1I am grateful for the invitation to this conference, which has given me a chance to see so many friends and colleagues and learn so much ; and for the suggested topic, that made me look at mirrors in a new way.¹

2Something over three thousand Etruscan bronze mirrors have been found, and are currently being published in the international Corpus of Etruscan Mirrors (CSE). This number evidently represents only a small percentage of the mirrors that were actually given to elite women during their lifetime and buried with them in their graves. They were made and used in various Etruscan cities mostly in the fourth and third centuries – though they were produced from the end of the fifth through the second centuries – and are widely scattered in museums and private collections today. Decorated mirrors have long been studied for the iconography of the scenes incised on their backs, and have served, much as Greek vases have, to study the realia of daily life of the people who used them, details of dress, furniture, and customs, as well as their religion, myths, beliefs and society.²

Meaning of Mirrors

3As in the case of Greek vases, the function of these objects often determined the significance of the images they represented. Etruscan mirrors were used by women, and are regularly found in women’s graves. When they were brightly polished they shone like gold ; they were part of a woman’s precious possessions, along with her jewellery. Mirror makers often represented women and goddesses using mirrors, emphasizing the importance of these objects, and incidentally advertising their own wares.

4The mirror in the corredo of an Etruscan bride was part of the wedding ritual. At her death, it was part of another ritual, when she took it to the grave with her. It was then dedicated to « L'espace de la Mort ». Sometimes, by bending the handle or scratching across the reflecting surface the word suthina, « for the grave », it was effectively destroyed for the living, and consecrated to a different level of reality – the world of the dead, of ancestors, and of the gods.³ After the public rituals of wedding and funeral, the mirror was put in a private place – the home, or the grave --, where it symbolized marriage and home, children, the life of a mater familias.

5The rituals of wedding and funeral were often related in the classical world. In Italy, splendidly dressed women in early burials were placed in the grave wearing their wedding finery and surrounded by all their jewels, including amber studded dresses and massive ornaments that were clearly meant for ritual use. In Greece, the wedding loutrophoros served as memorial to the dead, and Apulian vases represented funerary scenes filled with bridal symbolism.⁴

6Greek art of the fifth and fourth centuries illustrates the symbolic significance of mirrors. Attic lekythoi characterize scenes of mothers, children and nurses as home interiors by means of mirrors hanging on the wall that show they are taking place indoors.⁵ Attic funerary stelai show women looking into their mirrors.⁶ Reflections in mirrors are depicted on Etruscan mirrors and other fourth-century media, such as Apulian vases and mural painting. On one Apulian vase mourners at the funerary monument include a woman holding a mirror, and a man, in contrast, holding level an « ablution vessel » filled with liquid ( fig. 1).⁷ A funerary scene on an amphora in the British Museum (F 195) shows a man holding a mirror on one side of the stele and a half-draped woman on the other side : it has been suggested that the mirror is being used to evoke the image of the deceased. Such scenes are difficult to interpret. Are both the mirror and the pan with shining liquid being used for prophecy ? Or is the man offering the mirror to the dead woman ?

Fig. 1 - Offerings at the grave. Apulian vase in the Vatican. Ca. 450 BC. Drawing (After Masci 2008, No. 427).

Marriage

7Etruscan mirrors show scenes from daily life and Greek mythology, the latter often chosen or modified to make them relevant to Etruscan customs and beliefs. Many of these refer to love and beauty, and show the adornment of the bride as a preparation for marriage. On a handsome mirror in Indiana, inscriptions identify the three figures involved in the adornment as the three goddesses in the Judgment of Paris – Hera, Athena, and Aphrodite – with their Etruscan names, Uni, Menrva, and Turan, while an otherwise unknown character labeled Althaia stands on the left (fig. 2).⁸ The inscribed names of the goddesses change the meaning of the scene.⁹ The seated figure of the bride who is being adorned is called Uni, the goddess of marriage : here Uni, who protects the bride, is herself the bride.¹⁰

Fig. 2 - Judgment of Paris: adornment scene. Etruscan mirror in Indiana. Bonfante 1977, 149-168. CSE USA 1.4.

8Bathing was also part of the ritual preparation for marriage. In mythology, the ritual bath magically restored the beauty or even the virginity of a goddess. On Etruscan mirrors, both the bride and groom evidently participate in this ritual.¹¹ Often a mirror is shown together with a strigil and the unguent jar and dipstick that served to anoint the bride. A bathing scene shows the young lovers washing themselves, as a crouching handmaiden looks intently into a mirror (fig. 3).¹² We will be seeing her again. Once more, the strigil and the oil flask are present.

