ETRURIA. When or by what road the Rasena (Etrusci) reached their permanent seats in Etruria proper is by no means certain, though from the fact of their principal towns being well inland, from the tradition of their having been previously settled in Umbria, from the survival of their peculiar language down to late times among a people of the Rhaetian Alps, and from the discovery of works of art in this district corresponding with the earliest Etruscan
Chart of Etruria.
remains, there would seem to be considerable probability in the theory of their first settlement in Italy having been about the mouth of the Po, whence their progress would be through Umbria and across the Apennines. At the same time, it is to be remembered that, though "Rasena" was the national name of this people, yet there is strong evidence for supposing that the nationality, as we know it under the classical names of Etrusci or Tyrrheni (Tvppgvoi, Tvpcrgvoi), included another race which, if not nearly allied to the Greeks, had a singularly similar disposition towards the arts, such as it is hardly possible the original Rasena could have brought with them directly from the north. It would account for this other race, if we could accept the tradition (Herodotus, i. 94, Strabo, v. 220) of a body of Lydians having landed in Umbria and colonized Etruria, naming it after their leader Tyrsenus. This Lydian origin was accepted by the Etruscans themselves in late times (Tacitus, Ann. iv. 55), and many have seen a confirmation of it in the similarity of the tombs and tumuli exist-ing in both countries, and in the records of a singular community between them in such matters as music, games, and costume. Yet a native historian of Lydia (Xanthus) said nothing of the emigration from that country, and Dionysius, who cites him, maintained that the language spoken in Etruria had nothing in com-mon with that of Lydia. The legend of Herodotus is an attempt to explain the name of " Tyrrhenia" as applied by the Greeks to Etruria, owing, doubtless, to its being largely inhabitated by members of that same Tyrrhenian race which was found on the coast of Asia Minor and in Thrace, which people Thucydides (iv. 109) identifies with the Pelasgians, while Herodotus himself (i.57)speaks of the Tyrrhenian town of Creston, by which he means Cortona in Etruria according to Dionysius, as Pelasgic. Another tradition asserted that Pelasgians from Thessaly had entered Italy from the Adriatic at Spina and founded Cortona. While then the Tyrrhenians and Pelasgians were practically the same people, it will be sufficient to use the former name to designate the apparently foreign element in the nationality of the Rasena. In historical times the chief seat of the Tyrrhenians outside of Etruria was in Thrace, where they worked the rich silver mines, and to judge from their coins (e.g., those of the Edones and Bisaltas) were gifted with much the same disposition towards fine art which is observed in Etruria. From this position in a northern region, and from the traditions of members of the same race having entered Italy from the north-east, it is not unreasonable to suppose that they may have gradually made their way round by land, and may, in fact, have joined the Rasena while they were yet in their settlements at the mouth of the Po. So complete a blending of two races as appears in the Etrusci could scarcely take place unless the original contact had been during a primitive stage of civilization. No doubt there were other Tyrrhenians besides those of Thrace. There were those who were known chiefly as pirates, or as successful in seafaring, and from the circumstance of Caere, which previously had the Tyrrhenian name of Agylla, having been near the coast, it would seem as if part at least of the Tyrrhenians had entered Etruria by sea on the west coast.
It is common enough to find mention of the twelve cities Cities, of Etruria, but nowhere are their respective names recorded.
The probability is that in process of time this or that city fell out of the league, and was replaced by towns of more recent growth, till in the end there were at least seventeen presumable claimants for the title of one of the twelve. This is the case as regards Etruria proper, but there was a time wheu similar leagues appear to have existed among the Etruscan cities in the neighbourhood of the Po (Etruria Circumpadana), and again among those of Campania. As to the confederation of twelve cities in Etruria proper, and the political principles on which it was founded, nothing is positively known, except that the principles were essen tially aristocratic, much as in early Rome under the kings. The kings were elective for life, and were held in check by the principes or Lucumos who represented the real power of each state. In national enterprises one of the kings was chosen for supreme command, having a lictor from each city. The surroundings of official dignity found after-wards in Rome, the purple robe, the praetexta, the twelve lictors and fasces, the apparitores, the curule chair, and triumphal processions, were derived from Etruria, and in-dicate the nature of her constitution. The representatives met at the temple of Voltunma, the locality of which is not known (Livy, iv. 23), apparently in spring ; but it would seem that, in fact, the confederation was far from strictly maintained, at any rate in the matter of external policy. For internal affairs they had certain books (libri disciplines Etruscce) in which they were instructed as to the founding and consecration of public or religious build-ings, the distribution of the people into tribes, curia? and centuriae, the constitution of armies, and the management of everything pertaining to peace or war (Festus, s. v. " Rituales "). These books were divided into three sections, the third, libri rituales, being those to which reference has just been made. The other two were devoted to divina-tion, an art in which the Etruscans surpassed all other nations. The first part was the libri haruspicini, contain-ing instructions for divining the will of the gods from abnormal conditions observed in the entrails of animals slain in sacrifice, or from unusual natural phenomena. The second part was the libri fulgurates, treating of divina-tion from lightning. By such means the gods were believed to indicate their wishes towards men, and, indeed, had declared so much through the divine seer, Tages, a miracu-lous dwarf whom a labourer ploughing one day found in his furrow. Though then but a boy, Tages had grey hair, and was wise as if of a great age. His sayings, delivered always in verse, like oracles, were taken clown by Tarchon, and formed the books in question. Tarchon was the founder of Tarquinii, and from this town proceeded the other cities and their organization. Such is the legend, and in the early history of Etruria we have, as elsewhere, only legend, known mainly through the annals of Borne, which, when they go back to a period before the introduc-tion of writing (apparently in the 7th century. B.C.) must be largely imaginary, and even long after this, are highly coloured.
Veii. First in importance among the Etruscan cities was Veil, the site of which has been identified at Isola Far-nese, about 11 miles from Borne, its great rival and ultimate victor. Strong by its natural position on a high cliff, and fortified with massive walls, rich in its own territory, and commanding the assistance of its subject towns, Sabata, Sutrium, Nepete, and Capena, it maintained an almost constant state of war with Borne from the legendary times of Bomulus down to its capture by Camillus, 396 B.C., after which, by a decree of the Roman senate, it was forbidden to be inhabited (Livy, v, 6). The spoils then carried away indicated its wealth, and doubt-less this, together with other measures then taken, led to the desolation which now reigns on the site. Of the 14 re-corded wars with Borne, the most memorable were—the 7th (509 B.C.), in which, to replace Tarquinius Superbus on the throne of that city, Porsena of Clusium marched to its gates, though in a previous battle the Etruscans had been declared vanquished by a mysterious voice in the night, because they had lost one man more than the Bomans ; the 9th and 10th (482-476 B.C.), in which occurred the treacherous massacre of the Fabii, who, with their clients, to the number, it is said, of 4-000, had voluntered to hold Veii in check from their camp on the Cremerà ; the 12th, in which their king Tolumnius was slain, and the 14th, in which the Bomans, to whose gates the Veientes had so often carried terror, laid seige to Veii, and in the tenth year took it, as is said by the stratagem of a cuniculus or mine up through the rock of the citadel. Those who believe this story, point out that Camillus may have obtained his idea from the caniculus or outlet of the waters of the Alban lake, which also at this time was made to play a miraculous part. The waters of the lake were observed with alarm to be rising and threatening to overflow. The oracle at Delphi was consulted, and in consequence of its advice this outlet was made by the Romans in the space of a year (Livy, v. 15, 16).
