permit us to classify them. M. Martha himself has been obliged to renounce all attempt at making a classification and he has been very wise in limiting himself to bringing together some observations on the fashion in which this art was developed. In spite of the tendency which the Etruscans had toward plastic art, it is certain that without the aid of foreigners they would never have reached a remarkable degree of perfection. Whenever they were left to their own devices, their plastic works were immobile and archaic in form. They began to acquire perfection when they began to inspire themselves from the models of Oriental art, which came to them in the form of carved ivory, jewels, amulets, arms and stuffs. Later, the Greeks, who came into Etruria, towed, as it were, by the grand Asiatic currents, supplanted the Oriental models and became almost exclusively the masters of Etruscan art. The signs of this double influence are easily recognized in the most ancient Etruscan works which bear the stamp of it. At the time of the grand migrations, Grecian artists, who were numerous and widely scattered over their own country where their work was relatively poorly paid, because of the very fact of their numbers, spread themselves in great numbers over all the roads of the Occident, and it is natural that they should have sought by preference the most flourishing nations, who were more likely to recompense them satisfactorily. Etruria, which was then very prosperous, was one of the regions to which, apparently, these Grecian artists were attracted. We know the names of several Corinthian artists who came to Tarquinii with Demaratus, whom I have already mentioned. These are Ecphantos, Euchair and Eugrammos, mentioned by Pliny. Later, there are mentioned at Rome two Grecian artists who came from Etruria, Gorgasos and Damophilos, employed in the construction of the Temple of Ceres. It has been, then, a mistake to hold that the Etruscans were the inventers of statuary in Italy. The only merit perhaps which can be recognized in them is their having been the people amongst whom were executed the earliest statues on the peninsula, but by the hands of foreigners. At precisely what date all this importation took place remains still obscure, but it cannot go much beyond the time when the great currents of Corinthians, Carthaginians and Greeks directed themselves toward Italy. It can be quietly assumed that central Italy was the point of disembarkment where these grand civilizing currents met in rendezvous, particularly the Etruscan ports of the Mediterranean, the doors of the peninsula. Thus Etruria was the way by which the first glimmers of Oriental civilization were able to penetrate the very bosom of Italian barbarism at the time when Rome was not yet born, when from the Alps as far as Sicily there could be met only primitive and rude peoples.
From the examination of objects found in all the Etruscan cities it results that toward the sixth century of our era sculpture was still limited to the Etruscan cities of the south; that is to say, the maritime cities. It is only three centuries later that one finds the trace of it toward the north and in the interior, at Bologna, Cortona, Perouse, Volterra and Chiusi. All this time was needed for art to accomplish its work of penetrating the depths of Etruscan society. Nevertheless, we can remark that several centres were formed, and that each centre had its specialty, probably according to the taste of the inhabitants and according to the gross material which could most easily be procured in each locality. At Cortona, Arezzo and Perugia bronze was the fashionable material. At Clusium stone was carved. At Volterra they chiselled alabaster. At Tarquinii and Ceræ they used terra-cotta. It is also remarkable that each locality had its own style, its own school and manner, and this comes doubtless from the fact that each centre was created by artists who brought with them their several processes, their models, their inclinations, which they communicated to their pupils and their imitators. It even seems that, for each category of objects, there prevailed a different æsthetic quality derived from the exclusiveness of the ateliers. At Chiusi, for instance, to cite only this city, one recognizes very marked differences in the styles of the canopes, 1 statues, bas-reliefs and urns. The canopes are conceived with an unconscious but sincere and very pronounced realism, which denotes a real spirit of observation and a serious study of the human countenance. The statues, on the contrary, aside from the heads, which have sometimes an evident expression, are always modelled after a common type, with great dryness of form, without grace and without truthfulness. The bas-reliefs of the cippi are without grace or proportion, hardly comparable to the poor studies of the early times of Attic art. On the contrary, the urns, like the canopes, evidence a great searching after reality and sometimes an exaggerated care for truth. All this proves to us that Etruscan sculpture, like all arts which flourished in this country had no fixed rules, following no regular and normal course of development. Ceaselessly submitted to innovation brought by the last arrivals, exposed to a continual retouching and enlargement of ideas and processes, it was formed at hazard, by fits and starts, sometimes advancing, sometimes retreating, but never succeeding in becoming an organic art, purely because, in place of being indigenous, it was before and above ail an imported art. It would, therefore, be impossible to trace the chronological history of Etruscan art, as can so easily be done in case of Greek art, which is quite homogeneous, whose phases can be followed from primitive archaism up to the decadence, passing through the periods of its bloom to full maturity. Etruscan sculpture has no age, because one sometimes discovers it to have quite an advanced degree of perfection, only to fall again
into infancy; then, after a period of experiment more or less long, it suddenly reaches a moment of inexplicable prosperity.
