The urns themselves are the source of data for this project. The marble surfaces preserve certain tool marks and sometimes detectable patterns of how the tools were applied, which when considered across the whole corpus help to reconstruct the order in which sculptors worked to lay out the composition (ordinatio in Latin).
Inscriptions, both on urns/altars and from plaques added to columbaria tombs, serve as the basis for identifying issues of social status, work titles, and familial relationships. In the area of inscriptions, additional incisions, which served as guidelines, are frequently evident to suggest either that engravers and sculptors of the other decoration worked separately or one artist skilled at both letters and figures completed the entire object.
In time, this page will be populated with tables noting cineraria included in this project.
This project currently uses Steward Database software for storing various data for catalogued marble cineraria. A relational database is being created in order to organize and connect objects and their data connections better.