Scarcely less important than Veii, and like it also Tarqui-. undoubtedly one of the twelve cities, was Tarquinii, ml-now Corneto, the queen of the Maremma, towards which Gravisele seems to have served as the port by which its great trade was carried on. The story runs that among those who preferred exile to the tyranny of Cypselus in Corinth in the early part of the 7th century B.C. was a wealthy merchant, Demaratus, who, accompanied by certain artists with mythical names (Eucheir, Diopus, and Eugrammus), settled in Tarquinii, which it is to be presumed was then sufficiently advanced in civilization to offer prospects of comfort, and to have been known to the traders of Corinth at least. Demaratus married a lady of Tarquinii, and had a son Lucumo or Lucius, who, though rich, suffered from being looked down on as a foreigner, and, to escape this, migrated to Rome, where in time he rose to the highest office of king, under the title of Tarquinius Priscus, and compelled the submission of the whole of Etruria, the token of which was the insignia of the twelve fasces, repre-senting the twelve cities. He was succeeded by Servius Tullius, or Mastarna, as the Etruscans called him, under whose rule Etruria revolted, but without final success. Then came Tarquinius Superbus and his expulsion from Rome, on which occasion Tarquinii and Veii sent an army to endeavour to reinstate him. In the battle which fol-lowed, Aruns Tarquinius and Junius Brutus the first consul fell by each other's hands. From this tine Tar-quinii was quiet for a century, till 397 B.C., when it joined Veii against Borne unsuccessfully, and thus revived a series of wars, in which, though generally worsted with severe loss, she yet maintained her independence down to the defeat at the Vadimonian lake, 283 B.C. Towards the close of the second Punic war, when the Etruscan cities had to furnish Scipio's fleet each with its staple commodity, Tar-quinii supplied sail-cloth.
Corn and other provisions were supplied by Ccere, Caere, a town which, if less famous in war than the two al-ready described, was better known in the arts of peace. No doubt, in the legendary age, when it was ruled by the cruel Mezentius (Aeneid, viii. 482), it was sufficiently warlike, but in later times it rarely joined in the struggles against Rome, where, indeed, its people stood in high favour for having sheltered the Roman vestals and the Flamen Quirinalis from the Gauls (389 B.C.). From the privileges enjoyed by the Caerites in Rome arose, it was said, the word " caerimonia." It is recorded to the honour of Caere that she abstained from the piracy
The probability is that in process of time this or that city fell out of the league, and was replaced by towns of more recent growth, till in the end there were at least seventeen presumable claimants for the title of one of the twelve. This is the case as regards Etruria proper, but there was a time wheu similar leagues appear to have existed among the Etruscan cities in the neighbourhood of the Po (Etruria Circumpadana), and again among those of Campania. As to the confederation of twelve cities in Etruria proper, and the political principles on which it was founded, nothing is positively known, except that the principles were essen tially aristocratic, much as in early Rome under the kings. The kings were elective for life, and were held in check by the principes or Lucumos who represented the real power of each state. In national enterprises one of the kings was chosen for supreme command, having a lictor from each city. The surroundings of official dignity found after-wards in Rome, the purple robe, the praetexta, the twelve lictors and fasces, the apparitores, the curule chair, and triumphal processions, were derived from Etruria, and in-dicate the nature of her constitution. The representatives met at the temple of Voltunma, the locality of which is not known (Livy, iv. 23), apparently in spring ; but it would seem that, in fact, the confederation was far from strictly maintained, at any rate in the matter of external policy. For internal affairs they had certain books (libri disciplines Etruscce) in which they were instructed as to the founding and consecration of public or religious build-ings, the distribution of the people into tribes, curia? and centuriae, the constitution of armies, and the management of everything pertaining to peace or war (Festus, s. v. " Rituales "). These books were divided into three sections, the third, libri rituales, being those to which reference has just been made. The other two were devoted to divina-tion, an art in which the Etruscans surpassed all other nations. The first part was the libri haruspicini, contain-ing instructions for divining the will of the gods from abnormal conditions observed in the entrails of animals slain in sacrifice, or from unusual natural phenomena. The second part was the libri fulgurates, treating of divina-tion from lightning. By such means the gods were believed to indicate their wishes towards men, and, indeed, had declared so much through the divine seer, Tages, a miracu-lous dwarf whom a labourer ploughing one day found in his furrow. Though then but a boy, Tages had grey hair, and was wise as if of a great age. His sayings, delivered always in verse, like oracles, were taken clown by Tarchon, and formed the books in question. Tarchon was the founder of Tarquinii, and from this town proceeded the other cities and their organization. Such is the legend, and in the early history of Etruria we have, as elsewhere, only legend, known mainly through the annals of Borne, which, when they go back to a period before the introduc-tion of writing (apparently in the 7th century. B.C.) must be largely imaginary, and even long after this, are highly coloured.
Veii. First in importance among the Etruscan cities was Veil, the site of which has been identified at Isola Far-nese, about 11 miles from Borne, its great rival and ultimate victor. Strong by its natural position on a high cliff, and fortified with massive walls, rich in its own territory, and commanding the assistance of its subject towns, Sabata, Sutrium, Nepete, and Capena, it maintained an almost constant state of war with Borne from the legendary times of Bomulus down to its capture by Camillus, 396 B.C., after which, by a decree of the Roman senate, it was forbidden to be inhabited (Livy, v, 6). The spoils then carried away indicated its wealth, and doubt-less this, together with other measures then taken, led to the desolation which now reigns on the site. Of the 14 re-corded wars with Borne, the most memorable were—the 7th (509 B.C.), in which, to replace Tarquinius Superbus on the throne of that city, Porsena of Clusium marched to its gates, though in a previous battle the Etruscans had been declared vanquished by a mysterious voice in the night, because they had lost one man more than the Bomans ; the 9th and 10th (482-476 B.C.), in which occurred the treacherous massacre of the Fabii, who, with their clients, to the number, it is said, of 4-000, had voluntered to hold Veii in check from their camp on the Cremerà ; the 12th, in which their king Tolumnius was slain, and the 14th, in which the Bomans, to whose gates the Veientes had so often carried terror, laid seige to Veii, and in the tenth year took it, as is said by the stratagem of a cuniculus or mine up through the rock of the citadel. Those who believe this story, point out that Camillus may have obtained his idea from the caniculus or outlet of the waters of the Alban lake, which also at this time was made to play a miraculous part. The waters of the lake were observed with alarm to be rising and threatening to overflow. The oracle at Delphi was consulted, and in consequence of its advice this outlet was made by the Romans in the space of a year (Livy, v. 15, 16).
