or perhaps distinguished foreigners, such as Egyptians, appear to have had burying places of their own near the city, but not in the locality of its natives. I should here perhaps mention the aqueduct close to which we left our carriages, and under which we went in order to descend to the Grotta del Car- dinale. It is Roman, upon arches, though I know not of what date, and extends a considerable dis- tance. It used to convey water into Tarquinia, and it is a pity that something of the sort is not constructed for Corneto, as the town in summer is often sadly distressed from the failure of the present limited supply. The little river Martaruns far beneath it, and the streams which the people can command are not nearly sufficient. They have two very pretty fountains, which are often dry. Having satisfied our curiosity by visiting the tombs of the Tarquinians, our next object was to endeavour to trace the remnants of their abode during life. The only complaint that we have against the excellent Avolta is, that he rather dis- couraged the expedition we proposed to the rocky hill which was the site of the ancient city, and which formed so striking an object from the ne- cropolis. He represented it as a very difficult "236 TARQUINIA. scramble, which would not in any way reward as for the trouble. We were, however, resolved to make a voyage of discovery, and for that purpose drove along the public road which intersects the necropolis, until we got nearly to the end of it. Then we left the carriage, and walked to the brow of the steep hill overhanging the valley which separates the ancient city, now Turchina, from the necropolis or Monterozzi, and which runs on as far as under the town of Corneto. Down this hill we scrambled, and found ourselves in the midst of the valley, advancing towards the rocky cliffs on which Tarquinia was once built. As we approached we looked eagerly, but in vain, for any trace of the hand of man. A specimen of masonry, Cyclopean, Etruscan, or even Roman, would have been acceptable ; but we could discern nothing but rude cliffs and rocky terraces, which had doubtless once formed the substructions of towers and palaces. After a good deal of trouble we surmounted them, and enjoyed a fine view of the opposite necropolis, the more distant Corneto, and immediately around us, the site of the ancient city. Here we saw a hill rising above us at the distance of about half a mile, and our anxiety to find walls or stones, or anything which bore the marks of human workmanship, animated us to proceed : we compared ourselves with the explorers of the ruins of Babylon or Oaxaca, for the spot on which we now stood was to us, and I believe to most of our countrymen, as little known as the antiquities of the TARQUINIA. 237 remote east, or the scarcely discovered west. I cannot easily describe my pleasure, when, on ap- proaching the summit of the hill, I descried what was evidently a wall, and as I advanced I per- ceived a massive arch, half covered up in the ground ; but enough was seen to convince me, that it must have been a work of solid magnificence. The neighbouring summit had been built upon, and formed a terrace, the wall of which partially re- mained, and reminded us of the walls of Fiesole. On this we traced the substructions of at least two buildings, a greater and a less, both of the same solid masonry. I could scarcely find words to ex- press my satisfaction and surprise at this unex- pected discovery ; and I proposed to my com- panion that we should use the privilege of original explorers, and give names to the monuments of an- tiquity which he had thus rescued from oblivion. The arch we christened by the name of " De- maratus ;" the summit of the hill we called (as doubtless it really was) the acropolis or fortress ; and we assigned the larger building as a temple to Menrfa, the Etruscan Minerva, and the smaller as a heroon or fane to the demigod Tages ! But seriously, as this was the highest point of the city, and probably the arx, its summit must have been crowned by the principal public buildings, of which the temples were the chief; and no Etruscan city was built without temples in the most conspicuous part to Menrfa, (Minerva,) Kupra, (Juno,) and Tina, (Jupiter.) The arch strongly resembled that 238 TARQUINIA. of the cloaca maxima at Rome, which was built during the Etruscan domination of that city ; and it, as well as the foundations of the arx and temples, was built of that solid gigantic, yet regular masonry which is styled Etruscan, and which is equally re- moved from the huge and shapeless Cyclopean, and the less massive Roman. The Cyclopean walls are the remains of some most ancient people, who bore sway in Italy at a period even more remote than the national existence of Etruria. They are formed of vast polygonal blocks, and may be distinguished by two subdivisions of style which are sometimes found in the same city. 1. Rude and totally without order, as Pau- sanias describes the walls of Tyrus in Greece; an Italian specimen of this is " Cora" of the Volsci. 2. Where greater care and art were used in their construction ; and of this the walls of " Amitcrnum" may serve as an example. The mountains of the Equi, Heruici, and Volsci, are full of speci- mens of these walls. Sometimes they are formed of two parallel rows of blocks, witli a mound of earth between them, composing the body of the wall. The gates of such Cyclopean cities are generally mere interruptions of the walls, with an immense stone laid across by way of architrave, and an ap- proximation of the stones of the gateway to each other, tapering towards the top. Of these gates, the finest specimens extant are at Allatri, Segni, and Arpino. The Etruscm style is much more perfect than these, and denotes a far higher grade •'///// trpisip. I V i -■■J ~1 .Z'/W/w//// .'< I -///,/ h TARQUINIA. 239 of architectural taste and knowledge. The best specimens that I have seen of it are the magnificent walls of Cortona, Fiesole, and Perugia ; and to give an idea of the style of the gate, I subjoin a drawing of that of the citadel of Ferentinum. Belonging to this style appeared to be the remains, which we found at Tarquinia, and which I conceive to be solid remnants of Etruscan grandeur, surviving the less massive fabrics of the Roman municipia, and telling us how great the whole must have been, of which they form but a fragment. After spending a long time at the acropolis, seated on the foundations of the temple, we re- turned to our carriage by a different way, in order, if possible, to make more discoveries. — We de- scended another side of the hill of Tarquinia, and crossed a curve of the valley which divided the city from the necropolis. During this descent we examined some large and beautiful specimens of Etruscan architecture on the steep slope of the hill, which had formerly belonged to the outer wall of the city. When we returned to Corneto, we asked the gonfaloniere if no search had been made for objects of antiquity on the spot which he had just quitted, when, by way of answering our question, he conducted us to the palazzo of one of the principal Cornetan families, the Bruschi. There we saw tablets of marble, with Latin inscriptions in beau- tiful preservation, in honour of a distinguished bene- factor of Roman Tarquinia, a prsetor. These had been dug up among the ruins of the municipia, 240 TARQUINIA. which, like that at Veii, occupied a portion of the site of the ancient city. But I cannot help think- ing that if a diligent search were made, many more valuable things would be found. The place is very little known even to the Italians, and has scarcely ever been visited by the few strangers who have explored the tombs. I would, however, recommend it as a highly interesting excursion to every one who has half a day to spare. On the following morning we set out to visit the remains of an ancient temple about a mile from Corneto, in the direction of the Necropolis. We approached it from Corneto by a thing called a road, but which no English person would have guessed to have been meant for one, having at a small distance from it, on each side, vast and splen- did tombs, all now in ruined masses, and their con- tents at the other end of the earth, and then we walked through a quiet green lane, about one hundred and fifty yards, when we came upon a vast circle, something like the crater of a volcano ; the lower half of it being a cliff of rocks with eight wide-mouthed caverns, and the upper half of it partially covered with brushwood and huge loose stones. We descended into this rocky amphitheatre, which has indeed the appearance of some vast and magnificent quarry, and the extraordinary grandeur of one of the caverns arrested our attention before proceeding to the temple. We crossed over to the mouth of a cave which struck me as one of the most magnificent things of the kind I had ever seen. As TARQIIINIA. 241 far as it extends, it may vie with, or even surpass, the cavern at Castleton in Derbyshire. As I stood before its wide-yawning entrance, I thought of the lines of Dante, which the scenery here, if he had visited it, might naturally have suggested to him — " Per me se va nella citta dolente, Per me se va nel eterno dolore, Per me se va tra la perduta gente." On entering the cavern its height becomes still more imposing — its breadth increases, and its length is lost in gloom. But after wandering for about a hundred yards in its immensity, I found that it became suddenly narrow and abruptly terminated. This Avolta explained to have been the quarry from which the stone was taken to build modern Corneto, in the third or fourth century, or, as others say, in the seventh or eighth century. This cavern has three noble entrances, and its exterior and interior are worthy of each other. Though the galleries have been regularly quarried, and the stone drawn out of it has been, according to the fashion of old, in enormous rectangular blocks, there is no appearance of art about it, but it gives one the idea of some mighty natural wonder, expressly formed to excite admiration and awe. It has every appear- ance of having served for the great works of Tar- quinia, five and twenty or thirty centuries ago, and fallen Tarquinia, when in ruins, has much more probably been the quarry from which modern Corneto has been built. Whpn we expressed to M 242 TARQU1NIA. Avolta our admiration of this wonderful imitation of nature, he told us that, in his younger days, an eccentric countryman of ours, Lord Bristol, the Bishop of Derry, the " Count-Bishop," as Horace Walpole calls him, was so much struck with it, that he came almost every year to Corneto for the sake of seeing it, long before the more recent Etruscan discoveries had given the place an interest to persons fond of antiquities. Lord Bristol used to amuse himself with astonishing the Italian clergy. During his frequent wanderings, when he came to a very uncomfortable inn, he used to send to the parish clergyman and insist upon his exercising hospitality towards him as to a father of the church, and on one occasion he invited a large body of Cornetan monks to dine with him on a fast-day, and seduced them into disobedience by having for- bidden meats dressed up so as to represent niaigre. After they had all heartily eaten, he revealed the truth to them, exulted in the trap he had laid, and scandalized them by such irregular conduct in a Bishop. Next to this cavern came four old Etruscan grottos or graves, but all open ; and as they have been ransacked ages since, they are not worth ex- ploring. We therefore crossed the little vale to see the temple, the real object of our excursion, and at the upper end, on the opposite side, we came in front of a facade, hollowed out of the living rock, so as to form a cavern, carved with friezes, pilasters, and various architectural ornaments, having a de- TARQUINIA. 243 corated and dome-shaped roof. The carving is of a very ancient style, in most places much obliterated, and in some entirely so. One can only discover where friezes of elaborate ornament once have been. I am far from pledging myself to anything like accuracy in the resemblance, but the carving re- called a little to my mind the friezes of the temple of Antoninus and Faustina at Rome. In the in- nermost part of this sculptured cavern we descried a low door through which I squeezed myself, and entered a low vaulted chamber rudely cut out of the rock, which has probably been the adytum of the temple from whence issued the oracles with which the priests and the initiated deluded the people. Avolta informed us that this temple bears the name of "Cerere," but we heard no good reason assigned for its being so ; and it has much more probably been the temple of Isis or Iside, the name having been corrupted by the country people. It is a round rock temple, and not in the Etrus- can style, neither can I say that it retains any beauty now; but it is evidently of very high an- tiquity, and it is interesting, not only because it is the only remnant of a temple in this place, but, as far as I know, the only rock temple in Italy north of Naples. As we in some parts made out the frieze very indistinctly, and in others not at all, we asked Avolta if he knew what the figures were. He then made us perceive that they were all sphynxes of considerable size. " Some people," he said, m 2 244 TARQU1N1A, " have written treatises on this, and have seen in it I know not what mystic emblems ; but the ancients were not always mystical, they were sometimes quite plain, and this is nothing but an ornament, a frieze of simple sphynxes, which I remember (mite perfect." Ancient ornaments, however, had always some relation to the things they represented. Isis is said to have taught agriculture in Egypt, and to have been the same as the Ceres of Eleusis, but she is not the same as the Ceres of Rome or of Etruria, and Ceres would not have had sphynxes in hertemple. It was lined with stucco, and had once been painted ; but every mark of this is now obliterated. Carlo Avolta remembers three naked figures which would have told us much of its history, but once when he was away, a mischievous and unthinking man chose to hold a pic-nic here, and to light a fire, and esta- blish the kitchen of his party within the temple. The consequence was, that the smoke destroyed all that remained of the paintings. I fancy pic- nics were very often held here, and a more ro- mantic, retired, and beautiful spot can scarcely be imagined, though it would seem that meditation upon the past had formed no pail of the occupation of those who chose it for their merry-makings. To me it would have given the impression (but for these unseemly associations) of holy ground, " which breathed of peace, and tuned the heart to prayer :" a spot where one might come to learn wisdom, to meditate upon the days that are gone, and " to commune with ones own heart and be still." This TARQUINIA. 245 temple formerly had a door upon it, but it was so continually broken into by the contadini, that, after the above-mentioned memorable fire, it was never renewed. A Roman prince who admired this place as much as we did, had, many years ago, a set of plans made of the temple, and gave Avolta a copy tale quale, but they w r ere either stolen from him, or he lost them. What a scene this would have been for a general assembly of the Druids, or of the high priests, or great council of any nation ! The cave next to the temple was semi-circular, and, to my amazement, on entering it, I found a columbarium ; i. e. what I took to be a Roman burying-place, where small vases of baked clay, like flower-pots, only filled with ashes and covered with a lid, are laid in rows within holes, exactly like a pigeon -house. I called out to Avolta, " Surely it is not possible that this can be a Roman columbarium ;" he laughed, and said, " A colum- barium it certainly is, but Roman it is not. In my youth it was a cavern like the others, some old tomb probably, but many years ago a pazzo (a mad or foolish man) who was here, took it into his head to keep sheep above and doves beneath. He had a quantity of pigeons here, but now he is gone, and nothing remains of him but his folly. Words cannot tell how sorry I am not to have made more copious notes of what we saw in Corneto, so many things have entirely escaped me, which, when at the place, I thought it impossible to forget. There is a verv small, very ancient, and very in- 246 TARQUINIA. teresting little church or chapel in the burying- ground of the town, the Campo Santo, a model in its own style of architecture, with a cupola. There are twenty -three churches to a population which varies from four to nine thousand inhabitants, and upon an average there cannot be less than ten ecclesiastical persons to each church. In England there would be two churches to such a population at most, perhaps only one, perhaps only half a one, i. e. one to eighteen thousand, and two clergymen. There are two cathedrals, the old and the new, the former of which, called Santa Maria di Castello, is much the best worth seeing. It was struck by lightning some years ago, in 1810, and has been unserviceable ever since, except during three days in the year, of which that of St. Antonio is one. It was upon this occasion that the Tarquinian horses leaped off the roof of the high tower, and broke their necks or backs, so as to sign their own death- warrant, killing a Cornetan ass by the way, which was feeding peaceably beneath them, close to the church door. It has a beautiful dome, and the proportions are the same as those of St. Peter, though not the size. The entrance door is very fine — a large round arch, which has been com- pletely bordered in Mosaic of various coloured marbles, porphyries, and serpentine. But, alas ! little now remains, for they have been picked out and sold. I suppose the Vicario has in some way made himself very much disliked, as he is accused of doing it ; and scandal says, that when the Pope TARQUINIA. 247 visited Corneto, he took a sick fit, for fear of being obliged to conduct him to this ancient and ill-used church. The inside is divided into a nave and two aisles, by large ugly square pillars, with a smaller round pillar on each side. There is no bishop's chair in it, and no tables for reading the gospels, and the organ is most ungracefully placed in the tribune. In front of the curiously-shaped old marble pulpit are four small twisted pillars, which have been once Mosaic, but have been pulled to pieces like the door. One most rare piece of marble is here, which would have been displaced and sold also, had any one known its value, before the public voice stopped the shameless depredations ; and here and on each side of the great door are some exceedingly curious old Latin inscriptions, mentioning the bishops of Tarquinia, and the change of the see, and the foundation and con- servation of this church. They are well worth the trouble of copying. Something rare and remark- able also there is at the door, but I made no note of it; neither did I copy, as I hope others will do, a long Etruscan inscription, which Avolta showed me upon a piece of white marble in the left aisle. The pavement of the nave is that sort of Mosaic called " Opus Alexandrinum," and the baptismal font is large and handsome ; it is a round basin or bath for immersion, and I believe it to be antique. This church once belonged to the Franciscans, whose convent is attached to it ; and the outside and cloisters are worth looking at, though now 248 TARQUINIA. abandoned. One single brother, not a Franciscan, lives there, a very merry and good-natured looking hermit, whom I should not judge to be troubled with over-much study, or cumbered with over- much learning. Several of the churches have catherine-wheel windows, with doors of the Saxon arch, which have the chevreuil and shark's tooth. vAfVAAAAA> WWWWVN pattern round them. St. Mark's is the church next best worth seeing to Santa Maria di Castello, and it contains two good pictures, one I believe by Perugino. The church in which Cardinal Fesch and Madame Letitia lie I have already mentioned, and it is not worth a visit. Madame Letitia is enclosed in an immense sarcophagus of white mar- ble, perfectly plain, and without a letter inscribed upon it — not even " The mother of Napoleon," or " Letitia Bonaparte," — both being doubtless fraught with some very mystical and dangerous meaning. Avolta kindly took me to see a very handsome church, which is rebuilding by subscription, and is a tribute of gratitude to the Madonna who saved the town from cholera in 1835 and 183G. Such tributes and gifts to the churches, of pictures, tapestry, new altars, or silver chandeliers, are very COmmOD in Italy, and shame us, who have neither churches nor gifts in churches, dedicated to God, TARQUINIA. 249 in gratitude for his having saved us from war in our own country, when all Europe was desolated, and from suffering by the cholera like Rome and Maples, or for any other of his innumerable and accumu- lated benefits. When I think how such a propo- sition would be derided and spurned at in our parliament, I do not wonder at the Italian idea concerning us, that we have thrown off all religion, and know nothing of Christianity ; and I can believe what I have heard of a certain popular and shrewd Roman duchess, who, at a large Italian party in her own house one night," announced that she had a piece of news to communicate, which she was sure would give all her friends great pleasure. She had that day heard an Englishman avow that he believed in a God, and that his nation in general did the same. In short, she said, " they are not so wholly atheists as we have been led to think, and there are even some of them who say prayers, and are not ashamed to be thought religious." Amongst other out-of-the-way things, Corneto contains the Bridewell, or House of Correction, for the clergy of the Papal States. If ever it becomes in the way, i. e. a place of resort for strangers, I doubt, not the Bridewell will be removed, as the re- marks of foreigners might not always be either plea- sant or discreet. There were thirty of these reverend gentlemen in confinement in May 1839: some for murder, some for forgery, and some for other crimes. How these crimes are expiated I did not learn ; whether by fine, or confinement for a m 5 250 TARQUINIA. term of years, or for life. A very zealous Italian, I should think, would deny the existence both of the crimes and the persons. It is only by accident and inadvertency that a stranger can ever hear the truth of these things. We English, however, who fancy that the Italian clergy never are punished, are very glad to ascertain the existence of such a place. The dreadful inn at which we first arrived was once the Palazzo Vitaleschi, belonging to a cardinal of that name ; and certainly outside it has a very imposing and lordly appearance, being a splendid specimen of the domestic architecture of the middle ages. Its lofty front with Saracenic gothic windows and rich ornaments is beautiful, and the effect of its court, surrounded by stories of corridors, very fine; but within it is full of all uncleanness, and it was called in derision Palazzaccio, or " great dirty palace." I would certainly advise strangers against this Palazzaccio, until it has undergone a root and branch reform ; and the neat little inn in which we passed a week, has only four tolerable bed- rooms and one sitting-room for everybody, in which the arms of the Grand Duke of Tuscany, and representatives of the ladies of all countries, in costume, make a great figure. It is, however, pos- sible to procure very clean and cheap lodgings, with respectable and intelligent people near, which, to those who can speak Italian, I should recom- mend as the preferable plan. Dinner and supper could be had from the inn, where we found the TARQUINIA. 251 cook excellent. Avolta, to whom, after our wan- derings, we always returned, procured us admission a second time to Casa, or Palazzo Bruschi, the house of the richest family here, and we examined at leisure four large white marble slabs, with in- scriptions upon them in excellent Latin, and beau- tifully written. They were found along with many other things in the baths or thermae of Tarquinia, probably altogether a Roman work, and these were of the time of Aurelian, about a. d. 270, in honour of the praetor and proconsul, who restored the baths. Thence we went to the Casa or Palazzo " Falsacappa," another noble Cornetan family which has given a cardinal to the conclave. In the court- yard were broken columns and heads, and pieces of sculpture, and parts of friezes, all in marble ; and in the house we saw a variety of articles, some of which were for sale, but of which I only remember, as particularly fine, some bronze paterae, with lions' heads in the middle, finely executed, and exactly resembling in shape and size those paterae which are in the hands of the monumental figures. There was also a gold ornament, which has either been worn in front of the mantle, or has fastened it like a sort of button on the shoulder. It was the size of a small watch, and had on the upper part a disk of filagree, like a star, which turned round, and was most delicately and ingeniously wrought. Micali mentions eleven pieces or shields, exactly like the bronzes we here saw, which were all found upon the walls of the same tomb in Tarquinia ; some were 252 TARQUINIA. gilt, and some had composition eyes in the centre; heads, made of white and shining enamel, with black pupils. He does not say what became of them, but the tomb had been plundered before these were taken out, and a broken stone had remained in it with an Etruscan inscription. Avolta next took us to see the gardens of the Bruschi family, a little way out of the town. There are two of them quite distinct in character— the one upon the hill, and the other below it; in both of which the liberal proprietor allows his townspeople to walk when they please, and he delights in seeing the gay and well-behaved crowds who take ad- vantage of his permission on fete days, and on the summer evenings. I must remark, that his kind- ness is never abused, his flowers are not gathered, his fruit is not stolen, his vegetable beds are not trampled on, his shrubs are not broken, and his peacocks, here called " Uccello di Faraone," bird of Pharaoh, are neither chased nor stoned. In the lower garden, which is not so pretty as the upper one, we came suddenly upon two columns of while ami gray marble, I should guess fully eighteen inches in diameter, and from eight to ten feet in length : they were perfectly smooth, and beside them lay two others cannellated, and throe most richly worked Corinthian capitals. Roman they undoubtedly were, and they had come from the liatlis of Tarquinia. As we walked on through this extensive and varied garden, we came to a small piece of water full of gold and silver fish, at the head TARQUINIA. 253 of which I saw an immense stone Egyptian lion ; I should think it was from five to six feet long, and three feet high, but I saw it with such surprise and admiration, that it is very possible my eyes may have magnified the wonder. The head has that calm and mild, yet firm and commanding expres- sion, so peculiar to Egypt ; and the neck has been injured with scratches or ridges, as if some one had filed it or used it for a block. Whilst I was ex- amining this, Avolta came up, and told me that this lion was Etruscan, found in a part of old Tarquinia, which an industrious peasant had appropriated to himself as a corn-field, and over which he had, year after year, dragged his plough. He was so much incommoded by one large black stone, thinly covered with soil, that he resolved to dig it out, and forth sprang this lion to the light of day. We also visited the town-hall where the muni- cipal meetings are held, and from which the gonfalo- niere was summoned to our aid on the evening of our arrival. In one of the suite of public rooms the frescos on the wall betray at once the pride and ignorance of the Cornetans who lived between two and three centuries ago. They here assume to themselves an identity with ancient Corytus, and, on the authority of Virgil, found a claim to consider Rome as a Cornetan colony. " Atque equidem memini (fama est obscurior annis) Auruncos ita ferre senes his ortus ut agris Dardanus Idaeas Phrygian, penetrant ad urbes ThreYciamque Samum, quee nunc Samothracia fertur : 254 TARQUINIA. Hinc ilium Corythi Tyrrhena ab sede profectum Aurea nunc solio stellantis regia caeli, Accipit, et numerura divorura altaribus addit." JEn. lib. vii. 205. " I call to mind, but time the tale has worn, Th 1 Aurunci told that Dardanus, though born On Latian plains, yet sought the Phrygian shore, And Samothracia, Samos called before ; From Tuscan Corytus he claimed his birth : But after, when exempt from mortal earth, From thence ascended to his kindred skies A god, and as a god augments their sacrifice." " Surge, age, et haec laetus longrevo dicta parenti Haud dubitanda refer : Corytum terrasque requirat Ausonias ; Dictrea negat tibi Jupiter arva." JEn. lib. iii. 169. " Rise, and thy sire with these glad tidings greet, Search Corytus, for Jove denies thee Crete." Considering Corneto and Corytus to be identical, though Corneto was never heard of till ages after the iEneid was written, and Corytus is supposed by all writers to be Cortona, they regarded Dardanus as a Cornetan prince, Troy as a daughter colony, and Alba Longa and mighty Rome as remote descendants. They accordingly blazoned proudly on their walls a pedigree deducing Julius Caesar master of the Roman world from a line of Corne- tans, through the intermediate links of Romulus, Nmnitor, Ascanius, vEneas, and Dardanus. " Truly, where ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise." This reminded me of the famous pedigree of Sir Thomas Urquhart of Cromarty, wherein he traced TAltQUINIA. 255 his descent, by means of the same similarities of name, through most of the heroes of antiquity, back to Adam. The Cornetans might have gratified their desire of being connected on vantage ground with Rome, while at the same time they might have observed historical accuracy, if they had deduced their own descent as an offset from old Tarquinia, which gave kings and laws to Rome during the most splendid period of her earlier history. But enough of this. One of the frescos represents rather more truly the reception of a Pope, Clement VII., I believe, by the Cornetans, when he was ob- liged to fly from Rome in the reign of Charles the Fifth. One of our mornings we devoted to looking over the still remaining part of Cavaliere Manzi's once choice collection of vases and other objects found in his scavi, and which are for sale. The pieces of such as are broken are here cemented together, but in no way restored, and not even united with any skill, so that no one can be deceived as to what he buys; and though we thought the prices very high, and found every adjunct of form, or size, or colour, or quality of the clay, or subject, or inscription, taken into consideration, still the broken vases, because unrestored, were not charged like the whole ones.* There were a few that we wished for very * In Rome scarcely a difference is made in price between the entire vases and the broken ones, partly on account of the expense incurred in mending them, and partly because they are esteemed equally genuine. 256 TARQUINIA. much, but the person who has charge of them was so unreasonable, that we could not make a bar- gain. There were several valuable fragment's of bronzes of various kinds, speech], shields, and other things, and three glass vases, very small, and very rude in comparison of Cav. Campana's in Rome, but of the same description, and of the same colours, blue, white, and yellow, semi-transparent, and ar- ranged with art. Cavaliere Manzi had, I under- stood, a very valuable collection in Rome of objects found at Tarquinia ; and, from all we heard, it is a cause of deep regret, and great public loss, that there should be no museum at Corneto where one might see specimens of all the various beautiful and curious objects taken out of the tombs. The public-spirited Avolta regretted it as much as we did, but had been too much discouraged, and too little supported, in what he had already done, to set it on foot ; and I fancy no one else there has at once the power and the will for such an un- dertaking. We thence proceeded to the shop of an old widow whose former husband had been particularly fortu- nate in securing to himself a number of scarabei and jacinths from Tarquinia when the present exca- vations were first commenced. lie had made a greal deal of money, and a few of his stock still re- mained. On a former visit we had seen three curious scarabei, two of sardonyx, and one of black agate. The agate had on it an Egyptian device — " I sis in ;i grove of Lotus;" the same style, but not, TARQUINIA. 257 nearly so fine as the plasma tli smeraldo which I have mentioned ; and one of the others, the device of which was either a Triga or a Cerberus, had seven couches or layers of different colours in the stone ; perhaps I ought to say seven different shades of colour, as they were only varieties of red and white, but the arrangement of them was rare. We could not persuade this old woman to let us have them at a reasonable price before, and now we re- turned in the hope that she still had them, and would be willing to accept of such a sum as we could have got them for in Rome ; but the Prince of Sulmona, now Borghese, had been before us, and had either a more winning tongue than ourselves, or had not thought the price unreasonable. The Dowager Princess had a necklace of scarabei, very richly set in gold. The old woman was very glad to tell us that she no longer had these scarabei, but she brought us down two or three much broken, and one jacinth, which had formerly been in an ear-ring, but which she could not pair, and she asked double what old Vescovali would have done, and would not take less. One scarabeus had no back, and the other no face ! We accordingly left them, and I would advise all English travellers, when they have seen any object of the kind which they desire to possess, and are asked enormous prices, to get some dealer in Rome to purchase it for them, to whom it will be sold with equal readiness, and from whom no such sum will be demanded. I have already mentioned Pucci at 258 TARQUIN1A. Civita Vecchia, as a very moderate person, and I have no doubt that he would readily undertake such a commission, should it not be convenient to do it from Rome. I think I have now detailed all that I can remem- ber of Corneto and Tarquinia, likely to be useful or interesting to travellers in general. The air of the town and upon the heights is good, and the country pretty. A thousand scudi per annum is a large fortune there, enabling a man to keep a carriage and have every comfort. The costume of the men is the same as in Rome, and the women wear the black or white veils upon their heads, like those of the north of Italy. The town contains, besides what I have mentioned, two convents for women and four for men. The mallow here is cultivated as a shrub, and is so useful that Avolta said, were it less common, it would be sold for its weight in gold. The olive is very extensively cultivated, but does not thrive, and is only reckoned to yield a full crop one year in three. Corneto, besides being the head-quarters from which to visit the surround- ing country, will well repay a stay of three days for itself. Unfortunately, the roads from it to Tus- cania, Vulci, Castel d'Asso, and the other ancient ruins, are nearly impassable for carriages, and the only accommodation at present to be had for those who do not ride, is one four-seated open carriage which will not take more than three people, for the driver occupies one place ; and as this carriage has no springs, those who attempt it must make TARQUINIA. 259 up their minds to be shaken to pieces. All this, however, a few years will surely remedy, and I say to my reader again and again, go and help forward the reformation. The Cornetans are very proud of their country, and very fond of their municipal form of government ; but they are at present smart- ing under the idea that they are neglected, or at any rate not favoured by the Holy See, and that their former fidelity is no longer estimated, and their long and faithful services are beginning to be forgotten. Perhaps Tarquinia, though she can rise no more, may help to replace the crown of the maremma upon the head of Corneto ; may be the nurse of her restored fortunes, and the mother of her future prosperity. The site of Tarquinia is now called Turchina, the name which it probably always bore in the mouths of the peasantry, and the necropolis is called Monte- rozzi, or the rough mounts, from the rough way in which it has been destroyed. Since this was written, I have seen Sir William Gell's work " on Rome and its Vicinity," which supplies the following additional information: " The city of Etruria most connected with Rome in early times was Tarquinia, between which and Rome there must have been a carriage-road, even before the reign of Tarquinius Priscus. The date of its foundation was 1513 b. c. Others, however, say 432 before Rome, or 1186 b. c, which is the more probable. The stone employed in the build- ing of the walls is calcareous, but yet so exceedingly 10 260 TARQUINIA. soft, that it is, perhaps, more easily cut than the common tufo, so that no argument can be founded on any similarity between their construction and that of the Pelasgic cities. The walls are parallelo- grams, and are almost all constructed with soft stone. Very few of the blocks retain their original position, but are chiefly to be found under the precipices, or scattered about on the declivities. Irregularity of construction is, however, percep- tible in some parts, as is evident from the subjoined specimen, taken from what was once the citadel or palace " Corneto was probably either the Cort Nossa, or the Cort Enebra of Livy, commonly read Cortuosa and Contcnebra, two forts of the Tarquinienses. Pos- sibly Cort may mean a castle. One of them stood probably upon the opposite side of the stream. " Tarquinia is placed upon a nearly flat or table hill, shaped like the letter L, the top of the letter beinjr to the west, and the end of it to the north. At these two points were two castles, — Civitclla at the west, and Castellina at the north. The site of the latter is now occupied by a ruined convent. Tarquinia is defended by a high precipice round nearly the whole of its circuit, so that walls were scarcely necessary. Its gates were apparently six, TARQUINIA. 26 1 one of which on the north side seems to have looked towards Toscanella, (anciently Tuscania,) with a sort of mound and parapets which formed an approach across a ravine ; a third on the east might have been of less consequence ; a fourth on the same side must have been that of Norcia, an Etruscan town, more anciently called Orkle (a name perhaps corrupted from Hercules) and Orcia : a fifth was to the south, and its road ran along the valley to the west, towards Corneto and Gravisca ; a sixth was in the centre of the southern wall. A paved road still perfect, which must have been the sacred w T ay, or the road to the necropolis, runs from this south gate, and joins that of the valley at right angles ; it then probably ascended the opposite eminence, now called Monte Rozzi, one of the most singular and interesting spots in Europe. " This hill lies in a direction parallel to the city, in a line nearly east and west, and on its summit are seen three hundred tumuli or more, some of which, upon being opened, were found to cover Etruscan tombs, and to contain invaluable and, up to that moment, unsuspected treasures ; being- adorned with paintings which serve to throw much light upon the antiquities of Etruria. Some of these tumuli are still lofty mounds; a sort of breast- wall of stone may be observed encircling others ; some are degraded by time into mere hillocks, and there might have been others, now wholly undis- tinguishable. Their contents are eminently useful in affording information relative to the dresses, cus- toms, games, and sepulture of a lost nation, and 262 TARQUINIA. many of the personages represented in the sub- terraneous chambers have their names written in Etruscan characters. " The first of these tombs was discovered during the last century, and its figures copied by Mr. Byres, a British painter and cicerone, residing at Rome. These have been published by Micali, but still are but little known : (it is the Grotta del Cardi- nale.) One would almost suspect that the figures had been improved by the modern draftsmen into Grecian models and proportions, for many of them are positively the same as those represented in the Phigaleian marbles, and particularly the group in which one warrior prevents another from killing his wounded foe. Ictinus, who built the temple of Phigaleia, lived about the year 430 b. c. Now Tarquinia was at that period still flourishing, and the communication between it and Greece must have been frequent during the two centuries which had elapsed since the emigration of De- maratus. The subjects of the frieze at Bassae were those most generally adopted in the orna- mental structures of Greece, and there was suffi- cient time for them to be copied in Etruria before the fall of Tarquinia, which took place previous to that of Vulci, or earlier than 473 u. c, or about 280 b. c. In the tomb first opened at Corneto was an inscription in Etruscan characters — " Atha Felus Festronial Puia Arth .... a Falcc xix.* X!X*3>>IAVA"-0<14 TARQUINIA. 263 " The soil is so remarkably shallow as scarcely to cover the rock beneath, a species of sandy and soft calcareous stone called by the people of the country pietra arenaria, in which the chambers were ex- cavated, a sufficient thickness being left to form a roof, and sustain the superincumbent tumulus. The tumuli seem to have been bounded by a low wall, and the whole resembles that which Pausa- nias calls the Tumulus of iEpytus in Arcadia, of Pelasgic construction, only that the wall en- closing the latter is of hard and irregular blocks of limestone. " The tombs have been pillaged of many of their vases, arms, gold ornaments, and shields, without being subjected to any examination, drawing, or description ; and it is doubtful whether some anti- quities decidedly Egyptian, said to have been found at Corneto, were really discovered there or not. Certain geese, alternating with little figures in the attitude of prayer, and forming a border in fine gold, seem evidently Egyptian. " The chambers in the tumuli of Tarquinia are all nearly alike in size and shape. They are about nine feet high, seventeen wide, and eighteen long. One of the tumuli opened in 1828 is upon the edge of the hill and towards the north. Its roof is the natural rock, and has been split by an earthquake. The door is more than six feet high, and is four feet wide. It is singular that the men represented in these tombs are all coloured red, exactly as in the Egyptian paintings in the tombs of the Theban 264 TARQUINIA. kings. Their eyes are very long, their hair bushy and black, their limbs lank and slender, and the facial line, instead of running, like that of the Greeks, nearly perpendicular, projects remarkably, so that in the outline of their face they bear a strong resem- blance to the negro or the Ethiopian figures of Egyptian paintings. They wear round their ankles rings as ornaments, and armlets on their arms. Shawls of oriental patterns are also worn by both male and female. Many of those engaged in the sports have only a wrapper of linen round their loins. Some have boots of green leather reaching behind to the calf of the leg. " It does not seem precisely known at what period Tarquinia was destroyed. The Romans are said purposely to have burnt everything appertain- ing to the records of Etruria, and circumstances seem to confirm this." (These records told tales too much against themselves, and too contrary to those fables of glory, invincibility, and magnanimity, which they hoped to palm upon posterity for his- tory.) Some have thought that it fell soon after Veii, a. it. 359 ; but at all events it must have been destroyed before the triumph of Titus Corucanius over Vulci, a. r. 473, — a neighbouring city further removed from Rome, which could not well be reached while Tarquinia remained. In the year of Rome 401 j says Livy, vii. 15, et seq., the Romans revenged the cruelty of the Tarquinicnscs, who had slain three hundred and seven Roman prisoners, by the total destruction of everything Etruscan in TARQUINIA. 265 their city ; and three hundred and fifty-eight of the most noble of the inhabitants were floo-o-ed to death in the forum ! In 404 a. r. the Romans, having vanquished the Tarquinienses, granted them a forty years' peace ; in 456 a. r. they gained another triumph over the Etruscans, and this probably sealed the fate of Tarquinia, reducing it from that period to the condition of a Roman colony or municipium. " It cannot be imagined that the tumuli of Tar- quinia were formed after the conquest of the city by the Romans, nor even during its decline ; so that the date of the latest would be as much as three hundred years b. c. The latest of the tumuli of Veii, which are of the same character, and from which the most interesting discoveries may be expected, may be dated one hundred years earlier. An asser- tion of the learned Niebuhr, that the Etruscans, of all the Grecian games, practised only those of chariot-races and boxing, is amply refuted by the pictures in these tombs ; for in one single chamber we find wrestling, leaping, running, boxing, chariot- races, horse-races, cudgel-playing, and riding at the ring. It must, however, be remembered that these tombs were not discovered till after the publication of his history. At Tarquinia more may be learned of this mysterious people than in any other of the cities of Etruria, because it has remained more free from Roman innovations. Tarquinia, Veii, and Caere, entombed their magnates in tumuli, and in excavations in the rocks." 266 TARQUINIA. I have given all these extracts from Gell, because he is an authority never to be slighted, and my copy of the work is dated 1834; but I presume this ac- count was written in 1288, and many things have since been changed. No tumuli now exist, and only two circular walls which mark the site of any such, though it would seem that the Grotto del Car- dinale had formerly been ornamented with such a covering, and perhaps also the Grotto del Ba- rone, and the Grotto Verso il Mare. Gell says, that when he wrote, the Roman government had prohibited any of these tombs from being copied ; an order singularly at variance with their utter neglect of them in every other particular, and which I must suppose it was found impossible to enforce. We could, indeed, purchase no drawings of them, excepting two, but one more by a Russian artist was given me, and we copied and sketched many little things in these tombs without anything being said to us; and had I at that time thought of publishing an account of them, we could with the utmost facility have copied the whole. Avolta would have given me the old drawings of the temple of Iside, could he have found them ; but they still exist, though in private hands. The facial line, mentioned by Gell, is certainly a mistake, except in the case of the evil genii, who are represented with negro features; all the others are in either the almost straight Egyptian or the straight Greek. (Jell gives the following -ketch of one of the tumuli, the remaining walls of which we saw, but the structure of which, to the TARQUINIA. 267 disgrace of those who ought to have preserved it, remains no more. He says it was constructed on the same principle as the trea- suries of Atreus and Minyas in Greece, by stones approaching each other, and that the dia- meter of the dome was eighteen *eet, and its height almost the same The figures in the tombs which we saw, so far from having been improved by modern draftsmen, are provokingly mangled in the copies — I should say are common-placed and grotesqaed. Gell's mea- surement of the chambers is too large, except in a few instances. The boots of green leather must mean blue — at least we saw no green colour in any Etruscan tomb, and I think that the blue has appeared green, because it was seen by torch-light. It has been suggested to me that perhaps the green named by Gell and others, was composed originally of blue and yellow, and that the yellow had faded out of the colour: but I think not, for the yellow by itself appeared as fast as any of the other colours. The painted tomb of which Avolta told us, con- taining an elephant, could not be earlier than a. r. 474, about three hundred years before Christ, be- cause elephants were first introduced into Italy by Pyrrhus, at which time the Tarquinians assisted the Romans against them. These animals, being wholly unknown, were called by them " Boves Lucas," as n 2 268 TARQUINIA. being first seen at the battle of the Siris in Luca- nia ; and I feel no doubt that the man in whose tomb the painting was found was the captain of the Tarquinian band upon that field. The sketch of the cone at Tarquinia is the exact form of the present shepherd's hut, so often seen in the environs of Rome, and is what I meant when I said at Veii, that their huts were the living repre- sentations of many an ancient grave. •269 CHAPTER V. VULCI. TOUR TO MUSIGNANO, VULCI, AND PONTE LABADIA. The attention of the curious in Etruscan antiquity among- our Roman friends had recently been turned to the extraordinary discovery made about this time by the Prince of Canino at Vulci, of tombs con- taining a number of objects wholly Egyptian. The connexion of the polished nations of remote anti- quity with each other, is one of the most interesting speculations of the present clay ; and each fresh dis- covery leads us to suppose, that long before the people of the ancient world were bound together under the leaden yoke of universal empire, very distant lands were intimately united by coloniza- tion, commerce, and political alliance. In the Egyptian museum at Florence we saw a small china vase, which we thought had just been removed from a drawing room chimney-piece, but 270 vitlci. which Professor Roselini assured us lie had him- self taken from one of the tombs of the ancient Pharaohs, which bore all the marks of never having been previously opened. On one side there is a blue flower, and on the other a Chinese character, which was thus translated by Mr. Davis, the dis- tinguished Chinese scholar: "The flower opens, and lo a new year ;" and was pronounced to be in no way different from the modern writing of the celestial empire. In the same museum I saw a Scythian war-chariot which had been taken by Roselini from the Egyptian tomb of one who probably was a bold captain in the army of Ra- meses the Great, and who had brought it home as a trophy of distant Asiatic victory. Among our Etruscan scarabei there is one of large size and great beauty from Chiusi, formed of root of emerald, and of which the intaglio is a grove of Lotus, wherein stand the divinities Isis and Horus, represented in the best Egyptian style ; and we narrowly missed acquiring another, which was of still more uncommon value, as on it, by the side of a female! warrior, destroying a prostrate !