Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 19.djvu/639

ETRUSCAN.] POTTERY pottery maybe divided into six classes, (1) prehistoric; (2 black glossy Etruscan; (3) pottery rudely painted wit! figures of purely Etruscan design ; (4) plain biscuit clay unpainted, but decorated with stamped reliefs; (5) late: vases, badly-executed imitations of painted Greek vases but having Etruscan subjects, or Greek subjects treated ir a distinctly Etruscan manner ; (6) large clay slabs, witl painted figures, used for the wall-decoration of tombs. 1. Prehistoric. This is the work of the Siculi, Oscans, historic. Umbrians, and other occupiers of Italy before the arriva of the Etruscans. It is mostly small, made without the wheel, of Coarse brown or blackish clay, slightly orna mented with ridges of clay modelled in relief. One curious variety is in the form of a primitive Oscan hut, with a movable door, fixed with pegs. 1 The Museo del Collegio Romano has a fine collection of the prehistoric 615 Pre- Fi. 32 FIG. 32. Prehistoric pottery from Italy. pottery of Italy, Sardinia, and other places. shows some of the commonest forms. Struscan 2. Etruscan Slack Ware. 2 It is remarkable that the iare Etruscan race > though so extraordinarily skilful in most of the handicrafts, did not excel at any period in their pottery. They were especially famed for their skill in metal -work, and hence perhaps this largest and most numerous class of their fictile ware is mostly shaped after metal forms and decorated with designs not specially suited to clay. The clay of which this black ware is com posed consists (taking the average of many analyses) of the following ingredients, silica 63, alumina 15, peroxide of iron 8, lime 3, magnesia 2, and carbon 2. It is hard and metallic in appearance, generally of a glossy black, but sometimes grey. Its black is partly due to the super ficial presence of free car bon, showing that the vases were fired in a close kiln, under the direct contact of the carbonaceous smoke from the fuel, a process called in modern times "the smother kiln." If heated to a bright red in an open fire the ware loses its black colour and becomes greyish white or brown. Its forms and the figures stamped in blunt relief all suggest that they were copied from metal originals, a supposition strongly borne out by the fact that many of them are completely covered with gold or silver leaf (see fig. 33). The reliefs upon them consist of lions and other animals, sphinxes, chimaerae, FIG. 33. Etruscan cenochoe, of black human figures, or geometri- ware > with figures in relief. (Brit- cal patterns, all coarsely executed^and very blunt in their forms, partly from want und deutschen uoire " Vases * trusques de terre of sharpness in the moulds they are stamped from and partly through the shrinkage of the clay in the kiln. Some of the shapes are graceful, especially those underrated by reliefs (see fig. 34). Others are very fanciful, worked into vases. FIG. 34. Plain Etruscan black pottery. forms most unsuited for clay, such as " situlai " or buckets, with movable ring handles ; incense cups supported on thin bands of clay stamped with reliefs ; and jugs shaped like hollow rings. A few have their shapes copied from Greek vases, e.g., a number of small amphorae of exactly the same form as those made by the Greek potter Nicosthenes. A common form of Etruscan vase has a lid shaped like a human head, copied apparently from Egyptian Canopic vases. Some have human arms rudely modelled in clay and fastened on by pegs. Besides the black vases of this form, there exist many made of red clay covered with yellow slip. 3. Etruscan Painted Vases. A number of very strange Etruscan large covered jars have been found at Caere (see fig. 35), painted more than 3 feet high, and rudely painted in dull colours (black, red, and white) with large figures of animals, lions, wolves, horses, various birds, and some almost shapeless figures of men. There is considerable spirit in the drawing of the animals, as is often the case even when there was no power to delineate human beings. The finest of these vases are in the Louvre and at Orvieto. Some have only geo metrical patterns, bands of simple FIG. 35. Early Etruscan leaf-ornament, platbands, or chequers. P aillted J ar - (Louvre. ) Others are shaped like large round boxes on a foot, with lids, nearly 2 feet high. One of those in the Louvre, of red clay blackened by smoke, has a very curious drawing in white pigment, coarsely executed. It represents a mer chant-ship under full sail being attacked by a war-ship impelled only by oars ; the latter is crowded with soldiers bearing round shields, each with an heraldic device. The other vessel has only one combatant, a bowman, who, mounted on the yard-arm, discharges an arrow at the enemy. This appears to be a pirate scene, and, though t-ery rudely painted, it is not without strong dramatic force. 3 4. Vases in Biscuit Clay with Bands of Stamped Reliefs. Biscuit -These are mostly large pithi (see fig! 36) about 3 feet vases high, or thick pinaces (platters) 1 to 2 feet across. Some with are of dull red clay, covered with bright red slip ; others are yellow. The clay is coarse, mixed with crushed granite, sand, or pounded pottery, to which the coating of fine clay- slip gives a smooth surface. Their chief peculiarity con sists in the bands of figures in relief with which they are decorated, and which were impressed on the soft clay by -oiling along it wheels about 1 inch thick and 7 or 8 inches n circumference. Incuse figures were cut on the edges

A similar vase is illustrated in Man. lust., is., table iv.