Scarcely less important than Veii, and like it also Tarqui-. undoubtedly one of the twelve cities, was Tarquinii, ml-now Corneto, the queen of the Maremma, towards which Gravisele seems to have served as the port by which its great trade was carried on. The story runs that among those who preferred exile to the tyranny of Cypselus in Corinth in the early part of the 7th century B.C. was a wealthy merchant, Demaratus, who, accompanied by certain artists with mythical names (Eucheir, Diopus, and Eugrammus), settled in Tarquinii, which it is to be presumed was then sufficiently advanced in civilization to offer prospects of comfort, and to have been known to the traders of Corinth at least. Demaratus married a lady of Tarquinii, and had a son Lucumo or Lucius, who, though rich, suffered from being looked down on as a foreigner, and, to escape this, migrated to Rome, where in time he rose to the highest office of king, under the title of Tarquinius Priscus, and compelled the submission of the whole of Etruria, the token of which was the insignia of the twelve fasces, repre-senting the twelve cities. He was succeeded by Servius Tullius, or Mastarna, as the Etruscans called him, under whose rule Etruria revolted, but without final success. Then came Tarquinius Superbus and his expulsion from Rome, on which occasion Tarquinii and Veii sent an army to endeavour to reinstate him. In the battle which fol-lowed, Aruns Tarquinius and Junius Brutus the first consul fell by each other's hands. From this tine Tar-quinii was quiet for a century, till 397 B.C., when it joined Veii against Borne unsuccessfully, and thus revived a series of wars, in which, though generally worsted with severe loss, she yet maintained her independence down to the defeat at the Vadimonian lake, 283 B.C. Towards the close of the second Punic war, when the Etruscan cities had to furnish Scipio's fleet each with its staple commodity, Tar-quinii supplied sail-cloth.
Corn and other provisions were supplied by Ccere, Caere, a town which, if less famous in war than the two al-ready described, was better known in the arts of peace. No doubt, in the legendary age, when it was ruled by the cruel Mezentius (jEneid, viii. 482), it was sufficiently warlike, but in later times it rarely joined in the struggles against Borne, where, indeed, its people stood in high favour for having sheltered the Boman vestals and the Flamen Quirinalis from the Gauls (389 B.C.). From the privileges enjoyed by the Caerites in Bome arose, it was said, the word " caerimonia." It is recorded to the honour common among coast towns in early times (Strabo, v. 220); and it is a proof both of her advancement in civilization and of her reputation among the Greeks that she had a treasury at Delphi, where it was known as the treasury of Agylla, such having been the original name of the city. How the change of name arose is accounted for (Strabo, v. 220) with the ingenuity characteristic of ancient deriva-tions. Agylla had been founded byPelasgians from Thes-saly, but was afterwards captured by the Tyrrhenians from Lydia (cf. JSneid, v. 479), who, having enquired the name of the town they were besieging, and having been answered by some one from the walls with a word which they took to be the Greek xa'Pe> adopted this as the new name of the city. Herodotus (i. 107) speaks of it as Agylla, and relates how it joined the Carthaginians against the Phocceans of Alalia in Corsica (abut 534 B.C.), and, having carried away its share of the booty and of the prisoners, put the latter to death. Upon this followed a plague, as to which the Agyllaeans consulted the oracle at Delphi, and were told in reply that the way to appease the Phocaeans would be to institute public festivals of athletic games and horse-raciug. The sea-port was Pyrgi, cele-brated also for the wealth of its temple of Eileithyia, which Diouysius, the tyrant of Syracuse, ransacked (384 B.C.), taking from it 1000 talents, and spoils to the value of 500 talents more. As evidence of the high antiquity of the arts in Caere, there is the statement of Pliny (xxxv. 4-6) that paintings existed there older than the foundation of Rome. It was said to have been the last refuge of the Tarquins, and in confirmation of this is the modern dis-covery of a large sepulchre belonging to a family of that name, as seen from the numerous inscriptions in it. Little remains except tumuli and sepulchres, among which the most famous is that known as the Regulini-Galassi tomb, the masonry of which is Pelasgic in character.
Falerii. In close political relationship to Yeii, and probably reckoned as one of the twelve cities, though its population (the Falisci) was not purely Etruscan, was Falerii, originally on a high bare rock, but afterwards under Roman compulsion transferred to the broad plain which stretches to the Tiber, the Aequum Faliscum as it was called, to indicate the plain, not the justice of the people. The very ancient Fescennhua seoms to have been included in its territory. Trusting in its natural streugth, Falerii vainly made light of the Roman siege conducted by Camillus (391 B.C). It was on this occasion, as told by Livy (v. 27), that an official of Falerii, to whom was entrusted the education of the sons of the better class, led his pupils outside the city for their exercises as in times of peace, and by daily increasing the distance of their walks avoided suspicion, till at last he reached the Roman camp and offered to surrender the boys to Camillus, who, indignant at the treachery of the man, ordered him to be stripped, bound, and handed over to his pupils to be led back and punished. The habit of appoint-ing an official of this kind is spoken of as a Greek one, and, in connexion with the legendary foundation of Falerii by Halesus or Haliscus, a son of Agamemnon, together with the fact of its temple of Juno being the counterpart of the temple of that goddess at Argos, is taken as evidence of a strong Greek element in the town. Strabo (v. 226) quotes the opinion of some that the Falisci were not Tyrrhenians, but a distinct nationality.
