Exceptional Etruscan sarcophagi, urns seized from looters

Italian authorities have seized an exceptional group of Etruscan urns, sarcophagi and funerary objects looted from a single tomb in Città della Pieve, a town near Perugia in the central Italian region of Umbria. The objects include eight stone urns, two sarcophagi and a rich set of more than 50 funerary goods dating to the last quarter of the 3rd century B.C.

An investigation was launched in April of this year after the Cultural Heritage unit of the Carabinieri received a tip about a possible illegal excavation in Città della Pieve. Photographs of a number large cinerary urns with recumbent figures on the lids, a design typical of Etruscan funerary practice, were circulating on the illicit antiquities market. Consulting archaeologists identified the urns in the photographs from their decorative style as likely originating from an Etruscan necropolis in the Chiusi area.

The investigation was able to narrow down the location further to an Etruscan hypogeum linked to the gens Pulfna, which had first emerged in 2015 when a farmer stumbled on it while ploughing a field. That find recovered four urns and two sarcophagi, all belonging to males. While the looted urns and sarcophagi appeared to belong mostly to women, the patronymic “Pulfna” was engraved on some of them. That’s how investigators were able to pinpoint the likely find site.

Because the urns and sarcophagi were big and heavy, the looters had to have had specialized mechanical implements like earth movers and cranes. Only a few people were capable of mustering those kinds of resources, which gave the authorities a short list of suspects. The main one was a local business owner whose company had heavy earthmoving equipment and who just happened to own lands adjacent to the farm where the Pulfna hypogeum had been found in 2015.

Acting on information that the sale of the looted artifacts was imminent, the Carabinieri got authorization to tap suspects’ phones, follow them and spy on all their shenanigans with a drone. With all this information, they were able to find the likely hiding place of the objects and get a search warrant. The urns in the photographs were indeed found there and confiscated. The drone footage also revealed the excavation site. From what archaeologists could tell, it was a two-chamber tomb. Unfortunately the archaeological exploration of the find site revealed that it was completely destroyed by the looters.

They didn’t exactly handle the contents they were stealing with kid gloves either. One of the covers of the two sarcophagi was found in fragments outside the tomb. The surviving cover is intact, however, and it is inscribed with the name VELIA LEFNI PULFNASA. Inside are the skeletal remains of a woman about 40 years of age.

A preliminary reconstruction of the destroyed chambers hypothesizes that the sarcophagi and the two most luxurious and ornate urns were in the first chamber. The urns are made of local white travertine and are carved in relief with scenes of battle and the hunt, episodes from Atalanta and Meleager’s hunt for the Calydonian boar, and the Etruscan version of the killing of Troilus, one of King Priam’s sons, by Achilles in the presence of a pair of Vanth (underworld demons). The decapitated hero’s body is in front of an altar, lying on the belly of a fallen horse. Achilles holds the decapitated head up by its hair. Their lids are topped by semi-recumbent figures representing the deceased. They contain cinerary remains. These two urns are in state of conservation so exceptional that the polychrome pigments and gilding survive in large sections.

Also in the main chamber was the substantial funerary set includes bronze pottery of different forms, including situlae (buckets), olpai (water pitchers), oinochoai (wine-pouring jugs) and flasks. There’s
a balsamarium still containing traces of the perfumed unguent and a bone comb. There are four bronze mirrors decorated with figurative engraving. One of them is decorated with the she-wolf nursing a child in front of several deities (Heracles and Minerva can be recognized). The she-wolf suckling a boy is an obvious reference to the foundational myth of Rome, although this one does not have a second child. The Romulus story is very rarely depicted in Etruscan art, and further analysis is needed to confirm that that’s what is being referred to on the mirror. It is notable that the mirror dates to the late 4th century B.C., so it predates the tomb it was found in by a lot. This was a family heirloom.

The other five urns were in the second underground chamber. One of them in engraved with the name of the owner (VEL PULFNA CLANTI….) and features a gorgon head emerging from an acanthus bush between fluted pilasters. The original polychrome is very well-preserved. Another urn is smooth supported by two sphinxes and a lid with a deceased of mature age. Two others have a semi-recumbent
figure on the lid but post-depositional degradation has made the surfaces unreadable with the naked eye.

The recovery operation is considered among the most significant, not only for the quantity and quality of the finds, but also for their state of conservation and the fact that they come from a single site.

“The recovery of the Etruscan funeral contexts of Città della Pieve reminds us of the importance that the archaeological, cultural and historical heritage has for the whole of Italy,” commented the Minister of Culture Alessandro Giuli. “The more than 50 recovered elements of the funeral trousseau, the two sarcophagi, the eight urns offer a new opportunity to immerse oneself in the fascinating Etruscan universe and once again tell a fundamental fragment of the complex stratification of the societies that over the millennia have animated the history of Italy and have contributed to forming our national identity that is protected, safeguarded and enhanced here.”

* This article was originally published here