The thing which is definite as regards the sculpture of the Etruscans is its poverty of invention. The types are reduced to a small number and they are not individual. The religious images were borrowed from Asia or Greece. Some of the compositions are only reproductions of those which already had a place upon Greek pediments. Almost all the bas-reliefs are imitations of Hellenic work. In general the execution is heavy, except for the expression of the countenances, which is ordinarily striking. We find also, here and there, certain statues like those which I have mentioned, which depart from the ordinary style, such for example as the “ Orator ” at Florence. The general air of the personage has in these too rare cases a great expression of nobility, and breathes movement and life; but these are exceptions which are not sufficient in number to efface the impression of poverty and narrowness which is left by a far-reaching analysis of the works of Etruscan sculpture which we know.
Now let us pass to Etruscan painting, as to which we can formulate more precise and more complete ideas than as to their sculpture. The thing which offers the most interesting point is the study of the processes employed by the Etruscan painters. The documents are numberless. Unfortunately the best paintings, which have lain beneath the ground for centuries, have been injured by dampness. Others have been damaged by too hasty excavation, and again others bear marks of the injuries which at different epochs Etruscan tombs had to endure. But we have succeeded, more or less, through copies, through restorations or by repairs — the fidelity of which may be called in question, but which, nevertheless, are of great assistance to us in these studies — in reaching certain conclusions. The German Institute and the Gregorian Museum at Rome, as well as the Museum at Bologna, and the British Museum, possess fairly good collections of copies in color, but the surest studies are those which can be made on the spot, in the caves where the paintings can still be seen on the very surfaces where they were executed, and where, consequently, one can take better account of the styles and inclination prevailing among the Etruscan painters. At Corneto there are fifty or more caves with painted walls; twelve at Chiusi, four at Centari, two at Vulci, and at Orvieto. These are almost always, with two exceptions, mural paintings, and the first remark one makes is that these paintings are always executed upon the tufa or upon walls of masonry. When the tomb is of built masonry it is not painted. I believe there is not a single example of Etruscan painting in distemper. All are in fresco. As the tufa itself forms a very permeable background naturally prepared to receive color, the coating applied is ordinarily very thin, its thickness varying from ten millimetres to two centimetres. In analyzing these paintings, one obtains proof that the Etruscans had the practice of working after cartoons, and probably also used tracings. We can frequently notice on the plastered surface the traces of the dry point used to mark the outlines. With few exceptions, also, the background of the picture was never painted. It was the color of the plaster itself which furnished the distant planes of the picture. The colors of the Etruscan palette are grayish green, blue, ochre, lime-white, red and lamp-black; but these colors are not always met in Etruscan paintings. The paintings of the first epoch are composed in two or three colors, black, white and ochre. The paintings ordinarily represent banquets, dances, games, races, combats, hunts, portraits, deathbed scenes, funerary compositions, Greek or Etruscan legends, landscapes, and animals; but it is the gayer subjects, such as banquets and dances, which predominate, as if it were a part of the Etruscan philosophy to soften the conception of death by joyous imaging; as if it were to be considered only a happy event over which man need not borrow trouble. In the banquets are often shown licentious scenes, naked men and women, thus indicating the libertine habits of the time, and women, who are often found with cups in their hands, thus admirably justifying the reputation of passed-masters of drunkenness which the Etruscan dames enjoyed in the times of the ancients. From the pictured dances, it appears that the sound of the flute and the castanet was most agreeable to the Etruscans as accompaniment for these exercises. Sometimes the sexes alternate, or are mixed together; sometimes we see all the men on one side and the women on the other. The dance with the Etruscans had nothing methodical or coherent; dancers gave themselves up to disorderly and frantic gestures, jumping about as if the perfection of movement consisted in exhibiting prodigies of agility and equilibrium. With their dancing were exhibited feats of address, and there can be seen in a crowd of dancers personages who, while executing capers and pirouettes, play with crowns and cups overflowing with wines, holding them out at arm’s length without spilling, or emptying them at a single draught. The games are as various as the dances, but they are more frequently the sports of the circus that are discovered. I do not remember to have seen in the Etruscan collections a scene of combat with wild beasts, a fact which would prove that the shameful merit of causing men to fight with lions and tigers must, in the Western World, be credited to the Romans.
The study of these paintings concerning games is very useful in conveying knowledge of Etruscan manners and customs; and these paintings represent the inhabitants of Etruria as a gay people, lively, agile, comfortable and well content. The indication of the muscles, although anatomically false, gives evidences of robustness. Legends
take an unimportant place in the collections with which we are1 Egyptian mortuary vases.