Volci. One of the twelve cities also was Yolei (Vulci) ap-parently, though the historical notices of it are but few, and leave no impression of any great power. Yet its remains, as discovered in numerous sepulchres, show that it must have been an important city. Of these the tumulus of Cucumella, as it is now called, is remarkable not only for its size (200 feet in diameter, and 40 to 50 feet high still), but also for its general similarity to the tomb of Porsena at Clusium, of which we have only the description as quoted by Pliny (xxxvi. 13, 19), and to the tomb of Alyattes in Lydia. Up to 1830 this tomb at Vulci was encircled round the base with a massive wall, which is now gone. In the heart of the mound were discovered two loosely built towers, one of them square, the other conical, which perhaps may be fairly compared with the pillars in the tomb of Porsena and the ovpoi in that of Alyattes. From the other sepulchres of Vulci has been obtained a vast number of antiquities, not a few of which are of the first importance for the history of art in Etruria, and will be afterwards referred to. Yolsinii, called by the Volsinii. Etruscans Felsunn, as appears from its coinage, and now Bolsena, was one of the most powerful and warlike of the Etruscan states. The original site, it has been thought, was at Orvieto, which the Romans after a long and arduous siege destroyed, compelling the Volsinii to settle on the low ground at Bolsena. Chtsium (Chiusi), originally Camars Clusium. (Livy, x. 25), had been founded by the Umbrians, but became one of the principal cities of Etruria, being apparently at the height of its fame under the rule of its king Porsena, who to reinstate Tarquinius Priscus made that march to Rome (505 B.C.) with which are associated the undying legends of Roman heroism in the persons of Horatius, Scoavola, Clcelia, and Publicóla (Livy, ii. 11-13). Before this we find Clusium joined with other Etruscan cities on the side of the Latins against Tarquinius Priscus. Afterwards it was the assistance given by Rome to Clusium which drew down the Gauls on the former in 389 B.C. At the close of the second Punic war Clusium furnished corn and fir for ship-building to the Roman fleet. Mention has been made of the tomb of Porsena said to have existed at Clusium. In one place labyrinthine passages have been found among the tombs, such as appear to correspond to one of the features in the description of that sepulchre. Arrelium (Arezzo) was one of the twelve cities, but famous Arretium, chiefly in comparatively recent times. In 301 B.C. the citizens rose against the tyranny of their great family, the Cilnii, and drove them to exile in Rome, where their cause was taken up with this practical result, that a Roman army defeated the Arretines at Eussellae. Afterwards the city joined in league with the Gauls and Umbrians against Rome, but again was defeated. Next it was besieged by the Gauls. There is no record of its final submission to Rome. In the second Punic war it furnished corn, implements, and material of war for the R.oman fleet. During the civil wars it took the side of Marius, and would in consequence have lost all rights but for the intercession of Cicero. The present site does not appear to be that of the ancient town. Of its walls, which were said to have been built of brick, there is no trace. Conspicuous still for its stupendous walls and towers, commanding a high bare rock, is Cortona, Cortona. where everything that remains is in harmony with the tra-dition of its extraordinary antiquity. Of other records there arc scarcely any. Like Perusia (Perugia) it had Perusia. once been an Umbrian city, and like it also one of the twelve states of Etruria. Parts of the walls of Perusia remain, and many objects of great interest have been found on its site, none more precious, however, than the " Cippus of Perugia," with its long Etruscan inscription. Perusia I comes first into notice arrayed against Fabius, who com-pelled her to sue for peace. In the following year she was again at war, and shared in the disaster at the Vadi-monian lake. Other defeats followed, but not even that in which Fabius slew 4500 of her men, and took 1740 prisoners, was sufficient to reduce her to obedience to Rome, though that event followed not long after. In the second Punic war she supplied corn and fir to the Roman fleet. In the civil wars she took an active part, and when besieged by Octavius Caesar yielded only to famine. A great fire followed, after which the city was rebuilt by Augustus. Even under the empire it maintained a position of import-ance.
Vola- Volaterrce, called Velathri on its coinage, and now terra Volterra, of which the massive walls from 4 to 5 miles in circuit still stand on a great bare height visible far round, appears to have been one of the twelve cities, notwithstand-ing the fact of its having taken part with the Latins against Tarquinius Priscus. Almost nothing, however, is known of its history except the record of a defeat (298 B.C.) inflicted by L. Cornelius Scipio (Livy, x. 12), the battle having raged all day till darkness set in. The Etruscans deserted their camp in the night. Though considerably inland, Volaterrae is cited as having supplied tackling and other gear for Scipio's fleet, from which it would appear that she had been maritime, trading probably in the main through the port of Populonia, which is said to have been colonized by her. Possibly also the island of Elba with its rich mines belonged to Volaterrae. Its territory was extensive. During the civil wars it took the side of Marius, and after a siege of two years had to surrender, and only for a time escaped having to receive a military colony through the exertions of Cicero. Besides the walls there remain still several sepulchres of great interest, in par ticular that of the Cascinre family, famous in Roman history, and the ruins of two dome-shaped chambers, resembling in their construction the so-called tomb of p0pU. Agamemnon at Mycenae. Populonia, called Pupluna on Ionia. its coins, furnished iron obtained from the mines of Elba for Scipio's fleet. During the civil war it was destroyed by Sulla. Parts of the walls of huge masonry Russella;. remain. Russellce (Roselle) still survives in its walls of colossal masonry, but otherwise is a wilderness. Its history is uneventful, except for its siege by the Romans (294 B.C.), when it lost 2000 as prisoners and as many more slain (Livy, x. 37). It furnished corn and fir for the fleet of Scipio. Vetuhnia is given as one of the twelve cities, but little is known of it from records, and scarcely anything from remains, if, as appears to be the case, Mr. Dennis is right in identifying its site on the coast near Telamone, which he presumes would have been its port. Pisce, on the coast, was said to have been founded by Tarchon as a barrier against the Ligurians. Luna and Luca were pro-bably included in its territory. Of Fcesulce the huge walls on an impregnable height still remain. In Roman times the inhabitants moved to the lower ground of Florence. At Cosa and Saturnia are remains of massive walls, and at the latter place a peculiar form of tomb, which seems to date from a very early and at any rate a rude age. Salpenum and Aurinia are mentioned also among the Etruscan cities. Outside of Etruria proper, but still claiming to be Etruscan towns, we have, in Etruria Circumpadana, Felsini, afterwards called Bononia, said to have been at the head of the league formed by this district, Melpum, Mantua, Spina, Ravenna, Hatria, and Cupra. In Campania again were the following cities which Etruria was said to have founded or sent colonists to, but without the effect of making them practically Etruscan towns:—-Capua, Nola, Pompeii, Hemdaneum, Surrentum, Marcina, Scdernum.