Fig. 3 - Bathing scene. Praenestine mirror in Cambridge (CSE Great Britain 2, 12).

9In this context of the preparations for marriage and the importance of the marriage ritual we can begin to understand the significance of a remarkable mirror in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. (fig. 4).¹³ The captions, in the Praenestine dialect, close to Latin, identify the central figure as Jupiter, towards whom Iuno and Hercele are moving. The friendly relationship of Hercle with Uni (Hera, Juno) in Etruscan art contrasts with Hera’s hostility to the son of Zeus in Greek myth. Sexual symbols on either side set the stage for these two dii coniugales, who may be about to take part in a conjugal lectisternium with the blessing of Jupiter, god of oaths. The mirror, which seems to allude to the marriage contract and the sexual basis for its consummation, could have been a treasured object in the home of the couple, recalling the solemn nature of their marriage.

Fig. 4 - Jupiter, Iuno, Hercle. Praenestine mirror in the Metropolitan Museum (CSE USA 3.7).

10Other mirrors might have functioned like modern wedding portraits on the mantel, recording the formation of the family. One scene shows Turan, goddess of love, bringing together a famous mythological pair, Paris and Helen, as an example for the married couple.¹⁴ It might seem strange to see the adulterous lovers presented as an ideal ; but this is an Etruscan representation, and Paris Alexander is a favorite mythological figure in Etruscan art.

Fig. 5 - Turan visits Paris and Helen, who is nursing baby Ermania (Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale).

11Turan herself, the love goddess, together with her lover, Atunis, is a frequent example for mortal lovers. On one mirror the fragrant perfume or unguent the winged Zipna is about to apply will ratify their union.¹⁵ On another mirror, Turan and an older, taller, adult Atunis appear in a conjugal embrace in front of the marriage bed : the anasyrma gesture of Turan, who pulls up her dress and uncovers herself, announces the forthcoming consummation of their marriage (fig. 6).¹⁶

Fig. 6 - Turan and Atunis: consummation of the marriage. Etruscan mirror in Tarquinia, Museo Archeologico Nazionale (After ES 5.25).

12Divine births, the outcome of successful marriages, appear on a number of mirrors. Birth scenes in general, including the egg of Helen, are much more popular in Etruscan than in Greek art.¹⁷ An Etruscanized version of the Greek myth shows Tinia (Zeus) giving birth to a large, fully armed Menerva. As on the Greek vases, two attendants flank the god : they are beautifully dressed, properly attired for their aristocratic duties as they comfort him and bandage his aching head.¹⁸ Another mirror shows the birth of the baby Fufluns, wearing protective amulets ; he is the Etruscan Dionysos, who has been incubated in Tinia’s thigh. An attendant nurse, Mean, holds the unguent jar and dipstick (fig. 7). Is it to anoint Tinia, the father giving birth, or the new-born divine baby ? In the exergue above, the prophecy uttered by a prophetic head is reported in a ribbon issuing from his mouth.¹⁹

Fig. 7 - Birth of Fufluns (Dionysos). Etruscan mirror in Naples, Museo Archeologico Nazionale (After ES 1.82).

13In contrast to Greek myth, which transferred the maternal child-bearing function to Zeus the Father, Etruscan mythology usually restored it to the mother, as shown by the many images of kourotrophoi and nursing mothers in Italy,²⁰ and illustrated in a series of scenes unknown in Greek art. The great god Tinia, who, unlike Zeus, is not a philanderer, is often shown with his wife, Uni.²¹ He does, however, appear several times with Semla, who lifts up her skirt in an anasyrma gesture in order to have intercourse with the great god. (fig. 8).²² The presence of a satyr in one of these scenes shows that the conception of the god Fufluns Dionysos will be the result of this union. Finally, we see Turan, goddess of love, visiting a happy family, with (Paris) Elachsantre seated like a good father at the bedside of Elina, who is in bed nursing the baby Ermania (fig. 5).²³

Fig. 8 - Tinia and Semla: conception of Fufluns (Dionysos). London, British Museum (ES 1.81.2).

