[Sca-cooks] Fwd: BMR: Larissa Bonfante, Etruscan Dress. Updated edition

[Sandra Kisner]

Another review to check out, perhaps?  Sandra+

>Date: Sat, 30 Apr 2005 11:21:28 -0400 (EDT)
>From: owner-bmr-l at brynmawr.edu
>
>(From BMCR 2005.04.60)
>
>Larissa Bonfante, Etruscan Dress. Updated edition.  Baltimore:  Johns
>Hopkins University Press, 2003.  Pp. ix, 261.  ISBN 0-8018-7413-0.
>$22.00 (pb).
>
>Costume was one of the most important indicators of identity and status
>in the ancient world, where the rich clothing of the Etruscans
>certainly distinguished them from their Greek and Italic neighbors,
>whose accounts alone survive. The mute evidence of artistic
>representations and rare archaeological finds was shown by Larissa
>Bonfante, in the original edition of 1975, to provide a wealth of
>social, technological, and chronological information, much of it
>surprising to scholars who only knew the literary sources. We friends
>who importuned the author to see this book restored to print have been
>rewarded, along with first-time readers, with a fine, affordable
>paperback version of the 1975 original. The original text is unaltered,
>but has been updated in a stimulating "Bibliographic Essay" (pp.
>213-229). Readers must remember to check both the original set of
>bibliography and notes and the new references (pp. 222-229); the wide
>margins will allow them to jot down page references to the
>supplementary essay.
><snip>
>Anyone seeking topics for research will find much to consider in
>Etruscan Dress, and, as B. notes, the Hellenistic period as a whole has
>yet to be thoroughly analyzed, as does the field of theater and
>theatrical costumes. There was undoubtedly more complex social
>information embedded in Etruscan hairstyles: they must have expressed a
>greater social hierarchy than just long-vs-short to differentiate
>mistress from slave (cf. pp. 77-79). In fact, the short, wavy, bobbed
>hairstyles of 4th-century mirrors and painting, like that of the little
>blonde maidservant in the Tarquinian Tomb of the Shields probably
>denote personages more important than chattel-slaves.[[19]] (Note that
>the fan-bearer's costume is actually very close to that of her
>mistress, including the same fine red and black boots and linen dress
>-- we are being told that she is not a slave; perhaps she is a distant
>relation, the daughter of a client, or of another aristocratic family.)
><snip>
>For its references to Etruscan monuments and ancient literary passages,
>as much as for the compendium of costumes, Etruscan Dress is a mine of
>images, references and nuggets of information, in addition to a
>well-reasoned, critical analysis of dress as an index to the society
>and chronology of ancient Etruria. B. has introduced us to the
>complexity and sophistication of Etruscan dress, and this book will
>remain the anchor for years of future research in all directions.
>
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