(light piano music)
- [Voiceover] We're in the Etruscan Museum in Rome
and we're looking at one of the most important objects
ever found in an Etruscan tomb
and there were a lot of Etruscan tombs.
- [Voiceover] Well this is the primary way
we know about Etruscan culture.
They left us no literature, no history.
But we have a lot of their artwork,
which is found in tombs
and a lot of those have inscriptions.
- [Voiceover] This is the Sarcophagus of the Spouses.
There were two well known versions of this:
One is in Paris at the Louvre
and the other is here in Rome.
So this is a large ceramic container
and the two figures are essentially
a lid that can be lifted off.
- [Voiceover] The Etruscans occupied the area of
Northern Italy and it's an interesting time
because at the same moment there are Romans
who are occupying the city of Rome
and south of that there are Greek colonies.
- [Voiceover] But the Romans were not yet
Rome as we know it.
They were just beginning
and in fact they were ruled by Etruscan kings.
- [Voiceover] Right and it wasn't until 509
that the Romans ousted the last Etruscan king.
And this dates from slightly earlier than that.
- [Voiceover] So let's look at the couple.
- [Voiceover] Well they're incredibly life-like
and this is surprising because when we think
about ancient Greek sculpture from this time,
we might think of the Kouros figures,
which are very stiff,
where the limbs are very close to the body.
And here immediately we notice the figures
moving out into our space, extending their arms.
- [Voiceover] The figures represented
in archaic Greek art are also separate.
You think of the male Kouros figure or the female Kore.
Those are free-standing figures that stand alone
and here we have two figures that embrace,
that lie next to each other,
where there's a tremendous sense of intimacy.
- [Voiceover] In ancient Greek culture there are no
monumental tombs like the ones we find in Etruscan culture.
There are similarities and there are differences
between these two cultures that are
closely communicating with one another.
- [Voiceover] One of the most important differences
is that this is made in terracotta, that is this is clay.
Whereas the Greeks preferred mostly marble,
but increasingly would work in bronze.
This would've been modeled as a complete object
and then most likely when it had begun to dry,
what potters call the leather-hard stage,
it's likely that the artist would've burnished the object,
that is smoothed it with a hard surface
to create a glossy sheen.
Then it would have been cut in half,
likely because the object is so large,
it might not have fit in the kiln.
And so this would've been fired in four pieces:
both the lid and the base, on both sides.
- [Voiceover] So we mention the way
that the figures' arms are outstretched
and the way the figures move into our space.
Likely they were holding objects relating to a banquet.
We see banqueting scenes often on the walls
in frescoes in Etruscan tombs.
- [Voiceover] Or as some art historians have conjectured,
it's possible the women was holding a perfume bottle.
It's also possible that one of the figures
was holding a pomegranate, which is a symbol of the eternal.
- [Voiceover] There is a sense of sociability here
and it might remind us of scenes we see on Greek pottery,
of figures at a banquet, the symposium.
And when we see that in Greek pottery,
those are male figures.
But here we have a couple:
He's got his arm around her.
But we're not supposed to see these as portraits;
this is not the way this man and women look.
But instead, like the archaic smile,
we have features that are stylized.
- [Voiceover] These are clearly not rendered
from the observation of a model.
So we have found literally thousands of Etruscan tombs.
- [Voiceover] This was found in a necropolis,
that is a cemetery called Banditaccia, at Cerveteri.
- [Voiceover] This was one of the
principle cities of the Etruscans.
- [Voiceover] It was found,
broken into 400 pieces, and reassembled.
And you can see when you look closely
which pieces have been filled in by conservators
and which pieces are original to the sculpture.
- [Voiceover] And if you look closely
you can see the discs of the pupils are hollows
and it's likely that something was originally inlaid there.
It's really quite extraordinary how lucky
we are to have such an intact object.
(light piano music)