Prophecy

14These Etruscan mirrors frequently represented scenes related to the marriage as symbols of the home and family and eventually of the grave. Related to the marriage was their function as instruments of prophecy.²⁴ A marriage that joined the destinies of two great families deserved to be celebrated as an important ritual. Part of this ritual, as in India today, was the prophecy. Regularly used in religious ritual and for political purposes,²⁵ prophecy was used privately in marriage, and the act of reading the prophecy is a recurrent motif in scenes of weddings and marriage. It occurs in a series of finely crafted mirrors derived from the same original source. Though some of the names differ from one mirror to the other, the story is basically the same. On an uninscribed mirror in Princeton (fig. 9) :²⁶ the bride and groom are consulting an oracle, who will provide them with a wedding prophecy about their future. They look towards the seated figure on the right ; he holds an open diptych on his lap on which he is writing down the prophecy given out by the head of Orpheus. Also recurrent in the lower exergue is the small female figure, probably a Lasa. She holds out her mantle in a gesture normally associated to the bridal or wifely gesture of lifting the veil – it is often an attribute of Hera, for example. This gesture has recently been convincingly associated with prophetic scenes : here it would be appropriate to both contexts.²⁷ In this scene we seem to see clearly the intent of the Etruscan artist, the relation of the mirror to the wedding and the related prophecy, and the Etruscan meaning behind the Greek figures.

Fig. 9 - Pele surprises Thethis at her toilette; the Nereid Calaina (Galene) assists her. Etruscan mirror from Castelgiorgio, between Bolsena and Orvieto (CSE USA 3.14).

15A different relation between marriage and prophecy is represented on a mirror in the Metropolitan Museum. Here the nude standing figure labelled Thethis is at her toilette, assisted by the Nereid Calaina, or Galene, who is on the ground, offering her a jewel. (fig. 10).²⁸ I once thought that Peleus, rushing in unseen from the left, was reacting in surprised admiration at her beauty. But the many examples of prophecies that Nancy de Grummond has collected have convinced me that with this gesture he is registering his amazement at quite another sight. His hair, standing on end on his head, shows his horror at the revelation of the terrible outcome of the marriage : in Thethis’ mirror. Where she sees only the image of her face, he sees the birth of Achilles, the Trojan war, and the suffering it brought to both Greeks and Trojans.²⁹

Fig. 10 - Adornment of Malavisch, the bride, in the presence of Turan, Munthuch, Zipu, and Hinthial. Hinthial, « the soul » looks in the mirror. London, British Museum (Bonfante, 1990, fig. 17).

16A Praenestine mirror has a particularly clear depiction of the prophetic moment. It shows the embrace of two lovers, labelled Fasia and Mexio – evidently their real names, in the Praenestine dialect. Nearby, an attendant, acila (Latin ancilla, « maidservant »), looks into the mirror, and on the left, Ceisia Loucilia interprets the fata, or prophecy, as stated in an unusually long inscription : Ceisia Loucilia fata ret[tulit]. Iunio[s] Setio[s] atois ret[tulit, which tells us that Ceisia Lucilia is relating the prophecy to them. (fig. 11).³⁰

Fig. 11 - Embracing lovers, Fasia and Mexio, attended by acila (ancilla). Ceisia Loucilia interprets the prophecy (fata). Praenestine mirror in Cambridge (CSE Great Britain 2, 6).

17In another striking scene in the context of mirrors and marriage rituals (fig. 12, cfr. fig. 2), the seated figure of the bride is called Malavisch, a name related to the word for « mirror » malena. She is attended by Turan, (« Love »), Munthuch, and Zipna. Hinthial, « the soul, » stands beside her and looks into the mirror.³¹ This externalization of the Soul who reads the prophecy implies a typically Etruscan way of thinking, poetic and philosophical – one of the rare times when we see, though dimly, the outlines of such beliefs.

Fig. 12 - Scene of haruspicina, Pava Tarchies, wearing priestly hat, consults a liver in the presence of an attentive crowd. Etruscan mirror from Tuscania, Florence Museo Archeologico Nazionale (De Grummond 2006, fig. II.8).

18A different, public audience for the prophecy appears on a well-known mirror illustrating the practice of haruspicina, the most characteristically Etruscan kind of divination. In the center of an attentive crowd, Pava Tarchies, wearing the hat of a priest, left leg raised in the ritual pose for prophecy, examines a liver (fig. 13). In the exergue above we see the quadriga of Thesan, the Dawn, recording the time of day, an important aspect of the ritual.³² Another mirror shows the Greek seer Chalchas, his leg raised in the traditional pose, reading a liver. His wings are characteristically Etruscan, often applied to figures that were not normally winged in Greek myth. This scene uses the name of a Greek seer, Calchas, for a priest carrying of the native Etruscan ritual. In the François Tomb, too, the image of the Homeric hero, the wise Nestor, balances that of the Etruscan general Vel Saties as he practices the bird divination for which the Etruscans were famous.³³

Fig. 13 - Suthina, « for the grave, » scratched across the reflecting surface of a mirror from Bolsena in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. On the reverse is the representation of Prumathe (Prometheus) (CSE USA 3.11).

