The Etruscan Museum can be visited on application to the custode, every day except Monday, from 10 to 2. It is reached by the staircase which passes the entrance to the Gallery of Candelabra: after which one must ring at a closed door on the right.
"This magnificent collection is principally the fruit of the excavating partnership established, some twelve or fifteen years since, between the Papal government and the Campanari of Toscanella; and will render the memory of Gregory XVI., who forwarded its formation with more zeal than he ordinarily displayed, ever honoured by all interested in antiquarian science. As the excavations were made in the neighbourhood of Vulci, most of the articles are from that necropolis; yet the collection has been considerably enlarged by the addition of others previously in the possession of the government, and still more by recent acquisitions from the Etruscan cemeteries of Cervetri, Corneto, Bomarzo, Orte, Toscanella, and other sites within the Papal dominions."—Dennis.
The 1st Room—
Contains three sarcophagi of terra-cotta from Toscanella, with three life-size figures reposing upon them. Their extreme length is remarkable. The figure on the left wears a fillet, indicating priesthood. The head of the family was almost always priest or priestess. Most of the objects in terra-cotta, which have been discovered, come from Toscanella. The two horses' heads in this room, in nenfro, i.e. volcanic tufa, were found at the entrance of a tomb at Vulci.
The 2nd Room—
Is a corridor filled with cinerary urns, chiefly from Volterra, bearing recumbent figures, ludicrously stunted. The large sarcophagus on the left supports the bearded figure of a man, and is adorned with reliefs of a figure in a chariot and musicians painted red. The urns in this room are of alabaster, which is the characteristic of Volterra.
The 3rd Room—
Has in the centre a large sarcophagus of nenfro, found at Tarquinii, in 1834, supporting a reclining figure of a Lucumo, with a scroll in his hand, "recalling the monuments of the middle ages." At the sides are reliefs representing the story of Clytemnestra and Ægisthus,—the Theban brothers,—the sacrifice of Clytemnestra,—and Pyrrhus slaying the infant Astyanax. In this room is a slab with a bilingual inscription, in Latin and Umbrian, from Todi. In the comers are some curious cinerary urns shaped like houses.
The 4th Room—
Is the Chamber of Terra-cottas. In the centre is a most beautiful statue of Mercury found at Tivoli. At the sides are fragments of female figures from Vulci,—and an interesting terra-cotta urn from Toscanella, with a youth lying on a couch. "From the gash in his thigh, and the hound at his bed-side, he is usually called Adonis; but it may be merely the effigy of some young Etruscan, who met his death in the wild-boar chase."