<><■, there was a royal cartouche filled with hieroglyphics. I mention these precious gems as a strong link of evidence connecting Egypt with Etruria, for there can lie no doubt, from the shape, that the stones are Etruscan, while the intaglios are as assuredly Egyptian. We were told that the contents of these newly- discovered Egyptian tombs had been removed to vulci. 271 Musignano, the Prince of Canino's country-seat, and thither we accordingly resolved to go. About thirty years ago, the principality of Canino and Musignano belonged to the papal domain. Pope Pius VII. offered it for sale to Lucien Bonaparte, and, it is said, pressed him to purchase it, because he had a regard for him, and felt persuaded that it would prove a good bargain. It would almost ap- pear that he had a presentiment of the extraordi- nary treasures which were so soon to be discovered there, and which had not long been opened up before they yielded forty thousand louis. Lucien accepted the offer, became proprietor of Canino, and was thereupon created a Principe Romano. About fifteen years ago, when the sepulchres of ancient Etruria were first generally examined and began to be emptied of their magnificent contents, it was dis- covered that the newly acquired property of Lucien Bonaparte possessed more than a common share of subterranean wealth. Some of the most superb vases in the world were excavated by him, besides gold and jewelled ornaments of the most exquisite work- manship, and bronze images, mirrors, and utensils of great rarity and beauty. It is truly unfortunate that his pecuniary circumstances did not admit of his preserving all that he found, and thus forming a great Bonaparte Etruscan museum ; for it would have been the most splendid and unique collection in Europe, far surpassing that at Naples in the deep interest attached to countless antiquity, and to the mystery of an extinct people, the manner 272 vulci. of whose existence is now only to be learned from their graves. But, alas ! the precious possessions of Central Etruria have been dispersed over Eu- rope among the museums of sovereigns and the cabinets of the curious ; and the Pope, the King of Bavaria, M. Durand, the Duke de Blacas, and the British Museum, possess treasures, which, had they been preserved where they were discovered, would have made Musignano the place of pilgrimage to all those who inquired after the religious disci- pline of Tages, or the political constitution of Tar- chon. I had heard, in particular, much of the beauty of the gold and jewelled ornaments belong- ing to Lucien, and that, a few winters ago, the Princess of Canino had appeared at some of the ambassador's fetes in Rome with a parure of Etrus- can jewellery, which was the envy of the society, and excelled the chefs cVceuvres of Paris or Vienna. 'I'll us, after thousands of years, the sacred and cere- monial costumes of the illustrious of the early world were made to contribute to a scene of splendour in modern Europe. Ancient Home, under her kings, had probably seen many such, and modern Rome now looked upon them again. They were admired for their intrinsic merit among us, — a race who regard with awe, as a period of dim antiquity, the overthrow of that mighty and grinding despotism, which in its early years had overwhelmed the glory and independence of ancient Etruria, where they were made, and which did not begin to exist until the power of Etruria was already on the wane. VULCI. 273 Though we knew that the Prince of Canino was absent, we hoped to be permitted to inspect his museum, as we were bearers of a letter from Carlo Avolta to Padre Maurizio, a Franciscan, who is his chaplain. We set out very early from Corneto, and after a drive of about four hours we arrived at Musignano. The chateau of Prince Lucien is a modest unpretending structure, something between a monastery, a gentleman's house, and a farm. In front there is a large and handsome set of offices, while the house itself stands on a rocky height over the gardens and shrubberies, which extend for be- tween one and two miles along a valley skirted by a stream, and which are bounded on both sides by woody and, in some places, rocky hills. We were informed by the gardener that Father Maurizio had accompanied the prince to Rome, and that without an order it was impossible for us to see anything. Our only resource was, to send off a messenger, with our recommendatory letter from the gonfalo- niere, to the town of Canino, where the prince's computista, or steward, resided, in order to explain our wishes, and to procure the desired permission. In the mean time we were glad to stroll over the grounds, and make ourselves acquainted with the rural occupations and tastes of a man so intimately connected with all that is exciting in the history of the world during a quarter of a century. Musig- nano is a total deviation from the usual style of Italian villas, and has been laid out in close imitation of an English country place. The walks, berceaux k 5 274 vulci. of acacias, beds of roses, and thickets of laurel, are arranged with considerable taste ; and the most is made of the stream which runs through the garden, and which, about a mile from the house, forms a beautiful little lake, with very romantic rocky cliffs on one side, and a little island near the other, planted with the finest weeping willows, scions of the parent stem which shades Napoleon's grave in St. Helena. The Etruscan riches and tastes of the owner may here and there be discovered by a sarco- phagus, with a funeral statue of a recumbent Lu- cumo, half seen behind a laurel thicket. After having walked nearly to the end of the pleasure- grounds, we returned to the chateau ; and as the per- mission from Canino had not arrived, we breakfasted in a pavilion on a terrace in the garden, after which Ave were admitted within doors. The house was originally a Franciscan monastery, which the prince, in consequence of a disgust which he had taken to Canino, fitted up as a residence, and which the princess bestowed much pains in adorning with flower gardens and shrubberies. On entering: the © © court we found the traces of an active fanner on a huge scale, farm-servants bustling about, under the steward's direction, measuring heaps of grain, and weighing sacks of wool. The accommodation afforded by the chateau, and the style in which it is fitted dp, correspond with the simplicity ofitsex- ternal arrangements. There are no vast suites of halls and saloons as in the palaces of Italy, and the irregular cluster of small rooms reminds one ratlin- vulci. 275 of an old-fashioned English gentleman's house, or a parsonage on a large scale. The only thing princely or Italian in the habitation is the baldachino of a Roman prince, somewhat incongruously displayed in the little hall. We were disappointed in our hope of seeing the gold ornaments, which were either locked up or had been taken to Rome ; and our disappointment was not diminished when, on traversing a gallery, we found all the Etruscan vases, by which one side of its walls was covered, to be of a very ordinary quality. The form of some of them was elegant, and there was here and there a curious subject depicted on them, but the clay itself was coarse, and the style of art did not surpass mediocrity. The walls of a small saloon near the hall were covered on one side by the finest circular Etruscan shields of bronze I have ever seen. They were in excellent preservation, and were formed of embossed and richly adorned circles, contracting to the centre, where there was a bulb. This was small compensation for the many things we had expected to see, such as bronze candelabras, tripods, paterae, with raised figures and gilding; a trumpet which was found in a grave at Vulci, and a wheel of punishment for the wicked ; small ivory statues, a cup of terra cotta made by <; Evkeir ;" some plates belonging to the old Etruscan family of " Spurina," a tazza representing a man studying and praising the works of Chiron, and one which has upon it two ships, a trading vessel and a man-of-war. A painted vase containing ashes, which is an ex- 276 VULCI. tremely rare occurrence, some very fine scarabei, some large amber carnei, a quantity of the richest and most exquisitely wrought gold ornaments, but especially the headpiece of two disks and fillets, found at Ponte Sodo, and some green enamel neck- laces and idols set in gold, which appeared to be Egyptico Etruscan.* * I have thought that it might be interesting to particularize a few of the monuments which used to exist in the collection of the Prince of Canino, and which we had hoped to have seen through the kindness of Padre Maurizio. As specimens of art they exceed, and on the whole they are superior in number and in beauty to any other col- lection in Italy. I fear that some have been sold, but I give the catalogue of the prime objects as we obtained it. BRONZES. 1 . A female figure in the Egyptian style, but of Etruscan manu- facture, with a plaited under garment. A short-sleeved vest which only reaches to the waist, her hair twisted like a turban, and her feet bare. 2. Hercules in the lion's skin, carrying his club. A very fine specimen. '.'>. A figure standing on a column, naked, with a fish in each hand. Perhaps a river demi-god. 4. Figure found at Vulci. Egyptian style, hut Etruscan work. Naked, with the arms hanging down. •1. Two figures, also from Vulci ; the one naked, with both arms raised ; the other with the rijjit arm raised, as if making a sign, and tin- left a-kimbo with a mantle over his shoulders. (J. Two groups of bronzes, each upon a pediment, and each con- sisting of B man and woman, the latter with her hand upon the shoulder of the former, and all of them with the fillet round their heads, a Bign of rank and noble descent, 7. A player on the double flute, with the instrumenl in his mouth. It was called turariee, and was only used for sacred rites. :;. A warrior with helmet, shield, and sword. All these arms, of the same form, are often found in the sepulchres of Vulci, It stands on ;i handsome pediment. vulci. 277 In the principal object of our visit to Musignano we were amply gratified. A small wooden com- mode was opened, and displayed the extraordinary 9. A figure after the Egyptian style, which stood upon a tripod, and supported a lamp. It is naked and muscular, with a curiously formed helmet. 10. A very beautiful candelabra. The bottom of it is formed by a satyr, with his legs apart, in an attitude of fear. His left hand holds a large club in the act of bruising a serpent to death, and this club forms a third leg for this piece of furniture to rest upon. His right hand is raised with a stone to throw at the serpent's head, as it en- deavours to rise from beneath the club. From the crown of his head rises the elegant twisted form of the candelabra, up which a stag is climbing, and the whole is surmounted by a syren, whose raised arms formerly supported a large bronze lamp. (Vulci.) 1 1. Another candelabra, much less elegant, is composed of a small four-wheeled car, upon which repose four lions, with their faces out- wards. In the midst rises an Egyptian figure, with necklace and arm- lets, and above her head stands the lamp. ( Vulci.) 12. Some curious tripods, also from Vulci. One has upon it three figures in alto relievo : the first, bearded and winged, bears in its arms a dead youth. The second has a helmet, a sword, and winged bus- kins: and the third is Hercules in his lion's skin, with his club raised. It represents Hermes bearing a soul to happiness. The evil genius, armed, disputing the prize, and Hercules, the conqueror of the evil genii, coming to the rescue. 13. A number of pieces of bronze which formed a circle, and were fixed upon a wooden wheel in a grave at Vulci. The wood had perished, and the pieces accordingly separated. They 'have a border of geese upon each edge, and in the centre there is a man bearded and undergoing different kinds of torture : between each figure comes a hippocampus, and a Gorgon head alternately. This had represented souls in punishment, and in continual agitation, being allowed no rest. 14. Part of a frieze which went round a cista mystica. It repre- sents Gorgons running, and linked together by serpents. It has been plated all over with silver. 278 vulci. Egyptian contents of the tomb which had lately been found at Vulci. We regretted exceedingly that we were so unfortunate as not to meet the Padre 15. A Gorgon's head winged. Another with serpents, both in tin- Greek style, and less frightful than the very oldest manner of Etruria. It is one of their primary and oldest symbols of devouring and un- satisfied death. Always with the mouth open, and tongue out. 16. A variety of curious bronze instruments used in sacrifice, and ;i column with a warrior on the top, like a candelabra. On the sides were hooks, upon which the various instruments required at the altar were hung. BRONZE PATERAE. 1. A patera •, a beautiful and rare article, about as deep as an ordi- nary plate. It is richly covered with three figures, chiselled in relievo, and surrounded by a wreath of ivy. I have seen the engraving <>t' this patera ; the countenances upon it are very noble, and of the Greek form. The centre figure is Prometheus with the vulture, and his name, written in Etruscan characters, over his head. On the one side of him is Castor, and on the other Pollux, each with his name also written, and a star. 2. Another patera about an inch deep, the handle of which ia a woman, most beautifully executed. She has a diadem upon her head, and supports the patera witli one hand, whilst she places the other behind her. Both of these vessels were round in (he same small tomb near Castillina, in the plain of Canino, and it contained no other sort of furniture. The one had doubtless been used for the offering of barley cakes or salt, and the other for libations. Patera' like these are sometimes found ;it Vulci, f^i It upon both sides; and some of these also are in the Prince's Museum. IVOIIY. 1 . Two small statues in Egyptian stj te. '_'. Two figures of different sexes, in lusso relievo, upon a triclinium, and with double cushions, — a custom peculiar to Etruria. The figures are in the Egyptian sf vie. 5 VULCI. 279 Maurizio, from whose politeness and learning we should have had the most perfect information, which we were unable to extract from the rustic whom the 3. In the same style, a warrior with a spear, challenging an enor- mous lion, and on the reverse two Etruscan letters. The figures have been coloured and gilt. These, and others similar, probably orna- mented the little boxes which were often filled with offerings or relics placed beside the dead body. Many of these, made of wood and painted, are found in the tombs in Egypt. GOLD. 1. An extraordinary ornament, like what we saw at General Ga- lassi's, now in the Vatican. It consists of a large upper circle, two broad chiselled bands or fillets, and a lower and smaller circle some- thing like a large locket. The upper circle is rudely engraved, and represents two warriors fighting over the tomb of the deceased. This tomb is either a small pyramid, or such a cone as has been the one we afterwards saw at Caire. Above and around are combats of birds and beasts. This is set in a double border of zig-zag and Vandyke ; it was found in a scavo made by the Prince of Canino at Ponte Sodo, in 1830. 2. A little idol of green enamel, covered with stamped plates of gold. The figure is Egyptian, and the golden robe is Etruscan, stamped with winged lions, the guardians of the dead. 3. A large fibula or brooch of pure gold, and of very fine work- manship ; it is composed of one very large sphynx and two smaller ones •, below is the pin by which it fastens into a sheath. 4. A necklace of gold, whence hang six little images of Phtah in green paste, and in the midst of them a scarabeus, with the hierogly- phics answering to the letters t. s. i. or daughter, according to Rose- lini. The scarabeus is Egyptian, and of the same pasta as the images, and each image has hieroglyphics behind it. 5. A necklace composed of gold balls or beads, alternately plain and worked, terminating in a finely made ram's head. (Vulci.) 6. An immense gold locket, convex without, and concave within. It has been intended for perfumes, and the outer side has a number of 280 vulci. coraputista sent to attend us. But, from all that we could learn, it would seem that the external appear- ance of this tomb did not differ from that of others animals and figures depicted on it in minute grains of gold, which have been fixed in by fire. (Vulci.) 7. Several rings, with curious Egyptian characters engraved upon the gold. (Vulci.) 8. A broad band of gold called a diadem because it was worn upon the forehead. — It has a winged genius at each extremity. (Vulci,) SEPULCHRAL URNS. One very large, of travertine, with a woman robed, and with a dog upon the lid, exactly like an English monument of the middle ages. VASES. 1. A jug with red black figures, finely executed; subject, Hercules armed with his bow and arrow, relating his achievements to Eurystheus. Upon it stands the name of the artist Amasis — AMA2I2 EnoiE2EN. 2. A water vase with three handles, and a group of figures in black. The subject is Jupiter and Juno seated together ; he, with the thun- derbolt, and she with a spear. Proserpine stands before them with a pomegranate flower in her hand, and Mercury is behind with his cadu- ceus. Bacchus is coming forward with a cup. 3. A two handled vase with white and red figures. The subject is Thetis bringing armour to Achilles. She presents him with a shield, on which the sacred tripod is represented, and with two spears. 4. A Pariathenaic prize vase, esteemed of very great value. It lias two Btout handles; on one side is Minerva, the patroness id' the games, armed with her shield, and about to throw the spear. On the side of the vase are the words " Ton athen ethen athlon,"in Etruscan cha- racters; and on the reverse are four foot -racers, the first of whom has his foot just beyond the goal. This has been a prize given to the victor in a foot-race. .'). A jug, the front of which is completely covered with figures in red, black, and white I Bubject, tWO Amazons with names written : they are mounted, and accompanied by two dogs like mastiffs, and which are also named. VCJLCI. 281 in the neighbourhood, though its contents were so dissimilar. There were shown us images of large size, and with a decidedly Egyptian character. One 6. A very rare cup, on which is de- scribed a funeral procession in the mannerpeculiarto Etruria ; the figures are white, black, and purple. On the left. hand of the spectator is the gate whence the procession has issued forth to accompany the dead to his place of sepulture. The funeral car is drawn by two mules of a breed much es- teemed in Etruria. Upon it is laid the dead body of a bearded man ; his face uncovered, his head adorned with ornaments, and his body enveloped in a cloak. On the one side sits his daughter richly dressed, and on the other his son, and behind the car walks one of the nearest relations, in an embroidered pallium, absorbed in grief. Close to him is the player on the double flute, to whose measured cadences the company keep time. The whole is brought up by a number of soldiers completely armed, with helmet, shield, and spear ; but their heads are bent and their spears reversed, and they each bear different devices upon their shields, as if they were so many chiefs or heads of different bands of men, come to pay the last honour either to their equal or their prince. Two heralds go by the side of the mules, and appear to be making lamentation, and the car has nearly reached the gate of the tomb through which trees are seen, to indicate that it was situated in some rustic spot, and not amongst the dwellings of man. 7. Another painted vase in which a sacrifice is represented, and which was found within a sarcophagus of nenfrite. It was filled with the ashes of the deceased, the only painted vase I ever heard of so filled. By it lay a balsamario of alabaster, and a cup for libations. 8. Vase with two handles — figures light coloured upon a black ground. A countryman with two buckets on a rod ; the inscription round it is, " Hail the beautiful boy." 9. A drinking cup with two handles, of very fine clay. The figures are black on a red ground. This cup stood on a sort of tripod when 2S2 VULCI. of them had in its hand the sacred hawk of Egypt crowned with the symbol of divinity. There were several wheeled altars of bronze in the most perfect used. It has two eyes, which are to said represent Bacchus ; they are within wreaths of ivy, and there are satyrs running on each side. (Vulci.) 10. An eye painted cup, with a winged sphynx, and another eye painted cup, with a winged horse or Pegasus — both from Vulci. The eye united with a Pegasus is also found at Chins'. 11. A vase with two handles — figures red upon a black ground- Subject Diana, with her bow and arrow, looking upon Acteon, who is devoured by her dogs. This vase follows the account of Euripedes. It is therefore of very late manufactory, and may be compared with those of the primitive Archaic style, to show the difference which had taken place in the manner of representing subjects. 12. The prince has one drinking cup of the finest clay and the very oldest style. It has two handles, and is of this form ; black within and without, excepting one small compartment on each side. In the first we see Hercules with a sword only, conquer- ing Cyncus, who lias both sword and spear, and who is assisted by Mercury. There is an inscription behind Her- cules. In the second on the other side Hercules is represented fighting with Achelous, and break- ing off one of his horns. Achelous was one of the suitors of Dcjanha. and, after being vanquished by Hercules, lie changed himself into the river of that name which runs through EpirUB. 13. Some curious terra cotta plates with a single figure in the centre of them. II. Embalming vases in the Egyptian style. Two have asses' heads; one is a female head with a modius; another is a female kneeling, and her figure embracing the cinerary urn ; another is an ornamented leg. IS, Borne deep plates with inscriptions in Etruscan. One bears the name of the (iens Sjiurina, so well Known in history. vulci. 283 preservation, and a number of curious sacrificial instruments. There were ostrich eggs formed into cups, some of them painted, with figures exactly 16. A beautiful cup with two bandies, from Vulci. In the inside Juno is painted upon a white ground. HPA is written by her. She is standing, and is dressed in a white tunic, with a purple veil, the edge of which is painted in palm leaves, one colour being laid upon another. The face is in natural tints. The diadem, the necklace, and the sceptre, are in relievo, and of gold. It is exquisitely finished, but probably not of older date than about two centuries before the christian era. It was found in 1830. (Vulci.) 17. Atazza with one handle, red figures on a black ground. In the centre sits a man reading a book which he had taken out of a bookcase before him, and on this bookcase is written the title XIPONEI2, or works of Chiron, and beneath, the estimation in which those works were held — KAAE, excellent or beautiful."' On each side of him stands a youth leaning on a staff, and listening to him with earnest attention. 1 8. Another cup of the same form ; also red figures upon a black ground. On it are represented two kinds of ships, of the form in use amongst the primitive Etruscans. The one kind has a mast with the sails spread, and two ranks of rowers, twenty on each side. This appears to be an armed galley, with a projecting prow, the form of which is between the head of a dog and a fish. The other kind is a craft for merchandise, without oars, but with helm, ladders, and other furniture. This is a tazza equally rare and interesting, and I heard it described with admiration by Baron Stackelberg as a useful historical document. GEMS 1. Cornelian scarabeus. Fideus 3XVX armed with shield and sword. His helmet is on the ground ; shield is round ; sword two- edged and short. (Vulci.) We saw a real sword exactly similar at Tuscania. "2. Cornelian scarabeus, of the finest engraving. A warrior com- pletely armed, taking leave of an aged man, who is seated, and leans upon a staff or sceptre. (Vulci.) 284 vulci. resembling many of those copied by Roselini from the tombs of the Pharaohs, and others with similar figures carved on them. There were small earthen vessels resembling modern shooting flasks, and in- scribed with Egyptian hieroglyphics. There was a great quantity of glass bugles, which we know was an ornament often used by the Egyptians. I regret that I have lost the list of these articles made at the time, and that what I have mentioned is all I accu- rately remember. But it is enough to show the Egyptian character of this Vulcian sepulchre, and to give rise to an infinity of conjectures as to its probable history and design, all tending to demon- strate frequent intercourse between Egypt and Etruria. Was the occupant of the tomb an Egyptian settled in this country, or was he an Etruscan who had formerly resided in Egypt, and had conformed 3. Another ditto. A combat between a lion and a bull, in very old style. (Vulci.) 4. A scarabeus in cornelian, a chimera, made up of a lion and a cock. (Vulci.) 5. Lion, in the oldest, or at least the strangest and most barbarous form. A cornelian scarabeus. (Vulci.) AMBER. Some pieces are in beads, which have formed a necklace, and one piece is engraved. They arc found in the sepulchres of Vulci and Tarquinia, and in those of Puglia and Basilicata. The most ex- traordiii.u y fir form and engravings hitherto discovered ale in the possession of the prince of San Georgio at Naples, and look almost like little pieces of sculpture. The prince of Canino has also a small Etruscan trumpet, such as was used in the temples, and H liicli came out ofa tomb at Vulci. vulci. 285 to the religion and usages of the Egyptians, or was he simply a collector of curious things from distant lands, and was his museum buried along with him as his most valued possession? The latter sup- position is too trivial, and in addition to one or other of the former I would add, that it is probable that the deceased held a high rank in the priestly order, for so many sacred images, vessels, and uten- sils, are rarely found together in the tomb of a layman. And this again leads to a train of curious speculation as to the religious rites of the two coun- tries, whether it was usual for the one, at least partially, to adopt those of the other, and in how far there may have been in some places an identity between them. I think the most likely solution of the problem is, that the deceased was an Etruscan of great distinction who had lived in Egypt, and on his return to his native country retained the religion which he had learnt when there ; and that he offi- ciated as priest to his own household and offered up the domestic sacrifice on these very altars to Isis and to Horus. Strange that the habits, history, and tastes of an individual with a name and of a race unknown, should give rise to the most interesting- speculations two thousand five hundred or three thousand years after his death, and that the traces of him should have survived those of mighty empires and powerful dynasties. We tore ourselves un- willingly from these curious enigmas, and returned to our carriage, passing through the Prince of Canino's court, where the processes of weighing and win- 286 vulci. nowing were going forward under the matter-of-fact eye of the coraputista, the unsatisfactory nature of our intercourse with whom, made us more and more regret the want of the enlightened and polite guidance of Padre Maurizio. It took about three hours to drive from Musig- nano to Ponte Labadia, and our way lay through a desolate country, resembling some of the moorland districts in Scotland or the North of England, with more of rugged wildness and less of beauty than in the deserted neighbourhood of Home. Yet this was in very ancient times the most favoured spot in the midst of the highest civilization and the richest culture, and particularly famed for its wine. No contrast can be more striking than that between the ancient fertility and teeming population of Etruria and its present desolation and solitude. On the site of the wealthiest cities scarcely a substruction re- mains amid the barren waste, to tell of the noble fortunes thus extinguished. Where luxuriant vine- yards and smiling gardens and fruitful olive yards, gave ease and comfort to thousands of wealthy and industrious inhabitants, a scanty flock of sheep or herd of cattle now seek a miserable subsistence, on the deserted plain. The country which supported an opulent and crowded population in the days of Etruscan independence, was divided among a few great masters under the yoke of the Roman con- queror ; and the wealthy patrician, residing at a distance, drew ld> revenues from territories which had formerly been cultivated by resident landowners vulci. 287 so as to yield the fullest return for labour, but which, under a change of masters who were now absent, gradually grew waste and depopulated. The well- enclosed garden, cornfield, and vineyard, with the frequent town, village, and country-seat, gave way to a large sheep or cattle farm in the hands of aliens. The ancient lords became serfs, and the inhabitants were drained off to supply the constant demand of recruits for the Roman legions, and poverty, desola- tion, and disease, became the miserable fate of the country. It is generally admitted that, in the days of ancient Rome, the malaria was comparatively rare and mild, in many places where it now reigns with fearful violence; and this must be still more true of the same spots at a still earlier period in ancient Etruria. A densely inhabited country, kept in a constant state of high cultivation, is not liable to the same inroads of this frightful disease; and as Etruria was originally depopulated by the Roman usurpers, it is fair to make them at least divide the blame of the present physical calamities of Italy with the Goths and devastating barbarians of still more modern times, to whom these evils have in general been mainly attributed. A journey through Etruria, and a comparison between the frequent and rich records of the dead, and the scarcity and miserable poverty of the living, is enough to confirm our antipathy against those overbearing republican tyrants, who ground down the whole earth under their iron despotism, before whom the nations quailed, and to be enrolled among 288 vulci. the number of whose private citizens, was an honour envied alike by the oriental monarch, the Etruscan aristocrat, and the semi-barbarian chief of Iberia or of Gaul. " Senatus populusque Romanus" was in sooth to fill the whole earth, everything was made for it, and was to bow down to it. And that mighty, grinding, demolishing power under which all that was respected and time-honoured among the ancient nations were annihilated, ere long became itself a miserable tool at the disposal of a handful of Prae- torians or Janissaries, with a rapid succession of contemptible tyrants at their head, whose miserable end was the only merited part of their fortune. How the humbled Lucumones of the great Etrus- can commonwealth must have cursed the despotic levellers who demolished their government, de- stroyed their nationality, and obliterated their very existence ! We could almost fancy that voices from the tombs of Vulci and Tarquinia had summoned the northern hordes from the Elbe and the Oder to avenge their quarrel on the effeminate descend- ants of their rude destroyers. Thus endeavouring to recall the distant past, and to depict the last expiring struggles of Etruscan liberty, and the subsequent extinction of the wealth, civilization, and very existence of that great people, we had forgotten the desolate scene around us, when we were suddenly called to observe the castle of Ponte Labadia, the only inhabited place we had seen since leaving Musignano. It is a gothic fortress, of the middle ages, picturesque with its towers, and vulci. 289 curious in a country where there are few remains of that period of modern antiquity. It is finely situated on the precipitous banks of the River Fiora, over which was thrown the noble bridge which gives its name to the place, and which is one of the finest specimens extant of Etruscan architecture. It is elevated very high over the channel of the river, and forms a beautiful arch. Its masonry is of that huge and durable character peculiar to Etruria, — the connecting link in the history of Italian architecture between the Cyclopean and the Roman styles, having the beauty and regularity of the latter, with the gigantic size and strength which distinguish the former, but without that form- less rude appearance which seems to say that it had been rolled up by giants in sport. The outer wall of one side of this bridge is strikingly peculiar, showing evident traces of an aqueduct, the bridge having thus served the double purpose of a viaduct and an aqueduct to the city of Vulci, on the site of which now stands the modern fortress. But, before crossing or examining this bridge, we went to see a natural curiosity on the river-side. We scrambled by a very difficult and somewhat dan- gerous path down to the bed of the stream, the course of which we followed upon a narrow ledge, overhung by a projecting rocky precipice varied with curious and fantastic shapes, and terminating in a great cavern formed entirely of immense stalactytes. I thought that from the singularity of its scenery, its delicious coolness, and the freshness o 290 vulci. of its fountain, this cave must have been a favourite place of resort to the ancient people of Vulci, con- venient for their pic-nics and rural merrymakings, within a few minutes' walk of their town, and in- viting alike to the lovers of the picturesque, and of iced wine and other creature comforts. Reascend- ing the steep bank, we entered the fortress, and found the garrison to consist of a few ragged sol- diers under a corporal, and a couple of custom- house officers, one of whom deluded us with the prospect of purchasing antiquities found on the spot. But on his treasures being produced, the chief of them turned out. to be a broken specchio, for which he asked more crowns than it would have been worth if it had been whole. There is, however, no spot in Etruria where more precious things have been found than Vulci. Its chains and fillets of pure gold, and its jewelled ornaments, are of sur- passing value, and some graves were shown me in which, during the last year, some objects of very high price had been discovered. Our visit to Vulci was unsatisfactory from our ignorance of the greater part of its history, an from the meagrcness of such information as is known upon the subject. The Prince of Canino maintains that this is the site of the ancient Ve- tulonia; while Micali, with more probability, tells us that after considerable uncertainty, the site of Vetulonia has been fixed in the Sicnnesc Maremma, about five miles from Massa, and that its many ruins are there embowered in a thick wood. The 5 vulci. 291 same author describes Vulci as the parent state of which Cosa was a colony, still more distinguished than itself. He says that the traces of the city of the Vulcientes, the mother town of Cosa, are to be found in the lands of Cainposcala, in the district of Montalto, and on the spot called from time imme- morial Plain of Vulci, Piano di Vulci. With this account, Miiller, author of the Etriisker, mainly agrees. He says that the Vulcientes, in whose territory was the distinguished city of Cosa, had for their capital Vulci, so called from their own name, like Veii from the Veientes, and that it contained a municipium long after it was subdued by the Romans. It appears that Vulci was the old and faithful ally of the still more powerful state of Volsinii, which, after the downfall of Tarquinia, was the most potent of Central Etruria, and even after the dreadful rout at the Vadimonian lake, in the year of Rome 444, made a determined opposition to the rising mistress of the world. In the year 469, the shores of the same quiet lake witnessed another terrible battle, in which the star of the Etruscans for ever set, and the Roman Tiber rolled in triumph its yellow waves, made ruddy with the richest blood of Etruria. Yet, notwithstanding this signal overthrow, the Volsinians, with their allies of Vulci, carried on a war of resistance with Rome, and a victory over them gave the honour of a triumph to a Roman consul in 473, as is shown by the Fasti Consulares : and even after this, the in- o 2 292 vulci. dependent spirit of the Vulcientes seems to have continued ; for, in order to tame it, the Romans, in 479, founded a Roman colony at Cosa within their territory. Like Tarquinia and other Etruscan towns, Vulci continued to exist for many centuries after the loss of its independence ; and it is said not to have been finally destroyed until the twelfth century, but scarcely any remains of it are now visible. After crossing the beautiful bridge, the sight of which alone would repay one for a journey of many miles, we paused on the bank of the river opposite the gothic fortress, and endeavoured to conceive what the city of Vulci might have been in the days of its prosperity. It was built on the rocky banks overhanging the river Fiora, which become more and more precipitous and romantic beyond the site of the city, until they form the great stalactyte grotto which has been already described. Its position recalled to my mind that of Ronciglione, with which many of my readers may be familiar, on the Sienna road to Rome. Micali, to whom is due the ascertaining and fix- ing of the site of Vulci, says that the Fiora was called by the Etruscans the Amine, and he thinks it probable that Vulci was colonised by the Volsci- ans, dining the time that Etruria ruled over their country. A number of them may either have been transported, and settled here as prisoners under Tarquinian rulers, or they, as freemen, may have chosen to live under Etruscan protection, and have become naturalised, for they were very early ad- vulci. 293 mitted into the leag-ue of Central Etruria. Vulci was a small but extremely rich and civilised city, containing the most beautiful works of art which have yet been found, in jewellery, bronze, terra cotta, sculpture, and painting - ; and Cosa, which was a much larger town, and is commonly called a colony of the Vulci, but which never was their capital, appears to have been built when they felt the ne- cessity of a sea-port, and to have been the medium of their communication with foreign nations. Vulci, though conquered by the Romans in 473, was governed for long after, as a tributary state or municipium by its own laws and its own magis- trates. Hence probably that genius became concen- trated in art, which could no longer be turned to politics.* No spot in Italy has occasioned more disputes than this, as to whether the articles found in it were of Greek or native manufacture; and it would appear that the same tomb usually contains vases, of such dissimilar and often progressive workmanship, as would denote a manufactory car- ried on for many generations, and under a va- riety of circumstances, and a change of style and of hands. Micali gives his opinion in strong terms, that many of the Vulcian vases are alto- gether foreign, brought there by commerce from Greece and Sicily and Nola, while he says that the quality of the clay, and the names of the makers * Cicero says, that the belle arti were left to the conquered, and the ruling of men to the Romans. 294 vulci. or possessors, determine others as decidedly to be native. He saw one, in the possession of the Prince of Canino, with the name of Eucheir upon it,'a sin- gular coincidence with the designation of the person or class which Deraaratus brought with him from Corinth. This vase or cup is not painted on the outside, but it is made of the finest clay, and with- in there is a representation of the chimera, formed of a lion, a goat, and a serpent, in the old stiff' Archaic style, and the inscription upon it is £HjX£/pC7\0lh 6 L or "Eucheir made it."— The names of the noble Etruscan families for whom such vases were made, and in whose tombs they are found, are " Minucia, Annia, Aruntia, Velia," &c, and the names of the artists, who were not natives, but Greeks, are " Nicostenes, Archides, Talides, Xenocles, and Sosias," who was also, I think, a worker in Mosaic. Altogether, of foreigners and natives, above thirty artists' names are known, but the five names which I have indicated are found also upon vases in Sicily, at Nola, and in Campa- nia. The name of " Hiero" is inscribed upon several vases at Vulci, but whether it denotes the name of the maker, or of the person for whom, or during whose reign they were made, we did not ascertain. The black figured vases often contain subjects wholly local, such as funeral processions? or else something peculiar to the Etruscan faith, such as good and evil genii ; and upon these black vases, even when the subject is Greek, the dress, armour, and accompaniments, are all native. But vulci. 295 there are other vases found here after the model of the Dodwell in Rome, and these Micali calls "Co- rinthian," though he thinks their primitive origin must be sought in Asia Minor, because in them the style of dress and armour is usually Asiatic, and of a date long anterior to Phidias and Zeuxis, who were the masters of the Greek school in Europe. It would appear that Corinth was famed for its industry, commerce, and riches, in the days of Homer ; and that of its two ports, the one carried on a traffic with Asia, and the other with Italy, thus concentrating and connecting the civilisation of all these countries, for the ships of Etruria would meet there the ships of Tyre and Egypt ; and it may not be irrelevant to remark, that Egypt was included by the ancients in Asia. Cypselus, the tyrant of Corinth, is said to have had his furniture made by native artists upon Asiatic models, and it is proba- ble that the best of the artists fled from him under Demaratus. Such vases as the Dodwell must have been made in quantities about that time, as we learn from Strabo, and they were dedicated to the dead, and bore afterwards in Rome the name of Necro-Corinthian. The deities chiefly found upon the vases at Vulci are Hercules, Minerva, Apollo, and Diana, and these were the chief gods of Sicyon, where there was also a famous school of terra cotta, which may have furnished patterns to Vulci, as Paris, Dresden, and China now do to us, Both the Ionic and the Doric dialect are found upon vases excavated here. 296 vulci. Those which have an eye upon them, Micali be- lieves to be peculiar to Vulci, where they are found in the greatest numbers, and to Chiusi. It is true that eye vases are found sometimes both in Sicily and in Campania, but there is every reason to believe that they came there, as the Dodwell did to Rome, by commerce or by travel. Funeral pomp was carried to its greatest height from the first to the third century of Rome ; and the red figured vases are considered as posterior to this date, and have continued in use along with other styles until about 200 years prior to the christian era. Many vases have the Bacchic orgies represented upon them, therefore it is certain that such vases were used after the time when these orgies were practised, and they are said to have been introduced into Central Etruria from Capua in the sixth cen- tury of Rome, — i. e. between 200 and 300 years b.c. They may, however, have been painted upon the vases before they were introduced into the country, especially if we suppose that some of the rich Vulcians, a travelling and commercial people, may have been imitated at Capua. The Bacchic rites could never have been general in Etruria, for the nation, though luxurious and indolent, has left more evidences of purity and fewer of dissoluteness, as Niebuhr justly observes, than any other civilised people, and the loose characters satyrized by the Roman poets, appear to have been monsters amongst their eountrymen, and not samples of them. The VULCI. 297 Bacchic vases, or those supposed to represent these mysteries, are more numerous at Vulci than else- where, and in the graves of the rich only ; pro- bably of persons who had been initiated, and who, like most of the children of darkness, gloried in their shame. The abolition of the Bacchic rites, no doubt, affected also the art which had protected them, and painted vases fell into disuse, after they had been prostituted to minister to vice. Bodies began to be more frequently burnt than before, and the Roman modes took the place of national cus- toms, with those who were now Roman subjects. Those who did not condescend to the unpainted urn, took to the small stone chest, on which were still sculptured the monsters, the genii, and other sym- bols of the ancient faith. In the days of Julius Caesar and Augustus, painted vases were exhibited in the shops of Rome, and looked upon exactly as they are now. They were called " curious antiqui- ties," and were brought sometimes from Capua, where they were found in a very few tombs, as we are told by Suetonius, and in great numbers from Corinth, where they were found in almost every tomb, as we are told by Strabo. He says that the new inhabitants of Corinth, i. e. the colony sent there by Augustus, in excavating amongst the ruins, and exploring the ancient sepulchres, found quan- tities of terra cotta vases, and bronzes wrought in alto relievo, and that the beauty of these articles was so much admired, that they left no tomb un- searched. Thev sold them at high prices, and filled o 5 298 vulci. Koine with Necro-Corinthian, the name he gives the vases, and which he says were as much esteemed as the bronzes ; but at length the mine became ex- hausted of all that was really worth having, and the vessels which remained in Corinth, of a coarser clay, and far more ordinary use, would not repay the trouble of exporting them. The Romans little dreamed of such a store of them quietly lying within a hundred miles of their own gates. It is to this period, from the beginning of the empire onwards, that we may refer the number of rude imitations of Egyptian objects which are often found in tombs that do not indicate a higher antiquity. They are of barbarous workmanship, and altogether different from the extraordinary tomb lately opened by Lu- cien. Many Egyptian things have for years been found in Vulci ; and Prof. Roselini says that all those he has seen of any excellence are of a date prior to the Lagidi. I must mention, that whilst the graves of Tarquinia have, in a mass, been ra- vaged, those of Vulci have, with few exceptions, been left untouched. It is extremely interesting to see within the ruins of the city the spot on which the terra cotta manufactory was discovered, with its large heaps of broken and useless pottery. It had most likely served as a sort of monte testaccio to the Roman and Christian days of ancient Vulci. In the excavations which have been made on the Bite of the city, innumerable heaps of this ware have boon found, and among them some magnificent specimens of art. Of these monuments in terra VULCI. 299 cotta* there are two great divisions : first, statuary and votive monuments ; and second, monuments which have reference to architecture. Persons who could not afford statues of bronze, represented their divinities in baked clay. But though these terra cotta images must have been, among a super- stitious people, infinite, it would be false to suppose that most of those which are now found were of gods and heroes. Most of them are likenesses of individuals, and votive images, which were hung up out of gratitude in the temples, to commemorate pieces of good fortune, cures of disease, &c. &c. One of the most frequent uses of terra cotta likenesses was to decorate the lids of sarcophagi, and few sights are more curious and impressive than the interior of one of the larger Etruscan sepulchres, with ten or a dozen large coffins ranged around its walls, each covered with a recumbent figure as large as life, of a majestic Lucumo, or a richly adorned lady, re- presenting the person whose bones were deposited within. These figures were sometimes made of stone, but more frequently of terra cotta. Con- nected with these are funereal lamps of terra cotta, * I use this expression, as distinguished from Etruscan vases, (which are also in fact made of terra cotta,) to denote objects formed of baked clay, and not painted. Of this sort, though not Etruscan, are the beautiful vases which have been found at Pompeii. But the Etruscans were the great masters in the art of making them, as well as those ob- jects in terra cotta which are now exclusively called after their name. The richest assemblage of the former that I have seen is in the Gre- gorian museum, and in the private collection of Chevalier Campana, both of which have been mentioned in the introductory chapter. 