Word: etruscans
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1970-1979
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...lifelong search for archaeological treasures. Now 89, King Gustaf VI Adolf still enjoys an annual exploration in Italy. His latest dig is at Viterbo, 50 miles north of Rome, where His Majesty donned a jaunty hat, seized pick and chisel, and set forth to unearth the secrets of an Etruscan burial ground...
...second, and it has thus far been available only as an English-language paperback in Italy. Arcane as that fact may be, it has a certain poetic fitness, since Lawrence wrote this most lyrical draft in Italy, inspired partly by the sensual "bright and dancing" frescoes in the Etruscan tombs at Tarquinia. It is substantially longer than the famous version, but no more obscene-which is to say that today it seems about as off-color as a Tiepolo cupid...
...security is so poor that from 1968 to the middle of 1971 more than 3,000 works of art vanished. In the first three months of this year, 1,598 pieces were stolen, ranging from candlesticks to paintings by Titian. An estimated $10 million worth of archaeological material, from Etruscan vases to Roman busts, is spirited out of Italy every year...
...using a new dating technique, has reported that 48 of 66 objects thought to be from Hacilar, a settlement that existed 7,000 years ago in southwestern Turkey, are forgeries. The results of their investigations, published in the current issue of Oxford's Archaeometry, also showed that 25 "Etruscan" wall paintings on terra cotta, for which Swiss, American and other collectors have been paying up to $24,000 apiece, are less than twelve years...
...illustrations in McLean's book enforce the point. They indicate an obsession with certain fundamental themes: the phallus, sometimes decorated with wings (an accessory, incidentally, commonly found in ancient Etruscan art); assorted schematic representations of the vulva; and the Valentine heart-a symbol that McLean believes is more erotic than sentimental. Typically, the heart symbol, if it survives long enough on the wall, gets further embellishment; someone adds an arrow, and then later another resourceful artist converts the heart into a rude approximation of the female posterior...