Natural These, then, are the towns of Etruria. In their records resources, and in their ruins they survive as monuments of a life spent in extraordinary activity, and highly honoured in death. No country has left such wealth in its tombs. Nowhere have such battlements endured till now. Nature must have largely aided the Etruscans with her fertility, where now she is either exuberant to the degree of being a wilderness or pestilential as in the Maremma. Evidence of its natural products has been seen in the corn, fir wood, and iron, supplied to the Roman fleet. Its rivers and lakes must have assisted agriculture (" sic fortis Etruria crevit,'' Virg., Georg., ii. 533), on which the country appears to have relied even more than on commerce, since with a large sea coast it had comparatively few ports. The exceeding unhealthiness of the coast district anciently as now may have had much to do with this result. Yet their commerce was such as to place the inhabitants in a position to make treaties with that powerful nation of traders the Carthaginians, as, for instance, in the mutual agreement that the latter should hold Sardinia, while the Etruscans retained Corsica. To the Athenian expedi-tion against Sicily in the Peloponnesian war Etruria sent three ships, probably more from enmity to Sicily than from friendship to the Athenians. Their success in piracy was too well known in early times. The greater part of the country is broken up by chains and ridges of hills. The supply of timber was large, and doubtless profitable, as were also the pastures, from which a consider-able trade in cattle rearing and wool spinning was derived. The numerous lakes—Lacus Ciminius, Sabatinus, Vadi-monius,Clusinus, Thrasymenus,and Volsinius withits basalt rocks, afforded extensive occupation in fishing, as did the forests for hunting. Wine, largely produced, was nowhere so fine as at Luna. Flax and linen were grown at Falerii and Tarquinii. Besides iron and copper, there was a supply of silver and gold. The variegated marble of Luna was greatly prized. Volaterrae yielded alabaster, Arretium a clay peculiarly adapted for pottery, for which in later times it was celebrated. Tufa or travertine could be obtained in massive blocks from many places. There were numerous warm and sulphurous springs. The country had once been volcanic in many places, the extinct craters serving as basins for lakes. The most fertile and most highly cultivated districts were in the north at the foot of the Apennines, and along the upper valleys of the Arno and Tiber. The chief rivers were the Clanis, the Arnus (Arno), and the TJmbro.
During the early period the natural resources of Etruria must have been severely drained by her wars with Rome. Afterwards, when she sank into dependence, there arose private wealth, and the individual Etruscan becamepinguis et obesus, an expression which is abundantly verified by the portrait sculptures on their sarcophagi. Their extra-vagance in diet was a reproach, and in connexion with this their habit of reclining at banquets, as constantly seen in their works of art, was remarked on as similar to that of the Greeks; while the presence on these occasions of women who joined in the toasts, contrary to the customs of the Greeks and the Italic nations, was pointed out as consistent with the origin of the Etruscans from Lydia, where no less indulgence was said to have been allowed to women, and where also, as in Etruria, it was very usual to trace descent from the maternal side Etruscan dancers, who appear to have attended private as well as public ceremonies, were distinguished for the skill with which, without words, and only by action and gesture, they represented a story. Different from this may have been the armed dance, since it recalls that of the Salii in Borne, who accompanied their movements by songs of heroic deeds of old. Athletic contests, such as those of the Boman circus, together with displays of gladiatorial fights, were part of the amusements, and it seems almost certain that the latter form of excitement was derived by Bome from Etruria. The flute, trumpet, and lituus were the favourite musical instruments. Their literature consisted mainly of religious verses and national songs, of which, however, nothing is known. To these must be added the form of satyric songs which originated in Fescen-nium, a place belonging to Etruria. In science, especially in medicine:, and in philosophy their knowledge was highly reputed. As regards time, they reckoned by lunar months, and appear to have had some principle of intercalation, to equalize the solar and the lunar year. The lapse of each year was recorded by driving a nail into the door of the temple of Nortia at Volsinii, a habit which passed over to Rome. The month was divided into weeks of eight days, the eighth being set apart for marketing and house affairs; the day began at noon. Next to years they counted by scecula, each representing the longest life of the time, and reaching in some cases to 123 years, but with an average apparently of about 100 years. The Etruscan nation was to endure ten saeeula. The beginning of the 10th was announced in the year 44 B.C. The festivity of the Etruscans was accompanied by excess in personal ornaments and in dress; the toga picta, tunica pal-mata, the praetexta, the corona Etrusca, and the rich sandals which figured in Eome as insignia of office, had been introduced from Etruria, where also no doubt they served to mark the principes or luciimoiies as distinct from the mass of the people to whose lot it is in the highest degree improbable that such luxury as has been spoken of could have fallen. Their food was pulse, which may have been sweeter at Volsinii from being ground in curiously contrived mills (molce versatiles) of basalt (Pliny, xxxvi. 18, 29). Clientship, developed to the full in Rome, had first been proved practicable in Etruria, as was also the employment of slaves. The division of the people into three tribus and twelve curias at Mantua has been taken as representing the general principle of division, and this would seem to be confirmed by the tradition of the three names of Ramnes, Tities, and Luceres having been adopted for the Roman tribus from Etruria. To the books of discipline, by which public and private affairs were regulated, reference has already been made. There appears to have been also a fourth section of these books, libri fatales, dealing with common incidents. The interpretation of all these books and the conduct of such ceremonies as they prescribed belonged exclusively to the noble families, some of which had hereditary rights to the priesthood. In each state were always ten boys of such families undergoing instruction for this purpose. But besides the regular societies or colleges of Haruspices to which the Romans sent for aid when perplexed by serious portents, there were apparently others who obtained a vicarious living by ministering to the all-pervading superstition of the people. Instead of an oracle common to the whole nation as the Greeks had at Delphi, each state or city of Etruria had its own complicated machinery for discovering the will of the gods. (See AUGUKS.) Certain deities revealed their will by lightning, others otherwise. Mytho- The gods (cesar) were of two classes, the Dii Gonsentes, logy. who directly managed the affairs of the world, and certain nameless deities above and controlling them in such a way as Fate is above Zeus in the Iliad. At the head of the former was Jupiter (called Tinia in Etruscan), with whom were associated Juno (Uni) and Minerva (Menrfa), forming a supremacy of three for the protection of states, as may be inferred from the legend of Tarquinius having adopted them as the three chief deities of Rome. Their functions, however, were in each case different from those of the corresponding divinities of Rome and Greece, Jupiter being at once ruler of all in peace, god of war, and source of fertility in the earth, while Juno similarly was worshipped as " regina" in Veii, as curitis, an armed goddess, at Falerii, and as associated with Vulcan at Pe rusia, thus taking the place of the Greek Aphrodite and representing fertility. Minerva, again, was winged besides being armed, had the functions of Fortuna or Fate, and from her symbol of the serpent was a deity of the powers of the earth. The Etruscan name of Venus was Turan, of Vulcan, Sethlans, of Bacchus, Phuphluns, of Mercury, Tunis. Besides the other Greek deities who were in one way or another adopted into the Etruscan system, such as Apollo, Helios, Ares, Poseidon, Heracles, and the Dioscuri, a number of names have been handed down, some of which obviously designate gods of Latin or Sabine origin, while others may be synonyms of one and the same deity obtaining in different localities. The list includes Janus, Silvanus, Inuus, Saturnus, Suinrnanus, Vejovis, Soranus, Mantus, Pales, Nortia, Feronia, Voltumna, Mania, Eilei-thyia, Horta, Ancharia, Fortuna, Ceres, and others. To these were attached numerous genii of various powers and functions. As ruler of the lower world was the grim god Mantus with his hammer, and his associates Mania, Charun, and the Furige. Among the Lares Familiares were included the shades of deceased persons. The Penates watched over household plenty and prosperity. A goddess of Fate who occurs frequently on the monuments is Lasa, probably a feminine derivative from Lar, ruler, as in Lars Porsena. From what combination of early races, or from what promiscuous habit of adopting foreign deities, this complicated system arose cannot now be decided.
