The Vicchio Stele and Its Context

Abstract

The recent discovery of an inscribed stele in the foundations of the Late Archaic temple at the sanctuary of Poggio Colla (Vicchio, FI) sheds new light on the nature of cult at the site. The stele is one of the longest Etruscan sacred texts and is from a secure archaeological context. It is also the earliest extant non-funerary sacred text (excluding simple votive inscriptions). The object, currently undergoing conservation, promises to provide new evidence for Etruscan ritual, literacy, and language.

The Etruscans: Setting New Agendas

“…Another site that has become highly visible is Poggio Colla, where the discovery of what is billed as one of our longest Etruscan inscriptions has focused attention on a marginal site located on the path through the Apennines and across the Adriatic coast (Warden 2016 ; Warden and Maggiani 2020 ). Work at Montelabate, between Perugia and Gubbio, has also revealed a site that operated very much on the edges of larger settlements.…”

“…Recent discoveries at the Campo della Fiera sanctuary near Orvieto, the likely site of the Etruscan federal sanctuary known as the Fanum Voltumnae, include a c. 84-cm-high molded trachyte block that served as a statue base and was inscribed to record a donation by a woman—perhaps a freedwoman named Kanuta—from the Laracena family in the late sixth century BC (Stopponi 2011 ). Farther north, finds at Poggio Colla include a bucchero sherd from the second half of the seventh or the early sixth century BC stamped with what may be the earliest scene of childbirth in European art (Perkins 2012 ) and a sixth century sandstone stele bearing one of the longest Etruscan sacred texts yet known (Warden 2016 ). The artisans’ sanctuary of Cetamura del Chianti seems to have been continuously occupied between the seventh century BC and late antiquity and shows that the conflict between Rome and Carthage, as well as the “Hellenizing” trends that elsewhere marked the last three centuries BC, largely bypassed the site (de Grummond 2017 , 2020 ).…”