300 VULCI. which were lighted up for the last functions of the dead, and which were generally placed upon small altars of the same material, where they were kept burning in honour of a divinity. It may be that the lights now used in churches have some relation to these. But terra cotta was used as frequently for ar- chitectural and decorative purposes by the ancient Etruscans, and from them the art was handed down to the Romans, who employed it in some of their finest buddings, such as the Pantheon. The roofs of Etruscan houses appear to have been covered with tiles, ornamented with masks and other deco- rations ; and the ducts for letting rain-water off* the roofs were of the same material, and similarly adorned. Statues of terra cotta were also usual in what may be called the frontispiece of the roof, just as we find groups in marble surmounting the archi- trave of Grecian temples The excavations which have been made on the site of the Vulcian city have produced great quantities of these architectural ornaments, and the moulds and manufactory have been discovered where tliey all were made. Vulci was famous for its statuary in the days of Senilis Tullius. The necropolis covers a wide extent of ground on the side of the river opposite to the castle. Here, as in most other places, a sepulchre had no sooner been excavated and rifled of its contents, than it is filled up, and only two or three continued open. To these, situated at the distance of half a mile over _____ • - vu lci. 301 a corn-field, we were escorted by a soldier of the garrison. The entrance to them was by a descent of some steps, and a very low stone door, through winch we crept with considerable difficulty, and which admitted us into a small chamber where we could not stand upright, the walls and roof of which were not painted, but were adorned with pilasters and roof-trees of a sort of corded ornament. In one of these tombs an interior low door led into an inner chamber of largerfsize and similar appearance. In another the roof exhibited a peculiarity of orna- ment, that part nearest the entrance forming a sort of vestibule, coming out in a fan-like shape with curious carving. Some sepulchres have been recently discovered, remarkable from the number of chambers into which they were divided, and from their roofs, which were constructed in imitation of those in ordinary use. Of these some idea may be formed from the accom- panying drawing. (Figs. 4, 5.) It would almost seem as if the Etruscans had a presentiment that in distant times their name and race were destined to be rescued from oblivion by their tombs, for they have not only left subterranean traces of their exist- ence for miles round the site of their principal cities, but have erected lofty monuments whose ruins now fill the beholder with wonder, differing as they do from all others in their architectural shape. I have already had occasion to remark, that a favou- rite way of building with them was to erect a conical mound of earth, surrounded by a circle of mason- 302 vulci. work ; and sometimes out of this mound high towers rose from the centre and corners. A ruined spe- cimen of this mode of building, on a very small scale, and having had the cone formed of stone in- stead of earth, is the tomb which is familiar to every one between Albano and Aricia, and which has been commonly called that " of the Horatii." It is, however, altogether Etruscan, and the most ap- proved theory of its history is, that it was erected to Aruns, son of Lars Porsenna, who was slain in battle at Aricia by Aristodemus of Cumse. In this style was the famous tomb of Lars Porsenna himself at Clusium, of which so extraordinary and probably fabulous an account is given, with its labyrinth within the mass of the building, surmounted by five lofty towers, covered with a bronze roof, from which arose one, if not two or more stories of spires tower- ing aloft to an incredible height, and furnished with a vast peal of bells. One of the most singular monuments of this description now extant is situated at about a couple of miles from Ponte Labadia, near the road by which we returned to Corneto. It is called the Cucumella, and consists of a great mound of earth which, on being opened, was found to con- tain the remains of a square tower and round tower, which had formerly risen high above the earthen cone which embanked them, and at the bottom of which had been the sepulchral chambers, where there were doors which had communicated with the ancient entrance of the mound. All around were the remains of a massive circle of masonry, TT y j vuixr. 303 like what has been already described at Tarquinia and Monterone. I am not aware that any objects of value were found in this tomb. As it was pro- bably the distinguished sepulchre of some most illustrious individual or race, it was of course rifled of its contents at an early period by a barbarous Roman, or some little less barbarous Goth, while the more private tombs were left undisturbed, to be objects of curiosity or matter of gain to a Prince of Canino, or a Roman antiquary of the nineteenth century. Though the remains of the Cucumella are not very considerable, it is well worth while to visit it, in order to obtain an idea of one of the styles of sepulchral architecture by which the bodies of the most illustrious among the aristocracy of Etruria were honoured. Painted tombs like those of Tarquinia have been found at Vulci, but we did not see them. Micali describes the Cucumella as he saw it in 1830, and it is a very good description of it still. About a third part was laid bare, and showed the doors from space to space in the surrounding wall ; also, one door in the round tower, and an upper door in the square tower, which must have con- tained the principal grave. The masonry was of large stones laid together without cement, and on the top of the cone were several winged sphynxes, whilst over the lower doors were lions and griffins. The doors were in pointed arches, and the chambers hewn out of the living rock. Some of them were plastered round with a strong black stucco, and 304 vulci. had a cornice of ivy and myrtle leaves covered with leaf gold. The stucco was plentiful; the cornice only a fragment, and must when entire have had a very solemn and strange effect. Our desire to see the Egyptian tomb of which the contents had so deeply interested us, and which had been found near Vulci, was not gratified, as it had been filled up as soon as its treasures were re- moved. The cemetery of Vulci must have been of immense extent, for, at a still greater distance than the Cucumella from Ponte Labadia, we visited some tombs which had lately been excavated, and were still open. These lay entirely uncovered, like very large and immensely deep modern graves, and we thought we traced a close approximation to the Roman columbaria, in the niches hewn in the faces of the rock which formed the sides of the grave, and in which the bones and ashes of the deceased had been deposited. There were heaps of broken vases and cinerary urns, but all of the most ordi- nary quality, though of elegant shapes, lying about in every direction. And at the bottom of some of the graves we saw thin plates of metal, which looked as if they had once belonged to armour; but our search for anything worth picking up was fruitless. We did not proceed to Cosa, neither do I know whether any graves have been excavated there, but its walls are more entire than those of any other Etruscan town remaining, and an arch and several towers may be traced. Saturn ia, not far from it, but inland upon the Albegna, has the same sort of walls, vulci. 305 and there painted graves have been found. Many of the old towns upon the sea, where Italians some- times go to shoot the wild boar, must offer a rich field to an antiquary, if it is true, as I have heard, that columns, and the heads and legs and arms of statues, are sometimes seen sticking out into the water, or extending over it, soliciting, as it were, either to be brought forth to the light of day, or to be allowed a comfortable rest beneath the blue and quiet waves. We found the great crimes, and those most execrated in this part of the country, to be sheep-stealing and shooting the wild boar out of season. It was really refreshing to see the indig- nation which these excited, and that worse things are, comparatively, unheard of and unknown. After leaving Vulci, a drive of about four hours more brought us back to Corneto, where we related the events of a most interesting day to the excellent gonfaloniere over our supper table.* * See Appendix G. 306 CHAPTER VI. TUSCANIA, Oil TOSCANELLA. The day after our return from the plain of Vulci, where the existence of a rich and prosperous city has been in these latter times detected by its broken potsherds, we prepared to set out upon a new ex- ploring expedition to another seat of old Etruscan greatness, Tuscania, or as it is now called Toscanella. We are, if possible, still more ignorant of the exist- ence and fortunes of the ancient inhabitants of this city than of those of Vulci, though their abode has never been actually blotted out of the map of Italy as that of the neighbouring Vulci has been; for while the stalactyte grotto is now all that adorns the banks of the Fiora, and the ruined Cucumella stands solitary on the plain, the well-girt, turrcted, and highly picturesque town of Toscanella towers over the distant landscape, and proclaims that whatever may have been the greatness of ancient Tuscan ia, TUSCANIA. 307 she has left a representative not unworthy of her, at least in beauty and romantic situation. Descending from the heights of Corneto, and winding down the valley beneath its summit, we found the road at first exceedingly pretty. It encir- cles the base of the hill on which stands the town, and commands a fine view of that valley which sepa- rated ancient Tarquinia from its necropolis. We admired the steep cliffs of the Monterozzi, and re- cognized the position of the Grotta Delia Biga, and of the other sepulchres which overhang the valley, until this interesting scene was shut out from view by the rocky ridge of Turchina,once crowned by the ancientcapital, and then we passed through a desolate country and along a wretched road, which I believe have never before been traversed by such a vehicle as the heavy Roman berime, which now contained the whole ofour party. Not all the exertions of four excel- lent horses, nor the flagellations and execrations of our coachman, availed to save us from frequently sticking fast in the ground, and having to dismount ever and anon and go on foot ; and from our experience, I would recommend to others a very light carriage, or if their carelessness of comfort and the season of the year permit it, an open carritella, as being the best adapted for such an excursion, unless it can be made on horseback. At length our hopes of deliverance from our unpleasant predicament were animated by the many pinnacles of Toscanella, which we descried in the distance. As we approached nearer, we saw 308 TUSCANIA. a hill crowned with a mass of high walls, and flanked by clusters of round towers, which gave the place a very striking and fortified appearance, and recalled the middle ages, when Toscanella was long under the sway of a line of powerful feudal lords, who tyrannised over the neighbouring country. We halted before the principal gate, and began to consult as to how and where we were to pass the night, a subject which we had omitted, in the course of conversation upon what we thought more materially concerned the objects of the expedition. We had been more occupied with sepulchres than dining-rooms, and with sarcophagi than feather beds ; and now, when we awoke to our position, and con- sidered that there was no inn here as at Corneto, and that our friends Mr. Bunsen, the Prussian minister at Rome, and his family, in a late excursion which they had made, were hospitably received by a noble family in Toscanella, and entertained by them for several nights, the question arose with disagreeable perplexity, what we were to do ? We had a letter of introduction to one whom we expected to find emi- nently useful to us, but on whom we were fearful of trespassing too much, as his occupations were many, and his house might not be sufficiently large to contain so numerous a party, even were he hos- pitably disposed. This was Signor Campanari, with whose name all who have seen the beautiful antiquities which he has brought to this coun- try, must be acquainted. We made our berline TUSCANIA. 309 (a more capacious and heavy carriage than ever before, as I should think, traversed the no roads of old Etruria) wait at the city gates, whilst we held an anxious council as to the proper course to take, for the evening was rapidly turning into night, and we contemplated the possibility of either sleep- ing crowded in the carriage, or each on two chairs in some pot-house, the only representative of an hotel which exists in Toscanella. At length our necessities overcame our modesty, and we desired our coachman to drive to the door of Signor Campanari, in the hope that if he did not himself take us in, he would at least put us on the way of procuring accommodation elsewhere ; but as we were afraid of the carriage sticking in the narrow, twisted, and steep streets of the odd old town, we dismounted in order to walk on before, inquiring the way to the place of our destination. While yet arranging these matters before the gate, we saw a gentleman in black approaching from the country, followed by several workmen bearing shovels and mattocks. We felt a presentiment that this stranger was to have a material influence on our visit to Tos- canella, which was confirmed by observing that his clothes were soiled with clay, and that he held in his hands an instrument of bronze which had evi- dently not seen the workshop for more than two thousand years. Following the impulse which brings " together birds of a feather," we recognised in the stranger a veteran Scavatore ; and trusting that he would have a fellow feeling for us, who 31U TUSCANIA. wished to be what he was, but lacked opportunity, and who were come for the purpose of seeing - and learning that in which he was conversant — we ad- dressed ourselves to him, inquiring the way to the house of Signor Campanari. " I am Campanari," said he, and then he explained to us that he was returning home after his day's work among the extensive excavations which he was then carrying forward. We mentioned who we were, and by whom we were recommended : and while Signor Campanari was perusing the letter which we brought him, one of our party examined the bronze instrument which he had brought in his hand. It was a strigil or scraping instrument used in the baths, and which had been buried in its proprietor's tomb. As a spe- cimen it was very fine, though extremely fragile, as our poor friend found to his cost; for on examining it with great curiosity, and turning it round and round in his hand, the beautiful strigil separated in two pieces, and he remained aghast in an astonish- ment which produced in us feelings both of laughter and despair, with a fragment of the strigil in each extended hand. What will Signor Campanari say, thought each one of us, when he looks up from his letter and finds his beautiful strigil broken ? Even favourable impression will be dispelled, which may have been produced in his mind by the energy of a large foreign party, who have come rumbling over the desolate and untrodden moors of Tuscania, in a vast Roman berline, in search of the profound TUSCANIA. 311 at the bottom of an Etruscan tomb ; and every favourable sentiment produced by the recommenda- tion of our friend, will immediately vanish when he casts his eyes on the luckless knight of the strigil. The character of destructiveness too justly acquired by our countrymen flashed across our minds, and we contemplated nothing but exclusion from museums and tombs, a melancholy evening, on our own resources, and a night on hard boards. We were, however, speedily reassured by the benevolent smile which crossed over Campanari's face when he had read the letter, and which was not in the least clouded by the discovery of the accident. He said the loss of the strigil was of no conse- quence, and immediately invited us to his father's house, regretting that it could not contain the whole party, though he trusted to procure accommodation for the rest in the neighbourhood. We now gave the order of march to our lumbering berline, and preceded it in the train of our new acquaintance, under castellated walls, and through the turreted gate of the quaint old town. After mounting and crossing sundry steep and perplexed streets, we found ourselves at the door of the Casa Campanari, where we were installed with such a welcome as only genuine hospitality can give, which grudges no in- convenience, and only fears to appear sensible of the favour which it confers. We were no sooner settled at Campanari's, than we besought him to inform us concerning his ex- cavations, and, if possible, to procure for us the 312 TUSCANIA. pleasure of witnessing the opening of a tomb. The one wish he immediately proceeded to gratify, and he gave us hopes that the other might be accom- plished in the morning. The Campanari family have been constantly engaged in making excavations, since the grand discoveries of the Prince of Canino, which gave a stimulus to the curiosity or desire of gain of all who had land near the site of ancient cities, or money to lay out in this new species of mining. Among the sepulchral chambers of Tus- cania, his native place, as well as in the neighbour- ing Vulci, he has been eminently successful, and has, in the course of the last ten or twelve years, disinterred great treasures of gold and jewelled ornaments, bronzes, specchii, vases, and sarcophagi, with portrait lids. Some of the most beautiful vases in Rome, as well as in foreign museums, came originally from his excavations at a little distance from Toscanella ; and he presented to a former pope, as the first fruits of his labours, the splendid vase with inscriptions, which we had often admired in the Vatican library, and which represents some of the Grecian heroes of the Trojan war, beguiling the tedium of the siege with a game of chess. Campaign's eye immediately rested upon a Ro- man knight's ring of massive gold, set with an emerald, and engraved with a figure of Venus Victrix, which adorned the finger of one of our party, and he asked if it came from his tombs, being exactly of the form ami Betting found at Toscanella; but it I. (longed to the late Duke of Saxe Gotha, mater- TUSCANIA. 313 nal grandfather of Prince Albert, husband of our Queen ; and we were assured, when it came into our possession several years ago in Germany, that it was from Pompeii, and had been found on the spot by the Duke himself.* When we learnt the excessive strictness of the Neapolitan government, we began to tremble for the pedigree of our Venus Victrix, but we were reassured by being shown the spot at Pompeii where the Duke of Saxe Gotha had ascavo assigned to him by the king, with all its proceeds, and where he is said to have procured many valua- ble articles, which he shipped off directly. The king of Naples occasionally now grants similar fa- vours to illustrious strangers, and when we were there, Duke Bernard of Saxe Weimar had a scavo allowed him, and the king presented to him as a gift the bronzes which he had found. There is one improvement at Pompeii, which might be effected at a very small expense and trouble, and which would do more than many pages of laboured description to convey to the general observer an ac- curate idea of the manners and customs of the ancients. Some one of the most perfect and beautiful of the houses ought to be selected from among the many that are perfect and beautiful, that of the tragic poet for instance. It should be roofed in, and its * The date of this ring is the time of Julius Caesar, and it proba- bly belonged to some officer of rank in his army ; for it is an his- torical fact, that gold seal rings, with an intaglio of Venus Victrix on emerald, were worn by his most zealous adherents as a badge of partizanship. P 314 TUSCANIA. walls, in any places where they are imperfect, com- pleted to the roof, and then it should be thoroughly furnished on the scale of a Roman gentleman's dwelling, from the inexhaustible store of articles contained in the Museo Borbonico. As the pre- sent minister of the interior is a man of antiqua- rian tastes and pursuits, we are astonished that this very easy, and on the whole, cheap way of repro- ducing: a classical dwelling has not occurred to him. The Queen Dowager one day talking on this sub- ject, mentioned to us that it. was an idea which had formerly struck her, and that she had even suggested its accomplishment. But I have wandered too far from central Etruria, into tlie Etruscan confederation of the twelve cities of Campania, and, moreover, I have made an un- warrantable stride as to time, from the early re- public to the middle of the empire, from indepen- dent Tuscania to neat little Pompeii, the Clifton or Hastings of the Horn an world. And lastly, I have wearied out the patience of worthy Signor Cam- panari, who is waiting to show us the recent pro- duce of liis excavations. At the time of our visit, be had no great stock of curiosities by him, having recently sold great numbers of things to various crowned heads and museums ; but all that he had was fresh from the tombs. He produced two very be;; ut i fully engraved specchii which he had found a few days before, and an exquisite bronze female head, of which the toupet lifted off, forming a smelling-bottle: on this he set a great value, as he TUSCANIA. 315 said that out of a great number of tombs which he had explored, he had seldom been so fortunate as to find any similar. He had a good many sacri- ficial spoons and other instruments, specchii of more ordinary quality, and two beautiful specimens of early Etruscan coinage, both found in a Tar- qninian tomb, and both now in our possession. They are an assis and a semis. The former was the type of that adopted in Rome by Servius Tul- lius, the Volsinian Mastarna, having a head of Janus on one side, and on the other the prow of a ship. The latter has on either side a head of Minerva and the club of Hercules, which is therewith joined, to denote that it was coined or rather fused on occa- sion of an alliance between the Etruscans and the Rutuli. He had at this time but few gold orna- ments, as he showed us only one necklace and a beautiful garland of leaves for the head ; but gold ornaments are commonly found at Tuscania, chiefly rings and clasps. He was on the point of sending- off some vases to England, and among them there were one or two of unique beauty. As I was leaving the room where these things had been exhibited, I perceived a small basket in one cor- ner containing eggs,which I naturally concluded that Signor Campanari had just sent out to procure fresh for our supper: when, to our astonishment, he informed us that these eggs had contributed to a funeral feast some two thousand years ago, as he had found them in the tomb which he had been that day excavating. It has already been remarked in p 2 316 TUSCANIA. the description of the pictured walls of Tarquinia, that many of the guests on the Triclinia had eggs in their hands, and that they were the ordinary commencement of an Etruscan banquet. But until a real, substantial, and non-funereal sup- per could be got ready, the elder Signor Campanari proposed that we should accompany him by torch- light to visit the tomb in the garden behind his house. We gladly availed ourselves of his proposal, and traversed his little garden on a walk lined on both sides with sarcophagi, each one being sur- mounted by a recumbent figure of terra cotta as large as life, and similar figures looking down upon us from the walls above. In short, the whole premises teemed with sepulchral baked clay, some reclining with an air of dignified repose, and others with that exaggerated appearance and distorted position which evinced a ruder style, and had been the re- presentation of persons of inferior rank by less emi- nent artists. Signor Campanari explained to us that the tomb he w;is conducting us to see had been built by him- self, on the exact model and of the same dimensions with one which he had excavated ;t few years since, and that all the contents of the original had been deposited in the copy, where they stood tale quale. On opening the door, which was in the style of Monterone, the torches illuminated a chamber nineteen or twenty feet square, with a ledge all round it, on which were laid with great regularity ten or a dozen sarcophagi. They were covered with TUSCANIA. 317 their lids, each having a well-executed figure of nenfrite or terra cotta as large as life, and some- times of a size almost colossal, representing either men of grave and substantial appearance, with torques round the neck, and ring on the finger, holding in their hands a patera for libations ; or of elegant and richly dressed ladies, their heads adorned with ivy and myrtle wreaths, their ears with graceful pen- dants, their necks encircled with chains, and their arms with bracelets. Behind each figure were a number of vases piled up in irregular heaps, and some of them hanging above them by bronze nails in the wall. None of these vases were of the very finest quality, but some of them were tolerably good, and most of them were in perfect preservation. Signor Campanari informed us that at Tuscania there does not appear to have been a distinguished school of pictorial art. Most of the . vases that have been found are of a coarser quality and infe- rior design to those of Vulci and Tarquinia,' while the ornaments of gold and of bronze are of great beauty. The tomb after which this one had been modelled, belonged to a family of rank and conse- quence ; and if very fine vases had been manufac- tured at Tuscania, there can be no doubt that they would have been found in this and similar sepul- chres. It appears to have been from feelings of patriotism that the noble and wealthy families of this town were content to use what was homely, because it was their own, rather than purchase what was more beautiful, but produced by another city. >318 TUSCANIA. The name of the family whose tomb we were visit- ing, Campanari told us, was VELTHURI, as proved by the inscriptions. I did not examine any of these inscriptions, but from subsequent study I cannot doubt that VELTHUR signifies an office and not a person, and the centre sarcophagus of the Velthuri was probably that of the governor, and very possibly of the hereditary governor of Tuscania. There is reason to believe that the Romans, after their con- cpuest, made many of the local governments heredi- tary, as a means of securing their own power, by strengthening the hands of the grandees against the old constitution, and the ruling Lucumo might be Velthur of the place instead of Lar. A sarcopha- gus larger than any of the others stood in the middle of the chamber. It was uncovered, and contained what remained of the skeleton and armour of the head of the family of Velthuri. There he lay with his helmet, his greaves, and his two spears, after the fashion of classical antiquity, and all around him in the coffin there was the strangest assemblage of little odds and ends that I ever saw. If we may be permitted to judge of the old warrior's tastes, by the things which were buried along with him, he must in his day and generation have been a passionate lover of Rococo, with very little discrimination — in short, a collector of trash, like so many preservers of pseudo-curiosities amongst ourselves. There were quantities of little pieces of enamel, and transparent coloured pastas, clear stones or compositions, some like topaz, and others like amethyst, balls of per- TUSCANIA. 319 fume, utensils of bronze of all sorts., shapes, and sizes, and for all manner of uselessness. And lastly, I pulled out what gave me rather an unpleasant insight into Signor Velthuri's character, and a bad idea of the employment of his lighter hours — a pair of dice, which, if my memory fails me not, were loaded. I will not positively say that General Vel- thuri was guilty of unfair play, but this musthavebeen a fashionable vice among his countrymen, as loaded dice are constantly found. Another and more awful consideration was forced upon us by a closer inspec- tion of this large sarcophagus. On both sides of it there is unequivocally represented a human sacrifice. Whether this relates to any act of old Velthuri's life, I will not undertake to decide ; it is to be hoped not ; yet if it does, however horrible it may be, he is not without precedents among the most distin- guished early Grecian chiefs. But the subjects of the bassi relievi of sarcophagi have often no relation to the individual, but are national and historical. And even though the manners of Etruria may have been stained with this dreadful barbarity, they were no worse than those of the Greeks, the Carthagi- nians, and the Romans. Truly, before the light of Christianity illumined the world, the nations dwelt in " habitations of cruelty." In making our arrangements for the following- day, we we were most anxious, had it been possible, after witnessing the opening of a tomb at Tuscania, to have driven to Castel d'Asso, celebrated for its rock sepulchres, and situated considerably off the 320 TUSCAN I A. road, nearly half way between Toscanella and Viterbo. We were, however, assured that for our large carriage the country round Castel d'Asso was impracticable, and that it would be difficult to pro- cure a carritella, and a guide properly conversant with the road. The usual way of seeing Castel d'Asso is not from Toscanella, but from Viterbo; and if we had persevered in our attempt, more time would have been spent than we had to spare. We were therefore reluctantly obliged to relinquish Castel d'Asso, until we should go to Viterbo on a future occasion, and we limited our wishes to a day in ancient Tuscania. On the following morning we set out very early on foot towards the excavation which SignorCampanari gave us the hopes of seeing, and we left the town by the gate at which we had entered on the preceding night, advancing about half a mile along the road in the direction from whence he had come, strigil in hand, to welcome us: here we were met by the overseer of his excavations, who informed us that the proposed scavo had turned out a failure, he hav- ing discovered by infallible signs, that the tomb had been opened before. Being thus disappointed in the object of our immediate interest, Signer Catn- panari proposed Id take us a considerable round, in order to show us the objects best worth seeing, both in the abodes of the dead and of the living. We proceeded in the direction of the spot where Ins excavation had been intended, and lie showed us BOine graves which he bad opened a few days since, TUSCANIA. 321 and from which one or two of those sarcophagi had been taken, which we had seen in his back court. They had evidently been tombs of persons in hum- ble life ; the sepulchral chambers were small and rude burrows underground ? and here, as else- where, few or no traces were left of former and more important excavations, as the graves were no sooner emptied of their precious contents than they were filled up again. A little further on, we scram- bled down among rocks and brushwood to the mouth of a sepulchre of greater importance, which was called by the people of the country " Grotta della Regina," and which was very large and sin- gular in its form. The entrance was by a long passage cut in the rock, and when we fairly got into the cavern we were struck by the singular mixture of rude nature and ancient art, for the roof is sup- ported by two very massive pillars, and there are traces of pilasters cut out along the rugged rock. It is altogether a most irregular chamber, and very inferior to that which it most nearly resembles, the Grotta del Cardinale at Tarquinia. Behind the upper end there runs a circular mine, which on one side extends into a dark passage which has never been explored. The position of Toscanella and of the tombs which we had been visiting, reminded us of that of Tarquinia and its necropolis, the general character of the scenery being the same, though in point of beauty I think the preference must be given to Toscanella. p 5 322 TUSCANIA. From the bill of the tombs there is a very fine view of the opposite height, crowned with the high turreted walls and lofty round towers of the town, and of a still higher hill without the walls, on which is situated the church of San Pietro. Here, as at Vulci, and indeed more or less throughout Etruria, we were tantalized by visiting a spot which must have been famed for many important events, of which no recollection now remains, and which must have been hallowed by so many interesting associations, if the dead could be made to speak from the surround- ing tombs, and tell us what they once were. We are profoundly ignorant of Tuscania's early history ; we know not even to what city of the great league it was attached, though we may conjecture to Tarquinia ; we know neither when or how it fell, nor what be- came of it after its fall. We know that it was a strong and important place in feudal times, and the interest of a christian antiquary is excited by its ancient and beautiful church which I have just mentioned. Of this we had heard a great deal before we left Rome, and it was said to be the most ancient church in Italy, of the early gothic style, and one of the most curious specimens of that style in existence. We descended the steep hill from the Grotta della Regina, crossed over the valley, and recommenced an ascent up the hill, which is crowned by the ve- nerable church, in front of which we stopped in order to contemplate its interesting and strange architecture. It is said to have been built in the 5 TUSCANIA. 323 seventh or eighth century of the christian era, and its style is a total deviation from that of most ancient churches in Rome. It is a sort of gothic, formed of classical materials, Etruscan and Roman pillars and arches contributing to raise a fabric of which the plan and character widely differ from anything for which they were originally designed. In front, the great door is formed of an immense and beautifully ornamented arch of that rounded style usually with us called Saxon. Above there is a beautiful wheel window, and a profusion of carving of different ages and styles. I was particularly struck with one large carved group which bore a greater resemblance to a Hindoo representation of a trinity, than any- thing not Indian I have ever seen. Did we not know the thing to be impossible, I should be tempted on the strength of this sculptured stone to assert, that Bramah, Scheva, and Vishnu, must at some former period have found adorers in Etruria. There is a distinct representation of a trinity of colossal size. Three monstrous faces growing together, one full face in the middle, and a profile on each side. The arms of the figure are in the act of squeezing and destroying a writhing serpent. This very carious monument occasioned to us many interesting specu- lations. It certainly could not have belonged to the christian period ; for although unskilled in ecclesi- astical architecture and ornament as a system, we haa become sufficiently familiar with it, on the whole, to pronounce that this Tuscanian trinity was not the work of Christians in any age of the church, the 324 TUSCAN! A. rudest representations of early Christianity being to- tally dissimilar. Besides, this is by no means rude, it is monstrous. No less certain were we, that it is not a monument of classical antiquity, and that it resembles closely some Asiatic representation of a divinity. My own opinion is, that it may be a very ancient Etruscan carving, to represent a divinity, and that the idea, probably derived from Syria, and brought hither by the Pelasgi, was one of a trinity handed down from generation to generation, arising from the pure source of patriarchal tradition, and becoming gradually corrupted in its progress. — We know too little of the religion of the an- cient world to be able to trace this progress; but that it did exist we have no reason to doubt, and that it was in some way handed down in ancient Etruria, I think this remarkable stone may be adduced as affording some degree of evidence. The singularity of the monument is increased by the action of this triune Being destroying a serpent. May not this be a confused allusion to the most ancient of all prophecies which was uttered at the very gate of paradise, that " The seed of the woman hall bruise the serpent's head?" After the singular and beautiful exterior, the in- side of the church of St. Pietro rather disappointed us. It is very plain, for the paintings with which it was once entirely covered are now nearly effaced ; there arc two rows of pillars, some of white and marble, Borne of cipolini, and some of granite, with singularly ornamented capitals in leaves, TUSCANIA. 325 horses' heads, and all sorts of strange devices. There is a marble pulpit, as in most primitive churches, and a large flat table on a pillar for reading the gospels ; and the baptismal font is sup- ported by an ancient heathen altar. There is a good painting remaining of a Madonna and child near the high altar, and the miracles of St. Peter are painted on the walls and in the tribune. A flight of steps leads to the high altar, which is sur- mounted by a canopy, and behind is placed the bishop's chair, in the upper end and middle of the presbyteriurn, as is usual in all the old christian churches. It is altogether a very interesting spe- cimen of the most ancient style of church architec- ture, and peculiarly so as being probably the earliest gothic cathedral in the world ; though, as a model of a sacred building of primitive times, it must yield in interest to some of those in Rome, and especially to the ancient San Clemente, which is considered to be the most perfectly preserved Basilica of the early christian period, being as old as the fifth century. No specimen of this primitive Basilican architecture has ever yet existed in England. We descended by a few steps, from the church of St. Pietro, into a fine crypt, which had once been Roman baths. It was supported by several rows of marble pillars of all colours, sizes, shapes, forms, and orders, Roman and Etruscan, mingled together in' sublime confusion. These baths must have been ruined in the seventh or eighth cen- tury, about the age when the church was built, 326 TUSCANIA. and the architect must have taken whatever ma- terials he could find on the spot, which could be made serviceable to his new erection, without re- gard to anything but economy and use ; and thus a heterogeneous forest of pillars was planted on the foundations of the baths to serve as a substruction to the christian church, whilst these baths them- selves had been in great part constructed from the ruins of an Etruscan temple, of which the walls and substructions exist below. We saw an Etruscan temple, a Roman bath, and a christian cathedral, one above the other. This church, though cold and damp, has mass said in it every Sunday, and is held in great esteem throughout the country for its high antiquity. Not far from San Pietro was the ancient bishop's palace, of which little remains except a line of wall with some traces of gothic architec- ture in the windows, now incorporated in a large farm-house. Still nearer to the church stood two double towers, very high, formed of massive archi- tecture, and apparently as useless as the same in- explicable constructions in some parts of Ireland and Scotland. They had, however, served for do- fence in the middle ages, though I believe that they are of Etruscan origin. What I mean by double towers is, that each consisted of two towers, the one cased within the walls of the other ; each one of these towers was built upon Etruscan graves, and it is highly probable that in very ancient times they may have formed the centre of some immense TUSCANIA. 327 sepulchral mound, similar to the cucumella at Vulci, but which had been cleared away when the cathe- dral and other buildings were erected in the early christian period. Campanari informed us that he intended ere long- to make excavations beneath the hill on which San Pietro's church stands, where he expected to find very valuable things. We descended from the church by the side to- wards the town opposite to that by which we had mounted. But before we entered the gates we turned off to the right hand up a remarkable valley through which the road to Viterbo winds, where there are on all sides traces of ancient sepulture. The rocks which gird this valley are hollowed out into a great number of grottos nearly uniform in shape, though differing in size ; and there can be little doubt that this is the site of a great ne- cropolis. It would thus appear that Tuscania was almost surrounded by cemeteries, as this valley is situated at a great distance from the graves which we have already mentioned near Grotta della Regina. Most of these sepulchres are low, and formed of only one chamber ; others are composed of two or three chambers, but without internal orna- ment. In shape and arrangement they so greatlv resemble those which we elsewhere visited, that they do not require a particular description. The soft and porous quality of the tufo rock facilitated the formation of tombs in all these places. We also visited another fine and very ancient church, that of 328 TUSCAN I A. St. Maria, which is, however, greatly inferior in interest to San Pietro. Before we concluded our morning's walk, Sig- nore Campanari conducted us to the studio of an apothecary who has busied himself with the re- storation of broken and imperfect vases from all parts of the country in a way which, if not productive of the best effect, is peculiarly honest. He takes the fragments of a broken vase, which he completes, filling up all that is wanting with white terra cotta glazed, so as 'to rival the beautiful varnish of the anticme, and very ingeniously united to the frag- ments; and in this manner you have the vase re- stored in its ancient shape, but made of party- coloured materials, and the subject of the painting interrupted perhaps in its most important parts by glossy white. He has a collection of noble and costly vases for sale, but almost all of them arc patched in this extraordinary manner, which makes the vase collector's heart bleed for the ruin of so many fine specimens of ancient art. This may truly be called a a museo cimiterio. The way in which vases are restored in Rome, is infinitely preferable. For though the new parts are joined to the old, so as to be hardly distinguishable, and the subject, of the painting is completely restored; yet if the purchaser be himself a judge, or if he have friends and advisers who are, (and no one under other circumstances ever ought to venture to purchase,) he is sure of never being deceived. TUSCANIA. 329 Campanari had one small vase, with a pale ground, and containing, I think, a triumphal procession. We wished to purchase it, but he smilingly told us that it was not for sale in Italy ; he wished to send it to London, and try what it would bring. His brother valued it at £50. He had also an Etruscan sword, the blade of which had been joined to the hilt with gold. It was short and somewhat broad, with a double edge, and more like a very long dag- ger than a sword, but I have since seen the figure of it on scarabei. This we wished to purchase for a valued and now lamented friend, the Bishop of Lichfield, but it was not permitted to leave Italy. He had, moreover, fragments of bronze bassi relievi so magnificently wrought and so well preserved, that I could not help thinking they must have formed part of iEneas's shield which Venus had given him beneath the walls of Cere. It is sadly to Campana- ri's loss that he cannot tell to whom they belonged, for they want only a name such as Tarchon, or Vi- benna, or Porsenna, to bring more money than the famous fragments of the armour of Pyrrhus in the British museum. The pieces are larger, and the workmanship superior. The age, too, could be tole- rably well ascertained, and is more likely to be prior than posterior to Pyrrhus, viz. 280 b. c. — These extraordinary bronzes have been sent to England, and it is to be hoped will fall into hands worthy of them. He had also two bronze cistas very little inferior. As we returned to his house from San Pietro, we passed many large caverns, 330 TUSCANIA. which reminded us of the Matlock caves at home. They had all been tombs, but destroyed before the memory of any one now living, and some of them have passages excavated in the rock, which go in at one door, and then, passing behind two or three tombs, come out at another. There was one remaining sepulchre at Toscanella which we were anxious to see, but, alas ! we were not in time before it was filled up ; and a written description of it, which I was promised from the Archaeological Society, was never sent to me. Some time in the month of March, Campanari came to Rome, bringing with him some sketches of bassi relievi, found upon two large coffins, and some terra cotta, and bronzes, the forms of which I do not re- member, and two of the finest specchii which had ever yet been seen. They were large and perfect, of good metal, and containing a variety of figures with inscriptions, amongst which stood a new deity, or a new name for an old deity. They were very beautifully engraved in the Greek Etruscan style, and I remember amongst them Tinia, Kupra,Turan, and the god whom we call Neptune, with his trident, but I cannot tell his Etruscan name, nor his employment. Of these mirrors, one, if not both of them, had been gilt, or at least had that appear- ance ; but it was disputed in the society, whether the yellow colour was gold, or a chemical change effected by some peculiar kind of earth, in which these specchii were found. I do not, however, be- lieve that their having lain in the earth at all was TUSCANIA. 331 an ascertained fact. I can never forget my per- plexity and astonishment the first time I saw a specchio in the hall of the Archaeological Society. I saw a number of the members gathered in con- sultation round a thing which I took for an ancient sacrificial instrument ; I thought it was a frying-pan. It was small and shallow, but it had a rim remain- ing, and a handle, and seemed very fit for the pur- pose, only somewhat corroded with rust, and worn down by time. I saw the wonder it excited, and I had no doubt that it was a treasure most curious and rare. I thought, perhaps, it had been used in the funereal feasts, and it might have fried either fish or eggs, or any other sort of thing represented in the tombs. It was presented to me in my turn for inspection, and I timidly asked its name. One of the gentlemen said, " A specchio,'' and smiled. " A specchio," I repeated, and considered within myself — a specchio is the Italian for a looking-glass, but perhaps it may also be the learned name for some of those mystical instruments of which the use is not known. It was certainly not a glass. No one could see themselves in that thick unpolished metal ; the convex side would make a distorted face, and the concave, the surface of which was but slightly hollowed, had a figure scratched upon it. I looked again to see if it was a costume, but it was a genius winged and naked, — not, therefore, as it appeared to me, a model for female fashions. 1 asked the professor what it was. He opened his eyes, and answered, " A specchio !" There was 332 TUSCANIA. evidently no one there who could conceive the ex- istence of a being so ignorant as not to know the whole history, date, and use of a specchio ; so I was silent. One person said to me, " How would you like such a looking-glass?" and believing his speech to be a joke, I laughed. Another good- humouredly observed, " You will see it on the vases." For a whole week I was engaged in find- ing out the meaning of a specchio, and peeped in every shop-window in Rome to see if I could find it on a vase. I did fortunately see it on many vases, and in due time arrived at the knowledge I desired. After puzzling out my lesson, I could not help thinking what a pity that you learned men, who give public lectures, should not have amongst you one poor ignorant being, who, having felt, like me, the difficulty of groping her way back to the days of the Hood, and the origin of nations, could have had compassion upon another in distress, and have said, " A specchio means a looking-glass, and this is one : you will find that all the ancient nations used them of this form, and of brass, or of bronze, till about two centuries before the christian era, when they were made of polished steel, which custom continued until superseded by gliiss. A very fine one of steel, purchased by Capranesi, was lately dug up «'it Avignon, of the time of the empire ; and gl;iss was known and used along with steel at the time of the destruction of Pompeii, as you may see iu the toilet cabinet, of the Naples museum. This bronze, though it looks to yon so dull and TUSCANIA. 333 dingy, was once very finely polished, and specimens are occasionally found on which the polish still re- mains. Specchii of brass or bronze (for the words mean the same thing) are mentioned in the book of Job, at a time probably 184 years prior to Abraham. We know, therefore, that they are of the very highest antiquity, and most probably were invented by Tubal Cain, and used by the ladies in Noah's ark. They are chiefly, if not wholly, now found in the graves of Etruria, and the number known is about five hundred." Had any lady taken this compassion upon me, I should have thanked her more than I did that day either the wit or the charity of the learned men. By the time Campa- nari brought these specchii to Rome, I was wise enough to have stared myself at a question about them, and to have answered, that " a specchio meant a specchio." I never heard what became of them, but they are among the very finest that have ever been found, and must have belonged to some emi- nently rich person. Campanari's account of the sepulchre in which he found them was, that he was excavating as usual in a rough but quiet-looking spot, when suddenly he heard a great crash, the earth fell in, and he found himself standing in the centre of twelve figures, all with their raised and ornamented heads staring at him, and wondering why he came to give them such disturbance. He said he really felt frightened at the time, and inclined to run away, for, on whichever side he looked, there 334 TUSCANIA. were the red and fiery faces and the peculiarly stern expression of these reproachful figures. Their bodies were all covered with earth, and their heads only were raised above the soil, so that they looked like beings from beneath, come to sit in judgment upon him for violating their repose. The effect, however, was momentary. The living amongst the dead is a substance amongst shadows. Cam- panari ordered his men to fall to work, and the soil was cleared away. He then saw that the tomb was circular, rather an uncommon form at Toscanella, with one or two ledges all round it, and twelve or more coffins of stone and baked clay, each with its portrait figure of man or woman on the lid, in the dress of the ancient nobles. I think he found no gold ornaments in this tomb, but bronzes and vases, and beautiful sculpture. The subject of one sar- cophagus was the story of Niobe very fully repre- sented, with some Etruscan peculiarities ; but all those I had the opportunity of asking, were too learned to explain to me in what these consisted. Upon another sarcophagus was a human sacrifice. The fallen roof had, as is usual in such cases, de- stroyed much, and when we were at Tuscania, it could no longer be seen, because it was impassable from water. Campanari had kept it open as long as he could, by setting a watch upon it; but, be- sides the trouble and expense of this process, he was obliged to remove many things which would otherwise have suffered from the spring storms, and he said the peasants were incessantly watching \ TUSCANIA. 