For these gods temples were necessary, but in no case Architeo-have they survived. Yet from records it would seem that ture-they differed from those of Greece in no essential particular except in the ground plan, which, instead of being much greater in length than in breadth, was nearly square, to be in conformity with the templum or arbitrary division of the heavens prescribed by the sacred books. The theatres have been more fortunate, as at Fiesole, where the massive ruins still show how in this form of construction also the Etruscans had been indebted to the Greeks. Of amphi-theatres or circi there are no remains. There is, however, one form of construction in which they are allowed to have been first, that is the arch, as seen among other places best of all in the Gloaca of Rome, the building of which tradition regularly assigned to the Etruscans in the time of the Roman kings. How the perfect arch was developed may be seen from the apparent vaulting in the Reguliui-Galassi tomb at Cervetri and elsewhere, a system of masonry which the Etruscans had in com-mon with the builders of the so-called Tomb of Agamemnon at Mycenoe. The earliest tombs seem to be those in the form of a well, sunk in the ground and lined with stones, containing a vase with the ashes and burnt remains of the dress and ornaments of the deceased. In this early period cremation appears to have been the rule, if, indeed, it was not always more or less a favourite form of sepulture. Next we have two classes of tombs. First the tumuli, consisting of chambers encircled by a massive wall, and covered with a mound of earth corresponding to the tumulus of Alyattes in Lydia and other parts of Asia Minor, as well as to the Nuraghe of Sardinia. Of this general type doubtless was the tomb of Porsena at Clusium, in spite of the probably fantastic description of it already referred to. Its labyrinthine chambers have been identi-fied. The tumulus of Cucumella at Vulci has also been mentioned. Then we have tombs hewn in the rock, sometimes including several chambers connected with each other, and frequently adorned, like those of Lycia, with architectural fronts as of small temples. In these chambers were placed the sarcophagi and urns, for the most part richly sculptured, in general with subjects of design adapted from the Greeks, and having frequently on the lids reclin-ing figures intended either as portraits or in some other way to represent the deceased, whose name and descent are painted on the front. In many cases the walls of those chambers are richly decorated with paintings, not exclusively but mostly reproducing scenes of festivity. The dead were accompanied in their resting-place by numerous presents of painted vases, armour, and other objects. As a rule a special district or cemetery was set apart for the dead, but how far it was laid out so as to correspond with the quarters of each town cannot now be determined. For the construction of the dwelling-houses and Tuscan architecture generally see ARCHITECTURE, vol. ii. p. 414.
LANGUAGE.—By Etruscan is meant the language which guage. was spoken by the Easena in Etruria more or less during the last thousand years B.C. until it succumbed to the Latin. It was the predominant language of Cam-pania also from 800 to 400 B.C., at which time it yielded to the Oscan. Soon after this, owing to the incursions of the Gauls, it lost its hold on what was apparently its oldest home in Italy, the valley of the Po, but continued to exist in a debased form in the time of Livy (v. 33) among certain peoples of the Alps, in particular among the Rhaeti. To the ancients Etruscan sounded barbarous. Dionysius (i. 30) declared it to be related to no other language. Still there was a time when among the better class of Romans Etruscan was taught, just as afterwards was Greek (Livy, ix. 36). Its remains as preserved by writers are few and frequently misrepresented, including about 60 names of places, 28 rivers, several islands, hills, woods, and lakes. Of names of persons there are 7 prse-nomina, and 50 gentile names and cognomina together, a few names of deities, heroes, and mythical kings, 7 names of months, and about 30 glosses, mostly from Hesychius, Servius, and Festus, and in part very doubtful. Altogether there are a little over 200 words, and of those many are local names, and have obviously originated among peoples of the Ligurian, Umbrian, and Latin races conquered by the Etruscans. The Etruscan inscriptions discovered on anti-quities up to the present time will be found in Fabretti's Corpus Inscriptionem Italicarum, with " Glossarium Itali-cum," Turin, 1867; "Primo Supplemento," 1872, "Sec. Suppl.," 1874. The total number now reaches to about 5000, and increases yearly at the rate of 100 to 200. Unfortunately they include only 15 bi-linguals (Lat. and Etr.), and these are very short, containing almost nothing but names. Except the "Cippus of Perugia" found in 1822, which has 46 lines, Etruscan inscriptions are all short, there being for instance only five which have more than 20 words. Four-fifths of them are sepulchral, with the mere indication of names or relationship. A few names of towns have been preserved on coins, as also the numerals from 1 to 6, on a pair of ivory dice. Altogether there are about 200 words which appear not to be names.
Lepsius (Inscript. Umbr. et Oscce, Leipsic, 1841) was the first to determine definitely the character of the Etruscan alphabet. Its companion and northern variants were pointed out by Mommsen (UnteritcdischeDialekte, Leipsic, 1S40), and according to those authorities it was derived from a Graeco-Chalcidian prototype current on the west coast of Italy. In its common form it has the following 19 letters :—
A;D, 3, <i, % B, ©, 1, s|, 111, n,A, M,9, 3, *, V, 4«, 9,
a, o, e, v, z, h, 6, i, 1, m, n, p, s'. r, s, t, u, x, f.
Of these c is a remits, 0 = tli, \ = ch, s is soft, while the other letters have the usual force. Exceptionally M = k occurs as an archaic form of c; 0 = <£ = ph, mostly in foreign words, and A = m (Umbrian). The mediae b, g, cl, and the vowel o, though they often occur in words handed down by writers as Etruscan, are never found in the inscriptions. (For other peculiarities see Fabretti, " Osser-vazioni Paleografiche," Corp. Inscr. Ital. Pr. Supipl., p. 145-252.)
