It is thought to depict Persephone, Demeter and Triptolemus, the triad of the Eleusinian mysteries, however, there are several different competing interpretations about the figures and their meaning in the literature.

It was found during an 1876 excavation of the columbarium of the Statilii on the Esquiline Hill near Porta Maggiore in Rome, Italy.

The object is named after Ersilia Caetani Lovatelli, an Italian art historian and archaeologist who first published a description of it in 1896.

[2] The urn was discovered in 1876 during the excavation of the columbarium of the Statilii family by Italian archaeologists Edoardo Brizio and Rodolfo Lanciani from 1875 to 1877.

[3] They discovered three chamber tombs referred to as N, O, and P. The urn depicts three separate scenes, thought to portray a preliminary initiation and purification rite from the Lesser Eleusinian Mysteries, often described as myesis.