TERRACOTTA CINERARY URN, C. 300 BCE. THE BRITISH MUSEUM This terracotta urn has the form of a vase with a conical lid, and the summit of the lid has a pinnacle in the shape of a small vase serving as a handle. White paint, worn away in places, covers the surface. The only decoration is four painted and gilded bull-griffin protomes at the shoulder of the urn. In C5 BCE Athens this urn would be unthinkable, due to the strong Achæmenid Persian influence visible in the griffins, but the Athens of the end of the C4 BCE was quite different. It had lost even nominal independence and after the battle of Lamia in 323 was subject to Macedonian rule, but the empire of Alexander and his successors brought some cultural cross-pollination. The ashes and bone fragments of 2 people were found inside.

#SarcophagusSaturday today offers us a terracotta #cinerary #urn from #Athens, now in the #BritishMuseum. It dates from c. 300 BCE, and the painted and gilded #griffins show a strong #Persian influence, an inheritance from the by then divided empire of #Alexander the Great. #AncientBluesky 🏺

This white rectangular cinerary urn front was first noted in the Villa Giulia in its heyday, and found its way into the Borghese collection from which it was acquired by the National Roman Museum in 1893. It's a densely carved, rather beautiful relief crammed full of imagery. The youth, unfortunately emasculated by time, stands in a scallop-shell niche, which is usually an allusion to Venus, when the figure is female. He's wearing a lacerna or half cloak but is otherwise heroically nude. He is dressed for his trip to the Underworld. He's looking to his right (our left), his hands raised to chest level. In his right hand he holds a butterfly, symbol of the spirit, and in his left a tiny bird, possibly a peacock or even a parrot. At his feet are a dog and a monkey, symbols of attachment to earthly life. The vegetation on either side of the niche allude to the Underworld: olive, vine, and pine. At right a tall candelabrum culminates in a plaque with a Gorgoneion, an apotropaic protector.

#ReliefWednesday shows us the rich #relief work of the #cinerary #urn of one C. Iulius Saecularis, from c. 90 CE. The nude youth, a bit chubby, holds a #butterfly in his right hand, symbol of the #spirit. He doesn't want to let go of his earthly life. #Dionysiac symbols abound. #AncientBluesky 🏺

CINERARY URN WITH DEXTRARUM IUNCTIO, C. 80 CE. BATHS OF DIOCLETIAN Dis Manibus. / C(aius) Iulius Hermes / vix(it) ann(is) XXXIIII m(ensibus) V dieb(us) XIIII / C(aius) Iulius Andronicus / conlibertus fec(it) / bene merenti de se This beautiful marble urn is richly carved with an ædicule at lower centre containing a married couple holding each other's right hands, the husband at left, his wife at right. They are flanked by two spiral columns supporting a pierced pediment. At the two front edges are two pilasters decorated with an unusual leaf pattern with Ionic capitals connected by a garland of carved fruit. The inscription commemorates two freedmen: C. Iulius Hermes, the deceased, made at the behest of his fellow, Andronicus. As a pre-made urn, it seems a strange choice for one man to buy for another. Yet the catalogue of this museum doesn't even consider that these two were a couple, which was my first thought.

If you were the woman, and I were the man / Would I send you yellow roses / Would I dare to touch your hand? For #EpigraphyTuesday this #Flavian #cinerary #urn has a #marriage scene carved on it but names two #Greek freedmen. #AncientBluesky 🏺

LARNAX WITH FEMALE FACE, 240-220 BCE. MUSEO DELL'ARTE SALVATA, BATHS OF DIOCLETIAN This third cinerary urn found in an illicit excavation in the locality of S. Donnino outside the Umbrian town of Città della Pieve is much simpler than the other two from the same tomb belonging to the women of the aristocratic Pulfna family. It's a quite simple box in a local tufo whose lid has no effigy of the deceased but is a simple flat slab, on the front of which is a long inscription both incised and painted in red. I can't find a translation of this, but I can make out the name Pulfna on it. The corners of this box are carved like pilasters, and extend below it to make short legs. At centre is a strange female face, carved in an almost childlike way, with bulging eyes, triangular nose, and irregular mouth. She is probably a Medusa, with brown painted hair below an unpainted and jagged crown (?). Two symmetrical S-volutes flank the head, on a painted brown background.

For #SarcophagusSaturday we're back one last time at the #MuseodellArteSalvata at the #BathsofDiocletian in #Rome, to see a strange #Etruscan #cinerary #urn or #larnax saved from the clandestine antiquities market by the #Carabinieri. #AncientBluesky 🏺

LARNAX WITH THE KILLING OF TROILUS, C. 210 BCE. MUSEO DELL'ARTE SALVATA In 2015, news of the discovery of a hypogeum in the territory of Città della Pieve in Umbria, in the agrarian zone of San Donnino, began to filter out, as photos of objects from inside the tomb came to the attention of the Carabinieri. A raid on buildings of the owner of the land in question in April 2024 discovered an astonishingly rich haul: this was the tomb of the women of the powerful gens Pufna. All the grave-robbed property was taken into custody by October 2024. Here the lid shows a reclining woman in painted alabastrine gypsum, with golden jewelry, leaning on her elbow, a patera or offering plate in her other hand, resting on her knee. The box itself shows a violent scene from the Trojan War, the death of Troilus at the hands of Achilles, the one-man murder machine of the Iliad.

#SarcophagusSaturday takes us to the Octagonal Hall of the #BathsofDiocletian in #Rome, where a fresh catch of repatriated and captured #antiquities has reopened the #MuseodellArteSalvata. The traces of #polychromy on this #Etruscan #cinerary #urn add to the beauty of the work. #AncientBluesky 🏺

CINERARY URN, 80-100 CE. CENTRALE MONTEMARTINI This extremely richly-decorated urn of Luni marble was found in 1931 in the necropolis of via Ostiensis. Its tabula probably had the deceased's name painted onto it; traces of polychromy can be found in the crevices of the relief work. Two heads of Jupiter Ammon protrude from the sides of the urn, with a garland tied to the horns of the god's heads carved with pomegranates and pinecones, with points of shadow created using the short drill. The urn emerges from a cluster of acanthus leaves and stands on a leafy round base. The lid, too, is decorated with acanthus leaves and, at the top, four theatrical masks form a pinnacle. Cremation and inhumation were both practiced by the Romans, but cremation was more frequently used until the mid-C3, when burial became the norm. Most people were buried simply; if you had a terracotta sarcophagus or cinerary urn you were already wealthier than most. Marble urns and sarcophagi meant you were elite.

For a late #SarcophagusSaturday we have a beautiful C1 CE #cinerary #urn from the via Ostiensis #necropolis. This was once richly painted: #cremation was for the well-off, and this urn must have shone with #polychromy. #ClassicsBluesky 🏺

A large #Roman #Glass #Cinerary #Urn
Circa mid 1st-2nd Century A.D.
#Bonhams
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