Etruscan Necropolis of the Banditaccia – Cerveteri
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The monumental Banditaccia Necropolis, elected part of the World Heritage by the Unesco, lies on a a tufa plateau that is about 10 km long.
The distinctive feature of this Necropolis, the incredible treasure of knowledge that it contained, consists in the fact that the project followed by the Etruscans when building it clearly meant to recreate the “urban” structure of the city of the living: the tombs are in fact ranged along a main road, the “via degli inferi” (Underworld Street), and follow a chessboard pattern, with smaller streets crossing each other, tracing a complete urban grid.
The sepulchres are lined along the sides of the street and for the most part are mounds with a large circular base dug out of the tufa rock or purpose built which contains a large heap of earth inside which the architectural structure of a house is faithfully replicated, an incredible succession of domestic rooms, crossroads, decorations and portals included in a town context of which paradoxically one can sense the liveliness.
The Necropolis includes four hundred burials and spans a historic period from the 8th C. to the 2nd C. BC.
Among the most important tombs uncovered there are the Tomba dei Rilievi (Tomb of the Reliefs), la Tomba degli Scudi e delle Sedie (the Tomb of Shields and Seats), La tomba delle cinque sedie (the Five Seat Tomb) and the tomba dell’alcova (the Alcove Tomb).
The Sarcophagus of the Spouses was found in the one of the tombs of the necropolis; it is dated around 520 BC. The sarcophagus is a terracotta sculpture, on the lid of which there is a representation of a married couple, reclining on a triclinium, the kind of bed used during banquets. The man rests his arm affectionately on his wife’s shoulders, and the features of the two figures are typical of Etruscan sculpture, with very simple and straight lines, yet endowed with an innate elegance. The accuracy of certain details is particularly striking, as one can verify by looking at the pointed footwear worn by the two spouses, what the Romans used to call calcei repandi.
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