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| Pithos returned from Princeton University Art Museum Source: Ministero della Cultura |
One of the characteristics of recent returns to Italy has been the prominence of 7th century Etruscan White on Red Ware, some from the vicinity of Caere and others from Latium. One of the items returned from Princeton University Art Museum was a pithos that had been a gift from Edoardo Almagià in honor of Allen Rosenbaum (inv. 1999-8).
Among the Fordham University seizures was a series of White on Red objects: a biconical pithos with lid (inv. 7.039); a house-shaped cinerary urn (inv. 6.002); a cinerary urn with four attached bowls (inv. 5.010); a lidded pyxis (inv. 7.038); and a lidded pyxis (inv. 7.040). All these would seem to have passed through the hands of Almagià.
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| Pithos from the Getty Museum Source: Chasing Aphrodite |
The Fordham catalogue draws parallels with a pithos in the Getty, and it seems that at least one lidded pithos decorated with Odysseus and Polyphemos, and once in the Flesichman collection, has now been returned (inv. 96.AE.135). (I am grateful to Chasing Aphrodite for drawing my attention to the photograph of the reverse side of the pithos in a crate.) The Manhattan DA's office states that it, too, was handled by Almagià. It is unconfirmed, as yet, if another Almagià pithos was included in the return.
These objects were clearly derived from Etruscan funerary contexts. But what about the histories for the parallels cited for the Getty pithos that currently reside in the collection once formed by the late George Ortiz and another that surfaced through Athena Fund II and is now in a private collection in California? Where were they found?