335 to pillage this council of twelve, so that he found it much more expedient to remove all that was worth carriage, and then to cover the roofless grave up with the earth again. I saw many of the coffins belonging to it about his premises, and the faces of all had been painted with vermilion, the colour which in ancient times was given to gods and heroes, and which I have several times observed upon the Lucumones. Campanari promised to erect a tomb upon the exact model of what I have at- tempted to describe, in which, he would place all the unsold articles from the original as he had found them. I trust he will do so, for the model tomb of the Velthuri was most excellently done, and was deeply interesting. Campanari is a man of science and a patriot, and what he does is likely to be done with taste and judgment. Over the door of the Velthurian sepulchre was written in Etruscan letters, ril avil, " he lived ;" and this is a very common, and a very simple and touching- epitaph often found above the tombs. There were some other inscriptions rather longer, but few can be understood. One is " Eca suth inesl," or Rest in peace — Adieu in peace. Campanari had another large cavern-tomb in his garden partially fitted up, and in a style dis- tinct from any of those already mentioned. He was very unwilling that I should go into it, because it was not. entirely furnished and arranged ; but I thought it very well worth the trouble, though I can give no description of it, having a confused 33d TUSCANIA. jumble in my head of large stone sarcophagi with inscriptions, bronze shields, wheels, jars, strange instruments for uses stranger still, bassi relievi, and I know not what besides. There were quantities of large white rabbits running about in it, which frightened me by jumping out unexpectedly from where I stood. I asked Cam pan a ri how he could allow these animals to be there, which gave me the idea of vermin, and he said that he thought them appropriate, for that they were animals which loved sepulchres, and were constantly found about the graves. Above, below, and around, in Cam- panari's garden, were lines of sculptured coffins, funereal vases, and broken marbles. Many of the figures had the head and face very finely executed, and the rest of the person finished in the most hasty and slovenly manner, and many had the front only finished, and the back left smooth to be placed against the wall. I saw most strange positions and most extraordinarily distorted, elon- gated, or curtailed hands and feet ; but in all, the countenance was finished with an individuality and detail which evinced a high degree of art. The heads of some were crowned with chaplets of flow- ers, others wore fillets or diadems, and the forms of their various ornaments were dissimilar; some of the necklaces were of round beads, like what, we had seen so often in collections, and some of theiH of a pear-shaped ornament, like the famous neck- lace of Phidias's Minerva, and which is sometimes also represented on the vases ^P^JPQpvf^ TUSCAN1A. 337 Most of the stone sarcophagi had inscriptions. Alas ! who shall read them now ? They are indeed a dead language, and yet not without their instruc- tion to the living; and though they can administer no consolation to the departed spirit, and no flattery to " the dull cold ear of death," I do not think the testimony they bear to former knowledge and re- finement is a thing of small consequence. I hope Campanari will take drawings of his tombs, now that he has so much experience, and that he can give to the world so much information otherwise unattainable. He expects a very rich harvest of strange discoveries, of the highest anticpiity, in the scavi at present making about San Pietro, and he has this great advantage over enterprisers at Tarquinia, that not one in ten of these tombs has been opened before. Amongst other strange things which he had found at various times was a circular stone inscribed, a winged genius, also in stone, and three very prettily proportioned small pillars. I think they were marble, as were some fine capitals lying on the ground, and which must have been found amongst ruins of baths, in this vicinity. I have nothing more to add than what I ought, perhaps, to have stated at the beginning, and that is the description of our guardiano, a tender of cattle, whom Carlo Avolta sent with us to show us the road, which it is by no means easy to find after the first three miles from Corneto. This man was one of a regular profession in Italy, to keep the cattle equally from the attacks of man and beast ; some- Q 338 TUSCANIA. times to assist in hunting the boar, and some- times in running down the buffalo. I have seen them galloping along the high road at full speed with the spear extended after the buffalo, and pre- senting a picture worthy of our oriental draughts- men ; and when, as not unfrequently happens, the wild or enraged cattle attack peasants crossing the fields, these men are expected to run or ride up at a moment's notice to the rescue. Our guardiano was a most romantic looking figure — a fresh, stout, and rather large man about forty, remarkably well and substantially dressed in a jacket and cloak, or toga, of blue cloth, boots upon his legs, a gun slung behind his shoulder, and a very long pole shod with iron in his hand. He was mounted on a stout black horse, which probably belonged to himself, and his saddle was high peaked before and behind, with the seat sunk down in the middle. I have mentioned the picturesque appearance of all the Etruscan towns as we left them or entered them. We had no sooner lost sight of Corneto than we saw Toscanella rising far in the distance before us ; and after proceeding more than a mile, we had Monte Fiascone perched upon a high rock on the left hand, and Viterbo, less remarkable for situation, but much larger in appearance, on our right. As we returned, we found a spot, just as we branched off from a moorland track to a species of road where all lour towns could be seen together; and it was a pleasure to us to look over so much of old Etruria, ; nil ;i wonder to think how populous it must once TUSCANIA. 339 have been, for there were many towns between Tar- quinia and Viterbo, of which no trace now remains. For aught we knew, a city once stood upon the deso- late moor we were traversing. Near Corneto are numerous small hills, whether natural or artificial we could not tell, and extensive copse-woods, which are full of the wild boar. 340 CHAPTER VII. CiEItE OR AGYLLA. I think I have seldom felt better pleased than when our carriage turned off from the high road about six miles beyond Monterone, and we found ourselves on the way to Cervetri. Though we met with no acci- dent, I certainly do not recommend this road to such vehicles as usually go by the name of carriages in England, by reason of a very steep and stony ascent close to the town, and of sundry ditches before arriv- ing at this ascent. One of our party, pointing to the height, which by this time the reader will per- ceive to be the site of every Etruscan town, said to me, " Do you not see the necropolis?" I answered " Yes ;" but in truth I did not know which it \v;is, for I looked for something remarkable in appear- ance, while it was only visible as one of the many un- even eminences towards which we were driving. I do not believe that the great cemetery of this place can be seen from the side on which we approached, a-^ it stands beyond and behind the town ; but ano- &. © 1 Lid \ on c , k k a CERE OR AGYLLA. 341 ther burying-place, which consisted of the tombs of distinguished persons only, was on the same side with ourselves, and seemed to me like a height on which cones had been broken down. Cervetri has had three distinct existences, and has borne three separate names, which I beg the reader to keep in mind, when I give it any other appellation than the one it now bears. We find here earlier traces of civilization than in any other spot in Italy, and it was first called Agylla under the naturalized Pelasgians, then Caere under the conquering Etrus- cans, and lastly Cervetri, after Caere had gradually decayed under the Romans, who placed a colony of their own about two miles from the site, which they also called by the name of Caere or Cere, a name remaining at this hour to puzzle travellers. Agylla- Caere then became Caere or Cere-Vetere, and is so termed by the writers of the middle ages, and in many papal bulls ; and now it has become Cervetri ; whilst the little settlement, many centuries more recent, has appropriated to itself the name of Cere or Cere-novo. As we approached Cervetri, we saw a quan- tity of hewn stones lying about and gathered to- gether to build a wall, in which part of them had already been employed. To the eye they appeared about two feet long, one foot broad, and one foot thick, and they looked as if they had been dug up after a long interment. I remarked, " One would almost think that these dingy stones had once built the walls of the ancient city," and to my 342 CERE OR AGYLLA. no small surprise I was told that I was perfectly right, and that they had formed the old wall. They are found in great quantities hereabouts buried beneath the soil, and are used for building whatever may be wanted for modern purposes ; the Italians wisely arguing that they were hewn to build with, and that to use them saves the trouble of hewing over again. We entered the present village by an arched gate flanked by a wall on one side, and by a Roman tower on the other. It is a poor place, containing two or three houses of wealthy farmers, or non-noble proprietors, — that is, a sort of yeomanry. It has a palace belonging to Prince Ruspoli, the lord of the manor, and, to our great profit and consolation, i) has also a parsonage in the house of the Arci Prete Regulini. 1 say to our profit and consolation, be- cause the only inn is a wretched pot-house of the very lowest description, frequented by carriers and muleteers, where we sent our horses; and it is so bad that our Italian servant would not enter it, nor e ven taste of the food which was there prepared. Our archaeological friends in Rome had given us a letter to the Arci Prete, and we accordingly went to his house, and asked his leave to eat our luncheon in a room there. We were received, a few yards from the door, by a majestic looking dark man, somewhat elderly, with a grave and benevolent countenance. He told us that he was the Arci Prete, and insisted on our dining with him, after lie Bhould have exercised his kindness in guiding us to C^ERE OR AGYLLA. 343 the ancient monuments which we were come to see. Of course we desired first to visit the tomb he had himself discovered, and for this purpose we followed him, and again partly retraced the street and road by which we had entered the town. We passed many an ancient sepulchral cavern now open to the day, and walked nearly a mile along a pleasant and well-made country road leading to Cere-novo. — We then crossed a style on the right hand, into a field of Indian corn, and were told that this field had once been a tumulus like those at Mon- terone, but that the top was now beaten down, whilst the bottom was raised up. It had been broken to pieces, in order to search in all directions for graves, and its pristine form was gone. I do not know its real name, and therefore I shall call it Monte Regulini. By its side stood several other hillocks, which had once been regular tumuli, but which are now all more or less destroyed. Never without previous knowledge could 1 have imagined that we were walking upon the section of a cone. As we descended, we came upon a wall, probably about three feet high, and similar to what we had seen at Monterone, only more finished. This, Regulini told us, had gone all round the cone, having doors and graves in it at certain distances, the graves going round about half the circum- ference, and consisting of three chambers each, with short narrow passages between them. The form of the doors was not so Egyptian as at Monterone, and yet something in that style. The 344 CJERE OR AGYLLA. face of the mount is said to have presented the same appearance, the plain part having been the earth we had walked over, and the wall having been covered from view by the accumulations of time. It had been as smooth as Monterone, before the Arci Prete and General Galassi, feeling sure that it was a place of sepulture, agreed to undertake together the excavation of it in 1836. There were lions and griffins on the cornice of stone above the doors of the graves, and there was a large lion on the top of the mount. I do not remember whether these lower tombs had been opened before, or whether they were found sealed ; probably the former, as nothing of importance was brought out of them ; and yet there can be no doubt that they were the graves of distinguished persons only. Having found these sepulchres at the base of the mound, the Arci Prete and the general agreed, from what they knew of the Etruscan method of burying, that the tomb of the chief person in whose honour the entire mound had been erected, must occupy a more elevated place by itself, and was therefore to be sought for a considerable way higher up towards the centre, and far above the tombs already found. It was my impression, from the many holes which we looked down into between the lower wall and the principal tomb, that there had been a second row of vaulted burying places in this hill ; but we were not told so, neither have I heard, in any lecture, of such a form "I burial. The wall had a coping-stone, very neatly worked, and the stones of the basement row wen "l . ' . B.B B B B B I D.D I C^ERE OR AGYLLA. -345 higher and broader than those of the other rows. General Galassi did not know how to reach the cen- tral tomb. The Arci Prete had ideas of his own upon the subject, gained by experience, and by following out which, he came upon one of the most extraor- dinary discoveries of modern times. He excavated from the top until he arrived at a slope, which by steps had led down to a massive stone door towards the centre of the hillock ; this he broke, and behold he had gained the wished-for prize! I think there were no steps remaining by which we could descend, for we scrambled down as we might have done into some old Derbyshire mine, and entered by a sort of rude arch into a vaulted portico. I call it a sort of arch, because it would seem to have been constructed before the regular arch was known, or its principle conceived. It had the appearance, both within and without, which is represented in the plates, and it gave me the idea that its builders would have made a pointed arch, if they could. This is a sketch of the external architecture of the Regulini-Galassi tomb, which during the winter 1837-8 was commonly called, among the English in Rome, " General Galassi's Grave." The portico, of a few feet long, led into a square chamber, perhaps ten feet square or thereabouts; but I was so surprised and interested that I did not then think of the dimensions, besides that we had very scanty light by which to measure anything. I have already described the principal articles found in this tomb, which we saw in Koine at General Galassi's Q 5 346 CiERE OR AGYLLA. house, and which are now in the Gregorian Museum ; but it was unspeakably interesting- to look upon the spot where they had lain, though the only vestige of an or- namented sepulchre that now remains is some bronze nails firmly fixed in the walls, from which the shields and tazze had formerly hung. Along the sides, and on a sort of shelf or ledge, beneath the immense stones which formed the roof, were found the ornamented shields of bronze, but of such thin metal that they had evidently been made for ornament only, and not for battle. Mingled with them were arrows, a bun- dle of which lay close to the bier. This bier had four short feet, and was formed of cross-barred bronze thus ; it stood close to a walled-up door, the top of which was open, and upon this were placed two vases of silver and two vases for liba- tions. At the head and foot of the bier were small altars for sacrifice, and by the side of it were ranged a number of terra cotta images, most probably re- presenting Lares. I do not re- collect the precise form of these, but in the graves at Care are occasionally found very beautiful clay images, maped like mummies, which, until 1 knew better, I had believed to be an importation from Egypt. Some bones of the corpse lay upon the bier somewhat more than three thousand years old, and perhaps, CJERE OR AGYLLA. 347 had the tomb been opened with sufficient care, the corpse of the warrior himself might have been seen with all his grave-clothes on, as has been the case in some of the ancient Agyllan tumuli, as well as in se- veral, probably, less ancient examples at Tarquinia. Here he was brought into his last mortal dwelling- place, and left to his long and solemn sleep, reposing upon a couch which seemed to defy the hand of time, and having around him his arms and his altars, his perfumes, and his domestic sacred images, or deified progenitors. At his side also, as 1 was told, lay the wondrous inkstand, having upon it an alphabet of thirteen consonants and four vowels, repeated in syllables ; and opposite the bier stood the small household carriage in which the corpse had been conveyed to the grave, and of which the sides were ornamented with lions in bronze, in the style of early Greek workmanship. One vase for perfumes, also made of bronze, stood towards the entrance, consisting of three globes, one above the other ; near to which there was something like a candela- bra, and beyond it, just at the door, was a tripod surmounted by a vessel in which incense had been burned, probably during the funeral rites, to pre- vent infection. After this grave had been despoiled, the door leading into the other beyond it was broken down, and here was found a sight, if possible, still more wonderful, and yet I am led to believe by no means new to the people of Cervetri, though hitherto unre- corded. Here were vases of bronze still hans-ing- on 348 C^ERE OR AGYLLA. the wall by nails, a tripod containing a vase for per- fumes, a large vase ornamented with massive heads, some bronze vases of different forms hanging from the roof, and in a sort of recess at the end were two large stones about five feet from each other, on which had been placed the head and feet of the body buried here. No mortal form remained, yet so distinctly apparent was the purpose of the stones, that I could almost fancy I had seen one. Upon the stone next the end wall lay the extraordinary gold ornament I have described as shown at General Galassi's, consisting of two discs, with animals carved upon them, and two gold fillets; and sunk down below the stone, or half leaning upon it, was the superb golden breastplate which I have also already mentioned. On each side, where the wrists had once depended, lay broad golden bracelets, rich- ly worked in relievo ; close to the breastplate lay a clasp composed of three spheres of gold, and at various distances between the stones were the little lumps of the same precious metal which had been woven into the grand ceremonial dress of departed royalty. Now comes the wonder, — this had been u woman ! Whether a warrior queen or a priestess, none can tell, but my belief is the former. Greatly honoured and sovereign in power she had certainly been, and her name was " Larthia," which, as " lars" means " sovereign, or greatly exalted man," probably means "sovereign or greatly exalted wo- man." Attached to the wall behind her head had been two silver vessels, which hail fallen down; Kj 2S <\ M ^ £ S -- ». X >N fek CVERE OR AGYL1A. 349 they were both covered with Egyptian figures — the one was a small silver bucket, and the other a cup without handles. A quantity of vases were in the tomb, some of them bearing the names of Larthia, and others of "Mi Larthia,'' 410^4^ anc ^ •AIS^AnI l^ — which antiquarians have decided to mean the person to whom they belonged, and not the person who made them. Between the graves of these two bodies, and just before entering the closed-up door, were two side chambers of an oval form, supposed to be of posterior construction to that of the Larthia; they were round, and not oblong like the two just described, and contained neither bodies nor sarcophagi, but funeral urns filled with ashes. In the one were two rows of small terra cotta figures between the urns, and in the other a number of figured vases and bronze vessels, but no lares. Upon the lid of one of the urns was the image of a horse, exactly like what is often placed upon an English racing-cup ; per- haps the ashes in it were those of the battle-steed, and those in the other vases might be either the ashes of the prisoners or of the slaves of the warrior who reposed hard by, and who must have been some near and heroic descendant of the great Larthia in- terred in the walled-up tomb beyond him, otherwise he would not have been buried in her family vault. It is the opinion of the learned architect Canina, that this tomb was constructed many years previous to the Trojan war; and Troy fell one thousand one hundred and eighty-seven years before the christian •350 CJERE OR AGYLLA. era. We therefore read the language, and scanned the dress and furniture, and saw the very dust, of men who were contemporary with Jephtha and the older judges of Israel, long before the times of Saul and of David. Immediately on entering the tomb, one is struck with its architecture. It is formed of lines of smooth hewn stone, not very large, and perfectly parallel. They form a straight wall to the height of between three and four feet, and then gradually converge towards the top, where they are sealed into a vault by stones of prodigious size and weight. As the tomb at Monterone would have been an arch but for the beam which intersected it in the middle, ~l j — r- — p so this would have been an arch but ] / \~n for the want of key-stones, the place of which is supplied by a roof-stone, and also that the converging stones project over . . each other. In the one case -^ I think the formation of the 1 1 . beam was intentional, and in — \ the other that the key-stone 'was not yet discovered. The bottom of the tomb was of that pretty and durable work which we used to call " Roman pavement," i. e., pebbles and ground marble mixed with lime, forming a sort of plum-pudding stone or breccia. There were n<> paintings in this tomb, and indeed there are very few that we could hear of at Ceere ; such as were known to our guide being merely coloured lines and arabesque ornaments; and vet CyERE OR AGYLLA. 351 Agylla was one of those towns famous for its paint- ings before the foundation of Rome, and probably at the very period when this tomb was built. The inner grave contained no arms, and the outer one no ornaments. They were built at a time when the lordly dead were interred and not burnt, and when they were laid out gorgeously apparelled in their last resting-place, but were not coffined. Now the Greeks interred their dead in the days of Cecrops, but the custom had fallen quite into disuse, and they burnt the bodies at the time of the Trojan war. In this tomb the slaves and animals which belonged to the warrior had been burnt ; but for the Larthia no such sacrifices were made, and " she lay alone in her glory." Of the many sepulchres we have visited, this is the only one in which the door of the inner chamber has been found closed. It appears to me to mark some peculiar dignity or sacredness in the female dead, but I do not think she was a priestess, because no emblems peculiar to the priestly office were found beside her, unless the ornament upon her head, already described in the introduction, be thought indicative of consecra- tion. It was certainly neither crown nor diadem, and was quite peculiar, nothing in any material having been found like it, except the one from the Ponte Sodo, which was excavated by Lucien Bona- parte. When I first saw this strange ornament in Rome, it startled me, and gave me the idea of Aaron, the priest of Him who rules the earth and 5 352 CJERE OR AGYLLA. air, and who made the great light, and the lesser light, and all that fills creation. I was sorry to leave this interesting monument of early civilization, so like what is called the treasury of Atreus, or the tomb of Agamemnon, at Mycene, yet older, and with such a mixture of Egyptian and Greek art in its idea and execution ; but I was still more sorry to see the state of utter neglect in which it lay. The passage and chambers had been seven feet high, but they are now so blocked up, that we had often to stoop, and in some parts further progress is exceedingly difficult, and almost dangerous. The old stone door has been broken down, and not even a wooden one put in its place. Not the com- monest lock secures it, and no respect for its so- lemn purpose lingers to hallow it more. The rain and the rubbish are constantly falling in, and unless public opinion be roused to protect it, the Regulini- Galassi tomb will soon be, like its neighbours, inac- cessible. As I considered this wonderful remnant of the days that are gone, I could not help saying to myself, " Is this treasure really in Italy, or is it in the land of barbarians ? has it really been exca- vated, and left in this state by scientific men, or has it been sacked by plundering banditti?'' W lien oui- kind guide saw how truly anxious w i were to obtain all possible information on the sub- ject, to know the date of the tomb, the reasons tor assigning such a date, and the ideas of expe- rienced antiquaries concerning it, he gave us fully CERE OR AGYLLA. 353 the opinions of Canina, which appeared to him the most satisfactory, and which, as nearly as I can detail them, are as follows : — Canina thinks that the Galassi grave was originally covered by a small cone, formed round a centre of mason-work, the re- mains of which are still discernible, and that it was built by the Agyllans, and constituted the whole of the original structure. The wall and lower graves, which supported a very large cone, and enclosed this tomb, he believes to have been added some few generations afterwards by the Lydians, when they came over to the help of Mezentius and his Etrus- cans, in whose company they conquered Agylla, changing its name to Csere. It appears that the style of building before the time of Homer was ex- actly what we had seen here, as is proved from the accounts preserved to us of the sepulchre of Epytus, king of Arcadia. The stones were laid horizontally, and the doorway and roof were formed by their gradual approach, with a sort of slight curve. Over this was erected a small cone, either of mason-work or earth, and the best remaining specimen of this style in Greece is the so-called treasury of Atreus. Treasury, however, it could not have been, unless it belonged to a temple, for trea- suries were not built in open, unprotected places outside the walls. Antiquaries now generally agree that it was a sepulchre, and nails are remaining round the walls for vases and tazze, as in the tomb we had just left. I have been told that the chamber 354 CMRE OR AGYLLA. in this Mycene building was once painted, which the Agyllan certainly never had been.* * Since writing the above, I have obtained from my friend, Mr. Heathcote Campion, the following account of tombs in Greece which he visited in 1836. " The treasury of Atreus has obtained this name without cause or reason that I know of, and I firmly believe it to be the tomb of Agamemnon. It is a circular building about twenty feet in diameter, and over the door is an immense stone, cut in the same manner as those in the walls of Mycene. The whole structure is very regularly built, and the roof tapers to a point. It was originally covered by a mound of earth, regularly thrown up, and sloping down as evenly as a scarped fortification : but the earth has been cut away about the door so as to display the immense stones of which it is constructed. There was formerly, as General Gordon informed me, an enormous vase, four or five feet high, of coarse earthenware, in the centre of this tomb, which contained ashes, and which, from all that we could hear, were the veritable ashes of the ' King of men.' This vase was re- moved, and was for a long time buried in the garden of the General's house, but during the Greek war it was either stolen, or it must have been accidentally displaced during a fiie which burnt not only that house, but the greater part of Argos. " The few experiments which I myself made in excavating, were all in the plain of Athens, to the east of the city. The first tomb we opened or dug into, contained first a quantity of ashes and bones mixed, and then either underneath them or mixed with them, or both, small lachrymatories, and little vases in the Bhape of your Etruscan platter. but about one-eighth of its size. In one instance we found two rings, but so burnt that we could not discover of what metal they were made, and on being exposed to the air they soon crumbled away. One tomb in its general character will serve as an example of all, but we consi- dered ourselves as peculiarly unfortunate in having opened six tombs, without finding anything really valuable. The only vase of any size with which we were rewarded was Considerably injured liv an injudi- cious blow from a pickaxe, as it lay not covered over by vaulted masonry, like your Etruscans, but loosely imbedded in (he earth. It has been Cleaned and repaired, but as I have not seen it since. I cannot c^ere or agylla. 355 The lower wall which we had seen, and which sur- rounded the large cone, Canina says, is in the style of Thessaly and Lydia, where large and not small cones were used, and is the same that is described in describe to you the figures which are upon it. We generally found the ashes between live and six feet deep, and frequently two layers, one above the other. Antiquarians say that the greater part of these earthy tombs must be assigned to the Roman empire ; and they were certainly those of the poorer classes, or we should have found more objects worth our pains. " Lord H after this made an attempt to excavate the tumu- lus on the plain where the battle of Leucadia was fought ; but having unfortunately quarrelled with the Greeks who were working for him, and three festa days coining together, he could not induce them to continue the excavation, and in consequence he only obtained a small bronze lamp ; but as the tumulus was not half dug out, I think this augured well; and it is very probable that arms and other curio - sities may still lie there buried beneath. The tumulus of Marathon was opened some years ago, and nothing but a helmet and a quantity of flint arrow-heads were found. (It was most likely ransacked ages since.) " I saw one very beautiful vase in the possession of Gropius, the ex- cavator employed by Lord Aberdeen, and one of the oldest antiquaries here. It was in fragments, but nearly the whole vase remained, and it was very large. The subject was a sacrifice, an ox being led and ac- companied by many figures with their arms tossed wildly in the air. These figures were remarkably graceful and highly finished. He told me that vases of the first magnitude were found scattered among the ashes, without any further covering, as well as in another kind of tomb which is considered much older, and which is frequently found in the neighbourhood of Athens. It is a sort of vault built of hewn stones, *he top of which is formed of one stone superior in magnitude to the others. In one, which was discovered and emptied before my arrival, were found many rich and beautiful gold ornaments, particularly ear- rings and bracelets, made with an elegance and skill which I cannot believe the Greeks to have attained so early as Gropius thinks they did ; that is, in the age when it was their custom to bury, between the time of Cecrops and the Trojan war. " From the evident marks of fire on several of the vases, I conclude 356 CJERE OR AGYLLA. the tomb of Allyates, the father of Croesus. It is found oftener and larger in Caere, Tarquinia, and Vulci, than in any other part of Italy, and it is in these states that the Lydians are said to have settled. They used also stones with funereal inscrip tions ; they placed lions above the tomb-doors, and some allegorical emblem on the top of the cones j and they planted the whole round with trees — all which accompaniments appear to have been used in the Etruscan round tombs. Canina thinks that this tomb for many years contained the Larthia that they were placed upon the funeral pile, and from the depth and the irregular manner in which the ashes and vases were found, I conclude that the pile was erected over a hole dug previously, and that the ashes were allowed to fall loosely into it. The ceremony must have been very fine when the nearest of kin lighted the pile at each corner, and left it blazing with the music and multitude surrounding it, till it gradually sank and the embers were extinguished with wine. 1 con- clude that the ashes of the poorer classes were dropped into the pit already dug, that they were covered over, and that here the ceremony finished ; whilst those of the rich were collected and deposited in urns of porphyry and marble, and sometimes of gold and silver, and had feasts and games held in honour of them. " You know that after it became the custom to bury the dead out- side tin' city, the principal tombs used generally to line the high roads ; and it has been remarked, that those containing the richest ornaments are usually close to the road, while the poorer ones are situated be- hind them, whence it seems probable that even in the grave the rich paid for their frontage, and the poor who were unable to do so were thrust behind. M Another custom was to throw up a mound of eartli over the dead) .1 practice strangely in contradiction of their frequent wishes that the eartli might be light Upon the dead body. I have never seen it re- marked by others, but I could not help remarking myself, that we never saw a tumulus opened that had not a head-stone : and 1 think it probable thai these head stones were originally above ground, but have gradually sunk until the grass and weeds have overgrown them." CJERE OR AGYLLA. 357 only, and that the two side-chambers were not made until her great descendant came to be laid in the same place of honour. He says they are of a later construction and style than the original burying- place, though all bear marks of the most remote antiquity The similarity between the oldest Greek, the Egyptian, and the Tyrrhenian, is indeed con- stantly forced upon one in Etruria ; but I did not know that it was a remark made by the ancients themselves, until this day which we spent with the Arciprete. It appears that Strabo, in his seven- teenth book, describes the temple of the sun at Heliopolis in Egypt, and he says that the interior walls of that edifice were covered with figures sculp- tured after the manner of the Tyrrhenoi, and of the primitive Hellenists or Greeks, but not of the Greeks of his day. Perhaps it may infer a coeval antiquity in Hellas (or Greece) and Etruria ; at all events, Canina thinks that the tomb we had been visiting cannot be less than 3,000 years old, and remarks, as a further proof, that none of the vases discovered in it have upon them any details of the Trojan war, but are all in the Archaic or Egyptian style, and the bronzes are not unlike some of those found in the sepulchre of Atreus : besides, that the Argives used to bury quantities of bronze articles with their dead, and we have, in particular, mention made of the Tha- lamus, or brazen couch of Acrizius long before the Trojan war, which Thalamus was probably very like the bier we saw at General Galassi's, only larger. It is researches like these which convince us that 358 C^RE OR AGYLLA. the accounts of Virgil and Homer are credible, when they describe beautiful works of art in the very re^ mote ages ; and surely it must give us tenfold more interest in their poems, when we have reason to think they are depicting real things. I have heard Professor Roselini say that he looked upon Homer as the most correct of historians, and that it was the tombs of Egypt which had taught him to think so. Canina assigns the time between Mezentius and Tullus Hostilius, that is, from the fall of Troy to about the end of the first century of Rome, for the period during which the large cone of this tomb, the Cucumella at Vulci, and the round tombs we have named at Tarquinia, must have been erected ; and he thinks that they have been dedicated to the chiefs slain in war, which is very probable. The mausoleum of Augustus was built upon this Etruscan model by the advice of his friend Mecaenas. The central chamber contained himself, and at a lower elevation were chambers all round for his kindred. The whole was covered with earth, and planted round with trees. It is almost as much de- stroyed as the Regulini tomb, and its plan, to my eyes, is less recognisable, in the present arena for horsemen and bull-fights in the heart of Rome. Whoever looks upon the mound surmounted by a lion, which now covers our own brave countrymen in the field of Waterloo, will see a model of what has once been the appearance of the hill on which we stood above the Larthia's grave. We did not visit any of the graves in the sin- CMRE OR AGYLLA. 359 rounding - wall, but we were told that they all pre- sent the same style of architecture, only with more regularity, and a better finish ; all, however, were anterior to the discovery, or at least to the use of the arch, which was employed in building by the Tarquinians in the days of Tullus Hostilius — we know not how much earlier — and was introduced by Tarquinius Priscus into Rome. All tombs, there- fore, found arched, and all with a roof-tree across. Canina places at a later period than this one. — Some very fine specimens of roof construction, I be- lieve still visible, were found in Mount Abetone, and investigated from Rome in 1835. We had not time to visit them. We left with a sigh this relic of Agylla, and went to the edge upon the other side, which divides it from the next tumulus, once a twin brother, and still preserving a likeness ; partner in glory, and partner in decay. It is lowered and pulled to pieces like Mount Regulini ; only, instead of Indian corn, it is covered with vines. Of course, when excava- tions are made in it, they must be covered in again without delay, that the vines may not suffer. Here a tomb had just been opened of similar construction and similar riches, but it could not be seen. It was filled up, and in all likelihood is now utterly destroyed. It belonged to Signor Calabrese, a rich farmer, who " could do what he chose with his own," and the only tax upon whose free will was, that he might not sell to a stranger without the leave of his govern- 360 C^RE OR AGYLLA. ment. We could get no explicit and satisfactory description or account of this tumulus. I under- stood that in it there were several bodies, and that the principal one was that of a warrior, with a superb mantle thrown over him, worked in gold, like that of the Larthia ; but whether he had lain in a small central cone, and was by himself, or not, I could by no means ascertain. The papal govern- ment was in treaty with Calabrese, to buy from him his treasure trove en masse, as it had done before from General Galassi, and I believe the purchase was completed, in which case future travellers may contemplate at ease all the objects which were found there in some other rich compartment of the Museo Gregoriano. On this day, however, the greater part of them were still safe in Calabrese'sown house, and the Arciprete, who knew him well, offered to take us to see them. There were three or more tumuli beyond Cala- brese's ; and as they were all in the same condi- tion, we did not waste our time in a fruitless examination of them, but crossed Mount Begulini once more, to the style by which we had entered it. Directly opposite Mount Regulini and Calabrese is the height, upon which anciently stood the citadel, >{> that the soldiers had daily before their eyes the distinguished honours which marked the graves of their most distinguished chiefs. Those who had fallen in defence of their country, and were, there- fore, buried apart from the quiet and peaceable CiERE OR AGYLLA. 361 citizens. Upon the ground over which we trod, pieces of broken pottery , both red and black, were lying about in all directions, the fragments of common wine and oil vessels which had been extracted from these numerous graves. We saw specimens of them in the Arciprete's garden ; some are of immense size, and all are large, with two handles, and peaked bottoms for sticking them into the ground. The form may be seen upon the scarabei. The Arciprete's were all of coarse clay, and were most, if not all of them, painted in black, red, yellow, and blue lines, which went round them in circles or in Vandykes, and upon the central part were large fish resembling the paintings we had found at Veii. There are some Egyptian vases in the British Museum so like what we saw at Caere, that were they placed together, I do not think it would be possible to distinguish between them. I remarked that those belonging to the Arciprete faded exceedingly upon exposure to the air, and I should not wonder if in a few years the colours upon them were scarcely to be traceable. We now walked on, through the walled village of Cervetri, to the house of Signor Calabrese. He was away from home, gone with Cavaliere Visconti to make some arrangements about selling his trea- sures, that very day, to the government ; but his handsome wife no sooner saw a party of strangers desirous of visiting, and investigating what they could of the antiquities of her country, in the com- pany of the Arciprete, than she gave us a most R 362 CiERE OR AGYLLA. cordial welcome ; and though she regretted that only a very small portion of the objects which had been found were left within her power, the rest being locked up in a room, of which her husband had the key, yet she desired us to walk up stairs, and said that we should see all that she could show us. To me the sight of an Italian farmhouse was in itself interesting. It was very large, but con- sisted only of two stories, the lower one being wholly occupied with cellars for wine and oil, and with store-rooms. We entered by a hall, in which a number of barrels and instruments of husbandry were lying about. We then ascended the staircase, and on the landing-place found two doors, one in front and one upon the light hand. As I have a talent for taking the wrong way, I opened the door in front, and found myself in a very clean, comfort- able Italian kitchen, beyond which I strayed into a nursery or sitting room, in which it appeared to me that maids, mistress, and children, spent the morn- ing together. I had hardly time to speak to a fat rosy, black-eyed child, and to look around me, before I was called away in some haste, and told that I had entered the private apartments, instead of the reception rooms. I accordingly retraced my steps, and from the landing-place went in at. the right-hand door, when we passed through three light, airy, well-proportioned, and very cheer- ful rooms, before we sat down. I believe there was not a lire-place in any one of them, but as they would be warmed with a great brasier of charcoal C^ERE OR AG\LLA. 363 whenever they were cold, that did not signify. The floors were bright and polished, and the walls were painted, as walls always are in Italy, and the furniture in each room was the same Ottomans round the walls, with half a dozen chairs, besides a small round marble table in the middle, and a small glass cupboard in one corner. There ap- peared to be a suite of three more company rooms similarly furnished along the other side of the house, but we only entered two of them. Chairs were placed for us in the third room of the first suite, and we sat round the marble table, to which our hostess brought a small glass case, containing the few- articles of gold found in her husband's tomb, which had not been removed out of sight. It strikes me that they were such as Cav. Visconti did not intend to buy for the Gregorian museum, and that none of those which he was in treaty for could be seen. As I understood the handsome signora, her husband had taken with him the jewels which the Pope desired to purchase, and a number of bulky articles of bronze and terra cotta remained in the house, but they were all locked up in a store-room, and were not accessible. We saw a quantity of gold which had adorned the dress of the dead warrior, and was spread in flowers in some sort of pattern over his person. The corpse or corpses, like those in the Regulini tomb, had been uncofRned, and the gold, as we saw it, lay in lumps, and was to be melted and sold by weight to a goldsmith, the fate which most of the gold of Caere in former days has undergone. r 2 364 C^ERE OR AGYLLA. There were two scarabei ; the engraving upon each was deep, but not fine, in the round hole style. One of these had the Egyptian impress of two gods, probably Isis and Horus, but, for aught I know, it might be Pthah and Anubis, as they also are frequently represented upon the scarabei, and I do not know all the Egyptian deities in their various forms and attributes. One of them was seated, and a merry companion of ours declared that the gods were beguiling their time with a game at chess. We saw some serpent rings of elastic gold of large size, a chain of the Trichinopoly kind, and a golden fibula of delicate and finished workmanship; and this is all that I particularly recollect, though not all that we saw of curious and interesting ; for those who were better informed than myself, found things to admire— either engraved gems, or bronzes, or terra cotta, after I became tired. Signora Cala- brese showed some curiosities from other tombs which did not interest me, because at. the time I was wholly bent upon ascertaining what had been found in this last tumulus ; and old as the other tombs were, I considered them of a much later date, being of Caere, whilst the Calabrese tumulus be- longed to Agylla. I once heard a long description and enumeration, at the Archaeological Society, of the articles discovered in it when it was first opened; but trusting to see them all, I omitted to make any memorandum of what I heard, and there appeared to me a secrecy and a mystery to be CiERE OR AGYLLA. 365 observed about it, until tbe government transaction should have been completed, which it was vain for us to attempt to penetrate. I remember a few curious drinking vessels of terra cotta, some of them like arms and heads, and two in the shape of legs, like those represented on the Triclinium tazza ; but I was so much attracted by the living beauty, that I paid, on this occasion, less regard than usual to the riches and memorials of the dead. Our hostess, a very handsome and dignified young woman, had eight children, three of whom we saw, and the others were at school, some of them even at Rome. She did not seem to consider the size of her family as at all extraordinary, whilst we were surprised at it, because we had constantly been told that Italian families never exceeded four children ; and we had many opportunities afterwards of knowing that this is a great mistake, and a sort of fact not known to the Italians themselves, though it passes for certain truth so often amongst strangers. From Calabrese's we proceeded to look at the palace of Prince Ruspoli, the lord of the manor, whose eldest son is the Prince of Cervetri. It appears at one time to have been fortified and garrisoned, but the wars of the Barons are over now, and the French drove the princedoms before them, so that little remains but long suites of uninhabited rooms, in a large white building, with an arched port cochere in the centre, and a court in front, flanked by two white wings. Not far from this palace, we passed a house in the market-place, in 366 (LERE OR AGYLLA. front of which were hanging two iron collars, to denote the prince's right to hang, or otherwise punish, all intruders into his domain, if he thought proper : and they forcibly reminded me of our old Scottish jougs, which were very much of the same form, and destined to the same use, and which ex- isted as a privilege in the days of my own grand- father. They were emblems, and by no means sine- cure ones, of the laird's right of jurisdiction; and I do not suppose they were used with us, a century ago, either much more or less mercifully than in Italy. My grandfather never hanged vagrants, which perhaps a prince might still do ; but I have heard of his having them very severely punished, and being applauded for doing so. The church contained little worth notice, and does not repay the time spent upon it. Travellers should now proceed over the ground in which ancient Csere or Agylla once stood. — It covered the whole of that elevated table-land on a point of which Cervetri now stands, having the mount Abetone to the east, and the vast ancient cemetery, or as it is called " necropolis," to the west and north-west. " This once populous town now," according to Gell, " contains 117 inhabitants. Portions of the ancient wall have been employed, both in the habitations, and in the gothic fortifica- tions at the gate. Haifa mile beyond the necro- polis are the ruins of a gate of squared blocks, called Porta Antica, of which the architrave is gone. A path runs from this place toward Monte Abetone, CjERe or agylla. 367 on which is situated a castle which seems to be ancient ; it is built with regular blocks, and is called by the peasants Castel Dannato. At Cervetri several tumuli have been found covering five sepul- chral chambers cut in the tufo, but not painted, though of various architecture. In one is a seat and a footstool." I presume these tombs are those which were found in Monte Abetone in 1834. The town, like all other Etruscan towns, was walled round, having towers at certain distances, and four principal gates. Monte Abetone in the olden time was covered with pine trees, and dedicated to the god Sylvanus, who had a temple and altar here ; but we had no time to visit it, or its few curious graves. The great necropolis on the other side is called the " Banditaccia," and presents a very singular appearance, being a table-land full of caverns, and burrowed with holes. It is of course insulated, and separated by a valley from the site of the town. It was once, like the Monte Rozzi at Tarquinia, divided into streets and squares, and it still presents such a strange regularity in its ruined confusion, as is probably to be seen nowhere else. From having been the secret treasure-house and last rest- ing-place of a highly moral, orderly, wealthy, and civilized people, it became suddenly the noisy and fearful habitation of a tribe of bandits, lawless and dissipated men, utterly reckless of all but plunder. They feared no ghost, neither demon nor genius, but scattered the sacred dust, and rifled the narrow 368 CMRE OR AGYLLA. chamber, and dressed themselves and their children in the spoils of the quiet and unresisting dead. As they lived by deeds of darkness, so they dwelt in the habitations of those whose name was no longer whispered among the living, and it was from a village of animated sepulchres that they sallied forth, to extort ransom from the merchant, and gold or blood from the traveller. I would not say that the Banditaccia is a safe place yet, but there are very few places anywhere, either in or out of Italy, which may not be visited by an Englishman of ordinary prudence, and in the broad light of day. This necropolis had once in it a great number of those round and conical tumuli to be seen in the plate of Tarquinia, but they are all now destroyed, and but few even of the caverns present anything new to make them worth a visit ; yet it is a most extraordinary place, and it interested us, from our knowing so thoroughly what it originally was, and what until very lately it had become; that is, a den of thieves. We were told in Rome that many painted graves had been opened here of considerable beauty, and that memoirs of them were preserved in the pa pel's of the Archaeological Society. Micali says that they still exist, but we did not sec them, and indeed our guide denied that any such thing as historical or mythological subjects had ever been found in the tombs of Cicre. lie said that paint- ings of monstrous animals, and a few arabesque cornices, were sometimes found, but he had never C^RE OR AGYLLA. 