The first who attempted to explain the Etruscan inscrip-tions was Phil. Buonarroti (Explic. et Conject. ad Monum. Oper. Dempster., Flor. 1726). He was followed by Giov. Batt. Passeri (Paralipomena in Th.Demp>ster, Lucca, 1767), who sought to prove them to be in an Italic language,—in fact, a dialect of the Latin. This opinion has maintained its ground with many, and only quite recently we find the great work of Corssen (Die Sprache der Etrusker, Leipsic, 1874-5) devoted to the elaboration of a strictly scientific basis for it. On the other hand, Ottfried Müller (Die Etruscer, Breslau, 1828) had observed certain distinctly foreign elements in the language, and had pointed them out clearly enough, without, however, venturing upon any conjecture as to their source. His views, though adopted by Niebuhr, Mommsen, and Aufrecht, have not satisfied others less skilled in these inquiries, who have endeavoured to trace the Etruscan to a Celtic, Germanic, Slavic, Albanian, Basque, Semitic, and lastly a Turanian origin (Isaac Taylor, Etruscan Researches, London, 1874). These attempts have all failed, and Midler's attitude of reserve appears to be decidedly the best under the circumstances. (See W. Deecke, Corssen und die Sprache der Etruscer, Stuttgart, 1875; Etruscische Forschungen, 1875-6; and the new edition of *0. Midler's Die Etruscer, Stuttgart, 1877.)
As a specimen of how the Etruscan language sounded may be given the inscription from a tomb at Perugia known as the Torre di San Manno. It is the third longest of existing inscriptions. The single words are separated from each other by two dots and the lines by a vertical stroke. The last part, which is in brackets, cannot be read with certainty :— cehen : susi : hina-iu : s-ues' : sians' : etve : saure : lautnes'cle : caresri : aules': larsial: precusuras'i : I lars-ialisvle : cestnal : clenaras'i: es-: fanu : lautn : precus': ipa : murzua : cerurum : ein | heczri : tunur : clutiva : zelur [vs : cetiver : apas]. The simple vowels are a, e, i, u. Length is rarely indicated except in some doubtful cases by means of repeating the vowel. Modification of the vowels, such as occurs in various forms in thelndo-Germanic, Germanic, Semitic, and Turanian languages, is foreign to the Etruscan. It has no prefixes, and the accent appears to have been always on the first syllable, and in conse-quence of this arose the habit of alliding vowels in the middle of words to such an extent as to bring about frequently very disagreeable combinations of consonants. An extreme case is that of Elxsntre = 'AAe,f <xi/Spos. Some-times it may be due to a method of writing, though there is no evidence whatever of vowels being inherent in consonants. The dipthongs are ai, au, ei, ia, ie, iu, ui, and aia, aie, eia, eie, uia, and again ae, ea, en, ua, ue, which latter appear not to be original forms. The consonants are p, cjj (almost only in foreign words); c, (7c), x; t, 6; I, r; in, n; s (s), z; v,f, h. The aspiration of the tenues is very frequent, sometimes also of the mediae in foreign words, in which cases / and h take the place of <f>, h of \. It is doubtful whether/and h interchange with 6; his sometimes allided. The hard / is common to the Etruscan and the Italian languages, as is also its interchange with h. Assibil-ation (e.g., in the nanae^et/wei, which also occurs aspetsnei, pesnei, peznei) is common. Nasal letters often fall out before mutes, and n when preceding a labial becomes in frequently, e.g., laufe, lam<j>e; s never changes to r, and the interchange of I and r is doubtful. With regard to the suffixes indicating masculine nouns, which have been wrongly used as an argument for the Italic character of the Etruscan, the most numerous series ends in a ; the next is that in e ; endings in i and u are comparatively rare, in ie and iu less so, while ia occurs only exceptionally. Con-sonant endings are few. There is no suffix in p, <f>, z, v, f, h. The greater part of the feminine words, also chiefly names of persons, are derived from the masculine by the suffix ia ; not seldom nia, ta, 6a occur; also the diminutives za and la. Besides these, however, are a number of feminine words without corresponding masculines. As yet there is no trace of a neuter. Positive traces of declension are few. In the older inscriptions the nom. sin. in masculines ends in s (s), which afterwards is dropped. The gen. sing, in masculine words ending in vowels, and in fern, words end-ing in consonants, is formed by sa, occasionally ssa = s'a = za, and shortened to s, s', z. The connecting vowels i and u are used after I and r, e.g., vele, gen. sing. velus(a). But in masculines ending in consonants, and feminines ending in Towels, the gen. sing, takes I, originally perhaps la, or with connecting vowel al. But this system in the formation of ^he genitive seems to have been interrupted at an early period )y the more general use of the ending sa. A remarkable peculiarity of the Etruscan is the apparently capricious doubling and trebling of the genitive suffix, e.g., sla (s'la), and slisa (slis'a) in masculines; lisa [lisa, lis a, alisa (alls'a), alls', contracted to alsa, Is, Is, als, als'~\ and lisala (lisla, alisala,alisla,perhaps ?/s-We)inniasculineandfeminine. The dat. sing, is formed by the suffix si (si) attached to the nom., e.g., clan (son), dat. clensi (with modification of the vowel). An accusative singular is probably to be found in the phrase arse v«re<3 = averte ignem, as handed down by Festus, in which case it would be similar to the nominative as in plural words. Few other cases in the singular have been traced. Possibly cesar is an instance of the nom. pi.; it would correspond to the conjectural acc. pi. of clenar from clan = son, from which the dat. pi. is clenaras'i.
As to conjugation only one form is certain, i.e., the perf. 3 sing, in ce (Ice), as in turce (turuce, turhe) — dedit; lupuce = mortuus or mortua est ; svalce = obiit (mortem); amce = fuit; arce — habuit; zilayguice = magistratuni gessit (T). As to lupuce, however, and zilaynuce, there is some doubt. No augment or reduplication is known. It is possible that the phrase arse verse contains an imperative; mi appears posi-tively to mean " I am." The numerals may be given as follows :—9u (dun) = 1; ci = 2 ; ma% = 3 ; zal (esal, esl) = 4; s'a = 5 ; hut (huth) = 6 ; semcp = 7 ; cezp = 8 (10-2). The tens are formed by alch(a)l, but irregularly, e.g., cealchl (celchl) = 20 ; muvalchl (mealchl) = 30. In mixed numbers the units preceded the tens. Peculiar forms are ciemzathrm, probably = 2 and 40, and Qunesi muvalchl, pro-bably 1 and 30 ; s added to numerals may indicate the genitive. When z is added it seems to indicate repetition, e.g., eslz = i times. Pronouns and adverbs appear to be represented by the forms eca, cehen, ta, etli, and a few others. An is perhaps a preposition. The present writer believes be has discovered with certainty two enclitic conjunctions, c (originally perhaps ce) and m (with vowel) um, em, both equal to "and," e.g., puiac and puiam = "and wife."