« Till Death do us Part »

19 Mirrors had a place in the funerary realm, as we saw earlier. This was true in Greece, as we saw from their appearance on the Attic stelai.³⁴ That it was also true in Magna Graecia, among the southern neighbours of the Etruscans, is clear from the scenes on Apulian vases (fig. 1), where the mirror was thought to allow the living to communicate with the other world.³⁵ The mirror marks the boundary between the world of the dead and that of the living : we think of the custom, still practiced among some Jewish families, of covering the mirrors in the house when someone dies.³⁶

20Although Etruscan mirrors were not made for the grave, frequent references to marriage and death appear in the scenes incised on their backs. One of the most popular, the story of Admetus and Alcestis, is illustrated on three monuments of the fourth century, a mirror and two red-figure vases. As in the tragedy by Euripides that inspired them, they play with various elements of this story about Admetus, who earned the privilege of staying alive at the cost of sending his aged parents or his wife to die in his place.

21Etruscan iconography emphasizes the relationship between husband and wife, and these representations show the couple together, in contrast to Apulian images that show Alcestis alone with the children or isolated.³⁷ On the handsome mirror in New York (fig. 14)³⁸ the mood is one of conjugal love : the couple’s wedding, or Alcestis’ return from Hades, is celebrated with a kiss. Flanking the couple are two figures, unlabeled. The handsome youth on the left who turns his back as he leaves, shoes in hand, represents either Hymenaios or Thanatos – the torch he holds could be for either - or both - the wedding or the funeral, the marriage or the death that are so much a part of the story. On the right, an old woman with pendulous breasts and unkempt hair, a death demon, anoints Alcestei for a fateful marriage or an early death.³⁹

Fig. 14 - Atmite, Alcestei, and two attendants. Etruscan mirror from Civita Castellana (Falerii). 350 BC. New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art (CSE USA 3.6).

22Two vases also emphasize the funerary aspect of the story, though in different ways. The red-figure vase in Paris again show us on either side wait to escort Alcestis to the Underworld. The scene is accompanied by one of the few narrative inscriptions in Etruscan, which echoes a line from Euripides : « She went to Acheron as a sacrifice. »⁴⁰ The mood is different on an uninscribed but eloquent vase in Boston (fig. 15).⁴¹ The fact that Admetus is wearing a toga rather than the rectangular himation may show that he is in the world of the living, where he intends to stay as long as possible. As he energetically explains to a skeptical Alcestis why she must die in his place, Charu looks down at him, as if to say, « You and I know very well that you are the one I am supposed to take with me ! » Most telling are the funerary markers on either side, male and female : we know that in the end they will both die.

Fig. 15 - Admetus, Alcestis, and winged Charu, ca. 330 BC. Red figure skyphos. Boston Museum of Fine Arts (Museum photo).

Writing

23Literary sources record, and this conference has shown, the importance of writing in Etruscan religion and society.⁴² Writing implements, dedications and inscriptions included as precious objects in the luxurious tombs of the Orientalizing period testify to its originally ritual, religious, and even magical power.⁴³ Prophecies were written down. The longer legal, religious and ritual inscriptions regularly include the word zich, referring to the fact that they were written. The solemnity of the written style comes through even in the limited amount of written material that has come down to us.

24On Etruscan monuments, writing is itself a ritual act and adds to the object’s sacral quality. In the case of a mirror, the word suthina, « for the grave », scratched across its reflecting surface, transfers it to the world of the grave.⁴⁴ An exceptional inscription with the same function of suthina was incised on the surface of another mirror in the Metropolitan Museum : the proper name cracna, referring to a male member of the Cracna family.⁴⁵ This is another kind of funerary or votive inscription that ritually devote mirrors and other precious objects to a different realm, the world of dead ancestors, of the gods.