3(i9 heard of anything better than what we had seen at Monterone ; and from his apparent unwillingness to lead us into these tombs, after hearing that we had been at Tarquinia, I conclude that they were much faded. Vases of the most beautiful form and enamel are occasionally met with, and quantities of small rude bronze idols, and mummy figures of superior workmanship, and of highly polished clay It is my impression that these are sometimes found on the site of the old city, as well as in the tombs. There is a considerable love of art amongst the men of Cervetri, and a pride in the great antiquity and ancient history of the spot. An intelligent peasant will point out to you the situation of the old gates, and the truces of what not less than two or three thousand years ago were highways, and he will look towards the sea, and, pointing to the lonely fort of San Severa, say, " There stood our ancient port of Pyrgi." There must have been four great roads about Caere, as the four gates can quite well be dis- covered in the breaks of the rocky cliffs ; but only three of these roads are distinctly visible. One of them led to Veii, and is paved ; another, from the north gate, wound by the cemetery and its high round tombs to Pyrgi ; and this is considered to be Etruscan or Agyllan, and coeval with the highest prosperity of the place. Part of the third I suppose we had been travelling upon. It led from the east gate down to the Via Aurelia, and is said to have r 5 370 CERE OR AGYLLA. been Etruscan, but restored and kept up by the Romans, all the pavement which now remains being Roman work. This Via Aurelia commu- nicated also with the south and west gates. But though the breaks in the rock are very "evident which these gates once rilled, no superstructure of any kind, gate, wall, or tower, remains. I do not believe that there is one stone upon another which has not been overturned, and part of these stones I have already mentioned as employed to make a fence below Cervetri. The extent of the Agyllan city lay between Monte Abetone, with its dark fir woods on the one side, and the great necropolis, now the Ban- ditaccia, on the other ; and whilst I looked upon this singular burying-ground, and considered its ancient picturesque form, I could not help thinking- how curious it was that Pcre la Chaise and the mound of Waterloo should each in its way have been revivals of an old Etruscan cemetery. The old boundaries of this little state were Veii on the one side, and Tarquinia on the other, and within these boundaries were, no doubt, some smaller dependent towns, of which we only know the name of one, Artena, destroyed during the Roman monarchy, and placed by Nibby at the present Castellaccio, close to Veii. The state was watered by three small rivers. The Aro, now called Arrone ; the Minio, now Mignone, which joined I he sea at (iravisco; and the Amnis Ceritis, as C^ERE OR AGYLLA. 371 Virgil calls it, now the Vaccina, which is the only one we saw. It is little more than a brook, and ran between the town and Monte Abetone. As we returned towards the Arciprete's house, we called at two separate places where curiosities taken out of the graves are to be seen, but whether to be purchased or not I cannot say, as, greatly to our dis- appointment, neither of the proprietors were at home, and the remaining curiosities which we saw were, therefore, owing to the kind exertions of our friendly and benevolent host. He sent out to a young man who had a few articles for sale, and who immediately obeyed the summons, coming in with good manners and very substantially dressed, and giving us the idea of a well-doing small farmer. He brought some very beautiful gold ornaments, chiefly chains, clasps, bracelets, and serpent rings, and one ornament made of alloyed gold, the base metal of which was quite corroded. One of the chains, of extremely beautiful and de- licate workmanship, must have belonged to a lady, and was certainly the most exquisite gold ornament I have ever seen ; it could scarcely be exceeded by that of which I have heard so much, belong- ing to the Jesuits' museum, and it even threw the jewel-table of the Gregorian into the shade. It was only long enough to go half round the neck, and had probably extended across the breast of the corpse. It was formed of small gold com- partments, having sockets which fitted into each other exactly, so as to be a perfect representa- 372 CERE OR AGYLLA. tion of the vertebrae in the back bone of an animal. These compartments were ornamented with filagree work, fine like that of Genoa or of China, but of sur- passing elegance, and to each compartment was attached a small gold heart, which opened, and had probably contained perfume. The young farmer had already refused a hundred louis for this, which had been offered him by a member of the family of Torlonia, and he asked for it a hundred and twenty louis. I certainly have neve.' seen anything to equal it in Antiquity, skill, and beauty conjoined, but a hundred and twenty louis is a large sum to give for an ornament which could never be used except as a bracelet, and which even then would require an expensive clasp. It, too, had belonged to an illus- trious princess or priestess, whose names and deeds are now unknown, and which therefore could add nothing to its value. It is remarkable that the corpses of great and distinguished women seem to be as frequently found at Csere as those of men, and earrings are often adhering to the ears, as if they had been soldered in. I used to wonder that we never heard of mummies being discovered, or old linen like that of Egypt being found ; but it seems that in this mode of sepulture the Egyptians stood alone, while the sepulchral cavern, and the tumulus, and the tomb, whether painted or sculptured and furnished, has either been copied from them originally, or else was common to all the civilized nations of the most remote antiquity, from the dispersion of Babel downwards. CiERE OR AGYLLA. 373 Micali is of opinion, that much remains to be dis- covered at Csere which would well repay the ex- pense of search ; but no Englishman should engage in such a speculation, unless an Italian is to share it with him ; and if he is fortunate in obtaining an honourable and well-instructed partner, he may spend both his time and money in the purchase of engrossing interest and of intense pleasure. We were told of some figures that were not un- frequently found with four wings springing from the shoulders — two raised upwards, and two drooping downwards. They are all flat behind, with a hole in each wing, by which they were hung upon nails on the walls of the grave. These figures are not Egyptian, but one of the many imitations of Baby- lonian and Phoenician customs, which are found more abundantly at Csere than elsewhere. According to Sanconiathus, as quoted by Eusebius, Babylonian images were made with four wings in this precise form, with the hands joined upon the breast. Such figures may still be seen engraved on Persian cylin- ders, and on many of the ancient monuments of Central and Western Asia. I have also lately heard, that in a very recent excavation (184U) a marble statue has been found thirty feet in height, of very fine workmanship, probably Roman, from the ancient Forum, but its locality and date were not specified. My informant said that it was buried in a mound, and that it was believed to represent Apollo. Our conversation naturally turned upon the an- 374 C^RE OR AGYLLA. cient history of this once large and celebrated city, and we found the Arciprete a man of reading and information, and well able to discourse with us on the subject. After all his opportunities of personal observation amongst the tombs, and the still remain- ing fragments of ruin, he decidedly thought that Canina's view of the antiquity and subsequent for- tunes, first of Agy 11a and afterwards of Caere, was the most reasonable, because he draws the least from imagination and the most from ancient writers, saying truly that it is much more likely that writers who lived two thousand years ago should be accu- rately informed upon the subject, than that we, a people of different manners, religion, and habits of thought, should be able to elicit anything more true by our speculations. Adopting this view, he considers that the his- tory of the city and its cemeteries ought to be divided into three different epochs : 1, the Agy 1 Ian, or that of the Pelasgi ; 2, the Tyrrhenean, or that of the Etruscans; and 3, that of the all-conquering and all-engrossing Ilomans. Dionysius of llalicar- nassus tells us, that the Pelasgians, a. Greek colony, united with the aborigines or mountaineers and the primitive inhabitants of Italy, to drive out the iSiculi in the vicinity of Cotila, and still farther towards the south ; and that they afterwards inhabited and em- bellished the cities of the expelled people. Of this number, he says, were Pisa, Agylla, Saturn ia, and Alsiuni; and 1 believe that, Pisa is the only one dis- puted by modern antiquarians, who, with greater 5 (LERE Oil AGYLLA. 375 probability, consider it to have been a city of the Raseni rather than of the Pelasgians. Hence Agylla would appear to have been in its origin a town of the Siculi, conquered, as some say, by a colony of Greeks, joined to the native mountaineers ; while others say that these Greeks joined the conquering Raseni or Etruscans, who were then extending their dominions from the Rhcetian Alps towards Campania. This theory appeared to us the more reason- able, because the mountaineers or aborigines, or Bruzzi, as they are indifferently called, when traced back, appear to have been themselves no other than such of the Siculi as had taken shelter in the moun- tains from other invaders. The Pelasgians, of whom also we have the most contradictory accounts, some styling them the rudest and the most cruel of races, and others maintaining' that they brought with them every rudiment of refinement, Dionysius relates to have been a colony of Argives, — an idea of his own, derived from the circumstance of their having built a temple to Juno, the great goddess of Argos in Faleria, not far from Caere, though we do not hear of any such temple in Agylla itself; but he notices also that the tombs of the Agyllans resembled closely those of the oldest construction in the Argive part of Greece. Others say that the Agyllans were from Thessaly, and there is no discrepancy between the two accounts; for the Pelasgians most certainly were a tribe of wanderers from some other country, either Phoenicia or Egypt, when they first appeared 376 C^RE OR AGYLLA. in Greece some ages before the Trojan war, and, to the infinite amazement and consternation of her settled tribes, took up their temporary residence, sometimes in one place and sometimes in ano- ther, until a new wandering fit moved them off elsewhere. Dionysius places their first seat at Argos, under a king named Pel asgo, after whom they were called, and under whom they marched to colonize Thessaly. The Pelasgi, Argives, and Thessalians, are therefore the same people, according to old tra- dition, and one ship- load of these wanderers united with the Agyllans, as another ship-load, according to Justin, did with the Tarquinians. Their settlement was certainly an affair of peace, and not of war; for Dionysius says, that the first settlers were few in number and unarmed, possibly cast away at sea, and that they solicited leave from the natives to remain amongst them. They appear to have been men of good conduct and education, and to have gained a leading influence over the habits, arts, and even the language of the people ; for the Agyllan letters are Greek, and the very little that is known of their language, and of the Etruscan language also, is a mixture of Greek and Celtic; unless, indeed, as I strongly suspect, all the roots so termed are derived from the Phoenician. However, these colonists did not rule over the ancient people as conquerors ; they assimilated themselves with them, they improved and influenced them, they extended their commerce, conducting it on a better system, and they have made Agylla known to us, not only as a highly c^ere or agylla. 377 civilized city, powerful, rich, and populous, but as one most highly respected for its integrity and moral weight throughout the whole of Greece. It is a very singular thing, that if Agylla is the ancient native name, and was adopted by the Pelas- gians in their union with its inhabitants, they them- selves gave the name which it afterwards bore, and» as tradition tells us, most unintentionally, just at the time when they yielded up their rule to become in- corporated wholly with Etruria. The story told is, that when the Lydians arrived in Italy, one of them, who had lost his way in this neighbourhood, saw a soldier upon the walls of Agylla, and going up to him asked the name of the place. The man, either not understanding the question or not being in a mood for conversation, answered " x« an Etruscan, the mother of Mecsenas might have been descended, as Horace C^RE OR AGYLLA. 381 maintains that he was of Lydian blood in the female line. It is just possible also, that the dice buried with old Velthur of Tuscania may have been Lydian dice, and considered as great curiosities in his day. Virgil speaks of the Lydians as settled here, and calls the city Caere, at the time of the landing of iEneas ; and he also remarks that it was formerly called Agylla, and had been proud, prosperous, and independent, until subdued by Mezentius. Evander says to iEneas, (Virg. Book viii. 625,) " But mighty nations 1 prepare to join Their arms with yours, and aid your just design : Not far from hence there stands a hilly town, Of ancient building and of high renown, Torn from the Tuscans by the Lydian race, Who gave the name of Ca;re to the place. Once fair Agylla called, it flourished long In pride of wealth, and warlike people strong. Till cursed Mezentius in a fatal hour Assumed the crown with arbitrary power. What words can paint those execrable times, The subject's sufferings, and the tyrant's crimes ? The living and the dead, at his command, Were coupled face to face and hand to hand,* Till choked in stench, in loathed embraces tied, The lingering wretches pined away and died." There is mention made of a treaty between Me- zentius and iEneas, relative to a tribute, to which the former was entitled, of all the wines of this part of Italy. It is at this period that Astur took the command in Caere, and led to the help of iEneas three hundred men. We do not know the grave of * An Indian punishment. 382 C-ERE OR AGYLLA. Astur, which may very possibly have been one of those over which we trod, but he is celebrated in the iEneid for his skilful horsemanship, and for his beautiful armour. I have often considered how the memory of all these things could be preserved, and whether the whole history of them was not the invention of the Greek and Roman writers, the very earliest of whom lived so many centuries later than the events they record ; and it was from the inkhorn and en- graved cups found in the Regulini tomb that I first learned to estimate the sources from which they drew their information. Though no MSS. have come down to our day of that early period, there can now be no doubt that such existed, for writing supposes reading, and both suppose documents to be read. Indeed, I believe that when we read the words " Mi Larthia" on the silver cups at General Galassi's, we read the very earliest letters that exist in the world, excepting those found in the Pyramid of Shuplm in Egypt, and those which may be legible on the body of Mencheres in the British Museum. Even these, I suspect, are all hieroglyphics, and not lite- ral characters. No doubt, the priests of Csere or Agylla kept all her public monuments, and the heads of each great family would keep their private ones, by which means traditions may have been handed down to us but little falsified in the mass, and may very fairly and generally be depended upon, wherever national vanity and injustice, or vio- lent party-spirit, do not interfere. As to those who C^RE OR AGYLLA. 383 treat all the records of remote ages as fables on account of the various versions of the same story amongst ancient authors, or their many disagree- ments, they may as well reject all modern history upon the same grounds, for it has the same faults ; and they may end in believing nothing at all beyond such events of their own day as have come under their immediate observation. I give the legends as we find them in the old po- pular writers, and the Etruscan stones are entirely national and written traditions, and most probably are true, though by means of iEneas they have been falsely put together. We have no reason to sup- pose the whole history false, and many reasons to prove it the contrary, though the interposition of iEneas, and of all the events and settlements neces- sarily connected with his arrival in Italy, is a Greek fable, and was never heard of until the Etruscan power was far in its decline. We have no records of Caere for many years after this time, excepting that the arts, and especi- ally painting, flourished there long before the Corin- thians from Tarquinia gave any modification to the existing schools from their foreign style. Pliny says, that in Ardea and Lanuvia, painting was car- ried to perfection prior to the foundation of Rome, and that Csere possessed excellent paintings, older than either of them. He asserts, moreover, that painting was not an art in Greece at the time of the Trojan war ; but Virgil mentions pictures as part of the wreck of Troy saved by iEneas ; and whether 384 C7ERE OR AGYLLA. this be a poetical flourish or not, it has been prac- tised amongst the orientals from the beginning - , as the tombs in Egypt testify. The brightest days of Etruscan art occupied the space between the fall of Mezentius and the reign of Tullus Hostilius. Romulus took from Caere his reli- gious rites, and especially his vestal virgins. The Etruscan colony which was established on the Mount Celian, when Romulus first came to the banks of the Tiber, was from Caere, and though the word Ceremo- nia is always referred to the time when the vestal virgins returned with the sacred fire from Caere, it was more probably used, from the very first, for all the Etruscan rites which the Latins adopted from this people. Tullus Hostilius, the third king of Home, who always lived upon the Celian, is sup- posed to have been an Etruscan of the Caere colony ; ami it was under him that the three races of Latins, Sabines, and Luceres, or Etruscans, formed one people. He it was who destroyed Alba Longa, making Rome, as it were, independent. Ancus Martins, the fourth king, established the Jus Cere- tium, giving particular rites and privileges to all the Cerites. Lucius Tarquinius turned his conquer- ing army against them to prevent the powerful BUC- courshe was afraid of their giving to Yeii, as Csere \v;is then counted the happiest, w call hiest, and most populous city in all Ktruria, and affairs were aceom- modated by a treaty ; but, after the death of Tarqui- uiiis, Csere joined the rest of the league in support- ing Veil against Servius Tullius, and was obliged to CERE OR AGYLLA, 385 purchase a peace of twenty years, by yielding- a part of its lands to Rome. From this period we may date its decay, and we know little more of its history as a state of independence and importance. Tarquin the Proud took refuge in Caere with his two sons, after he was driven out of Rome; and no doubt the Caere troops were joined with Porsenna's in the reduction of that proud city, and returned home when Porsenna abandoned Tarquin's cause : # for he never returned to Caere, and its inhabit- ants, from that time forward, seldom took any part against the Roman people. In the year of the Republic 214, the Cerites joined the Carthaginians in sending out a fleet to dislodge the Phocians from Corsica. It was then that they allowed or commanded all the pri- soners brought home to be stoned, and to lie un- buried at Pyrgi, which occasioning a pestilence, they sent rich gifts to the oracle at Delphi, and asked what they must do in atonement for their sin. The oracle commanded yearly games and races in honour of the slain, and this memorial endured for 150 years at least, and perhaps for much longer. Many authors confuse this expedition with that of the Agyllans, ages before, not considering that they were perfectly distinct in character and purpose. The Agyllans sent a treasure to Delphi, the Cerites * This expression is a compliance with the opinion that Porsenna made war in favour of the Tarquins ; it is, however, more probable that Porsenna belonged to a different political party in Etruria, and did not embrace their cause. 386 CERE OR AGYLLA. expiatory or propitiatory offerings, and the one is never to be confounded with the other. In the year a. r. 365, when the Gauls besieged Rome, and threat- ened to overwhelm and ruin the whole of Italy, the vestal virgins and the sacred fire were sent to Caere. We are told that one Albinus, a plebeian, who was fleeing away, and was in his chariot with his wife and children, met them barefooted and bleeding, convey- ing the Palladium and the holy vessels, on the Mount Janiculum, now Montorio, and that he im- mediately stopped and alighted, declaring that he would not ride whilst the ministers of the gods ■walked. He made the vestal virgins take the place of his own family in his chariot, and conducted them safely to Caere, were they were received and enter- tained with the utmost honour until they could re- turn to their own city. Strabo moreover says, that the Cerites attacked the Gauls in their retreat, and took from them all the spoil which they were bearing away, and which they immediately, in like manner, restored to the Romans. The senate, in gratitude, called all their sacred rites henceforward Ceremonia, and from this comes the word Ceremony. They henceforward obliged themselves never to re- fuse hospitality to the Cerites, and gave them all the rights of citizenship, except a vote amongst the tribes. Nevertheless they are often taunted with not having shown sufficient gratitude for the bene- fits they received, as the citizenship of the Cerites used to be a mock-word among the Romans in after times. CJERE OR AGYLLA. 387 In the year a. r. 402, according to Livy, Caere joined Tarquinia in a war against Rome, and ravaged the Roman lands down to the coast, carrying all the booty into Caere. These lands had once all belonged to Etruria, but Manlius was created dictator to recover them ; upon which the Cerites, becoming frightened, endeavoured to make a separate peace, throwing all the blame upon the Tarquinians, and reminding their adversaries of their meritorious conduct during the Gallic war. The Romans lis- tened to their prayers, and granted them a peace for a hundred years. In the year 444, Livy places the great battle which took place between the Etruscans and the Romans under the consul M. Fabius, when the former took refuge in the Ciminian Forest, a large and thick wood close to Viterbo ; and Fabius, in order to discover their designs, sent amongst them a noble Roman who understood their language, having been educated at Caere, and this town seems to have contained a university for the Roman youth, who, until the second century of the Republic, were sent here to study Etruscan as we study French or Latin, and many of whom continued to be instructed in Etruscan down to Cicero's time. I suspect in- deed that Romulus's tongue as nearly resembled Etruscan as that of Henry the First's court did Pa- risian, or of Harold's German, though in the days of the empire the people had ceased to understand each other, and the old Latin was as unintelligible to Augustus, as the English of Alfred would be to us. s2 388 C^RE OR AGYLLA. At the time when iEso, or whatever his name might be, made his expedition into the Ciininian Forest, the Cerites used to study Latin, and serve as interpre- ters between the Romans and the other Etruscans. This is particularly noticed in the adventure of those Romans who were found disguised as shepherds in the fields of Russella. Canina thinks that the Agyllans spoke more Greek than Etruscan, and the Cerites more Etruscan than Greek, and that as the Romans became more and more powerful, their native tongue merged at last into Latin. I had almost forgotten to mention that it is no uncommon thing in the sepulchres of Caere to find Romans laid in the same grave with a long line of Etruscans, very possibly their own ancestors in a former age. In the year of Rome 535, Livy tells us that the waters of Caere ran with blood. These waters are a warm spring which used to serve the ancient baths, and which still exist about a mile from Cer- vetri. They are called Bagni del Sasso. In the year 547, the Cerites victualled the fleet of Scipio with corn and all other articles of food, after which Pyrgi seems to have gradually dwindled away, and Caere to have sunk into a provincial town, The destruction of Carthage must have given a deadly blow to the trade of Pyrgi, and the Romans had the command of so many other ports, that they had no occasion to keep up this one, or to prevent its decay. It was a place of no importance in Strabo's time, and he says that Caere, once so wealthy and so renowned, presented nothing but a few melan- CMRE OR AGYLLA. 389 choly ruins as the vestiges of its former greatness, and was frequented only by invalids for the sake of its baths. In Augustus's time, however, it rose again, and was a favourite foster-child of many of the emperors ; but we will not discuss its history further. We cared as little for its modern history — I mean its fate for the last 1800 years merged in another power — as we did about its Roman sarco- phagi. We had come to see an Etruscan city, and to hear as much as we could of an Etruscan story, and we felt almost vexed when anything Roman crossed our path. It was like the impress of sub- jection, when we wanted to investigate only the footsteps of freedom and independence. Many monuments and inscriptions of imperial times have been found, and from one of them, that of Visbinus, the freedmau of Trajan, we learn that Caere in his days was a municipium, and contained within its walls one temple dedicated to Mars, and one to the Divi Csesaris, besides a Basilica Sulpiciani — that is, a court-house ; and a curia — that is, a market-place or square for the assembly of the Decemvirs. Caere bore its part in the decay of the Roman empire until it became, like so many other famous places, almost forgotten ; and a small Roman village, at first a garrison, and then a settlement, sprang up near it, and usurped its very name. Why Caere Nova came to be preferred to the old town we do not know, unless the sight of modern poverty and decay became intolerable in the midst of ruined splendour, and a totally new place with hope was found more 390 CiERE OR AGYLLA. congenial than an old one with sorrow. Little no- tice of it exists in history, but in a. d. 1236, we find Gregory IX. issuing a bull in favour of the episco- pus portuensis, or bishop of the ports, in which he calls the walled village we were visiting Caere Ve- tere, i. e. Old Caere, and the village two or three miles distant, Caere Nova, or New Caere. My gentle reader, if you have been able to wade through this history, you will probably now be tired both of it and your long walk, and you will wish to refresh yourself as we did, and perhaps ask what we had for dinner. Truly I am very sorry that I cannot tell you, for our wits were all put to flight by our excessive surprise at such unex- pected and unpremeditated hospitality as a dinner, laid out for uninvited strangers in the house of a Roman Catholic priest. We were all perplexed, and truly sorry to have caused so much trouble to a man who lives alone, who fasts twice in the week, and who expected nothing less, when he rose in the morning, than to have his time taken up, and his kitchen emptied, by a party of hungry and in- quisitive foreigners, tumbling in upon him just as he was sitting down to his meridiano. The fact is, that we had taken our own provisions with us, as every stranger must needs do, and we had ex- pected leave to eat them in the kind Arciprete's parlour, but in the bounteousness of his heart he had ordered them all to be put away, and a hot dinner from his own store to be prepared for us. I can just tell you so much of the matter, that it C^ERE OR AGYLLA. 391 consisted, like all Italian dinners which are not a l'Anglaise, of five courses, with a prelude of ancho- vies and olives, and a finale of biscuits and fruit. We had soup, then lesso, that is boiled beef; then arrosto, or something roasted ; umido, or something boiled ; fritata, or something fried ; and dolce, or something sweet. After our repast was finished, we went to see an enormous wine-vessel in the Arciprete's garden, which had just been taken from a tomb. It stood fully four feet high, and could not have contained less than five and thirty gallons. I scarcely know how to advise any one to proceed who wishes to explore Caere, and who has not letters either to this excellent man, or to the rich and equally hospitable Calabrese, who behaved to some friends of ours in the same liberal manner. It is certainly not to be expected that their time should be occupied, and their arrangements broken in upon by travellers, and the English are the last nation in the world who would wish or like such a thing ; but there is no inn, and therefore a resting-place should be provided for in some way or other ; for no one can do the place justice who does not spend there, from morning to evening of a long summer's day, perhaps about sixteen hours. Caere Nova should be seen also, for it is very pretty, and several curious tombs, and some rare and strange things, are remaining there. It is possible that Prince Ruspoli might allow any party properly recom- mended to him, the use of his palazzo, as it is a 392 C^R E OR AGYLLA. common practice in Italy for the great families to permit the halls of their unoccupied residences to entertain strangers; but as the Duke Torlonia has a large empty mansion at Caere Nova, which he will not suffer to be entered for any such pur- pose, it is also possible that there may be particular reasons for refusing it in this part of the country. To the credit of my countrymen be it spoken, we never heard of any of these permissions, where they were granted, being abused. I trust they never will allow it to be said of them that they have in any instance presumed upon or ridiculed Italian hospitality, and returned evil for good. It was always a pride to us in Rome to observe how universally the English were respected and trusted for honourable conduct. Proud and impertinent they were, often equally ignorant and careless of national customs and prejudices, and we used to hear remarked of them as a mass, that they came to teach and to judge, but never to inquire or to learn ; but their truth, honesty, and honour never seemed to be questioned. The best time for touring to all out-of-the-way places in Italy is in the month of October, as the malaria is then over, and the days are neither too short nor too hot. The so-called roads are more passable, and the weather is more steady, than in the spring. Caere in ancient days was celebrated for its wool, which bore the highest price in the Roman market, and was much esteemed for civil and military dresses. I believe it still keeps up its C^RE OR AGYLLA. 393 reputation ; and its wine, sung by Martial, though small in quantity, is still excellent in quality, if we may judge from the sample we had of the Arci- prete's. The place must also have been famous for its chemical preparation of perfumes, unless those we saw from the tombs were foreign, for stronger have never been found anywhere. When we left Rome, we were told to take torches or bougies with us, and to have them always at hand whenever we went to explore a tomb ; and we never went anywhere without having reason to admire the wisdom of this advice, which I therefore repeat to travellers. Caere Vetere is a very sweet spot, and the interest of visiting it is not diminished by its access being somewhat difficult ; besides that, it is the oldest civilized colony in Italy of which we have any re- cord, and the only one much known and esteemed by the Greeks before the foundation of Rome. They had, indeed, traditions of others, such as Corytus, Tarquinia, Pisa, and Adria, but they had little commerce with any of them in comparison with Caere. Prince Ruspoli is the manorial lord of Caere Vetere, and Duke Torlonia of Caere Nova. s 5 394 CHAPTER VII. CASTEL D ASSO. We went for the night to a very comfortable and well-provided inn at Viterbo, and we spent the hours before evening fell, in visiting its three fine churches, with their excellent paintings ; parti- cularly the least rich in other ornaments of the trio, but which was immediately behind the hotel, and contained one of the best pictures in Italy; a " Sebastian del Pioinbo," representing our dead Saviour after his deposition from the cross. It is a work of the very highest merit and purest style of composition, and is well suited to the peculiar colouring of Scbastiano ; we saw it both by day- light and by torchlight, and I think preferred the latter. Viterbo would well repay a residence of two days — the one to see the vicinity, and the other it- self, and the numerous works of art and science it possesses, which are seldom visited, and very little 10 castel d'asso. 395 known to English travellers. There is also a noble castle, with an octagon tower, belonging to the king of Naples, which should be visited from Viterbo on the way to Rome. The next morning we hired the best light carri- tella we could get, a quattro posti, with four places, and set off very early, under the conduct of a guide, to see the ruins of Castel d'Asso. I was in a fever until we had made this out, always fearful to the last moment that some accident would occur to pre- vent the great pleasure we anticipated. We had known many who had set off to visit it, and then had found some unexpected impossibility, which had obliged them to abandon their object, so that we had a sort of presentiment that the same thing might happen to ourselves, and that we should never see it : the more so, perhaps, that we had heard such wonderful descriptions of it from the fortunate few who had been there, and we had read these descriptions fully confirmed in the Archaeological Papers, so that I verily believe, in the end, we would rather have lionized this extraordinary valley than anything in Italy besides, — Rome always ex- cepted. We were told that there was nothing known in the world like it, except the valley of the Kings, called " Biban el Melek," in Egypt, a place far beyond our sphere of travel ; and that it con- sisted of four valleys, all of them full of rock sepul- chres. One only of these, however, was the valley resembling Biban el Melek, composed of the graves of chiefs, and it was difficult to find, and often mis- 396 castel d'asso. taken, as all the four join, running as it were into each other, and many of the peasants offer them- selves as guides, who are quite ignorant of the right one, and will therefore take you to what is little worth looking at. We were desired to in- sist upon being conducted to San Giovanni di Bieda. It is, as we were told, an oratory in the chief valley, and has an annual fair. Who shall express with what joy we entered the carritella, passed the gates of Viterbo, and gave these orders to our guide 1 Sir William Gell thus speaks of Castel d'Asso and the glens adjoining: " Near Ronciglione and Sutri stands Blera or Bieda, a town of ancient Etruria. The population is still considerable, and there are several remains of antiquity, consisting chiefly of tombs cut in the rock and walls. At San Giovanni di Bieda, on the road between Vetralla and Viterbo, are several sepulchres in the rock, with mouldings of genuine Etruscan architec- ture; a stream running from Blera has here worn in the soft volcanic stone a deep valley with rocky sides. * The Etruscans delighted in tombs excavated in such situations, and those in this valley are both ex- traordinary and numerous. The stream unites with another from near Viterbo, which, like the former, presents on its banks, at Castel d'Asso, a series of tombs, and also inscriptions, which can only be compared with those in the valley of the tombs of the Kings, Biban el Mclek, near Thebes. Another / / ' / □ castel d'asso. 597 joins this from Norcia, a curious and interesting- city, and in this valley is a Doric tomb, with paint- ing and sculpture ; the Grotta del Cardinale is another of these curious tombs. They are painted like those of the tumuli of Tarquinia, and are as yet unknown to the antiquarians and literati of Europe." I have thought it right to give this account, though, unless Sir William Gell saw these tombs himself, I greatly doubt its accuracy. I cannot, however, say that there are not painted tombs in these valleys, because we only fully explored one of them, and part of another ; but I suspect that the account is given from the relation of others, and that it has been a misconception. Again, he says, " The Etruscans entombed their magnates at Falerii, Fescennium, Norchia, Nepet.e, and Blera, in the rocky dells common in their terri- tory. It is highly probable, in the absence of all positive history, that the necropolis of Voltumna (Viterbo) was reputed of superior sanctity, and that many persons of rank selected this spot for sepul- ture. We have named the extraordinary assem- blage of Etruscan tombs at Castel d'Asso, near Viterbo, which were first introduced to public notice by the learned Orioli of Bologna, who wrote a short account of them. By the ancient road through Forum Cassii, they are fifty-three miles from Rome. The face of the rock is cut into a form unlike anything Grecian or Italian, and pro- duces a most imposing effect ; the style bears some 398 castel d'asso. resemblance to the Egyptian, but it wants one re- markable characteristic, that of a very projecting cornice on the summit. The profiles of these tombs are very singular, and perhaps the four given below, which were brought some time ago from this place, are the only specimens of real Etruscan mouldings that have ever been seen in our country." We had met in Rome and elsewhere a very few persons who had seen Castel d'Asso, and said they were disappointed ; but we always thought we knew the reason, viz. that they had had bad guides, and therefore their opinions made no impression upon us ; once only we were staggered by a friend of our own, a very well-informed and intelligent English- man, who had taken some pains to see it thoroughly from Viterbo, and who said he really did not think it would repay any one for the trouble it cost. — His speech remained in our minds as a problem to be solved, a thing to be wondered at and remem- bered, but which perhaps might be accounted for from a difference of tastes; and this we thought the rather, because the more we inquired from those whose antiquarian knowledge and accuracy we could trust, the more strongly and plainly it ap- peared, that there was nothing in Europe, besides, of the same kind, and we resolved upon seeing it at all hazards, if we could. I understood that it had been explored and brought into notice by the learned professor Orioli and Mon- signore Marini, about five and twenty years since, and that they had written a full description of it ; castel d'asso. 399 but it was never my good fortune to meet with these works. I also understood that here, and here only, the caverns were sculptured ; but besides that, this is not true as to its being the only site in Etruria of sculptured caverns, for we have already named the one described by Micali at Tarquinia, and the temples of Cerere or Iside, as seen by our- selves, I never met with any one who professed to have discovered or to have seen any sculptures at Castel d'Asso beyond the Egyptian ornaments over the tomb doors. The great interest of this spot arises from its having been the ancient Voltumna, the grand gathering place of all the Etruscan tribes, where the national councils were held from the time of their first establishment in central Italy ; frequented on every great occasion by the assembled nobles and their trains, by the rulers of each separate state, and by the priests with all the pomp of their gor- geous and awful worship. There the national chief, or dictator, was elected ; hence laws were promulgated, and peace and war declared, not by one state only, but by all Etruria, collected for her own internal government, or for defence against her foes ; there all those solemn councils were held which required the highest religious sanctions, and the universal national consent — a plan of govern- ment under which the nation increased and flou- rished for six centuries, until about fifty years before the building of Rome. After this time, and for reasons of which no records now exist, dispute, dis- 400 CASTEL D ASSO. union, and decay seem to have taken the place of former concord and prosperity. The arts flourished and became more refined, and the arms of the several states prospered, but the union of the nation was dissolved, and therefore her real strength was gone. Cyrus's fable of the bundle of sticks was fully exemplified in this people. At the head of the glen is supposed to have stood the great temple in the precincts of which the council assembled, and within which the sacrifices were made ; and in its immediate vicinity were the rocks dedicated to be the sepulchres of those whom Etruria honoured and mourned — the high captains of the league, the high priests, the distin- guished patriots, noted orators, dreaded warriors, or beloved and wise kings; those, in short, to whom the whole nation gave a grateful burial, and for whom they wept. I think, if I only saw a row of broken stones, or a line of upright posts, each of which marked the long narrow home of some eminently great man, whose death had oc- casioned tears to a whole people, and whose deeds were written, not in the book of eternity only, but which had also filled a page in the restricted and abbreviated annals of time, I could not have looked upon it unmoved — I must have felt interest and re- verence. How much more, then, when these sepul- chres have been hewn to last as long as the valleys that contain them, and the names, and the years, and the offices of their tenants, are graven in the rock with a pen of steel, to last as a memorial for CASTEL D ASSO. 401 ever ! I did not doubt, when we were on the way to Castel d'Asso, that we were going to a rich treat, and should enjoy a feast for excitement, enthusiasm, and romance, even to satiety. For the first two miles the road was so good that we were angry at having been induced to engage the rumbling- and uncomfortable carritella, and we thought we might as well have driven in our own carriage; but just as we had hinted something of the sort to our guide, we turned off the country thoroughfare, which led straight on to some unpro- nounceable village, and we went for a few hundred yards over the grass. We then came to a mill-race and a full stop, and what we were to do further w r e did not know. The race was raised several feet exactly above a broken wretched country track, into which we were to plunge, and which was ap- parently made by the treading of cattle, or the dragging along of ploughs and harrows, aided by the not unfrequent overflowings of the stream, which wanders at random wherever not previously en- gaged to feed the mill. We had to dismount, and by the help of poles and peasants to pass the race ; next the horse was to be coaxed to a species of all- four scramble ; and last of all, the vehicle was lifted, and dragged, and pushed, and tumbled, I know not how, until it fairly stood in the holes of the track which we had hired it to pursue, but where, to all appearance, it was fully resolved to remain quiet and at rest. I now saw that we could never have brought any English carriage along this road, 402 CASTEL D'ASSO. unless we had intended it to take care of the mill till our return, and we amused ourselves with imagining the astonishment it might have excited amongst a party of native sight-seers or wonder- hunters, had any such arrived in scrambling trim, as to how it came there, why it remained there, and to what nation it could belong. It would indeed have been the type of a people ignorant and bold, and not an unapt remembrancer of the Gallic in- vaders, who, between two and three thousand years ago, had their war-chariots planted, probably, on that very spot. The mill had once been a square tower, very likely some old lucumo's dormitory transmogrified, but it is now quite abandoned, and in due time will be a ruin to baffle future antiqua- rians. We proceeded in the track, being very often lifted so high from our seats by the jolts, that I more than once expected to be tossed out upon the ground ; sometimes we went over portions of rock, then through holes out of which rocks had been taken, then over furze bushes, and then through water sometimes shallow, but more than once up to the horse's knees, and nearly over our own feet. At last we got upon a heath, where the ground was firm, but where, as far as I remember, there was no track at all. We were in a very fine open country, a plain or moor, with mountains at some distance on each side of us, when suddenly we came upon a steep and most romantic ravine, con- sisting of bold rocks covered with wood, dropping castel d'asso. 403 down perhaps 200 feet beneath us, with a wide and rapid brook in the bottom, and on the cliff directly opposite rose the picturesque and massive ruins of a gothic castle, very like those of Germany, and belonging to the era of the feudal barons, and the time when German imperial troops, under the German emperors of Rome, garrisoned this part of Italy. The vision was so unexpected, that we could not for the moment help fancying that we were in Scotland, looking upon Roslin or some other of those many beautiful castles which are hid in the Scottish glens. Perhaps the nearest resemblance to it is the glen of Cadzow in Lanarkshire, opposite the castle of king David, or that of Craig near Rhynie in Aberdeenshire. I stood fixed to the spot, for I never saw anything so un-Italian in Italy, and it appeared to me that nothing but the sky was its own. Not a shepherd's hut was in sight, not a contadino in velveteen jacket and breeches, with red waistcoat, bronze face, and rich black eyes, was to be seen ; not a thing that breathed or told of the south, whilst the wide and shallow, the clear and brawling brook, the green trees, the oak, the aspen, and the alder ; the abrupt steep rocks, the round towered castle, and even the smooth greensward on which we rested, all seemed to belong to Scotland. Did we want further confirmation, look at the heather in blossom, and look at the mountains around. Did we want con- tradiction ? Alas ! look at the sky. Delighted, however, at this beginning, we halted 404 CASTEL D'ASSO. to gaze upon the fortress before proceeding further, and spread a table of provisions for ourselves in this lovely wilderness, perhaps upon the very spot where stately buildings once stood, and the nobles of Etruria may have held their yearly feasts cen- turies before us. Castel d'Asso was an Etruscan fortress, erected in the midst of this once densely populated country, near Monte Fiascone and Trosso, and not very many miles from Tuscania. It was situated in the state of Tarquinia, and served as a place of refuge for the inhabitants upon any sudden invasion from their enemies. Cicero mentions it by name, " Castellum Axia," as a place of great strength and importance in his day. It was then regularly garrisoned, and probably by Etruscans under Roman rule. There were four other forts in its vicinity which have all been destroyed, whilst this has passed from conqueror to conqueror through the lapse of ages, always maintaining its original destination, and going from Goths, and Huns, and other barbarians, to Italians and Germans, ac- cording as each could maintain the upper hand. The present structure is a fortress of the fifteenth century, but it stands upon Etruscan foundations, and gave mo the idea of having been once much larger than it is at present. We did not climb up to it for want of time, but I have no hesitation in saying, from the few observations which we after- wards made, that it would well repay the trouble. It is ungarrisoncd, and indeed I believe untenanted now, and there are no cottages near it, which 1 CASTEL d'aSSO. 405 repeatedly turned to look for, as it gives one the idea that it must have protected some little hamlet to supply the servants, and other necessary aids and appliances of an established garrison in a wild country. I presume that lines were drawn round it on the opposite side, but we did not visit them. We remained for some time in earnest contem- plation of this fair and unexpected apparition, and we were very sorry to leave it, as we had to dive down into the glen, and believed that we should only see it once again as we crossed the elevated heath on our return : we were, however, agreeably mistaken. Upon turning away to commence our expedition, we tethered the horse, and left the carritella and pro- visions with one guide, whilst we took another to lead us into the much-wished-for and long-desired glen. We scrambled for some hundred yards through rocks and brushwood, and along such paths as are constantly found in wild woods, and we descended for some way into the little sequestered valley, and were still going on in a most courageous spirit when our guide called us with a loud voice to stop. " Ecco," he said, " look there, those are the graves." " Those!" we exclaimed, "where?" " Just above you, signori, and before you, and for a mile along those rocks, they are all the same." We saw nothing, absolutely nothing but a continued cliff of wooded rocks, and we asked with uncontrollable disappoint- ment, " Is this all ?" " Yes," said the man, with a most provoking look of superior wisdom and half- 406 CASTEL D'ASSO. suppressed amusement, " this is all ; many travellers come here, and say that there is nothing to see, but there is always the fortress. Will you please to cross over and look at it V No, indeed, we were far too sublime, after the humbug of the glen, to think of going to examine an old castle. We told our guide that we could see far better castles in Britain. We cast one sullen, despairing glance upon the holes in the rocks, which we supposed had been the sepulchres, and thought them less worth a journey than the caverns in Dovedale, or in a thou- sand other lovely scenes at home ; and we marvelled how Cardinal Orioli could have had the silliness to write such magnificent flourishes upon such rude and poor remains, more like holes for dogs or sheep, than scenes to set people's brains on fire ; and we quite agreed with our long-headed English friend, whom we had not before believed, that it was indeed a senseless thing to peril one's neck, and have all one's bones dislocated, in a weary drive of six rough miles, to see at the end nothing better than this. We were consequently resolved to retrace our steps, turn our backs in anger upon the far-famed valley, and return in bad humour home. By home I mean Viterbo ; and we had actually begun the backward march, when something gave a turn to our feelings, and we agreed, after consulting together, that our guide perhaps might not exactly