Travignoli stele

Description

Stele number 6 was found in the locality of Travignoli in the Municipality of Pontassieve. For a time it was thought to be lost, but then it was found in 1911 in the garden of Mr. Lawrence's villa in Fiesole. It is a large stele: it is, in fact, about 1 meter 65 centimeters high and up to 55 centimeters wide. Made of grayish-yellow sandstone, the stele has a trapezoidal shape and a crowning composed of a seven-lobed palmette decoration set on two rosettes with a circular border and eleven petals, resting on the backs of two crouching felines in the round, mirroring each other, facing the sides of the monument. On the thickness of the stone is a band decorated with repeated ESSE tendrils. On the main face we see two sets of ESSE tendrils separating three hollow metopes decorated with bas-relief scenes. The stele, despite surface abrasions, represents one of the most remarkable specimens of Fiesole stone.