Il precario equilibrio della pesatura: le anime a confronto

Present in Greece especially in archaic and proto-classical pottery productions, the subject of weighing destinies and / or souls finds a counterpart in the epos. The scale and whoever holds it visualize the subject, who is ambiguous in the outcome of a same action. Conversely, the subject is rather uncommon in Rome; it recurs on two sarcophagi of urban production datable to the end of the 1st century. a C., perhaps addressed to individuals with Orphic-Pythagorean sympathies. Both the sarcophagi exhibit a Nekyia where an old bearded man appears with the balance in his hand on the threshold of Hades. Could a connexion with the scale sculpted on ambiguous so-called Boston Throne be conceivable?