know what it was we most wished to see, and that we would explore the rocks for ourselves, as far as we could walk and trace them. It was truly fortunate we did so, or CASTEL D'ASSO. 407 neither of us would ever have deemed the Biban el Melek of Etruria worth a second thought, or ever have spoken of it without ridicule. We walked on about twenty yards, and then sat down to try and make out if there really was any- thing remarkable within our view. We walked on twenty more, and then began to copy what we saw. We walked on twenty more, and we fairly fell into ecstasies worthy of Orioli, or Marini, or any other scavant who may have written upon Castel d'Asso. They had their revenge. " Ay," said our guide, " this is just the way Signore Dodwell went on. He was a learned Englishman, ' un dotto Inglese,' who visited this place twenty years ago. He at first saw nothing, and then he began to draw, and then he measured, and then he talked, and then he held up his hands like you." When our eyes first opened upon the sepulchres of Castel d'Asso, we saw exactly what the plate represents, a line of irregular rocks, which gave us the idea of having once all been smoothed, having had a shaved face towards the castle, and of having afterwards been broken and made uneven either by some convulsion of nature, or by the mischief and wantonness of man. As we sat and stared at the sort of street which we began gradually to dis- cover, we saw that doors had been engraved high up the rocks in the Egyptian form ; that is, smaller at the top than at the bottom, and with a broken and defaced, but perfectly visible rod cornice above them. As we gazed still further, we saw that these 40S CASTEL d'aSSO. rock sepulchres had once joined one another in a continued series ; there was indeed fully a mile of them, thirty of which we counted, and the castle valley is met by another towards its centre, and directly opposite the beautiful old fortress, in which we saw sepulchres in the cliffs on both sides. They were like a street, the dwellings of which correspond to each other. We condescended at last to approach these strange and chiselled rocks, that we might examine them more closely, and found beneath each engraved door, if I may use such an expression, an open one, six or eight feet lower, which led into the burial-chamber. It would appear that these cavern mouths had formerly been covered up with earth, and that nothing re- mained above ground but the smooth face of the rock, with its false Egyptian door and narrow cornice. We entered several of these sepulchres, but it would be untrue to say we explored them, for the largest and best worth seeing are dark and difficult, and we had neglected to bring our torches, and therefore we could only see to a limited extent even those cells into which the bright sun pene- trated. Some of them would almost require a miner's dress, for they are entered by a bore like what we saw at Monterone. Of those we did enter, the greater part consisted of a single low chamber, and the roof was hewn out of the rock, and was either vaulted or Hat. Some consisted of two chambers, the inner one being lower than the outer. Sonic were large, and must have contained many CASTEL D'ASSO. 409 bodies, and others were so small, that unless they were side chambers merely, of the kind we saw at Veii, they could only have contained cinerary urns, or memorials of those who were buried elsewhere. I confess that I believe they were side-chambers only, but those we saw were in the cross valley, and we were by that time too tired to fight with fallen stones and prickly brushwood, and a guide who was firmly persuaded we were crazed, to try and find out the principal chamber. It is well worth an anti- quary's while, however, to pursue the search, because it is circumstances like these that teach us ancient customs, and enable us to determine dates. I think that all the very small vaults which we observed were at some distance from each other, and projected from the line as they would naturally do if the real sepulchral chamber lay between them. The idea which entered my mind at the time was, that these small chambers could not be for infants, both because none but the illustrious in deed rest here, and because no funeral honours were ever allowed to infants ; neither is it likely that they were for urns, because these graves bear marks of an antiquity prior to the burning of bodies. Almost all, if not every one, of these caverns has a ledge round it, sometimes grooved for vases or other ornaments, at others merely for sarcophagi, and in some instances with stones laid across the ledge on which the uncoffined body has been placed, like the grave of the Larthia at Caere. The farther we advanced, and the more we saw, the stronger T 410 CASTEL D'ASSO. was the impression which these caverns made upon us, and the more solemn and exalted became our ideas as to the grand and magnificent conception which had first dedicated them to the memories of those whose fame they were intended to render im- mortal. We met with two or three that were very little injured : they were large and perfect in form, and deeply hewn, and we thought them truly noble monuments from their very simplicity. About a quarter of a mile from where we had first detected the hand of art, we began to perceive deep regular lines of inscription in the rocks ; the letters were a foot high, and sometimes chiselled two inches deep in the stone ; they were all in the oldest Etruscan character, and evidently intended to be read at a distance, perhaps even from the other side of the valley. I am sorry that I cannot find the copies of any of them, but their meaning to a certain extent I know perfectly. They expressed the name of the deceased, and his title, his age, and I believe, in a rare instance or two, the year in which he died, but according to a computation now unknown ; and at the end of all this was the touching sentence, " Rest in peace." As our eyes became more and more accustomed to the place, we observed enor- mous fragments of rock, which had been broken off these sepulchres in various places, and were lying in all directions below us, happily with their large and long inscriptions upturned. It seemed as if they supplicated compassion ; as if the very stones CASTEL D'ASSO. 411 spoke to entreat protection from the civilised against any further attacks of the barbarians. I am doing what I can to answer the appeal, by making them known, for nothing will protect them so effectually as the visits of travellers, which will render their preservation a matter of gain to the Contadini, and indeed to the country generally. Some of the in- scriptions consist of a few words, others occupy two whole lines, and where the valley I have mentioned joins the castle glen, the inscriptions have gone round two sides of the tomb ; and the whole scene left upon our minds the impression of a sublimity and poverty, rudeness and refinement, simplicity and art, which I never saw united anywhere else. We said to one another, This has been an eastern people. Here is the oldest recorded form of human burial for the great amongst mankind. Here is the cavern sepulchre like what Abraham purchased for himself in the cave of Macbpelah,. and here is the style of writing alluded to by Job, 184 years before Abraham* — " O that my words were graven with an iron pen, and lead, in the rock for ever." These are the graves of a civilised race in their very ear- liest period. Here we see reading and writing, a distinction of ranks, and the ideas of a difficult and gigantic masonry. Is this a Petra ? No, for it wants the sculptures. Is it then a Biban el Melek ? It is certainly an assemblage of the sepulchres of great men only, and of whole valleys dedicated to the illustrious dead. * This date is according to Hale, Brinkly, and Ducautaut. T 2 412 CASTEL D'ASSO. Sir W. Gell remarks of these tombs, " A single specimen of them may suffice instead of the descrip- tion of many. On the front of one is inscribed in large letters, ' Ecasu in esl Titnia,' or, ' Adieu in peace Titinius.' On another, ' Saucnes suris.' On others, ' Ecasu or Ecasuth,' with some family name." " The ' JEdium species barycepkalw, humiles et latce,' or ' a style of building, low, with heavy top and wings,' ascribed to the Etruscans by Vitruvius, seem to be exemplified by the sepulchres of the country. It may be observed, that brass arms have been found in these sepulchres ; which seems to refer them to a very ancient period ; it is remark- able that scarabei also, in cornelian and other stones, are frequently met with here as in Egypt, but always with Greek or Etruscan subjects engraved upon them. The interpretation of the inscriptions found at Castel d'Asso, and other Etruscan cities, has hitherto wholly defied the efforts of the learned, beyond family names, and a very few often-repeated phrases." There was once a road which ran in front of these giant tombs, and led to the temple of Voltumna. It was traversed with awe and reverence by genera- tion after generation of the proud and the noble, and even now there lingers a sacred breathing of seclusion and a holy beauty in the spot. This mode of burial seems to speak for itself that it was prior to petty masonry, the small cones of Caere, or the large cones of Vulci and Tarquinia. The tombs have been all, without exception, rifled, so that, CASTEL d'aSSO. 413 save a nail or two, and the stone ledges, we did not see anything remaining of their former furniture. Amongst them all, the stunted oak and brushwood grew above, and below, and around, whilst the stream runs far beneath. We were shown one or two, which, on account of the difficulty of access, we did not attempt to enter, but which have an upper chamber above the vault, ascended by a spiral stair- case cut in the rock ; in the inside of some we saw the remains of a very narrow cornice cut in the stone and going all round beneath the roof, and in one of them the roof itself had some ornamental squares, like the medallions of the Grotta del Cardinale. The fortress is seen from all the tombs that we entered, and indeed once commanded and protected the whole of this sacred gorge. We could not help thinking it probable that the sepulchres in this glen were all the tombs of noted warriors, laid in front of the castle ; those of the double rows in the centre glen might be of kings and statesmen, and those nearer the temple of the high priests. These valleys of hollowed dust, these cliffs which were supposed to eternize the names and the deeds of the mighty whose spirits had fled, give rise to noble ideas ; and so much did they grow upon us the more we con- sidered them, and so profound was the impression they left, that at this moment I feel, as I did before we set off to visit them, that I had rather have seen the glens of Castel d'Asso than any other spot in Europe, except Rome. 414 CASTEL D'AS30. The precise site of the ancient fane of Voltumna is not ascertained ; but as Castel d'Asso is undoubtedly the old fort, the " Castellura Axia," so it seems ex- tremely probable that the little oratory of San Gio- vanni stands upon, or within, the ground once occupied by the old temple. Voltumna was the goddess of Concord and the protectress of the Etrus- can league ; and though her temple was never used as a place of national assembly after the year 400 of Rome, it must ever have been holy ground in the eyes of every Etruscan, solemnised and sanctified by glorious recollections and by fond regret. It would probably last as a fabric, though in ruins, till the christian era, and then it was a common custom for the Italian Christians to turn all those places which they had found devoted to idols into oratories. Their idea was to supersede false worship by true, to purify the temple of Baal, and make it the temple of God, but to let sacred ground continue sacred still. We of the north, in our fiercer mood, used to destroy the heathen temples, because we said, " what agree- ment hath the temple of God with idols?" But this was not the genius of the whole of Christendom, and I do not recollect any instance of it during the lifetime of the apostles. Miiller says, that in the heathen times an annual fair was held here at the feast of the goddess, when the merchants from Egypt and Greece, from Tyre and Carthage, and those of Asia Minor, brought their wares for sale; and that, during the inde- pendence of Etruria, there was a fixed meeting every CA8TEL D'ASSO. 415 year of all the states for sacrifice, besides the great political meetings which were called whenever a common danger threatened the league, or any parti- cular state desired it, each state having the power of summoning the council whenever it chose. Now though Rome peremptorily forbade political meet- ings amongst her Italian, so called, " allies," and therefore these must have been abolished from the time her rule was established, yet the yearly sacri- fice and fair may have long continued, or perhaps have never ceased. There is an annual fair at San Giovanni di Bieda now, and truly it was to me an interesting and poetic thought, that it may be the uninterrupted though humble and fallen representative of the once lordly pageant; and that as such, it is in perfect keeping with all the rest of the scenery round. The little image and the peasant fair, represent as thoroughly the proud temple, rich in costly gifts, the meeting of the princely nobles, and the eastern merchants, as do the open plundered graves, in their present neglect and decay, the once hallowed and guarded tombs ; or as the ruined and deserted fortress may image the massive and solid Etruscan masonry which marked the habitation of armed men. I might, indeed, further add, they represent one another in the same manner as the thin and scattered wood upon the hill near Viterbo repre- sents the once dreaded gloom and dangerous shades of the Ciminian forest, and as the sulphureous pond, called by the peasants " Valdemone," in the Valle 416 CASTEL D'ASSO. d'Orta, does the renowned and disastrous Vadi- monian Sea. It is quite evident that these illus- trious graves have been wantonly defaced, and, as far as idle men could effect it, destroyed, in mere pastime in various places, for we saw masses of rock that had been split and pushed down in a manner which could only have been done by the repeated attempts of mischievous hands, and we accused of the deed the garrisons opposite, from the days of Alaric to those of Napoleon. The strata of the rocks was in no place disturbed as an earthquake would have done it, but large blocks with long en- gravings had been tumbled down whence none can ever raise them up again. It is perhaps candid to state, that we did not see the adjacent glens of Blera, where I believe there is a village, and of San Giovanni ; and therefore it is possible that tombs may remain there, still better worth the pains of an excursion than anything we did see ; but I am inclined to think not, and that the chief glen has been that of Castel d'Asso, or at least that the others would be merely a repetition of the same thing. In old times the high priest and the king were buried in sepulchres of exactly the same form, and with much the same ceremonies, and the furniture only was different, none of which now re- mains. The sculpture, I feel sure, was not better worth seeing further down than here, for though what we saw was extremely simple, yet it was per- fect in its kind, denoting the infancy of a great people, and nothing of their decay. The tombs were CASTEL d'aSSO. 417 sketched rather than sculptured, but the sketch was that of a great mind and a masterly hand. We were moralising and meditating, wondering and copying amongst these graves, when we were startled by the noise of shouting in the glen, and by encountering the nose of a donkey which pushed forward through the brushwood and almost knocked me down. It was laden with panniers, and, though pioneering its own way, was very quickly followed by six young men, all Italians, and all with baskets and rods, come here to fish. Shortly after we met another party with a donkey, who looked like wandering artists, and some of whom descended into the open tombs, but they did not appear tu understand anything about them. Our guide told us that these valleys, on account of their beauty and their streams, were a favourite resort of all the neighbouring gentry and townspeople for fishing or for sketching, or to pass a summer's day ; also, at certain times of the year, for students from all that part of Italy, who come either for relaxation, or for instruction, as the turn of mind may be. When I asked him if Cardinal Orioli was not the first person who had brought them into notice, he said, No — that the first persons were two canons of Viterbo, the one now dead, and the other a man of ninety, who examined and wrote a description of them many years ago, and in consequence of whose publications Orioli had come to see them. He told me their names, but I only recollect Padre Semina- t 5 418 CASTEL D ASSO. rio, of the Minerva. We could extract no informa- tion as to what these tombs formerly contained, nor when the last of them was rifled, but they were pro- bably plundered ages since, for they were marked objects to a set of idle soldiers, and the opening- of one would immediately lead to the ravaging of them all. I feel half ashamed to confess, that we left Viter- bo, where there is a learned and distinguished body of antiquarians, chiefly ecclesiastics, without seeing the museum. Objects of the greatest beauty are found in sepulchres all round Viterbo, and from a tomb at Bomarso, very near the town, came the largest panathenaic vase, and the finest tazza in our possession. Micali mentions two cucumelle, that is, tombs in the Lydian fashion, which were opened in 1831, at Baccano, between Viterbo and Monte Fiascone, and these conical sepulchres are not un- frequent all round this neighbourhood, as might be expected throughout the state of Tarquinia. He also mentions a spot called Paratula, which was ex- cavated in 1493, in the presence of Pope Alexander VI., out of which were taken many statues in stone and marble, with Etruscan inscriptions, and the ac- counts of which exist in the public library at Sienna. We had no time at Sienna to examine these ac- counts, which I believe to be in manuscript. They were written by Sigismondo Tizi di Castiglione, a Florentine, in the 1st vol. of the History of Sienna, and are said to be very interesting and curious. It CASTEL D ASSO. 419 is possible that the statues themselves may remain in the museum at Viterbo, but this point I could not ascertain. The very rarest of the Italian coins have also been found hereabouts, as might reasonably have been expected from the seat of national assembly and of greatest foreign resort. The firstof them was an assis of Servius Tullius, with the word " Roma'' upon it, in ancient Etruscan letters, bearing a front face of Rome upon the one side and an ox upon the reverse, which devices refer to some league be- tween Rome and an Etruscan state or city, at a time when the stamp of Rome was so new that it required to be named in order to be recognised. Another of these coins was found more towards Monte Fiascone. At Viterbo there was also an assis found with a tripod on one side and a trident on the other, the emblem of a union between re- ligion and commerce. In two or three other tombs was found a different sort of money. The pieces are of bronze and triangular, each piece weighing five pounds, with a trident on one side and a thyrsus on the other — the symbols of commerce in wine. These strange coins, two in number, are now in the Jesuits' museum ; Cavaliere Visconti gave me the account of the first mentioned, and would, I am sure, inform any stranger where they may be seen. The unicorn is the present emblem of the city of Viterbo, and was very likely adopted from that of Voltumna, as these emblems seldom change ; and I 420 CASTEL D'ASSO. have already alluded to one or two upon my own scarabei, which remain the same now as they were centuries before the christian era. Tarens is one of them, the founder of Tarentum. The scarabeus representation is a man sitting on a dolphin, with a star beneath him, and it is a matter of history that this was the arms of Tarentum five hundred years b. c, and it remains the arms of Tarentum at this day. This singular scarabeus, deeply cut, but in a very early style, is of black agate, with a female head on the reverse side in relievo, exactly like an Egyptian head, though of Etruscan carving We did not hear of any very remarkable scarabei being found in the Viterbese, and all those of Castel d'Asso, &c, which would have been most interest- ing, have long since disappeared. We spent in these beautiful glens a far shorter time than they deserved, chiefly from not know- ing how we ought to have proceeded. We should have started very early in the morning with mules or ponies, and we should have taken torches for the graves, and provisions for the day ; also, a blouse to put on when descending by the mine shafts, and then we might have employed a long day in seeing all the four valleys completely. On our return, as we approached the mill, we observed, about a mile from the track, a number of small columns of smoke at some distance from each other, with a sort of bluish appearance towards the ground, as if there was an occasional low jet of flame. This proved to be what the Italians call a " bulicame," CASTEL D ASSO. 421 i. e. a quantity of liquid sulphureous matter in action, and is worth the trouble of a visit. The whole of the ground in this district is volcanic, and the bulicanie seems to be the remains of still un- absorbed or unexhausted volcanic matter. Some antiquarians have boldly maintained that it was once the Vadimonian sea, but all probabilities are more in favour of the Valdemone in the Val d'Orta, though the two sulphureous marshes closely resemble each other, this being the larger and the more por tentous. As we drove home and reasoned upon the excited imaginations with which we had left Viterbo in the morning, our consequent disgust and disappoint- ment, and the very high gratification we had re- ceived from a little patience and careful investiga- tion, I could not help thinking that we had been like the Irishman who abused his gamekeeper be- cause he did not find in the same beat the sixteen brace of partridges which his brother had shot the day before : " Why," says the man, " sure your honour did not suppose that those same we bagged yesterday would be here waiting for us to-day ?" How very often do we English travellers go to see the ruins of ancient grandeur, and the sites of renowned cities, such as Troy or Carthage, Nine- veh or Babylon, which we know have only been fixed by the deep reading and the painful and repeated searches of learned travellers, as if we expected that all their former pomp should sur- round them still — as if the genius of glory and re- 422 CASTEL D ASSO. nown which lingers over them, were bound to make itself visible in gross and palpable form to our material eyes. Alas ! from them the past and the future are equally veiled, and belong to those ex- istences in which spirit alone can commune with spirit. It may be a humbling thing to human pride to visit the poor remnants of greatness passed away, the all but forgotten, all but undiscernible indications of our noblest talents, and our mightiest efforts ; but it ought to be eminently useful. Here we see that " they all wax old like a garment, and are all eaten up like wool ; but thou, Lord, art the same, and thy years shall not fail." We had seen at Castel d'Asso the very rocks not able to preserve the dead committed to them ; and the words graven upon those rocks, though not indeed obliterated, have in many instances been moved out of their place, and in all have ceased to tell their tale. Let us not, then, sentimentally and uselessly lament the appointed lot of everything in this world, whether in flesh or stone ; let us not weep that all which lives must die, " all that's bright must fade," all that exists must perish ; but let us, who look upon their vacant places, and either eulogize the day when they flourished, or give a sigh to their decay — let us, who know that the time is coining when our own country also may be laid as low — that even England may become a theme " To point a moral or adorn a talc ;" castel d'asso. 423 let us ask ourselves, Have we any reason to believe that we are the possessors of better things ; have we, with our full light, secured to ourselves that which every Christian is entitled to account his own, — a more enduring habitation, a more lasting memorial, and a glory which passeth not away ?* * See Appendix H. 424 CHAPTER IX. CLUSIUM. I have now come to the termination of our Etruscan expedition, which ended at Chiusi ; tor we were in the month of June, and the heat was such, that we could visit no more towns without a residence of several days. The hot time of the day, from ten in the morning to six in the evening, must have been spent within doors, without comfort or occupation, in Italian inns ; and we should have had no other hours for exploring than those before or after ten or six, which we thought would be too in- convenient for our purpose. We were also anxious, like most of our countrymen, to make our way quickly to cooler regions, before the summer solstice had actually set in. We accordingly left V iter bo for Monte Fiascone, a very old Etruscan settlement ; and whilst our horses were resting, we walked up the hill upon which the town is perched, that we clusium. 425 might once more enjoy the view from its summit, over the beautiful lake of Bolsenna, along a lovely and fertile country, and over many a wide plain, rich in the vine and olive, as far as from Bolsenna itself to Corneto and the sea. We looked a last adieu to the scenes of former adventures and plea- sures — the sites of Tuscania, Tarquinia, Gravisca, and Ansidonia, and upon ground occupied by the dead, wider in extent than that now peopled by the living. It is a land obscure and unknown to one half of Europe, but it was, centuries ago, the mart of civilisation, and the highway of nations. When we reached the terrace by which this view is commanded, we found there a company of pea- sants assembled for the same purpose as ourselves, and who reminded me of Scotchmen, so much did they know of the history of the country, its past glories and vicissitudes, and all its new and old localities, and so much did they seem to pride them- selves in recollections which spread a halo over their native land. Many sepulchres full of curious things have been found at Monte Fiascone, and we saw the open mouths of several of them ; but as they were empty, and of the same kind with what we had seen else- where, particularly at Tuscania, we did not enter any. We pursued our way by a good road, and through a cultivated and delightful country, until we came in sight of Orvieto, one of the loveliest scenes in Europe. We here descended a steep hill literally groaning under the richness of its produce, 426 CLUS1UM. covered with olives, vines, and other fruit trees, and peopled now as thickly as it probably was in ancient days. There were two large convents on opposite sides of the road, with quantities of pretty orna- mented cottages and terraced gardens, each new turn of the road bringing into view something which we had not observed before, and which told of industry, wealth, and comfort. The hill was cul- tivated and ornamented from its summit to its base, and before it rose the magnificent and stately height on which stands Orvieto, rising as completely isolated as a rock in the midst of the waters, and its ridge of steep cliffs being everywhere surmounted, in true old Etruscan fashion, by a strong city wall, with gates and towers, giving one quite the idea of what Veii must have been before its destruction. The castle stands outside the gates, and is a very large and strong fortress, surrounded by a deep fosse ; and though deserted, empty, and much in- jured, the outside is so entire, that we could not look upon it as a ruin, and we wondered that it was not repaired and still made to contain a garrison. Orvieto is famous for its wine, and boasts of two wonders, which no stranger should neglect to see, and which will occupy about one day. These are the well of San Patrizio, and the cathedral. The ancient emblem of this town was a goose, a bird sacred to Bacchus. Our first care, as usual, was to get accommoda- tion at the inn, and we found the landlord at first as imposing as his house looked wretched ; but after a clusium. 427 time we became friends, and he made us more com- fortable than we had thought possible. Our beds and bedrooms were clean and dry, and as we took care not to order things which he could not furnish, our supper was excellent, and our breakfast a-la- fourchette by no means bad. The room in which we supped appeared to me to have been a place of con- cealment in the house ; it was low and vaulted, and looked so exactly like an Etruscan tomb, that we all started as we entered it. I think it only fair, when entreating my countrymen to go off the high road, and away from the well-provided inns of the frequented part of Italy, to warn them that they must take their own provisions, or accommodate themselves to the manners and habits of the natives in towns and villages where there is no post. The English are too apt to call for tea, coffee, and milk, as a matter of course, and to declare, when they cannot get them, that they are certainly to be found all over the world besides, except at that one unfor- tunate and most stupid inn to which their ill fortune has that night led them. Above all, they reckon upon bread, biscuit, and wine being staple commo- dities everywhere. Now it so happens that, biscuit is unknown out of the great towns, bread is con- stantly uneatable, and the wine is too sour to be drunk. Tea is not to be procured, and milk is thought so unwholesome, that for half the year the cows are sent up to the mountains, perhaps ten miles off. What then is to be done ? A landlord will sometimes coolly say, " If you required these 428 clusium. things, you should have sent to us yesterday, and we should have had them ready ; but if you give us no time, you must take what we can give." We found the yolk of an egg an excellent substitute for milk with our tea, and gradually got accustomed to the goat's milk, which is what is used by the people. Eggs may always be had, and omelet ; generally, also, fruit and macaroni, rice, and some sort of soup ! cheese is in every house, but gene- rally too strong for an English stomach. The wines of Monte Fiascone and Orvieto are both excellent and celebrated throughout the papal states, but they are heady, and very often mixed with white lead. When travellers bring their own provisions, such as fowls, &c, which English travellers often feel ashamed to do, the innkeepers in such places as Orvieto, or Citta di Pieve, are much obliged to them for their consideration, instead of being of- fended, or thinking it mean, and are quite happy to prepare their provisions with far more of con- diment and cookery than we could find in any country inn at home. Our arrangements with our host being completed, we proceeded to lionize the well of San Patrizio, the walk to which is very fatiguing, as it lies fully a mile off, without anything of interest to amuse by the way. It is near the castle, and was built to supply the garrison with water, being a source which never fails, while all the fountains in the town occasionally run dry. In consequence, this well is allowed to be used by the people, and the descent clusium. 429 to it by a spiral staircase is made wide enough for a water-cart, drawn by a donkey, to go down. It is enclosed by a circular tower hollow in the centre, which reminded me of Coningsboro' Castle in Yorkshire. The walls are double, something after the fashion of the towers we saw at Tuscanella, and the inside wall is perforated with open windows, so that for many hours of the day the light of the sun is quite sufficient to show the way with safety. Between these walls are two staircases crossing and interlacing each other, and so contrived as never to meet ; but whoever descends by the one side, ascends by the other, and there are separate doors of ingress and egress. I asked if it was named after the Scotch St. Patrick, but though the names and stories of the old British saints in general are better known in the hamlets of Italy than in the universities of England, I do not think the fame of St. Patrick of Dumbarton, the apostle of Ireland, had ever reached Orvieto. It was named after a dignitary named Patrizio, who built it, and who was either a bishop or a governor of the place. The cathedral we visited twice, spending there the evening of one day and the morning of the next, in order to see it by both lights, without which it is im- possible to do it justice. It stands in a square by itself, and is the finest thing of the kind in Italy. The front is florid gothic, with Norman arches and pinnacles, and the building is entirely of white and black marble, inlaid with brilliant mosaics. The front is approached by broad marble steps, and has 430 CLUSIUM. three doors, the centre doorway being- a round arch, composed of small pillars, alternately twisted and plain, with a cornice of arabesques ; and within the arch there is a very old mosaic of the Virgin and Child ; over this is a pointed gothic arch, with an old mosaic of the ascension of the Madonna. The arches of the side-doors are pointed, and above each door is a high pediment of marble, enshrining- gothic mosaics, which represent, the one the birth of the Virgin, author unknown, and the other the baptism of our Saviour, by Cesare Nebbia. On each side of the doors are compartments of white marble, in the form of a tree with branches. Each branch takes a different scene of scripture history, and is worked in basso relievo, beginning with Adam and Eve, and ending with the final judgment. It is in a very fine style of art, by the famous Niccolo Pisano, or Nicholas of Pisa, a. d. 12G7, who was the first artist of his day. Over these stand the emblems, or, as the Italians rightly call them, the hieroglyphics of the four evangelists in bronze. The three upper mosaics represent the coronation of the Virgin after a design of Lanfranco's ; the presentation in the temple, very old, and author not known ; and the affiancing of the Virgin, by Pomarancio. The coronation is the highest mosaic of all, in very bright colours and graceful forms, and has been lately renewed by Cardinal Gualtiero, and the learned Cardinal Orioli, present Bishop of Orvieto. I do not know the date of this church's erec- tion, but it is on one continued plan, and not made up of heterogeneous materials, like the churches in the 6 CLUSIUM. 431 north of Italy. The facade is in the same style with many of the beautiful cathedrals of Normandy and England, there being introduced into the stone-work the gay and brilliant colours of the south, in such well-executed mosaics, that they have the effect of fine pictures outside the church. The name of the architect was Lorenzo Maytani of Sienna. We saw a painting of this cathedral in Rome, which was exhibited privately to the Pope, and may very possibly be purchased by this time for the Vatican. It was by a native artist, about two feet or two and a half feet high, and had taken him two years to execute, from the abundance and minute- ness of the ornaments to be copied. There is a manufactory of mosaic equal to the Roman, in a very episcopal-looking building close to the church, and the inhabitants of the town have an honest pride in keeping their cathedral in perfect repair. It was in all its glory when we saw it, for it was the octave of the corpus Domini, considered in Italy as the closing scene of the Easter festivals, and all the people were in gala. The cardinal bishop in his richest robes bore the host, and a numerous clergy and immense crowd of people followed. It is a pretty thing to see an Italian town upon a festa-day, be- cause the streets are thronged, not merely with gay, but with cleanly dressed people ; and the velvets and the silks, and the gold and the scarlet, do not look more rich, than the volumes of muslin worn by the women look pure and graceful. At such times they always display either long white veils or large white 432 clusium. handkerchiefs, or broad worked muslin aprons, and sometimes all three, upon their persons. At Orvieto, however, the costume upon the head was a small scarlet shawl bound with black or yellow, and to my surprise made of worsted, reminding me of the once universal use of wool for dresses in the Roman states. When the procession came out of the church it was accompanied by a sort of village band playing lively airs, but this music ceased as it re-entered, and we found the nave lined with military. The host after a few minutes was restored to its place, a dead silence followed, and then the event was announced by a blast of trumpets, which had an effect startling and sublime. The inside of this church is worthy of its exterior, and I need hardly add, rich and handsome. It is divided into three parts by two rows of fine marble pillars, with very curious capitals, and the holy water font stands upon a sculptured pillar, or altar. On the left hand of the transept is the chapel of the santissiino corporate, and on the right that of the Madonna, a wonder of the world, which I am equally incapable of describing and of magnify- ing it as it deserves. Had the cathedral possessed nothing else, it would have been the gem of Italy from this chapel alone. It is entirely covered with fresco paintings, the walls by Luca Signorelli, and the roof, which is like that of a tent, and divided into four or five compartments, by Beato Angelico and Ghirlandajo. Those who know the chaste co- louring and delicate softness of Angelico, may have clusium. 433 much to admire, but little new to wonder at in the roof; but the walls, I confess, almost surpassed my powers of belief. I had often heard that Signorelli was a great painter, and had seen many of his pictures, all of them, to my eyes, stiff, exaggerated, and barbarous, though masterly ; but the figures here were flowing, graceful, powerful, energetic, and touching. The four walls represent many scenes of one story — the fall and judgment of Antichrist ; and the whole bodies forth a grander epic poem than any story I ever saw in painting elsewhere. I wonder that with the many glowing geniuses and fervid minds of Italy it has never been transplanted into verse. The first compartment exhibits Antichrist falling like lightning from heaven. Then he appears upon the earth, a noble and venerable figure, with the single blemish of the mal occhio, standing on a sort of platform, and haranguing the people. Behind him is seen the spirit of evil prompting his speech, and whispering into his ear. He beguiles the mul- titude with the all-seducing words of man's wisdom, and he displays at his feet the glittering rewards and tempting gifts which are reserved for his ser- vants. Here are scattered or heaped up vast piles of money, gold and silver vessels, rich furniture, and jewels ; and he seems to say, " Who are the fools that follow after wisdom, and the weak who seek after godliness ? who mortify the desires of the flesh, and humble the pride of the understanding ? For- sake your superstitions and austerities, and follow u 434 clusium. after me. Behold, the riches, and the honours, and the glory of this world are mine, and on whomsoever I will I can bestow them. Behold, all these will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me." Crowds are represented as listening, and the rich, and the learned, and the mighty, and the light- hearted, and the jovial, are there — all the lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God ; and the gifts of Antichrist are borne away, and his service is lauded to the skies ; too loudly indeed, for the skies hear at length, and send a fearful answer. The temple of God meanwhile is taken possession of by Mammon, his soldiers keep guard that none may enter it un- punished, and the few lowly in demeanour, but re- solved and faithful in heart, who have tried to enter, and who were driven away and cast out, are either looking up to heaven in unpitied misery and desti- tution, or are sealing their imprudent testimony against the evil one with their blood. Antichrist is triumphant, and the martyrs are seen in many parts of the picture fallen and lifeless, a sport to their enemies. Then comes the next compartment, in which the voice of their blood is heard on high, and the heaven opens, and the archangel descends, and Antichrist is hurled into the bottomless abyss, whence he can rise to deceive the nations no more. Then follows the general resurrection, a wonderful compartment, or, as I began to read it, canto. Luca Signorelli has imagined that according to a person's good or bad deeds in this world, would be his per- 7 clusium. 435 fection or deformity at the last day. Some, there- fore, are grinning skulls, and naked cross-bones, hideously feeling about for their remaining mem- bers ; others are bony skeletons, lifting up their skinless and uncovered faces towards their dreaded Judge, " The sightless eyeball on which he will never pour the day," and the yawning hungry jaw which will now never feed upon the long offered, long rejected tree of life. The tongue, if such there be, is parched and dried up in the roofless, moistless palate, and can express fear and horror only, of all the many passions for which it once found utterance. These faces cannot speak, they cannot give forth even one single cry for the mercy which was for so many years within their power, but, being uncared for or despised, is now turned to wrath. Others are represented as half clothed, but not daring to look up to the heavenly Judge,— others are rising from the tomb with clasped hands, and the agony of despair depicted in their countenances, for they see that glory is never to be their lot. Truly is it a picture of" some who rise to shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father, and of others whose portion is shame and everlasting contempt." The blessed seem all to recognise each other, and the condemned to be occupied with themselves. Among many raptured faces are three of a beauty which even Raphael never excelled, of perfect and graceful forms, a man and two women, perhaps his u 2 436 clusium. sister and his wife, in which it is hard to say whether the expression is most touching of human affection, or of divine and grateful love. It is a tender, holy, and inspired joy, in which every one may sympathise, and which every one must envy. This was the first group that arrested our attention on entering the chapel, and we said, " Oh ! there are Raphael's three Graces, we will look at them afterwards? let us examine Signorelli's works first ;" upon which we turned to the opposite wall. As we made this remark in English, our guide did not un- derstand us, and took no notice ; but when we came to it under his direction, the whole proved to be by the same hand, and was indeed Signorelli's masterpiece. Raphael and his master Ghirlandajo are said to have spent hours and days here in study- ing it, and had Signorelli executed this group only, and nothing else, it would have been sufficient to have ranked him with the first of painters. I must say of the pictures in this glorious chapel, that the conception of them without the execution, or the execution of them without the conception, were either of them alone sufficient to have immortalised any man. There was another singular group in this picture, besides the three figures just described, consisting of two brothers, the one risen, and the other rising by liis aid, when between them appear the despair- ing, howling, unclothed skull, chest, and arms of one condemned. It is wonderful how the artist has contrived to mingle with the joy of meeting each clusium. 437 other upon the eve of glory, their horror at this un- expected sight. The next compartment, of inferior interest, is the closing scene ; but it wants indivi- duality, and therefore everything which could ex- cite in us fellow feelings. It was the reception of the good into life and happiness, and the banish- ment of the wicked into never-ending misery. The roof is the representation of the highest amongst human beatified spirits in the kingdom of glory. In one compartment are the patriarchs, in the second the apostles and evangelists, in the third are the martyrs, and in the fourth the chief saints and doctors of the church. The culminating point is the crowning of the Virgin, as the first of created beings, beneath the emblems of the Trinity. The painting of these compartments is exquisite, with the light, the sweetness, the softness, and the holi- ness which peculiarly mark the pure and lovely paintings of the Beato Angelico di Fiesole. I have heard that the story of these frescos, according to the real meaning of their author, is published, and that many of the countenances are portraits — which last I do not doubt ; but we could not procure the book, if such exists, and our guide professed to know nothing about it. I have given this description according to our understanding of it, and in the sense which I think it must convey to every one who has no written guide, and who is not told that such and such particular groups had ori- ginally some other meaning. Some of the frescos are much faded, but the two grand scenes of the 438 cLusiuM. Resurrection and the preaching of Antichrist are in perfect preservation ; and, to the honour of the clergy and people, all that does remain is most carefully preserved. After leaving Orvieto, Ave travelled by a good but very hilly road to Monte Leone, where we baited our horses, and thence on to Citta della Pieve, which stands as usual on the summit of a steep hill. We went almost the whole way at a foot's pace through rich forests and well-cultivated land, but it tired us, from a want of variety and a want of water. One pretty little village, which we saw upon a height above us, contained a large, and from its im- posing appearance I should imagine a government establishment of baths. It is full during the season, but for what complaints it is frequented I know not. Citta della Pieve commands a very exten- sive and map-like view over a romantic country in which water is abundant, for thence may be seen the lakes of Chiusi, Castiglione, and Viterbo. It is a very poor place, but, as usual in Italy, contains some splendid pictures, chiefly by Pietro Perugino, who was born here. The finest of these pictures is a fresco, which was painted by him for the town, and presented by the town to the church. It stands in the oratory of S. Marco, and beneath it are en- shrined two of his letters relating to the picture, which are curious enough, and will repay the trouble of deciphering, from the insight they give into the taste and ideas of his day. They stipulate the sum for which it is to be executed, and the time in which clusium. 439 it is to be finished, in order to be ready for his birth- day. The subject of the picture is the Adoration of the Magi, and the painting- is worthy of the man whom Raphael imitated for many a year before he could surpass. The churches of San Agostino and S. Antonio, and the cathedral, contain also pictures by Perugino worth seeing, and in the latter there is a dead Christ by another artist, which in my esteem came next in excellence to the celebrated fresco of the Adoration. The view from S. Antonio is exquisitely lovely, and we walked round from it to Santa Maria, but it did not repay the trouble, for we saw nothing new, and only gave ourselves unnecessary fatigue. Chiusi is not more than six miles from Citta della Pieve, and the country between them is a para- dise. Its situation, however, disappointed me, hav- ing expected something still more imposing than Orvieto, because it is a place much more celebrated. There is a resemblance between them, but the ascent to Chiusi is more gradual ; there are several mounts round it which appear to form part of it, and its cliffs are far less bold than those of Orvieto. Yet it has the advantage of standing upon a beautiful lake, and from the water I dare say it presents a very striking and noble appearance. Upon entering Chiusi, we looked down upon the Chiana or Clanis, where, like the Tiber, its yellow waves have often rolled ruddy with Etruscan blood, and upon the lakes of Peruo-ia and of Chiusi ; and we were not 440 CLUSIUM. unmoved as we drove into the once illustrious capital of Porsenna, and, during his days, the richest and most powerful city of Etruria. On arriving at the inn, we were agreeably sur- prised to find it so very tolerable ; and though it is not by any means one of the first in Italy, no one who goes there need fear either want of sleep or want of food during the three entire days which he must lodge in it, if he wishes to do Chiusi justice. The people were clean and civil, and our greatest perplexity was an amazing scarcity of seats when the canons of the place were kind enough to call upon us, and wished to inspect some of our curi- osities. We were then obliged to put tables into requisition to supply the place of benches ; but when Chiusi becomes more visited, its furniture will natu- rally become more plentiful. In consequence of letters, we fared well as to the object of our visit, and saw much which I am sorry to mangle by very imperfect description. We found amongst the canons a considerable society of learned and gentlemanly men, and we were equally de- lighted with their conversation and their courtesy. No sooner had we completed our arrangements with the padrone of our hotel, than, with a view to make the most of our limited time, we set out in quest of such objects of curiosity as did not require full daylight. We sent our compliments to those of the clergy who, we were informed, possessed the best, antiquarian collections, and from whom we were, at CLUSIUM. 