The “ #Sarcophagus of the Spouses ” is an Etruscan funerary #sculpture made in terracotta, dating back to the sixth-century BC and found in the 19th-century at the necropolis of Cerveteri, near #Rome.

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‣ The spouses lie on a typical kline during a #banquet, in a position of perfect equality: they have the same proportion, both wear long hair and the woman wears traditional headdress and shoes. One senses their important political and social role. The Romans instead lost these uses and downgraded #women in #society so as not to admit them to the banquet until the imperial era

‣ The structure of the work is that of the canopic jars containing the ashes of the deceased while for the representation of the #spouses it’s known that the Etruscans were inspired by the representations of Greek art. With her right hand the #woman is offering perfume to her husband who in the meantime holds out his palm, in the left hand instead she holds a small object, perhaps a pomegranate, symbol of #immortality

⇒ Date: 520 BC

⇒ Material: Terracotta

⇒ Dimensions: 140 x 202 cm

⇒ Site:  Museo Nazionale Etrusco di Villa Giulia, Rome