25A number of mirrors illustrate written documents as legally witnessing ritual acts. On a mirror from Volterra, an enthroned Uni nurses a full-grown, bearded Hercele in order to make him immortal and eligible for admission into Olympos (fig. 16). The ritual act takes place in the presence of a solemn gathering of divine witnesses, On the right, Tinia points to a tablet that documents the adoption : Eca sren tva ichnac hercle unial clan. « This mirror shows how Hercle became son of Uni ».⁴⁶ we have seen before that though the hatred of Hera for Herakles known from Greek myth is illustrated on some Etruscan monuments, a friendly and even loving relation between the two is characteristically Etruscan, and agrees with the sense of Herakles’ theophoric name, « glory of Hera. » In the exergue above, a satyr looks into a patera full of liquid : he is practicing lekanomanteia, perhaps seeing the prophecy of Hercle’s final apotheosis.⁴⁷

Fig. 16 - Uni nursing the adult Hercle in front of divine witnesses. Etruscan mirror from Volterra in Florence, Museo Archeologico Nazionale (Bonfante and Bonfante 2002, p. 155, Source 36, fig. 33).

26On another mirror, the prophecy or carmen sung by Cacu – a prophetic figure who plays the lyre and looks like Apollo, the Greek god of prophecy – is being taken down on folding tablets by the boy Artile.⁴⁸ Images of Vanth holding a scroll, reminiscent of the Recording Angel, are ubiquitous in tomb paintings.⁴⁹ Elsewhere, a winged female demon holds a prophetic scroll on which are written the names of the three characters on the mirror : Lasa, Ajax and Amphiaraos, a seer (fig. 17).⁵⁰ The two heroes are presumably in the Underworld, or being taken there by the Lasa. We would expect the winged female to be called Vanth, the female spirit who, along with Charu, accompanies the dead on their dangerous journey to the Afterworld. Perhaps at some level the names of Lasa and Vanth are interchangeable.

Fig. 17 - Lasa holding a scroll, with Aivas and Hamphiare. Etruscan mirror in London, British Museum (Bonfante 1990, fig. 17).

27The dead must take documents with them to the Afterworld. « The dead need a name to enter the Underworld. » In fact they need more than a name : they need to take their titles and curriculum vitae if they are to take their proper place in the society of that other world. That is why Laris Pulenas is shown displaying his genealogy and priesthoods documented on the scroll, and why priests are portrayed on their urns with the attributes of their priesthood, including the sacred linen books from which they read out the rituals they celebrated in their lifetime.⁵¹

Conclusion

28The Hellenistic period brings a change, which reflects a transformation in the customs of the Etruscan society in which these mirrors were commissioned, created and used in important family rituals. By the second half of the third century, a less aristocratic clientele was acquiring smaller, simpler Etruscan bronze mirrors. On these the most frequent images were winged Lasas and Dioscouroi, without benefit of inscription. The Lasas often hold alabastra, unguent jars and dipsticks like those we have seen being used in various ritual scenes (fig. 18).⁵² As for the Dioskouroi, the attribute of the « dokana, » or lintel of the door -- represented by the horizontal lines stretching between them -- shows their function as guardians of ritual passages. (fig. 19).⁵³ These symbolic, emblematic figures thus imply similar views of the significance of the rituals previously celebrated in the more expensive, narrative scenes of earlier mirrors.⁵⁴

Fig. 18 - Lasa with alabastron and perfume on a Hellenistic mirror in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (CSE USA 1.18).

Fig. 19 - Dioscouroi with shields, dokana and star. Hellenistic mirror in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (CSE USA 1.1).

29Etruscan mirrors had a place in the context of the spaces of both life and death. The mirrors we have discussed have long been thought of as « picture bilinguals, » with the inscriptions as direct translations of the figures they accompany. We have seen that this was not always the case.⁵⁵ The inscriptions that seem to identify the figures are often ambiguous, even detached from the images, and do not necessarily give them a permanent, regular identity. Writing functions on many mirrors as a way of elevating the daily to the ritual. As in an epithalamium, they move the scene to a mythological level, equating the married couple to mythological lovers.

30An inscription can also move the object, from the space of the wedding and the birth, the home and the marriage, to « L’espace de la mort. » Such mirrors are themselves documents of these important rites of passage in the lives of their owners, first as wedding gifts and finally as heirlooms destined to go into the grave and follow the ancestors in the life beyond. But these mirrors also had a special power : they allowed men to see the gods.⁵⁶ There was a divine movement behind the mirror as marriage gift and part of the wedding ritual, behind its power as an instrument of prophecy and its capacity to help move the family into the world beyond the living. Its ritual functions gave it a symbolic, magical force. In interpreting the scenes represented on these mirrors, we do not have to choose between genre scenes and mythological figures : the ritual transcends both. A mirror carries with it the special power and the symbolic meaning it had for the mater familias and her family, in the home during her lifetime and at her death in the grave and in the world beyond.