441 all events, sure of a greeting- full of kindness and urbanity, and a ready answer to our queries concern- ing the marvels of their native city. Our message received an immediate answer of much politeness, and we set out on our little tour of evening visits. Our cicerone first conducted us to the house of a priest, in whom we discovered a corresponding member of the Archaeological Society, and on whom the names of Braun and Lepsius produced a talis- manic effect. He immediately unlocked the little store of curiosities which from time to time he had collected, and parts of which he had no objection, for he was not rich, to resign to the curious stranger. We saw many singular and beautiful sarcophagi, with figured lids, and with sides covered with bassi relievi and inscriptions. One in particular attracted our attention from its entire novelty, I may say whimsicality ; and it must have been a fashion pecu- liar to northern Etruria, as we never saw it else- where : though in Clusiutn, we found, that was not uncommon. It gave me the absurd idea of" every man his own coffin !" A recumbent funereal figure as large as life, and not unlike the sculptured lid of a sarcophagus, lay on the ground. The priest ap- proached it, and unscrewed the head, which ap- peared to have been a portrait, when, to our asto- nishment, we saw that the body was filled with the ashes of the deceased. The price which was asked for this, and indeed I may say for cinerary urns in general at Chiusi, appeared to us very moderate after the sums for which antiquities of this class are u 5 442 clusium. sold in Rome, where they are uncommon. The moveable head of this and many other statues at Chiusi, showed me how easily the statue of Juno might have been made to bend its head, when Ca- millus entreated it to remove to Rome. It required but a slight shake, perhaps only a stamp of the foot, or some sudden movement from an attendant stand- ing near. We next turned to the priest's collection of small articles, particularly scarabei, which are said to be finer and more abundant at Chiusi than elsewhere ; and we found two very good ones made of cornelian, which he was willing to sell to us, the one repre- senting the combat between Hercules and the Hydra, and the other an Etruscan organist, or at least a man playing on an instrument more nearly resembling an organ than anything else. These he was willing to sell to us, and they were the only spolia of that nature which we carried away from Clusium; they were, however, opima. We were next conducted to the house of an aged canon, who, with a brother beetle-fancier, the vene- rable archdeacon of the district, was waiting to receive us. I have seldom seen two more amiable or benign old gentlemen, full of mildness, urbanity, and information. They were not long before they displayed to us their treasures in long rosaries of scarabei, all well engraved, some in the highest style of art, some with very extraordinary sub- jects, and several which excited our covctousness with inscriptions. It was delightful to see the clusium. 443 interest which the good old men took in the my- thological and heroic stories which were engraved on them, and to hear the very ingenious and often learned interpretations of the myths and allegories which the different intaglii represented. I think the one possessed eighty, and the other a hun- dred ; collections in which they not a little prided themselves, and they were very much astonished when we told them, that we had almost as many as both put together, — not indeed so select, but all genuine, a fact they doubted, and of which they were not convinced until after a careful examination and scrutiny of them in our rooms the following day. They then recognised many as old acquaint- ances, originally Chiusian, and which had belonged to the late Prince Vidoni, and other well-known collectors. In the houses of these canons we saw vases of all forms, shapes, sizes, and styles ; from the plain coarse urns of Veii to the shining stamped black jars of Volterra, the eye-painted vases of Vulci, and the tall and slender forms of Basilicata and Rua, in Magna Grecia. They were all, however, found at Chiusi, and, to my eyes, were none of them equal, in fineness of enamel or material, to the best of those we had seen in the south. Quantities of them could be distinguished from Egyptian, only because of their locality, and are so like, that many learned men maintain them to be genuine Egyptian, and to have been brought hither by commerce. The types of them certainly were thus imported, as the 444 clusium. models of our porcelain were from China. We saw lamps, lachrymatories, tiles, water-ducts, votive offerings, and another object, which was to me so new that I took it to be modern. I saw upon the priest's sideboard what I supposed to be a dejeune of Wedgwood ware, and I conjectured that it had been presented to him by some English traveller who had been obliged for the same civilities which we were then receiving. Whilst, therefore, my more learned and scientific companions were look- ing over some bronzes, I stole up to examine it, and to convince myself whether or not I was right. It consisted of a small and well-finished tray, the handles of which were worked in heads exactly like two of our own vases found at Paestum, and this tray was filled with a variety of small cups and sugar-basins, and utensils which were certainly not English, and of which I could not make out the use. For a dejeune there was neither tea nor coffee-pot, so I tried if the vessels would answer for a writing-stand, or for a cruet-stand, or for a toilet-table. None, however, would suit exactly. For tne one purpose they were too few, for the other too many, and the forms all ran riot. Ac- cordingly, ashamed to show that I did not know what to make of the thing, nor whether it were ancient or modern, I looked out of the window, praised two or three prints in the room, and then asked with a careless air what was the use of that china-stand upon the buffet. The good priest smiled, and said it was a focolare which he had got clusium. 445 out of a scavo a few weeks before ! I forgot all my prudence, and exclaimed, " So it really does come from a tomb, and it is ancient ! How extraor- dinary ! I took it for a Wedgwood dejeune." We then proceeded to examine it, and he told us that it was often called also a " recipiente," and that it was common in the tombs at Chiusi, standing beside the corpse or cinerary urns. He supposed that it had contained offerings for the dead, and the vessels consisted of what I had christened two tea-caddies with covers, one sugar-basin, two pestles with a mortar, two spoons, and one vase, the top of which was a cock's head. Our friend thought this sym- bolical, as a cock watches for the dawn. We saw many more of these afterwards, and they are such pretty and elegant pieces of furniture, that on our return home we were much disappointed not to find any of them in the British Museum. Indeed the Etruscan collection there is very poor and incomplete. In the houses we visited we saw several cinerary urns and a quantity of sculpture and basso relievo in marble alabaster, and in a pretty white stone with a disagreeable smell, called fetid limestone. On one marble urn was sculptured the scene which has interested us so much in the Camera del Morto at Tarquinia, and it is not a rare subject in this part of Italy. What keeps up the interest is, that all the faces are portraits, and that, in every repe- tition of the subject, the countenances and the adjuncts of the scene are different. It struck us 416 CLUSIUM. with extreme astonishment, because it was so like some picture of the present day, before we had begun to criticize minute particularities, and before we had considered that death and burial, human sorrow and human affections, were as common in the days of the flood as they are now. I know not why it is that we are so habitually creatures of the present, and that we seem to feel as if all wisdom, and decency, and civilization, were centred in our- selves, or our own times, looking with astonishment at marks of the same feelings evinced in the same manner by those of our own nature who passed their trials amid the same materials some thousand years ago, instead of remembering that every as- piration and every talent found amongst us must have existed amongst them also. They had not indeed Christianity, but they had the firm belief of a future state, their continued happiness or misery in which was to be decided by their conduct here ; and how few are there amongst the mass, even of Protestant Christians, who know any more, or who ever testify to the world, except by one or two forms, that they have any other faith ! Many and many an accomplished and highly educated Eng- lishman speaks and acts as if Christianity had nothing to do with his future being; and this because, while he is instructed in all other things, religion forms no part of his education. In the common intercourse of high life, Christianity is treated as a very proper respectable set of customs, but it is too often considered to be as little of a CLUSIUM. 447 reality, and as truly a superstition, as any of the notions of the heathen. Will not the men and women of these monuments rise up against us at the last day, along with the Queen of the South and the men of Nineveh, if we make no more intimate and accurate acquaintance with the ways of Heaven than they here displayed ! These reflections were forced upon me by what I saw in the house of a Roman Catholic priest, and whilst I looked at him in his peculiar dress, I could not but acknowledge that, however much I might differ from him in many points of faith, these remarks did certainly not apply to Roman Catholics. They are not ashamed to profess loudly and pub- licly upon every occasion, that they are not, and cannot be saved like the heathen ; that their depen- dence is not upon themselves and their own merits, but upon another, and upon that, which may have merit as done upon his account. Having made Christ the corner-stone, without which there is no building, they have indeed almost concealed it by the supererogation, purgatory, and so forth, built thereupon ; but however much the Roman Ca- tholic church may have hid the wine and oil of the Scriptures, it has never put them away. I know that this has no more to do with Chiusi than with Babylon, had I been standing with a Roman Catholic priest upon the banks of the Euphrates, but it may not be amiss for us anywhere to con- sider upon what our hopes of future happiness are built ; and in what they differ from the heathen 448 clusium. who were before us, and from our brethren around us whom we condemn. Near the Camera del Morto lay another very beautiful cinerary monument, which I took for a sarcophagus ; it was made of fetid limestone, a sub- stance which looks like inferior and unpolishable marble. The lid was composed of the figure of the deceased, a young noble in the arms of the genius of death : below him lay a dog, perhaps to signify fidelity to the last, and that he was faithful to his country until snatched away by death. In the hands of the half-raised figure is a vase, the cover of which lifts off and discloses the ashes of the per- son holding them. There are a vast number of tombs at Chiusi, but I shall only describe five, because they are sufficient samples of all the rest, and because each of these five was to us an object of interest which we should have been sorry to have left the place without see- ing, and which we should certainly revisit, if ever we found ourselves there again. They lie wide from each other, as Chiusi appears to have had its necropolis on three sides of the town, and therefore we hired a caritella of a more convenient and less dislocating sort than any we had fouud in the Roman states, and took a guide of sufficient prac- tical knowledge to lead our car the way it should go We passed some very large and curious tumuli close to the town, and had a beautiful drive of about a mile and a half into a wild wood, where we dis- mounted and had to wait until another guide could clusium. 449 be procured, who was the accredited guardian ot this tomb, called, " GROTTA DELLE MONACHE," VAULT OF THE NUNS. We walked for a few hundred yards by the side of a low hill, and then came to the porch of the tomb It had a strong wooden door fixed there by the government, and kept by this man under a strong lock. We entered and saw a low vaulted chamber hewn in the rock, after the manner of Tar- quiuia, with an inner chamber of smaller dimen- sions, and which had two false doors painted, one on each side. Both the chambers had a broad ledge all round them, and the two together contained six- teen coffins. One was a very large old Etruscan sarcophagus, with a sculptured lid lying by itself upon an upper shelf. It was quite empty, though its tenant must once have been the chief person buried here, and he most likely was the maker of the tomb ; now he appeared as a triton amongst minnows, for his was the only coffin, according to our acceptation of the term ; the rest were all cine- rary chests, and urns, many with the ashes remain- ing in them as they were at first found, and to the best of my memory, all of marble or alabaster. In several of the other tombs we saw chests of traver- tine, limestone, and coarse clay, mingled with the alabaster and marble ; but whatever might be the material, they almost all had inscriptions upon them in the Etruscan character, and several of 450 CLUSIUM. those we saw in the Grotta delle Monache had upon them, in addition, carving- in a style which struck us dumb with amazement. The subjects were races and combats ; or scenes from the Iliad. Two of these latter in basso relievo we much coveted, for they were of a spirit and beauty rare even amongst the Greeks. We intimated our wish to purchase them ; but though there were six small chests with fixed prices, ridiculously low, which we might have taken away with us, the two we wished for, one of which represented the death of Hector, it appeared could not be disposed of without some weeks of trouble, and our days in Italy were numbered. First, the nuns to whom the Grotta belonged must be consulted, and then if they were willing to make the sale, they must notify the same to the grand duke, and he must send a person down to visit the vaults and examine the objects in question, and re- port to him if they were such as he might permit to be removed without detriment to Chiusi. The mo- ment we heard this we gave up the idea of purchase, for we had no hope that any time or influence would engage the grand duke to part with such monu- ments as these, and scarcely indeed a wish that he should do so, for who cannot but admire in a sove- reign, the spirit of a protector of science and a patriot, and wish that all monarchs were the same? This sepulchre is said to have been discovered by a peasant, who dreamed that be was wandering at night beneath the hill, and could not find his way; suddenly he turned into the porch where we stood, CLUSIUM. 451 and, after repeated endeavours, succeeded in open- ing the door, when, to his horror, he found himself in a tomb. Whether he conversed with its inmates and discovered their secret history, or whether from fear he remained as mute as they, I do not know, but he awoke, and behold it was a dream ! He slept and dreamed the same thing a second time, with the addition of finding treasure of some de- scription with which he enriched himself. He awoke, fell asleep again, and a third time dreamed the same thing. The following afternoon he came down to this spot, cleared away some earth and brushwood, and found one-half of his dream exactly as it had appeared to him in sleep ; but I forget whe- ther he obtained a reward from the convent, or made away with some few articles which he sold at a distance, and for which he was outlawed. Dreams, it would seem, are a common way of discovering tombs at Chiusi amongst the peasants, and we heard many stories of the sort with different endings. We had mismanaged so ill as not to engage any of the canons to accompany us in this day's tour, and therefore it was vain to endeavour to ascertain in any satisfactory manner the age of this tomb, or of any of the tombs, for neither of our guides bore any resemblance to Agapeto, to say nothing of the Gonfaloniere Avolta. The Grotta delle Monache contained dead, both buried and burnt, probably many successive generations of the same family, and all the writing in it was Etruscan. The sculpture differed in degrees of merit about as widely as can 452 CLUSIUM. be conceived, from the sublime to the almost gro- tesque, and the two urns we so much wished to possess, must either be specimens of the most flou- rishing time of Etruria, i. e. before the foundation of Rome and during its first three kings, or they must be the work of artists in the days of Augustus. They are of a beauty which I have scarcely ever seen exceeded. There were no other ornaments in this tomb, and no paintings except the false doors. Chiusi existed long after it was subject to Rome, governed by its own laws, and containing its own noble families; and therefore its tombs, like all those of ancient date in the present Tuscany, have probably been used through a long succession of ages, and may have contained the bones of many whose career was run far from them. We left this drive to another tomb about a mile further off, called DEPOS1TO DEGLl DEI : This being the name of the family on whose ground it stands. In front of this we waited for many minutes, until a woman, who lived in a queer look- ing little cottage near, could be at sufficient leisure to bring us the key, and I could not help thinking how nicely drenched we should have been without any shelter, had an Italian thunder-plump come on whilst wo were waiting at each separate tomb for its own separate guide. When our little woman did come, she was very civil, and opened the door for us in all due form, knowing about as much of the his- clusium. 453 tory of the tomb as the chickens at her cottage- door. All she could inform us was, that it had be- longed to the ancients, and that there were pictures of it in Chiusi, but whether for purchase or not she could not say. This tomb consists of three cham- bers, the first being the largest. The bodies and the ashes are deposited in the back and side cham- bers, each entering by an Egyptian formed door, and having a ledge all round. I think that each chamber contained in it only one large sarcophagus in the old Etruscan fashion, besides numerous chests, generally square, and of various sizes, but all filled with ashes, and all sculptured with more or less art. In some instances they were piled upon each other, and here, as in the Monache, the very inferior ones were for sale at stated and very low prices, but they did not tempt us, after having seen the unpurchaseable specimens of such very superior merit. They were of travertine, terra cotta, marble, and fetid limestone, which last is a very pretty ma- terial, but very brittle. Opposite the door of the side-chamber is a false door, painted like those at Tarquinia, and for the same purpose ; that is, the appearance of uniformity. The back chamber has red and blue lines painted round it, but the side- chamber is unpainted. The front is supported by a beam across, as we had seen in so many other tombs hewn out of the tufo, and on each side of the beam is that ornament introduced into Roman architecture, towards the end of the republic, and called perspective squares, consisting of a number 454 clusium. of concentric squares, diminishing' in size as they go deeper into the stone. The walls have a deep rude cornice in red and blue in this sort of pattern f^^~\fXT\f\f^ , and beneath this comes a frieze of figures, which has gone all round, and may be from fourteen to eighteen inches high. They are much smaller and much coarser than the paintings at Tarquinia ; like them they are upon a sand coating, which covers the tufo, and upon which the subjects have been traced when it was wet ; like them, parts have fallen, and much is considerably faded — but unlike them, that which does remain, is most carefully and jealously preserved. Those who visit Chiusi twenty years hence, will probably see them as perfect as they are now; whilst those who visit Tarquinia in 1841 will not see all the figures and the colours which we saw in 1839. The subjects in the Deposito Dei were, horse and chariot-races, a triclinium, leap-frog, wrestling, players upon the double-flute and lyre, and foot-races ; bringing to our minds Ttosellini's ac- count of the tombs cut out of the rock at Beni Hassan, of the same form, and containing the same subjects. Near this tomb there is another somewhat larger, but of the same character, discovered in 1734, and so very similar, that we did Dot think it worth our while to visit it, as we were pressed for time: our guide said that if consisted also of three cham- bers, and had athletic games all round the walls, such as pugilism to the sound of the double-flute, clusium. 455 wrestling, before well-dressed spectators, chariot- races, &c. We now remounted the caritella, and had a very beautiful and varied drive by severy lofty tumuli, until we came down to the quiet lake of Chiusi, and, after going for some little way along its banks, we walked up a very steep ascent to a sort of cavern, like the entrance to an English ice-house, or an Italian wine cellar. It was just below a farm-house of the grand duke's, and, as I supposed, formed one of its many offices. We sheltered ourselves under its roof from the burning sun, and waited, as usual, until the guide to the sepulchre we had come to see could be procured. We expected to be led into the wood close by, where there appeared to be, and really are, many very curious graves ; but when the contadino appeared with the key, he came towards us and applied it, to our astonishment, to this very wine-cellar, fitting it into a padlock upon the door. This tomb is called DEPOSITO DEL GRAN DUCA, because it belongs to the grand duke, being found upon his farm. It was discovered in 1810, when his steward was searching for a proper place in which to construct a wine-vault. The contadino who found it stole one urn out of it, which he sold, and was, in consequence, immediately condemned to the galleys. It is this severe and prompt punish- ment which preserves the property of Chiusi. I think this tomb surprised us the most of all those 456 clusium. we saw, it was so wholl} r unlike any other. It con- sisted of one low vaulted chamber beautifully and resrularlv built in a round arch of smooth rectan^u- lar and moderately sized stones, without cement. The door was as ancient and as uninjured as the vault, consisting- of two stone leaves closing in the centre, and turning upon stone hinges very artifi- cially inserted in the architrave and in the floor. The vault had a ledge all round it, on which lay eight funeral chests of travertine. They are usually called cinerary urns ; but Chiusi has so many real urns, that I give the name of chests to all those which are rectangular, and of a chest or coffin-form. Some were of considerable size, but they all con- tained ashes, and not bones, and they were all co- vered with lids, and bore Etruscan inscriptions. One or two had sculptured upon them the winged genius of death, his feet terminating in serpents, exactly like my scarabeus, and beautifully executed ; others of them had Medusa's head, and there was a third device, but I have forgotten it. Near this tomb are the catacombs, subterraneous places of concealment, and burial of the early Chris- tians, closely resembling those of Home. There is a sort of chapel hollowed out in them, and here were found the bones of the lady saint and martyr Santa, , in whose honour the cathedral was raised. We returned towards Chiusi, skirting for some distance the Jeweller's Field, a rich loamy valley, which lies low beneath the cliffs upon which the clusium. 457 town stands. It is called " Campo degli Orefici," or the Jeweller's Field, because, from jewels being frequently found here, it is supposed that the jewel- ler's street ran, in the olden time, either through it or above it. The ornaments found are gold ear- rings, brooches, fibulae, rings, chains, and scarabei ; and this is the only place in Italy where I ever heard of scarabei being found otherwise than in the tombs. Chiusi is supposed to have been the city where the best were engraved in the early times of Etruria, and it exceeded all the other towns of Etruscan Italy in engraved gems, Vulci only ex- cepted. The canons, whose collections we saw, had several scarabei with inscriptions, but none for sale ; nor are they ever likely to be, as they are marked objects, and so much prized in Italy, that some of the rich Italian families will secure them the mo- ment they come into the market. I have said that it is not uncommon to find such objects in the Campo degli Orefici after heavy rains, — and what I mean by " not uncommon," is, that one or two were found there three years ago, and no one will be sur- prised at a ring or brooch being again found there two or three years hence. After reaching the highest point of the road, which goes by this field, we were again called upon to dismount, in order to walk through some ploughed fields down an abrupt descent to the DEPOSITO DIPINTO — THE PAINTED VAULT : The most perfectly preserved, or I perhaps should x 458 clusium. say, the least injured by time, of any of the many chambered sepulchres we visited. Even this, how- ever, had a portion of its paintings obliterated by damp before its discovery in 1826. The tomb is hollowed out of the tufo, but the rock in one corner had cracked, by which means the rain had pene- trated and worked much mischief. We first came upon a narrow paved path, and then upon the an- cient and unimpaired door of an old Etruscan sepul- chre. On each side were small chambers, with open arched doorways, like what we had seen at Veii and Monterone, hewn out of the tufo, with a ledge all round, and which had been appropriated to the feasts and meetings for prayer and mourning for the dead. The interesting old door of the sepulchre very much resembled what we had just seen in the grand duke's vault, but was still more artificial. The tomb consists of three chambers, upon the same plan with the Deposito Dei, with a false door oppo- site to the entrance of the side-chamber, and the paintings are exactly of the same character, only larger, better finished, and less faded. They are as interesting as those at Tarquinia, for they em- brace one or two subjects which were new to us, hut they are not so well executed. The roof is arched and supported by a beam, on each side of which are square compartments cut into the rock. The ledge which goes all round, has on it many small nimble cinerary chests with Etruscan inscrip- tions, and above this is the frieze, containing the 8 CLUSIUM. 459 paintings distinctive of the tomb, the figures of which may be eighteen inches high. First comes a chariot-race, consisting of three bigas, one of which is broken and overturned, the shock of the concus- sion having tossed the unfortunate charioteer into the air, whence he is represented as falling down head foremost. The victor is one who has just overshot the goal. Then follow the pedestrian and minor games. Two naked pugilists are boxing to the sound of the double flute. Four naked young men are waiting the orders of their master to start for the foot race, and he appears to be addressing them, carrying a staff in each hand, and wearing the pallium. Before him are two men engaged in ano- ther game — they are leaping over two sticks which are balanced upon each other ; and upon the other side-wall are dancing fio-ures, like some of the rope-dancers from Herculaneum, now in the Naples Museum. Two or three men are playing at ascolie ; that is, leaping directly upon the centre of a large vase, the bowl of which is very protuberant, and the surface of which is greased and slippery. Here the performer has missed his step, and is falling to the ground. One man near him seemed to me to be using dumb-bells — another is playing at quoits — others at leap-frog and wrestling, and at the end there is a column like the bronze one found at Vulci, with a cup of oil upon the top of it, for the use of the games; and finally, a warrior throwing a spear at a mark to the sound of the double flute. Probably other games were represented upon x 2 460 CLUSIUM. that part of the coating which has unfortunately fallen off, and which covered one half of the hack wall. Over each side-door there is a lunette, represent- ing scenes from the funeral feast. In each, the par- ties consist of men and women, sitting and con- versing together with the drinking-cup raised. In one there is a greyhound, in the other a player on the lyre, and behind the principal personages is a servant, who is running towards two tables of a very recherchee form, one of which is filled with wine-vessels. The back chamber is painted in broad red and blue lines all round it, and in the centre of each wall is a large gorgon mask, with teeth dis- played and tongue out, to represent all-mocking, all-devouring, all-hideous death. Below these is a bench as if for large sarcophagi, and two broad stones at one end are laid across it, which may have been for an uncoffined body. Our guide, of course, could give us no information as to their purpose, but their position was something like what we saw in the Larthia's cell at Care, and here lay a sculp- tured and broken stone, with the fragment of an inscription. The lunettes also had long inscriptions under them, but I should fear they could no longer be deciphered. The side-chamber was unpainted and empty, and had probably been appropriated to freedmen and dependents. The front chamber, when first opened, had contained several more chests which were now sold. One of these sepulchres, opened in 1827, belonged to the Sentinate i jj: yj j-"fJ43< CLUSIUM. 461 a noble family who had also rich tombs in the Ne- cropolis of Tarquinia. Description wholly fails to give an idea of the added interest there is in seeing tombs filled with their old urns and sarcophagi like those at Chiusi, instead of coming into a chamber vacant and empty like those at Caere and Tarquinia, which one endeavours to repeople in vain. It has all the different effect of an old churchyard full of strange and venerable monuments, and a new churchyard in which no tombstone has as yet reared its head. All these sepulchres have once had in them other ornaments, and probably in great quantities, but the vases, the bronzes, the arms, and the gold ornaments, which grateful affection, or de- vout feeling, or filial sorrow, once consecrated within their walls, have for ages disappeared. Many believe that they were pillaged at the time when Brennus attacked Chiusi on his march to Rome, about the year u. c. 356, but I know no good au- thority for the assertion. At whatever time, how- ever, they may have been pillaged of old, they are not suffered to be pillaged anew, neither may little bits of the painted walls be peeled off in order to be put into private collections where they are good for nothing, neither are those who copy them suffered to deface them with charcoal — neither dare any peasant here come to light his fire and prepare his supper in one of the painted tombs. Partly owing to the ignorance of our guides, and partly owing to our own stupidity, we did not learn to what ancient 4G2 clusium. families any of these sepulchres belonged ; but amongst the well-known families of Clusium are those of Anius, Carinus, Volsinius, and Trebonius, written in Etruscan characters, Ani, Carra, Fuisini, and Trepu. There are four other sepulchres near the Deposito Dipinto, but none of them nearly so well worth seeing, and there is one containing seven chambers, but without any paintings. It is rather an objec- tion in the way of visiting these tombs that each one has a separate doorkeeper, and each door- keeper, besides obliging you to wait until he is forthcoming, expects two pauls for unlocking the door. The sum is not much, but it is provoking to have one's hands for ever in one's purse, instead of the pleasant arrangement at Tarquinia, where Agapcto bore the key of all the tombs, and could besides talk to us like an antiquary concerning them. The so called guide-general at Chiusi told the driver of the car where to direct his course from one tomb to another, and then ran at each separate place to get the doorkeeper, whilst we stood wait- ing. I confess it gave me a very unpleasant idea of that exacting temper which travellers so often com- plain of in the Tuscan peasantry, and it would be far better for themselves in the long-run, were the guide to take the keys of all and pay them so much a time. As we were walking about a quarter of a mile from the Deposito Dipinto, we were joined by a pea- CLUSIUM. 463 sant dressed in the usual substantial style of the country, with a few articles for sale — one was a small gold ring, which he said he had found in the Jewel- ler's Field, and which had fitted the first joint of a woman's finger. It was set with a blue pasta, imi- tating a turquoise, and was two small for any one but a child. Another was a scarabeus out of a tomb ; the stone was onyx, and it had upon it some common subject indifferently executed in the round hole style. For each of these he asked a hundred francs, and laughed at the idea of parting with them for less. I was not at all surprised at the value put upon these things by the canons, but very much so at the prices asked by the peasantry, and often for articles which were by no means first-rate. We were now on our way towards the tomb of tombs, THE TOMB OF PORSEXNA, Once the best known, and, as far as I am aware, the only Etruscan sepulchre celebrated in ancient his- tory. Reader! wilt thou believe me? The labyrinth of this tomb still exists, but its locality is unascer- tained. No less than four tumuli close to Chiusi dispute the honour, and though to us only one seem- ed to answer the description given by Varro of its being under the town of Clusium, a stranger may not dispute with a native upon such a question, and especially upon so cursory a view as ours. What, 464 clusium. however, we regarded, and upon very good autho- rity, as the representative of this tomb, has now no architectural remains, but is a labyrinth under the present castle, i. e. under the ground of the ancient citadel. The building over it would thus be exactly beyond the walls, and rising in face of the garrison, which was the common fashion for the distinguished chiefs of Etruria. Pliny relates to us Varro's description, as fol- lows: — "King Porsenna was buried beneath the city of Clusium, in a place where he left a monu- ment of himself in rectangular stone. Each side was three hundred feet long and fifty high, and within the basement he made an inextricable laby- rinth, into which if any one ventured without a clue, there he must remain, for he never could find the way out again. Above this base stood five pyra- mids, one in the centre and four at the angles, each of them seventy-five feet in circumference at the base, and a hundred and fifty feet high, tapering to the top so as to be covered by a cupola of bronze. From this there hung by chains a peal of bells, which, when agitated by the wind, sounded to a great distance. Above this cupola rose four other pyra- mids, each a hundred feet high, and above these again, another story of five pyramids, which towered to a height so marvellous and improbable, that Varro hesitates to affirm their altitude." And in this he was wise, for he had already said more upon the subject than sober men could credit. The alti- tude Varro gives is 250 feet upon a base of 50 ('//.■ 1 ' 1 '1 'l ' 1 'I 'l 'l- 1 1 1 , ! Ill, 1 1 ' 1 ' . ' ■ ' ■ ' ■ ' . ' ii i i i i i J 1 i 1 1 1 f i i i i i ■■■ i i i : i ; . ' i ' i ; ■ ' i ' i ■ '■■■'■ 1 T-V-r L - III i 1 ! — ' ■ 1 ■ , ! ' ' ' ' ■ , '. 'l 'l 1 I 'l ' 1 ' 1 1 1 1 1 1 , 1 '■' ■'■ 'i i '■ "H- - i , ' , ' .'. ' ■' .'-H- i , . i i,i i i i I i i ii i \ii i i ii i i i i i — 1 i i i i i i rn ■ CLUS1UM. 465 feet; and though I used to think that any measure- ment added to this must be extravagant, it appears that buildings of this height and higher are exist- ing at this very day in China. The great porcelain tower at Nankin, which has been visited by some of our countrymen, rises aloft 884 steps, built in nine stages, and there are bells jingling upon the roof at every stage. There is, therefore, nothing incredi- ble in the height nor in the bells, nor in the bronze roofs of Porsenna's tomb, especially amongst a people who excelled all others in their manufactory of bronze ; and we must remember that this tomb was built to rival the great works of the kings of Egypt ; works of which the king of Chiusi doubt- less had plans, and he succeeded so well in his de- sign, that this extraordinary tomb was considered one of the wonders of the world, even in those days of giant masonry and cyclopean magnificence. However, any one who has seen the tomb of Aruns, the son of Porsenna, near the gate of Albano, will be struck with the similarity of style,] which, com- paring small things with great, existed between the monuments of father and son. Those who have never been in Italy may like to know that this tomb of Aruns is said to have been built by Por- senna for the young prince who fell here in battle with the Latins and with the Greeks from Cuma, and it is certainly the work of Etruscan masons. Five pyramids rise from a base of fifty-five square feet, and the centre one contains a small chamber, in which was found, about fifty years since, an urn x 5 466 clusium. full of ashes. Some antiquaries have thought that they might possibly be the ashes of Pompey, brought from Africa by Cornelia, and magnificently interred at Albano ; but the first authorities upon these points at Rome say that this tomb is of much older date. I think it was covered up with earth till about two hundred and thirty years since. As to Porsenna's monument, it was never covered with earth, to which, doubtless, it owes its destruction, and it appears to have been known by tradition only in Pliny's days ; but it must have had a very grand effect whilst it did exist, rising close to his own romantic city, and dignified by his illustrious name. The reason why doubt is thrown as to the labyrinth beneath the castle being his, is, because the labyrinth of the tumulus opposite is the largest in Italy, and both more extensive and more curious, consisting of several stories. This labyrinth we had no time to see, and whoever would wish to visit, all these tombs satisfactorily, must devote a very long day to the purpose. Not far from this rises a mound, known to be very rich in antiquities, but it belongs to one of the canons, who will not permit it to be excavated during his life. To this, there- fore, the antiquary may look as a feast for the days to come. I believe that every rare object found in Chiusi is immediately copied into a work called the Museo Chiuisino, that the memory of it may be preserved. On our return into the town we visited many small collections, each of which had its own pecu- clusium. 467 liar merit, and each of which, besides repeating* the old story of vases, bronzes, funeral urns, sarcophagi in clay, stone, or marble ; scarabei, and gold orna- ments, had some one thing to show which we did not see elsewhere. The chief museums are the Pasquino, Paolozzi, and Casuccini, the last of which alone I shall particularise, because the brief and im- perfect description I can give of it will convey an idea of all that is best worth notice or most remark- able in the others. The Casuccini is so very extraordinary a collec- tion, that could a person only see either it or the tombs, without having time for both, I am not sure which is to be preferred. The padrone of it, Signor Casuccini, is a very wealthy proprietor in Chiusi, having an extensive property in which he has made and is still making excavations on a large scale, and the whole collection was found upon his own land, and, though not a public exhibition, is most liberally and freely opened to the inquiring stranger. We were ushered into four or five large rooms, com- pletely fitted up from top to bottom with rare and strange antiquities, and laid out with the most pleas- ing taste, everything being so placed that it could be seen to advantage, and so as not to lose its proper effect. Those who have no knowledge of antiquity, and no love for its customs, would be as much amused here, as at any other very pretty, very strange show. There are even old stones, shafts of columns, &c, so disposed about the room, that one may sit down upon them and admire the surround- 468 clusium. ing objects at leisure and with comfort. Though we had no intelligent guide with us, and the master of the house was from home, it was a help and a pleasure at the very beginning to know that all we saw had been found at Chiusi, for had we not known it, we should have referred a vast variety of objects in this extensive museum to other places. There were black stamped vases like those of Volterra, and which I doubt not really were made at Volterra, seeing- that it lies in the immediate neighbourhood. There were others of black stamped clay of inferior execution, like what we had found at Veii. Here we saw the eye-painted vases of Vulci, in which the principal animal or figure often appears to spring from the eye which is painted beside it. These are supposed to have been only manufactured in Chiusi and Vulci, though they are sometimes found in other parts of the world. Here were the high narrow forms and pale clay of Magna Grecia, though the subjects on them were differently represented ; and here were the forms, subjects, and style of group- ing of Tarquinia, though the enamel was decidedly inferior. Casuccini has vases of immense size and beauty, and many of them are inscribed. I must pay, however, that in the polish of the clay, the brilliancy of the black enamel, and the spirit of the drawings, they do not equal the finest which we saw in the vicinity of Rome; but he has tazze, which in every respect equal what we had elsewhere seen, if they are not superior, and this is the more sin- gula) - , because tazze are a great deal more rare than clusium. 469 vases, and are but seldom obtained unbroken. His bronze and gilt specchj also are not to be exceeded, even by the Prince of Canino's. He had several focolari like the one we saw at the young priest's, both black and red ; and he had one very remark- able jug, large and handsome, and in the Egyptian style, which we could not help observing, the sub- ject being repeated three times upon the bowl of the vase. First appears a man in helmet and cuirass, with a wedge-like beard in the old Egyptian style, and two spears in his hand. This is called a warrior god, though the spears are by no means appropriated to divinity, being frequently found buried with the body of a chief. He is followed by a female called the Mantled Queen of the Dead, though I think with as little reason as the other is called a god, for she looked to me more like the wife of a man before her, whom she is holding by the arm, and who is half naked, bearing in his hand a drawn sword. Then comes the gorgon monster, which represents death itself, the grinning- and hideous devourer of all things. His tongue is out, his teeth displayed, he has tusks like a wild boar, crossing each other at the extremities of his mouth, and he has a pair of wings which open outwards from the breast, as if even in immortal attributes he differed from every other existing or imagined thing. Next to him ap- pears Mercury, the protector and conductor of souls below, with a wedge-like beard and wings, and with a goose at his feet. Then follows the dog-headed Anubis, the constant attendant in Amentis, and the 470 CLUSIUM. guardian of the dead, having- a swan or some such bird at his feet, and a sparrow-hawk with wings expanded above his breast ; representing the dis- tance and difference between the good and evil prin- ciple — the one cleaving to the earth, or sinking lower still — the other rising upwards in the air towards heaven. Round the rim of this vase twines the serpent belonging to the good genius, and again, in various places appears the gorgon mask, as if to represent the constant attacks and mingling of the evil genius in all the passages of our history ; even of him who gives to the grave its terrors, and to death its sting, and from which an opposite power must help to save us. the very heathens knew that fallen man must have a Saviour, and that he could do nothing of any real worth without divine protection and assistance. There are a great many cinerary urns in this col- lection, both in red baked clay, and in black un- baked clay, with lids that lift up, and which have upon them either the faces or the entire figures of the deceased. Of this last kind are five black urns, which have no other ornaments than the figure or effigy which forms the lid, in a kneeling attitude, as if supplicating the gods of the shades in favour of his ashes, or of the spirit which once animated them. This same representation is stiffly engraved upon most of the monumental stones of Egypt. Some of the red vases had holes beneath the figures, as if to allow the heat or vapour of the ashes to escape from the urn, and there were a few CLUSIUM. 471 strange urns, consisting- of the head of the deceased, the size of life, in terra cotta, extremely well ex- ecuted, and filled with his own ashes. Any tomb with a number of these heads placed upon the mor- tuary-shelf must have looked, when opened, like a dungeon in which a number of traitors or patriots had been beheaded. Amongst the bassi relievi we examined a flat stone of travertine, on which was finely sculptured a funeral feast, and the usual triclinium, and near it stood a marble altar with a sacred procession and re- ligious ceremony going on to the lyre and flute. One altar had represented upon it two warriors on horse- back holding shields, and the face of each was painted red — it is in the very oldest style known, and of a kind found only in Chiusi and the Val de Chiana. One fragment of an altar has an inscription upon it, beneath a youth who lies upon the ground veiled. In opposition, as it were, to these marble altars of the highest antiquity in basso relievo, we saw two marble cinerary urns, or monuments, with subjects upon them in alto relievo, and in a style many cen- turies later, when Etruscan subjects began to be re- presented in the Greek and Roman manner. The first portrays the genius of death with his hammer raised, having struck down one victim, and being- prepared to strike down another, whilst he still watches over a combat between two persons near him. When this vase was first brought to light, the figures had over them an inscription in black letters, but they are now almost obliterated and quite illegi- 472 clusium. ble. Upon the lateral faces of the urn are the good and evil genius, each on his own side, keeping a gate into the world of spirits, and anxiously watching to discover by which the newly disembodied soul will pass. We longed to see how it was finally disposed of, but this is not told ; and it is impressive to mark how carefully the Etruscans have in general avoided passing their own judgment upon any one. The deceased probably met his death in battle. The lid of the urn is composed of his effigy, but wants the head. The other monumental urn, the size of a sarcopha- gus, belonged to the family of Apponia ANV8A, a noble house of Chiusi. The lid represents, in old Etruscan fashion, the deceased, a lady, wanting, how- ever, the head ; she is reposing upon double cushions, not embroidered, but finished off with tassels ! She is half sitting, with the left knee a good deal raised, and a quantity of chains and ornaments upon her person. The neck is encircled by a serpent, which re- minded me of a Hindoo neck bangle, and beneath this hangs a necklace like a knight's collar, com- posed of a thick cord, upon which are strung orna- ments, alternately round and pear-shaped, of consi- derable size. From the two front pears proceeds a chain which crosses and terminates in the girdle, but is confined at the crossing by a large round ornament like a bulla or medallion, which, no doubt, contained perfumes, and which is stamped with a rose within a wheel. The hands must have held the patera, but both in this and in the other monu- ment they have been broken off. The subject sculp- clusium. 473 tured upon the front of this monument is the parting of husband and wife at the death of this lady, and the scene appeared to be touching and beautiful. She is bidding her husband adieu, without knowing how to leave him, and behind her appears the genius of death winged and buskined, but not frightful, gently drawing her away. At the oppo- site side of the picture stands the gate of Hades, within which is a genius waiting with opened shears to cut the slender thread of life. Between this genius and the husband is a long line of figures, with inscriptions over them, probably names or titles, or some sentence expressive of lamentation. They represent the nearest relations endeavouring to comfort the bereaved husband, and to reconcile him to his loss. The last figure is a female with some peculiar machine in her hand, the uses and mean- ing of which are unknown ; perhaps, it may here- after be discovered by a scarabeus, as happened in the case of another instrument, the intention of which was still doubtful when we left Italy. The engraving I allude to is upon a cornelian scarabeus found at Chiusi, and represents a man running with a number of vases strung upon a rod, and thrown over his shoulder. Campanariwas told by one of the learned canons, that this string of vases was supposed to represent a musical instru- ment formed of a number of brazen vessels which knocked against each other as he ran, and was used like a peal of bells to announce in the olden time some noted or notable public event. When we 474 clusium. were in the British Museum, we saw this very in- strument brought home from the South Seas, where it is used as an announcement bell ! It stands in the room where there are a number of antique bronzes, and the old public seals of England. The upper end of one of the large rooms at Casuccini's is entirely filled with sarcophagi laid upon ledges as they were found in the tombs. Some few were our old friends the Etruscan lucumones, as large as life or larger, lying in state upon their own coffin lids in stone or terra cotta; but the greater number of these monuments were cinerary urns or chests of large size, some part of which, perhaps the arm, or the crown of the head, or the vase in the hand, lifted out and admitted the ashes. I have reserved to the last mentioning the one which pleased and astonished us the most. In the midst of all these sarcophagi, upon the ground, and in front by itself, like the presiding genius of the place, sat a white-robed figure, of grave and solemn appear- ance, in a curule chair. It made me start when I first saw it, for it looked like life, and as if it were going to rise and demand from us why we intruded there. I am sure, had I seen it in the tomb, so pure and still, yet so dignified and commanding, I could never have drawn it forth. I could not have laid rude hands upon it. It was to my mind the most beautiful and solemn manner of embellishing death that ever entered a mortal's head, and reminded me of those lines, CLUSIUM. 