## 2 Context  
The crested helmet under investigation is from Tomb 1036 from the Casale del Fosso necropolis at Veii (Figure 1). The helmet is currently located in the Museo Nazionale Etrusco di Villa Giulia e Villa Poniatowski di Roma (National Etruscan Museum of the Villa Giulia and Villa Poniatowski in Rome) and was examined in January 2019. Veii, located approximately 15 km north-northwest of Rome (Figure 1), was an important community in southern Eturia, which flourished during the Italian Iron Age and was traditionally considered an early rival to Rome until its conquest in 396 BCE, according to the ancient literary evidence ([PERSON] _Ab Urbe Condita_ 5.22). Whether due to Roman conquest or not, the site went into decline around this time and remained mostly abandoned afterward, with brief periods of light occupation during the medieval period [8; 9]. The urban centre of Veii is situated atop a plateau with the community's various necropoleis surrounding it (Figure 1). The site of Veii has been the subject of archaeological interest since the 14 th century [10], although formal excavation only began in the 19 th century and was initially focused on collecting valuable objects and worked marbles for private and museum collections. More systematic approaches were slowly adopted, and in the period between 1913 and 1918, a methodological investigation of several of the necropoleis was undertaken which uncovered around 1200 tombs from Grotta Gramiccia, Casale del Fosso, Pozzuolo, Monte Campanile, Valle La Fata, and Macchia della Comunita necropoleis [8; 9]. Tomb 1036 from  
Figure 1: The site of Veii with associated necropoleis, including the location of Casale Del Fosso. the Casale del Fosso necropolis, located to the northwest of the plateau (Figure 1), dates to between 750 and 731 BCE and was excavated in 1915. This grave was, from its initial discovery, understood to be exceptional due to both the style of burial and the number and the perceived quality of the grave goods. The context was a single inhunation burial, where the body was deposited into a _fossa_, or pit grave, in a wooden box which also contained grave goods. The grave goods included a spear, a pair of swords, a'mace', a pair of composite'shields', several large embossed bronze discs placed over the body, and this helmet. When excavated, the entire assemblage, including the body, the items, and the box, was encased in a thick layer of plaster and transported to the Villa Giulia in Rome to be conserved; due to a delicate conservation process, the finds were only displayed nearly a century later [11] (Figure 2). The crested helmet from Tomb 1036 is of the 'Villanovan-type' [12], which emerged in Italy during the 9 th century BCE, with the first examples appearing at Tarquinia--a nearby community in south Etruria. Although possibly connected to earlier crested helmets from continental Europe, such as the Pass-Lueg helmets of the Bronze Age, and with clear connections to helmets found in San Canziano-Skocjan, Hallstatt, and Zavadintsy, these crested helmets were evidently new to Italy in this period and quickly formed an important expression of the emerging 'warrior ethos', which is argued to have dominated amongst the elite within Etruria at this time [13]. By the late 8 th century BCE, when this helmet was deposited, these types of helmets seem to have taken on increasing symbolic connotations--only associated with burials of the highest status [14]. The helmet, as with others of its type, was made through an elaborate process. The two halves (front and back in Figure 3) were likely formed by'sinking', where a flat sheet is curved by hammering into a concave indentation. The vast majority of the decoration, which was likely achieved through repoussing or punching from the inside (most notably a series of small dots, largely invisible now due to patination), would have been added during this phase as well, as it would have been impossible to achieve once the helmet was assembled.