On a recent trip to Italy with Evan Michelson--co-star of TV's "Oddities" and Morbid Anatomy Library scholar in residence--we paid an impromptu, jet-lagged visit to the wonderful Cimetero Monumentale in Milan. We were both struck by the over-the-top--and, for a cemetery, odd--sexiness of so many of its funeral monuments, particularly the one shown above. I was trying to get to the bottom of this peculiar phenomenon when I came across the following lengthy discussion of the very monument in the book Italian Memorial Sculpture 1820-1940: A Legacy of Love; As it is quite fascinating, I quote it here in its entirety here:

Milan has one of the most enigmatic of erotic monuments. Conceived by Piero da Verona ... for Maria Beruccinia in 1914, it is subtitled Dedizione and inscribed 'Non dire ad alcuno perché sona morta' ... Dedizione translates as "devotion' in English, but in Italian its earlier meaning was 'surrender' or 'submission' and, by extension, 'self sacrifice.' Our curiosity is further incited by the inscrutable inscription 'Don't tell anyone why I'm dead' or, more liberally, 'Don't tell anyone the cause of my death.' The particular kind of graceful femininity was preceded in the works of Canonica and of Domenico Trentacoste... Da Verona must also have been receptive to the sensuality of the 'Genoese Symbolist School"... while the pose may specifically reflect contemporary photography, ranging from artistic poses to soft pornography.... One's immediate reaction is to ask what on earth a sculpture like this is doing in a cemetery. Is there malice in its presence there or in the eye of the beholder?