4<0 " Enfant de l'art, j'imite la nature, " Et sans prolonger la vie j'empeche de mourir ; " Je conserve tous vos traits de la maniere la plus sure, " Et je deviens plus jeune a force de vieillir." It was the portrait and figure of the deceased ; but what increased my wonder was to perceive that it was a woman ! The Larthia of Chiusi. She sat in queenly dignity, in her robes of ceremony, and in her chair of state ; and the inscription which told of what she had been, was placed beneath her feet, as if, when she entered the grave, the things of earth were to her all levelled with the dust. The figure was of fetid limestone, in a beautiful style of art, and such was its effect that I could hardly refrain from tears. It has been raised to soothe some bleeding heart, and it is the gem of Chiusi. Indeed, I cannot but believe from the many poetical sculp- tures which we saw in this and other collections, that the Etruscans have had amongst them poets of the highest order — men of master minds, who knew the source of every deep and holy feeling which dwells within the human breast, who could rouse the soul to noble daring or heroic suffering, to triumph in the strains of victory, or to melt at the touch of sorrow ; who could pour balm into the wounded heart, and not only sympathize them- selves, but teach others also how to share and soothe a brother's woe. It is to be hoped, for the sake of Chiusi, that if ever this rich and noble collection conies to be parted with, and brought to sale, it will be purchased by the town whole and entire, 476 clusium. and that no part of it will be dispersed or suffered to wander elsewhere. Signore Paolozzi's museum was once a rival to this, but now everything either has been sold, or stands for sale, and in another year I do not think it will be worth visiting to any one who does not intend to become a purchaser. As we had heard of many of the articles which were once to be seen there, and would not believe our guide as to the quantity which had been disposed of, we insisted upon proceeding to this house, and moreover, when there, we expected to find all that our fancy had pictured previously. We were very civilly admitted, and shown the poor remains of this once splendid collection ; but as our expectations had been un- reasonable, we were proportionably disappointed, and to such a degree, that I really do not know whether some of the notes I have preserved refer to things which we did see, or only to what we ought to have seen in the Museo Paolozzi. The finest things in his house had been purchased by an Englishman, and were laid aside to be packed up the following day, so that we were just in time for a few articles which will never more be exhibited in Italy. lie used to be rich in Canopus vases, bronzes, ami marbles, with alto and basso relievo, and he once had a tazza of native black earth, un- baked but highly polished, on the handles of which was stamped an Egyptian goddess, standing before a pyramid and watching the dead ; and he had several with winged lions, and winged sphynxes, CLUSIUM. 477 which both in Egypt and Etruria were guardians of the sepulchre. Here or elsewhere we saw some red and ornamented water-ducts like what used to be made at Veii, and a silver vase and patera chiselled, in a style which antiquaries say cannot be later than 750 b. c , about the foundation of Rome. Per- haps the most pleasing article was a four-sided marble altar, the scene upon which was the death of a noble matron, in basso relievo, of great merit. The whole of the subject, and the manner of treat- ing it, are strictly national. The dying lady is extended upon a bed, and her son is weeping by her side, whilst many women are mourning round her in different attitudes. At the end of the picture are a man and women seated and busily engaged in some act which was connected with the situation of their expiring friend. All the faces are portraits. The collection of bronze idols used to show the three different styles of the old Egyptico-Etruscan, the Etruscan proper, and the imitation of Egyptian, which is the latest, and the rudest ; and this series would have been particularly interesting to us, as enabling us to classify our own, but it was broken up, so that, nothing could be learned from it without a more intelligent guide that we were fortunate enough to find on the day we saw it. I have said that we visited several other small collections, but though interesting to see, they would only weary in description. There is a place called Sarteano, about six miles from Chiusi, which we should certainly have driven 478 clusium. to, had we heard of it in time, on account of the curious tombs and vases which have been found there. In this part of Italy, more than anywhere else, they appear to have buried in all manner of styles : coffined and uncoffined, with tumulus, laby- rinth built cell, and rocky cavern ; in sarcophagus and cinerary chest, in recuuibent or seated statues, in funereal busts or urns ; and Sarteano is singular even as one of these varieties, for it would appear to have belonged to a tribe or sect who buried in a manner peculiar to themselves. It was acci- dentally discovered in 1825, and consists of a number of tombs all excavated in the tufo, and consisting, for the most part, of one chamber only of moderate size. A few of them contain two or three chambers, and are supported by a pilaster hewn out of the rock to support the roof. They are un- painted, and have no other ornament than the door and a ledge round them for the urns with which they are filled. These urns are called canopus vases, because they resemble in form the Egyptian vases of that name ; only, that instead of containing the heart and viscera merely of the deceased, they contain the whole body reduced to ashes. As the roof of many of these caverns has given way on being forced in, quantities of these urns are found broken. We saw some very strange ones at Casuc- cini's, and there are two particularly well worth attention in the Florence gallery. The one is a vase standing in a curule chair of wood. The peo- ple called it " dura . Larthia Fuisinei Lecnesa. 7. A Lecne Fuisinal. 8. A Lecne Fuisinal Arthal. Of these four arc men — 1. Fel Lecne Piece Larcnal. 2. A Lecne A Althnial. 7. A Lecne Fuisinal. 497 8. A Lecne Fuisinal Arthal. And four are women — 3. Tanchfil Sefctnei Lecnesa. 4. Tanchfil Phrelnei Tebatnal Lecnesa. 5. Lth Titei Lecnesa Cainal. 6. Larthia Fuisinei Lecnesa. These may be thus explained — 1. Fel or Velius Lecne, son of Fisce Lecne, by a lady of the house of Larcne. 2. Arnth Lecne, son of Arnth Lecne, by a lady of the house of Althne. 7. Arnth Lecne, son of a mother of the house of Fuisine. 8. Arnth Lecne, son of a mother of the house of Fuisine, and of a father whose name was Arnth Lecne. 3. Tanchfil, of the family Sefctne, wife of a Lecne. 4. Tanchfil, of the family Phrelne, by a mother of the family of Tebatne, and wife of a Lecne. 5. Larthia, of the family of Tite, wife of a Lecne ; her mother was of the family of Caine. 6. Larthia, of the family of Fuisine, wife of a Lecne. The fashions appear to have changed in different generations as to minute particulars, but that is no more than was to be expected. For instance, the successive Mesdames Lecne sometimes stated their mother's name and sometimes omitted it, which might depend upon its being more or less distin- guished ; and they sometimes placed it immediately after their own family name, as in No. 4, and some- 498 times after their husband's name, as in No. 5. In like manner, Mr. Lecne, No. 7, has treated his father's memory unhandsomely, by omitting- to name him, while he of No. 1 has made it to precede, and he of No. 8 to follow, his matronymic. From these materials we may arrange a tolerably distinct family tree for some generations, and we shall see whether any reader of these pages, in a future edition of Debrett or Burke, will attempt to connect the blood of some modern British race with the purple stream of ancient Etruria. I could point out, if I chose, many derivations scarcely less ridiculous in most of our books of pedigree ! Lecne with father's prenom: and mother's family unknown. Wife unknown. A lady of the ^. L family Larcne. Avntli Lecne. ii;l u'.( m: kisck lahcnal, iNo. 1 ) of the sarcophagi. Probably he died without issue at leasl none are mentioned in the sarcophagi as i> eing descended from him. AHNTI1 LECNE A.RNTHAL ALT1IMAL. (No. 2) A lady of the family Althue. L AT? Till A of the family i FUISINE. (No. it a':\tii LECNE PUIS] NAT,. On account of some unhappy political or private pique, be quarrelled with his father, ami did not add big prenomen to his own. (No. 7 i Ali.vru LECNE FUISl ,\ A I, A Kill A I. probably In herited the bulk of the pate| nal property, and. as in < 1 1 1 1 y bound, took his lather's pri noinen in full, and pul it in tin. place ol i our.* I No. ii.i No issue from these two brothers is mentioned leene is t lie la miiy of Llclnlut, driven awaj from Arezsoin a. u. 454 for tyranny. 499 It is, however, certain that both of these brothers, and their father's first cousin, Fel Lecne Fisce, were married ; for we have three matrons to dispose of in marriage, who were not born in the house of Lecne, but who in their maiden state rejoiced in the names of Sefctne, Phrelne, and Tite ; all, doubtless, ancient and noble families, but whose only right to mingle their dust with the Lecnes was marriage ; as denoted by the termination sa, which changed Ladies Tanaquil Sefctne or No. 3, Tanaquil Phrelne or No. 4, and Larthia Tite or No. 5, into the happy sharers of the wealth and honours of this noble house, making them all Lecnesa. But the reader must fix for himself, and herein I cannot assist him, to which of the three gentlemen in want of wives they are respectively to be united. 500 CONCLUSION. We did not explore any further amongst the sepulchres of Etruria, but we visited many of her still existing towns ; and as gigantic remains of the nation are scattered throughout Central Italy, which may prove very interesting to the inquiring tra- veller, I will add, in conclusion, a few notices of such as are best known, or best worth knowing. The chief cities of old Etruria in Tuscany are, Fiesole, Arezzo, Cortona, Roselle, Sienna, Volterra, Populonia, and Saturnia. Lucca and Pisa are both cities of Etruscan foundation, but I am not aware of any remains in them that can be traced up higher than the Roman time. The Etruscan papal cities arc Bologna or Felsinia, where vases have been found of the old manufacture, and where the museum contains many curiosities; Gubbio, Macerata, Perugia, Assisi, Todi or Tuder, Norcia, CONCLUSION. 501 Terni, Civita Castellana, Kepi, Sutri, Bolsena,Cossa, Albano,Tasculum, and Rome. South of Rome are Capua, (or, as it is used to be called, Volturna,) Nola, Herculaneum, and Pompeii; but it is not my intention to give any description of these last, beyond the remains of Rome, with which I began, and with which 1 shall end. The Florence Gallery in the Palazzo Vecchio claims mention as containing invaluable specimens of Etruscan art ; as it is seen by every stranger, it would not require to be pointed out, only that what happened to myself may very likely happen also to others. My senses long refused to believe the things they saw, and when I walked amongst the Etruscan sculptures and idols, the beautiful marbles, the strange cinerary urns, and, above all, the wonderful bronzes, I did not believe them to be antique, nor yet that they were meant to be shown as such ; I thought that they were copies, or restorations, or imaginations of the antique; and therefore I beg to assure my countrymen, that the chimera, the bronze boy, the statue of Metellus, and all the other won- derful things which they see in these rooms, have not known the human chisel for the last two thou- sand years, and many of them are centuries older. Who, without the assurance of deeply learned per- sons, could believe that the false eyes, the wig vases, and the wooden curule chairs, could boast an anti- quity so remote ? Yet one loses the whole pleasure and benefit of the thing without this previous know- ledge ; the more so that the English are so sus- 502 CONCLUSION. picious of humbug, that they are slower than any other nation in ascertaining and feeling convinced respecting- these truths. FIESOLE — CITY OF THE LEAGUE. One whole day may suffice to view its many remains ; vast portions of the ancient walls may be seen in four different places, chiefly to the north and west. We saw one stone thirteen feet lono- rectan- gular, and forming part of a wall without cement. On the north is an ancient gate, but of Roman res- toration ; such also is the amphitheatre discovered in 1806, though many antiquaries think that it was not erected until the time of Sylla, who turned the Etruscan city into a Roman colony. Some remains are visible of the ancient tower behind the present cathedral, and of the ancient citadel on a height to the west, occupied by the convent of San Francesco. We descended into some caverns hewn in the rock, which had been graves, and out of which a German is said to have extracted two bodies covered with ornaments, and much treasure in gold and bronze. The old cathedral of San Alessandro is only worth visiting to the antiquary. It stands upon a chris- tian church, built in the days of Theodosius, and this again was erected upon the old Etruscan temple, of which sundry niches exist, now used for keeping relics. The columns in the church, sixteen in num- ber, unpolished and of Cipolino marble, once be- longed to tins temple. San Alessandro is the oldest basilica in Tuscany, and was once called St. Peter's CONCLUSION. 503 of Jerusalem. The theatre was excavated in 1819 by the Prussian Baron Friedman Shellerstein, who uncovered twenty steps and six gates, also a podium with three steps, the work of the Romans, but in the oldest manner, and regularly built, the stone being- united by the most tenacious cement. The canons have covered the greater part of this up again, because the surface is useful for vines, and will yield a few scudi per annum. Not far from this are some caves called " Buche della Fate," of built arches, which have supported some large build- ing. In the Borgo Unto is an Etruscan subter- ranean work of uncertain purpose, but very curious. We saw six or nine steps which lead to the shaft of a mine, and this mine terminates in an arch above a spring of water. There are also Etruscan ruins near La Doccia. No one going up to Fiesole should omit seeing the paintings of Beato Angelico, and the terra cotta groups of Lucca della Robbia, which abound in the town and upon the road. AREZZO OR ARRETIUM — CITY OF THE LEAGUE. A beautiful and interesting place, which will occupy a day. Inn, Albergo Reale, very good, The walls are Etruscan, and brick was employed in their construction. The public museum should be visited. This town was the native place of the well- known and powerful families of Cilneus or C.l.ne F.l.ne, and of Maecenas. Here was found the chi- mera of the Florence Gallery, and a bronze almost as interesting of a yoke of oxen ploughing, now in the Collegio Romano in Rome The dresses of the 504 CONCLUSION. men, the oxen, and the plough, all are native Etrus- can. Arezzo was famous for its vases of red stamped clay, of a bright coral colour. Pliny, in his thirty-fifth book, says, they were considered equal to those of Samos. This town is full of the most interesting relics of the middle ages, and pos- sesses some very fine and curious churches, rich in painted glass and ornaments. The ancient emblem of this town is a horse. It was the birth-place of Petrarch. CORTONA — CITY OF THE LEAGUE. Close to the memorable Lake of Thrasymene. This town will also occupy a day. It is the ancient Corytus from which Dardanus is said to have fled, and tradition reports it to have been an old city at the fall of Troy. As we approached it, the place seemed to consist half of rock and half of wall. It lies exactly within its ancient circumference, and two-thirds of the wall are undestroyed, of magni- ficent Etruscan masonry, formed of blocks of marble laid together without cement, having sometimes smaller stones between them, or earth laid in to fill up the interstices. For fully a quarter of a mile the ancient wall is uninterrupted — then comes a portion which is Poman,— then Etruscan, then a modern repair, and then Etruscan again The gates are all in their ancient position, Porta Monta- nina, Porta Colonia, and Porta Santa Maria, having only the names changed. Who shall tell the date of these old stones ? Heaven looks upon Troy, and CONCLUSION. 505 alone knows where her stately palaces have stood, but the whole world may see and admire the traces of Etruria. The one lives in spirit and in song — the wide earth resounds with her history, whilst her existence is treated as a dream ; the other lives in her rocks, her walls, and in her tombs, whilst the fame of her heroes and the names of her artists are alike uncared for and unknown. Cortona was dead as the home of freedom, when Hannibal occupied her ground. From the Piazza, a street runs directly south, and leads to a double gate in the ancient wall, now almost filled up, or built up, and converted into a common sewer. Continuing the circuit, Porta San Domenico and Porta San Agostino are also ancient. The upper part of the wall has been renewed since the thirteenth century, and is called Muro Senesi, because rebuilt by the people of Sienna, the allies of Cortona, in those stormy days when it was destroyed, for liberty's sake, by the republic of Arezzo. A portion of Etruscan masonry of immense stones is to be seen near the Porta Montanina, another below the castle, and another close to the spedale or hos- pital, and the foundation of the Palazzo Laparelli. The museums, which must be visited, are the Museo Corazzi, and the Museo Venuti — besides the pub- lic museum of the academy. About half a mile from the Porta San Agostino, without the town, is a curious Etruscan building, called the Grotta of Pittagora ; it seems to have been an ancient se- pulchre, ]and in the same direction there is ano- z 506 CONCLUSION. another most extraordinary building, which is called Joseph's Well — Pozzo di Giuseppe. We were not told of it until after we had left Cortona in 1839, but it had been lately discovered, and was very much injured by the man in whose ground it lay. It was described to me as a subterranean temple. Near this town was found the famous terminal altar, with a prayer upon it to Vulcan or Sethlans, the account of which I first received from an Italian. It is ugly but unique, and upon that account invalu- able. The top of it is a circular stone, something- like a millstone, with these words in Etruscan cha- racters, divided into six lines : -). Arses, or 4. Avertas, or, 1. Vulcan, 4. Vvrses, 5. Ignem, 2. reducing to ashes, 1. Sethlans, 1. Vulcan, 3. be appeased, 2. Tcphral, 2. in cinerem redigensque, 4. avert, C>. Apetermni, 6. apud terminum, 5. the fire, 3. Piscstestu. 3. Piatus esto. <>'. from the boundaries. Along with this lay several other pieces of stone, some square, which have formed the pedestal, and others triangular, with bases slightly rounded, so that six of them laid together formed a circle ex- actly the size of the inscribed stone. These were placed one upon another, and formed a short column surmounted by the inscription. This altar was in the possession of the late Bishop of Lichfield, and was exposed at his sale in March 1840. The bishop was justly proud of it, and used to say, with his pleasant wit, " This is my Etruscan Fire Insurance Policy." We did not bid for it, because we thought 8 CONCLUSION. 507 that any sum which it was in our power to offer would be deemed insufficient for such a purchase. It was bought by the British Museum for £6. 6s. ! ! ! about the value of the carriage from Cortona to England. Cortona contains some first-rate pictures, and gave its name to the famous painter, Pietro da Cortona. Persons visiting the cathedral should observe the large sarcophagus, said to be that of the unfortunate consul Flaminius. Many of the churches are worth examination. ROSELLE A CITY OF THE LEAGUE. Here is little to be seen but walls ; the remains of which, however, are of very considerable extent. They are built without cement, but the stones are not all rectangular. On the north-east is a square of ruined wall surrounded by double lines, and supposed to be the ancient fortress. Towards the south are some curious vaults ; considerably to the west of this, and about the ascent of the hill, are some remains of dwellings. Still more to the west, and between the path and the walk, are caverns in travertine, and near the wall upon the north are more caverns, excavated in a very hard stone. Roselle is melancholy and interesting. SIENNA. A town so full of works of art, that it will occupy two or three days. The Etruscan antiquities consist of some portions of wall near the church of San z 2 508 CONCLUSION. Antonio, and of very interesting subterranean caverns and grottos near the town. VOLTERRA CITY OF THE LEAGUE. This is generally held to be the most interesting of all the Etruscan cities. The Italians say, that he who has not seen Volterra knows nothing of Etruria. The inn is very indifferent, and the place will occupy a long day, the labours of which we must have spread over two or three days, had we at- tempted the adventure in June. Its remains are most imposing, and its public museum is the richest in Italy, but to see it thoroughly, some little interest, is necessary with the Director. The walls of Vol- terra are Etruscan, and do not now cover above half its ancient extent. The gate called " Porta all Arco" is one of the wonders of the world. Its date cannot be less than six hundred years before Christ — it may be, and probably is, many centuries older, and it is a perfectly circular arch, formed of immense blocks of stone without cement. The keystone, and the stones above each side-pillar, are enormous 11 Kisses which have been cut into heads, probably of the protecting deity of Volterra ; and though no features now remain, an Englishman told me, that no wonder he had ever seen had made such an impression upon him as that centre stone. His expression was, " I did not know, until I saw it, CONCLUSION. 509 that the dumb stone could speak." I have heard Italians say nearly the same thing. Tradition says that it was built by Tarchon 1186 B.C., and as the arch was certainly known in Egypt three centuries earlier, there is nothing incredible in the tale, for the Etruscans were in constant communication with Egypt from the earliest to the latest period of their national existence. The Porta del Sarno at Pompeii, also Etruscan, and the double gate at Paestum, are faint resemblances of it, and in both the groove for the portcullis is still visible. This gate is represented upon a fine basso-relievo in the town museum, the subject of which is the death of Capaneus, when, instead of the soul passing through the gates of Hades, it is made to go through the gate of Volterra, the form of which was, no doubt, more familiar to the artist. The fortress stands within the ground of the ancient citadel, and the town preserves remains of baths, aqueducts, mineral wells, amphitheatre, piscina, cloaca, ancient gates, and public and private sepulchres. Of these last, those in which the chief treasures were found are now covered in like the mounds of Caere, for the sake of the vines which are placed over them. The best spe- cimens of the walls are to be seen at the church of the Menseri, and at Santa Chiara. The cathedral of Volterra was restored by Nicolo Pisano, and is a very fine structure. The town contains thirteen churches and eight convents, of which I have a list, and may contain more. It was famous in old times for its manufacture of black stamped vases un- 510 CONCLUSION. burned, and which take a high polish. Those of any excellence are rare, and very beautiful. Several coins have been found, which give the old name of the city," Felathri:" and a number of articles in silver, vases, tazze, and ornaments, and one mosaic, which had adorned the baths. It was also famous for its sculptures in native alabaster and stone. The monument of'R. L. Cecina has already been given as a specimen of excellence in this depart- ment, though it was not executed till art was on the decline, as the inscription upon it, in Latin as well as Etruscan, testifies. This tomb is in the museum at Paris. Many at Volterra are consi- dered to be much finer, and several of them in this style have the garments coloured and gilt. At Campo Nero was found the famous tomb of the Cecinas. The emblem of Volterra is a vulture. The works of the grand duke for the manufac- ture of borax, near Volterra, are well worth all the trouble requisite to visit them. POPULONIA — CITY OF THE LEAGUE. Populonia was a colony of Volterra upon the Mediterranean, or, as that part of it was then called, the Tyrrhene Sea. About one-half of the ancient Etruscan wall remains, and it is best seen in the spot called Massi. There are other ruins, but they are Roman, and I question if the place is interesting to any but an antiquary. A wall with six arches is the fragment of some Roman building, and close to the tower of Baratti is some Roman CONCLUSION. 511 pavement. A mile further north is a perennial fount, once, no doubt, a place of baths, and near this, a little more inland, are the ruins of the docks. All the building that remains is Roman restoration. SATURNIA CITY OF THE LEAGUE. Saturnia is well worth visiting: and all its walls remain entire, composed of polygonal blocks of stone laid together without cement. This is not, however, a proof of its antiquity, as it and Cossa are supposed to be the youngest of the Etruscan cities, and are the only two between the Arno and the Tiber not built in regular masses. Saturnia preserves its ancient name, the oldest, perhaps, of all names in Italy, and has some very curious sepulchres. Parts of the wall were restored a. r. 569, when it was a Roman colony. PAPAL CITIES — GUBBIO. Gubbio, of which Ikuvium was the ancient name, is a beautiful place, deserving to be included in every Etruscan tour. It was much favoured by Rome after it lost its liberty, It is an Umbrian city of untold antiquity, and was conquered by the Etruscans about one thousand years before the Christian era. Here are kept the famous Eugubean tables found at La Scheggia, a little to the north of the town, in a. d. 1444, close to the site of the ancient temple of Jove Apenninus. They are tables 512 CONCLUSION. of brass or bronze engraved on each side, with a long liturgy, and with the names of places and deities, and references to local manners and cus- toms, which but for them would have been unknown. These tables were seven in number: six only are preserved. One was sent to Venice to be trans- lated, before the conquest by Napoleon, and has never been recovered. This table, and another unique and inestimable gem which was in the Venetian Library, viz. the old Italian MSS. of the four gospels,* sometimes called the " Italian Codices," are probably in some private collections. According to Sir William Gell, eight of the inscrip- tions upon tbe Eugubean tables are in Umbrian or Pelasgic, commonly called Etruscan, and four in Latin characters. In the latter, which seem to be like the other tables as to their contents, but some- what modernized, the letter o appears instead of v, and sometimes instead of /. The g is also intro- duced, which was not used, as it is imagined, till about the year 400 B. c. Those in the Umbrian character may be three hundred years older, that is, of the time of Romulus and Nunia. The lines run from right to left chiefly, but in one of the tables from right to left and left to right alternately, in the manner called Boustrophedon. A slight alteration had taken place in the language when the tables in the Roman letters were written. The Archaeological Professors in Rome told methat • Tii,- Gist of all translations from the Greeks, and the originals quoted by the Latin fathers prior to Jerome. CONCLUSION. 513 the language here called Umbrian was the Oscan, not identical with the Etruscan, but as near to it as Swedish is to German, and Portuguese to Spanish — perhaps as near as modern English is to that of Henry II. or nearer. The third table is an edict for the feast called " Plenarum urnarium." One of the oldest Latin tables is a prayer for the agricul- ture of Ikuvium, often written IIOVVINA ! or thus, ANIVVOII. The Latin of these tables was not understood in the days of Cicero or Livy. The reader is probably aware, that among all the nations of eastern origin, the ancient mode of writing public acts was upon tables of stone or brass, and that such writings are held sacred, as laws or as records of history. Specimens may be seen in the Capitol of the consular times, which look as fresh and as sharply engraved as if they had not been more than a twelvemonth out of the workman's hands. The cathedral at Gubbio, with one or two churches, containing excellent pictures, the duke's palace, the town-house, and the public library, are particularly well worth notice. MACERATA. Not itself an Etruscan town, yet proper to be mentioned, because in its immediate vicinity lies the theatre of Pylargone, of which I was assured that the architecture is Etruscan. This theatre is scarcely to be called a ruin. It is so perfect that the very steps remain which conducted from the orchestra to the stage. A model of it is in 514 CONCLUSION. the possession of the Archaeological Society at Rome. PERUGIA — CITY OF THE LEAGUE. A splendid situation, and the Hotel de l'Europe an excellent inn. It will take four days of hard work to see this city, abounding as it does in Etrus- can, Roman, and Italian works of art, of singular merit and rarity. It appears to have been the last of the leagued towns which bowed its neck to Rome ; for, though tributary before the Social War, it was continually throwing off the yoke and re- asserting its ancient rights ; and it did not become a Roman colony until burnt in the cruel wars of Sylla, about a. r. 670, 80 years b. c. The ancient emblem of the town was a stork. Its most illustrious families in the days of old were those of Volumnius,* Pomponius, and Metellus. Some portions of the wall and one fine gate are Etruscan. The Porta San Pietro is an Etruscan gate, but modernized and repaired. Those who wish to see the antiquities of this place in perfection should, if possible, procure an intro- duction to the learned Vermiglioli, as courteous as he is profound. In the rich museum, the most re- markable object is some fine plates of silver and bronze, with intagli and basso relievo, adorned all over with arabesques and small figures of animals, beautifully engraved by the hand of a first-rate artist. In some parts the dresses of the figures are in gold, and the style is the earliest Egyptian. * The Hcpulclirc of this distinguished family is veil worth visiting, and stands in the midst of the ancient necropolis. CONCLUSION. 515 These plates, along with a quantity of figures and monumental furniture, were all found in one cave near Perugia, which appeared to have been a place of concealment. It is supposed that they all belonged to a temple, and were hidden by the priests during some of their many times of plunder and distress. The consequence is, that sacred furniture of different ages was found laid up together. These silver plates have covered a votive car, the wood of which has perished, and which was probably presented by some chief eminently successful in battle. When this treasure was found, the proprietors caring- nothing about ancient art, and very anxious to make the most of it, some of the silver was im- mediately sent to be melted down ; the rest fell for- tunately into the hands of Mr. Dodwell, Mr. Millingen, and the museum of Perugia. Dodwell's share is to be seen in his museum at Rome, and is for sale. Millingen's was bought by the late K. Payne Knight, and was presented by him to the British Museum. These latter plates represent, the one a chariot with two horses and a charioteer, driving over a man who has fallen, and who has doubled himself together upon the ground, an atti- tude common in Perugian sculptures. The clothing and harness are silver gilt, or rather gold laminse fastened upon the silver with very small nails. Another has two figures on horseback richly dressed in gold and silver. Another is a race with one of the competitors thrown ; and another a combat of lions over a pig— with the fragment of a griffin. 516 CONCLUSION. The different articles found in this repository re- minded us much of the tomb at Crere. They pre- sented similar specimens of an extended intercourse with polished nations at different periods, or much varying in the progress of art. Here were the styles of Egypt and Egina, Phoenicia and Etruria, through the lapse of many generations. Near Perugia is a building called " Torre di San Marino,"' in which there are several fine Etruscan circular arches made of large blocks of travertine, sixteen feet long, ten feet broad, and ten feet high. On the left side is an Etruscan inscription in large letters. Within the town it is hardly necessary to particularize, as objects that must be seen, the Castle ; the Legate's palace ; the Palazzo Antinore ; all the pictures everywhere, for they are excellent; the celebrated Cambio, which used to be the Ex- change, painted by Pietro Perugino, and his illus- trious scholar Raphael ; the chapel next to it, equally well worth seeing, painted by Perugino, and his excellent scholar Gian Niccolo Vanucci, and opened for use only once a year; the cathedral, which, though ugly outside, has some fine carved wood within, some painted glass, and a deposition from the cross, worthy of all praise, by Barrocio ; the church of San Domenico with rich painted glass, near to which is an oratory with a Madonna of Peru- gino's, for which the king of Bavaria offered ten thousand scudi : and the church of San Pietro, one of the richest I ever visited in beautiful pictures by Pinturecchio, Sasso Ferrata, Caravaggio, Guercino, CONCLUSION. 517 Guido, Perugino, of whom there is here a charming Madonna della Seggiola, and Raphael in his first manner both in painting and in carving. This church stands upon the site of the ancient temple of Venus and Mars; the columns in it, of marble and granite, twenty-two in number, came from that temple. We saw six churches with much fatigue, but I would gladly go to every one of them again. The Porta Augusta is a very fine piece of architecture, attributed to Augustus, and is composed of large blocks of marble without cement. Antiquarians say that it is an Etruscan gate restored by Augustus, which seems probable. ASSISI. A town beautifully situated and very interesting ; the native place of Saint Franceso of Assisi, and of Metastasio. Some remarkable tables with Etruscan inscriptions have been found here. It will occupy half a day, with a good guide. The church of Santa Maria Filipini was the temple of Minerva. There are many antiquities of which my notes are too brief to give any adequate description. Travellers should see the church of S. Francesco, and the monastery of Santa Clara, and they should visit at the bottom of the hill the magnificent con- vent of Santa Maria dei Angeli, which contains many fine paintings, and particularly one lately presented by Overbeck, perhaps the artist of highest genius now in Italy. 518 CONCLUSION. TODI AND NORCIA. These places we were unable to visit.* In an ex- cavation at the former, the bronze warrior of the Vatican was found, and a great deal of finely built wall remains. At the latter there are lines of tombs, which once had sculptured fronts ; a specimen of which I subjoin from Sir W. Gell's work on the vicinity of Rome. All these fronts are now destroyed, and the sepul- chres are not nearly so well worth seeing as those of Castel d'Asso ; but Norcia was described to me as " a very curious and interesting Etruscan city, which every one ought to see." TERNI. Three miles from Terni, on the site of the ancient Interamna, is a mass of Etruscan wall, curious to * Since writing the above, I have seen the drawings of two remark- able tombs at Norcia, with temple fronts, and sculpture, which appear to mo more striking than anything even nt Tanpiinia, and so different from all other parts of Ktrnria, as it now exists, that no traveller ihould neglect to visit them. They are the only monuments remain- ing of the architecture of ancient Italy. CONCLUSION. 519 the antiquary. The little town of Terni contains the ruins of an amphitheatre in the bishop's garden, and of a temple in the church of San Salvadore, called the temple of the sun. In the cellars of the college are the remains of a temple of Hercules, and at the Casa Spada ruins of ancient baths. Terni has an excellent inn, and, with its waterfalls and ruins, occupies a day. FALERIA, NEPI, AND SUTRI. Faleria, the ancient name of Civita Castellana, is a most romantic and picturesque place. The inn here is not very good. The place will occupy a day, being full of antiquities, and probably coeval with Agylla. The valley Dei Tre Cammini is full of Etruscan tombs, and there are a great many also near the Ponte del Terrano. There is a portion of old wall beneath the posthouse, and good guides may be got here ; but by far the best guide that I know to Civita Castellana, Nepi, Sutri, Albano, and Tusculum, is the excellent work of Sir W. Gell. At Nepi there is a fine specimen of Etruscan wall, and there have been many tombs opened and ran- sacked. We twice spent some hours there, but the inn is very comfortless. Sutri possesses many remains of Etruscan walls, many cavern sepulchres, particularly one with a pillar in it, called " the Grotta of Orlando," and an amphitheatre hewn out of the tufo rock, In the valley near the Porta Romana, at a little distance 520 CONCLUSION. from the town, is a ridge of rocks upon the right hand, hollowed into sepulchres which have once been fronted with stone and ornamented ; but all these ornaments have been destroyed, and little now is to be seen except the caverns. Sutri has not, however, been much explored. The credulous inhabitants believe that it was the birth-place of Orlando, and of Pontius Pilate. BOLSENA CITY OF THE LEAGUE. Bolsena, near the ancient Volsinium or Felsinia, stands upon a lake of the same name, having sepul- chres, caverns, and tumuli on three sides of it. It is a ruinous old town. Over the gate, and on the out- side of it, is a large basso-relievo, which was found close to the town, representing the sacrifice of oxen to Ceres. Near the church are various small remains of inscriptions, columns, busts, and rude bassi-relicvi. The inn is very bad, much to the disadvantage of this beautiful and once luxurious place, from which two thousand bronze statues were carried off to Rome, b. c. 265. In modern times, the only one found here, I believe, has been the statue of Aulus Metellus, the son of Velius, born of Vesia, now in the Florence Gallery, and called the Arringatore ; the inscription is written upon the border of his robe. Several black and red vases were found here in 1817. Here are the remains of a temple supposed to be that of the celebrated goddess Nor- tia, and without the town are the remains of an CONCLUSION. 521 amphitheatre. Bolsena was the native place of Ser- vius Tullius, or of his parents. COSSA — CITY OF THE LEAGUE. On the sea-coast. This port of Vulci retains the best preserved military works in Etruria. The walls are quite perfect, consisting of polygonal blocks of stone, and six of the old towers remain. Three double gates are distinct, and two paved roads, viz. the one which led towards Rome, and the other which went northwards, and joined the Via Aurelia. The place is now called Ansidonia. A Roman colony was settled here a. it. 489, nine years before the first Punic war, and hence all the remains of old buildings within the walls are Roman, excepting three sides of a building of the middle ages on the south-east, and near the wall. There are many of those ruins called " Conserva- tory d'Acqua," which an antiquary told me was a convenient name for every piece of masonry of which they had not otherwise ascertained the purpose. Nearly in the centre are the remains of a broken arch, and beyond the walls is a co- lumbarium. It has a curious effect to see all the houses of a city swept away, effaced as a rubbed out drawing, and its boundaries standing entire, as if waiting for it to rise up again. We saw something of this sort on a large scale, but not perfect, at Peestum. 522 CONCLUSION. ALBANO. Albano is full of antiquities; the greater num- ber of which are too well known to need description. It has two good inns and a museum, public gardens, and beautiful drives and walks. The -Etruscan re- mains are the tomb of Aruns. The temple of Jupiter Latialis on the summit of Monte Cavo, and the truly wonderful Emissario upon the lake, which, though made with Roman money, is of Etruscan architecture. No building in Italy was the work of Roman artists before the temple of Cere, in the sixth century of the Republic. TUSCULUM. This was an Etruscan city, though I believe that all its present remains, except one curious well, are Roman. ROME, THE PUPIL OF ETRURIA. The Etruscan remains in Rome are a portion of the Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus, founded by Tar- qnin the First about a. r. 170, and completed by Tarquin the Proud a. r. 242, more than 500 years before the Christian era. It is close to the Pa- lazzo CafFarelli, and very near the rooms of the Archaeological Society. The Cloaca Maxima, and the Circus Maximus, both the work of the same great prince. The Mamertine Prisons, commenced by Tullius Hostilius, and finished by Ancus Martius about a. r. 130, restored by order of the Republic CONCLUSION. 523 during the consulship of V. Rufinus and M. Cocceius Nerva. The Agger of Servius Tullius in the gardens of the Villa Negroni : — The Wall of Servius Tullius, now much decayed, under the church of Santa Balbina, on the right hand of the exit at the Porta Capena. This wall is of tufo, and constructed with alternate layers of square and oblong stones, the one row presenting their sides, and the next row their ends. A Portion of the same wall in the gardens of Sallust, built about the year of Rome 200. The Tomb of the Scipios discovered in a. d. 1780. It was excavated in Peperino, and was used in a. r. 456, after the Social War. The architecture of this tomb is Etruscan, though the manner of burying in it was much simpler than the rites and ornaments of Etruria. Beside these, there are Etruscan walls of unknown antiquity beneath the Coliseum ; and in addition to all these, the latest of the Etruscan works, the Tabularium, overlooking the Forum, the building of which was not completed until a. r. 674, and" which was still excavating in 1839. Only one Etruscan Bronze remains, and that is the famous Wolf of the Capitol, of which we have his- torical mention in a. r. 457, nearly 300 years b. c, and which was the work of Etruscan artists. It was found many years since built up in the old walls of the temple of Romulus. 524 CONCLUSION. For the benefit of those who wish to read the inscriptions, I subjoin an Etruscan alphabet. The words are always read from right to left, and the short vowels must be supplied. A \Afif\ B a C o >n E M3 F $ G>©6Bq8 II B^Gq I 1 S V K X)\ L >! A>/ M ~I\M>71 N 1 H P n 1 i R qail^ S ^mh T fy-f TJ y J>NAOI/i Appendix F. — Page 239. TARQUINIA CORNETO. Inscriptions upon the marbles which are now fixed upon the staircase in the Palazzo Bruschi, and which were found by Cav. Manzi and Signor Foscati, in the baths of Tarquinia, December 1829. i. THERMAS MVNICIP \ALE PATER EIVS COS. AvlGVR S TESTAMENTO. F \E CI S QVAS P. TVLL1VS. ESTERTIO. TER. ET. TR. T ADIECTA. PECVNIA AMPLIATO Q,v\JE OPE\UE PERFECIT II. P. TVLLIO, VARRONIS FIL. STEL. VARRONI COSS, AVGVRI, PROCOS. PROVINC. 534 APPENDICES. AFRICAE. LEG. AVG. PRO-PR. MOESI.E SVPERIORIS CVRAT. ALVEI TIBERIS ET R1PARVM. ET CLOACARVM VRBIS. PRAEF. AERARII SATVRNI PROC. PROV. BAETICAE. VLTERIORIS. HISPA NIAE LEG. LEG. XII. FVLM1NATR. ET VI. VICTRICIS P. F. PRAETORI AEDILI. CERIAL1. QVAESTORI VRB. TRIBVNO. MILIT. LEG. XVI. ET XVIRO STILIBVS. 1NDICANDI PRAETORI, iETRVRIAE QVIN QVENNALI, TARQV1NIS P. TVLLIVS CALL1STIO. POSVIT III. Q. PETRONIO. MELIORI. VIRO. COS. CVR. R. P. TARQVINIENS. ET. GRAVISCANORVM. PRAEF ISC. FRVM. DANDI. LEGAT. LEG. XXX. VLPIAE. CVRATOR. PVRGENS. ET. CERETANORVM. LEO. LEG. VIII. AVG. PRiET. TRIB PLEB. KAND1D. QVAEST. PROV. NAR. BON. QVAEST. SODAL1. AVG. CLAVDIALI. SEX. VIR. TVRM PR. TRIB. LATIEL. LEG. PR. M I N . XVIRO. ST1LIT. IVDICANO. ORDO. El. CIVES. TARQV1 NIENSIVM. PATRONO. OP TIMO. (iVOD. REM. P. FOVE APPENDICES. 535 RIT. ET. THERMAS. RESTI TVERIT. IV. L. DASVMIO. P. F. STEL. TVLLIO. TVSCO. COS. AVGVRI. SODALI. COMITI. AVG. HADR1A NALI. SODALI. ANTONI NIANO. CVRAT. OPERVM. PVBLICORVM. LEGATO. PR. PROVINC1ARVM. GERMANIAE. SVPERIOR. ET. PANNONIAE. SVPERIOR. PRAEFECTO. AER. SATVRNI. PRAETORI. TRIBVNO. PLEB. LEG. PROV1NC. AFRICAE. QVAEST. IMP. ANTONINI. AVG. PII. TRIB. MIL. LEG. IIII. FLAVIAE. TRIVMVIRO. A. A. A. F. F v P. TVLLIVS. CALISTIO. POSVIT. DOMITIAE. ELPIDI. C. F. CON1VGI. Q. PETRO. NI. MELIORIS. VIRI. COS. ORDO. ET. CIVES. TARQVIN1ENSIVM. PATRONAE. DIG NISS1MAE. 536 APPENDICES. In the fourth vol. of the Archaeological Transac- tions, p. 177, Monsieur Duxeau tie Lamalle makes upon these tables the following observations : " From the information conveyed to us by these tables, it results, " 1st. That all the institutions and dignities of Augustus were continued to the time of Nerva and Commodus. " 2d. The four consulates here enumerated reveal to us a difference of magistracies, and teach us some- thing before not known of the nature and import- ance of their functions. " 3d. Th eyspeak of revolts, insurrections, and inroads, which find no other place in history. " 4th. They teach us also that the foreign conquests of Trajan were the cause of that weakness of the empire which began to show itself on the acces- sion of Adrian, and gradually increased until its fall. " 5th. These marbles confirm the progressive de- crease of the free population, and the products of Italy, by the importance they give to the office of Prefectus Annonas. " 6th. They show us that the rank of Curator, in four of the towns of Etruria, was equal to the rank of Prefectus Annonse, a fact before this unknown. " 7th. They show us that the mode of jurisdiction and the composition of the Roman tribunals was very vicious, and contributed to the decadence and depopulation of the empire." Monsieur do Lamalle gives ;ilso the Latin of APPENDICES. 537 these tables fully written out, but it seems to me useless to add anything further for English travel- lers, than that the last line but one of the fourth table, a. a. a. f. f. means auro. argento. aere. Flando. Feriundo. Appendix G. — Page 305. VULCI. I cannot think that I have done justice to Vulci, or to the Remains of Etruria, without mentioning that among the most beautiful objects in gold, of Etruscan art, which I have ever seen, were some of those lately in the possession of Mr. Herz, 11, Great Marl- borough-street, London, and that he affirmed the greater part of them to have come from the sepulchres of Vulci. When I saw them I regretted much that I could not compare them with the valuable collec- tion of Lucien Bonaparte, which indelicacy of work- manship and high style of art they do not exceed. Very near Vulci lies the Ponte Sodo, whence the Prince of Canino has extracted a quantity of valu- able gold ornaments, particularly a thick gold chain, ending in a ram's head, and a frontlet, con- sisting of a larger and smaller round gold plate, like that found upon the head of the Larthia at Agylla Csere. When told in Rome that these ornaments had 538 APPENDICES. been found in a tomb at the Ponte Sodo, I supposed that they had come from Veii, because I did not know of any other Ponte Sodo than the one there : but I have since been made aware of my mis- take. The house of Prince Musignano has upon it lions and griffins, which were taken from a remarkable tomb in his grounds, called the Cucu- mella. At Vulci, a painted grotta has been found be- neath the old walls, and near to one of the ancient highways, but we did not hear of it until we were far away from the spot, and it is probably now inaccessible. It was discovered by Signor Campanari, a. d. 1833, and consisted of a single chamber, supported by a pillar in the centre, the capital of which we saw in the Campanari garden at Toscanella. Two heads are sculptured upon it, which he named Helen and Paris. The roof of the grotta was vaulted, and supported by a beam in the midst, but not painted. Above the door was a paint- ing of the (Jciiius of Death, with a large mouth and club. On the right hand were three figures, — one a bearded man clothed in a blue mantle, the second a young girl in a tunic and red mantle, and the third a naked figure standing behind, and sup- posed to be Charon. There were other figures, but the stucco fell upon the grotta being opened. On APPENDICES. 539 the left hand was a man in a red pallium teaching a youth in a red mantle and short tunic, and held on the other side by a woman, also in a red mantle and tunic, wearing upon her head the tutulus, the an- cient Etruscan sign of matronly rank. Near to her stood a girl who appeared to be her daughter, and next to the girl a man in a blue mantle. Then came a large hole which had been made in ancient times to get through this sepulchre into others close to it, and, as is supposed, all unpainted. Beyond the hole stood another girl and another matron. Opposite the entrance sat Pluto, with a very noble head and countenance, naked from the waist upwards, seated in a curule chair, and having the loner part of the form enveloped in a red pal- lium. His right hand rested on the seat, his left bore the sceptre terminating in a lotus flower. His beard and hair were gray, his face wore a fierce ex- pression, and he had a golden crown upon his head. Before him stood Proserpine, in a tunic, a blue man- tle, and a white veil, which she was raising with her right hand, as if revealing a glimpse at the myste- ries of futurity. She had a bracelet upon her right arm, and a large ornament upon her head. Near Pluto, (or Sethlans, as he was most likely called by those who painted him,) stood three figures, supposed to represent the three infernal judges : Minos with a dark red-coloured mantle, iEacus in blue, and Rhadamanthus in light red, leaning upon a staff. Upon the fourth wall were a number of figures, 540 APPENDICES. the most distinct and prominent of which were a boy and girl gracefully dressed, passing with the others onwards to something unseen. Campanari thinks that all the figures in this grotta (not allego- rical) were portraits, and that the family buried herewererepresented in the first instance as passingto judgment, and in the second, as passing from it — jus- tified, and pressing onwards to the heaven of heavens. He says that all the paintings were the size of life, done upon frescos, and superior in execution to any at Tarquinia. He wished to have them removed in order that they might be preserved in some safer asylum from damp and destruction ; but in endeavouring to execute his purpose, the whole fell to pieces upon the floor, and was utterly destroyed. I confess it would have been a satisfaction to me to have seen the cave in which those things had existed, and to have pene- trated through to the line of sepulchres with which it was connected, but the Italians do not seem to have this feeling nationally, nor to estimate their antiquities in any other manner than as to how many scudi each is likely to sell for. There were several urns in the grotta on the left-hand side of the door, some of them containing burnt bones, but Campanari gives no description of them, and I do not know what has become of them. APPENDICES. .541 Appendix H. — Page 423. CASTEL d'asSO. In the annals of the Archaeological Society, I have found seven inscriptions : J^ 13 V\ I Ineisl, •■•OVMA>3Ecasuth, ...*3*I3> 440VUA Arthnal ceises, 3IM131 : 4M3MI VMA>3 Ecasu inesl Tetnie, <31V\| **3"\AVl\QV urinatess luies, V\\OV ** ^vl "*' uth in Is . . . 0V^A>3 Ecasuth. THE END. LONDON : PRINTED EV G. J. PALMER, SAVOY STREET, STRAND. 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