THE ‘noble house of Tarquin’, as Lord Macaulay termed it, may never have ruled in Tarquinia. But there is no doubt as to the nobility of the necropolis of the former Etruscan city of Tarxuna, or Tarxna, that sprawled over a now bare hill set well back from the coast above the river Marta. The city fell to Rome in 308 BC. A millennium later, after a long period of decline, the site was abandoned, some of the inhabitants moving westwards to the northern tip of the ridge that had served as the necropolis, to found the city of Corneto. The associations of the former name had an irresistible appeal to Italian patriots, so the place was renamed Corneto Tarquinia in 1872 and Tarquinia, tout court, in 1922.
Although evidence of their activity is omnipresent in the swathe of central Italy they once controlled, the Etruscans are in some ways an oddly elusive people. This is partly because they chose the sites of their cities so well that their successors continued to occupy these. At Volterra the circuit of their walls impresses, and at Cervetri their great necropolis haunts the imagination. In the archaeological museums of Florence and Volterra, of Chiusi and Rome, we can see something of the artistic vigour of their civilization. But it is perhaps most readily understood at Tarquinia, where the rich holdings of the Museo Nazionale Tarquiniese can be seen in conjunction with the lavish decoration of so many of the excavated tombs.
The museum is housed in the remarkable late Gothic Palazzo Vitelleschi on the north side of the Piazza Cavour. Cardinal Giovanni Vitelleschi, for whom it was begun, was a patron of considerable taste, as the frescoes in the studiolo on the first floor confirm. The building lends itself admirably to the display of the archaeological collection. The sculpture is for the most part of little sophistication. Sarcophagi with recumbent portraits pall, but in a small relief of the Suicide of Ajax, for example, evident energy is matched by a degree of refinement. Pride of place goes, on the second floor, to two fragmentary winged horses made in earthenware that flanked the approach to the main shrine in the Etruscan town. Nearby are murals salvaged from three of the tombs in the necropolis, notably the Tomb of the Olimpiads, datable to the late sixth century BC, and the early fifth-century Tomb of the Triclinium. The collection is rich in smaller items and in local ceramics. But it would be perverse not to admit that the latter are crude by comparison with the decorated black figure wares from Athens for which the Etruscan plutocracy had an understandable predilection. These are arranged by subject matter: war, sport and sex. And we are left in no doubt of both the visual preoccupations of the Athenian potters and the tastes of the Etruscan consumers who chose to be buried with such luxury goods.
The necropolis lies to the south-west of the town, an easy walk. Over 6,000 tombs have been found, some sixty with substantial decorative schemes. Only a dozen or so are open at any given time. Flights of steps lead down to the tomb chambers, which for conservation reasons are sealed with glass. The repertoire is varied: swarthy dark-haired men feast with, and less frequently make love to, fair-skinned women; they are seen wrestling and hunting; furniture and trees serve as props and animals abound. Intelligent labelling helps the visitor to make sense of the chronology of ancient painting, so much of the evidence for which is due to the very survival of the Tarquinia tombs.
Museo Nazionale Tarquinese: Baccanti Tomb.
Medieval Corneto should not be overlooked. On a spur at the north-western angle of the walls is the splendid and superbly sited church of Santa Maria di Castello, begun in 1121 and consecrated in 1208. The road to the left of the Palazzo Vitelleschi, Via Cavour, descends to the restrained front, which is flanked on the left by a handsome campanile. The interior has been responsibly restored and original fittings, including the font, the pulpit and a ciborium, are in place.