The following is a list of the words which have been made out from the inscriptions with tolerable certainty:—ncts'vis trutnvt— haruspex ; fronta (Greek?)—fulgurator; avil—life; n7—year; liv*= month; tusurthir=husband; puia—wife; clan=son; sec (sech, s'ec, s'ech) = daughter; thura = grandson; lautni—freedman; lautnita= freedn'omau ; etera=slave ; eteraia — female slave; tusna = swan; «g/Zm=.dog;fo'«»Z:?'M = panther; suti (suthi, s'uthi)=toTab; suthina = sepulchral object; sutna—sarcophagus; nesl-=grave; naper—niche (of tomb); cela (Ital.?) = sepulchral chamber; tular=tombstone (plural?); cesu = coffin ; mulvannicc (mulenike, &c.) = sepulchral; hinthia = shade, shade of the dead; farlhana (harthna) = monument; fleres (-res') = image ; tins'evil = dedicated object; alpan = work of art; cape (kapi, Italian?) = cup; oiA(«)mic-lamps; neviku—earthen-ware vase; nipe=v&se; Jmins=fountain; SOTfce = died; leine (line) = lived; tur{u)ce—gave; «mce = was; orce=had; zilachnuce=magis-tratum gessit; i2'fac7(?tWircs = magistrates; mi—I am. To these may be added, besides the numerals and particles just cited, the follow-ing names of deities :—Tinia (Tina)—Zeus; L7«i = Hera; Setklans "Hephaestus; Turmus=Hermes ; Fuflumis—Bacchus ; Turan = Aphrodite; Laran (Lalan ?) — Ares ; Lala = Selene; Thcsan = Eos ; Wsil (Italian ?) = Helios ; Menrva (Italian ?)~ Minerva ; Maris = Dioscurus; Lasa=a subordinate goddess; and many other deities not yet accurately identified. From ancient writers we know also Maiitus— Hades, Nanos or Xanas=the Etruscan Ulysses, and cer-tain names of months:— Vel(c)itanus = March; Ampiles=May; Actus ujune ; Traneus = July ; Ermius = August; C'eelius=September;
Xoffcr (Utofer in Corssen) = October. Lastly, we have the glosses:
cesar, aisar=ieus; aisoi^Oeoi; falando (or falandumI) = caelum;
aukelos—"Ems; andas = Bop4as ; arimos = iriBnKos; damnos='imros ;
antar—herds ; arakos—Upal-; g(;i)uis=y4pavos; capys—falco; capua
= cuipolliccs pedum curvi sunt; burros —navdapos ; ataison = ava-
SeVSpas (wine); arse verse"averts ignem; agalctora = ira7Sa; lucumo
=princeps;efo'una—hpxh't lanista—carnifex; Auto-=mimus; ludius
=saltator; SMfittZo=tibicen; nepos = helluo; gapos — oxVM-a; velites=
light-armed; balteus—strap of sword ; cassis = metal helmet; wia_-
ijsm = additamentum pondcris; Idus = middle of month; atrus =
ending of word for the day after a festival. This list could be
easily increased by conjectures. (W. DE.)]
It appears from c. statement of Varro, quoted by Art. Censorinus (BeDie A~atali,xvii. 5fol.), that Etruscan history was divided into ten periods or scecula, and it is known otherwise that the tenth of these periods began in the year 44 B.C. The first four saecula are given as lasting each 100 years, the fifth 123, the sixth 119, the seventh 119, and allowing for the eighth and ninth each an average of 120 years, we obtain the year 1044 B.C. as the beginning of Etruscan chronology, a date which curiously corresponds with that usually assigned to those great movements of races in Greece with which the Etruscan traditions were associated. The really important point, however, in these figures, as Helbig (Annali dell' Inst. Arch. 1876, p. 230) has lately shown, is the circumstance that the first four periods are given in round numbers, and thus justify the inference that the keeping of regular records had not begun till the fifth period, commencing 644 B.C., a date which at ' the most would not be more than a century after the first introduction of the Greek alphabet iuto Italy by means of the Greek colonists. Apparently the oldest alphabet as yet discovered on Etruscan remains is that known as the Chalcidian-Greek. It occurs on a vase from the Begulini-Galassi tomb at Caere, and in all probability it had not reached the Etruscans before the end of the 8th century B.C. No doubt everything tends in this early period to connect the Etruscans, not with the Greeks, but with the Cartha-ginians and the people of Italy and Sicily opposing the then active Greek colonization, which must have seriously threatened their trade. In 537 B.C. they united with the Carthaginians, as has been mentioned, to drive out the Phoco3aii3 from Corsica. Such was the influence of Car-thage in 509 B.C. that even the Romans accepted a com-mercial treaty with her ; and among the ascertained dates of objects from Etruria may be mentioned 673-527 B.C. as that to which certain porcelain vases with hieroglyphics from Yulci and Caere are definitely assigned,—which vases again point to commerce with a people who understood and could imitate hieroglyphics. We have thus in the 7th and 6th centuries B.C. a picture of activity and fre-quent contact among the trading and advanced peoples of the Mediterranean which, though it implies a degree of national hostility on the part of the Etruscans towards the Greeks, need not exclude the intercourse of traders, nor a readiness to profit by the industrial and artistic skill of the Greeks. Otherwise it would be impossible to account for the legend which states that in the time of Cypselus, the tyrant of Corinth 660 B.C. (Pliny, xxxv., 12, 43), Deinaratus, accompanied by certain artists, Eucheir, Diopus, and Eugrammus, settled in Etruria, and gave the first impulse to plastic art in Italy. These names sound legendary, but it may be taken that they would not have been invented unless to account for a fact which in this case is the very marked resemblance between the early art of Etruria and of Greece, a resemblance which could not have been accidental, or at any rate need not be supposed to have been so when the means of communication were so plentiful. We know, for instance, that the Etruscan silver coinage was struck on the Attic system as arranged by Solon about 590 B.C, having similar designs (e.g., the face of the Gorgon), the same weight, the same nominal, with the stater as its unit and the drachme as its half, and with apparently the same sign of the half as that used at Athens for the hemiobol (Mommsen, Römisches Münzuesen, p. 218). Tuscan architecture, essentially Greek, approaches most closely to the early Ionic-Attic style. The general impression, however, has been that it was through Corinth rather than through Athens that Etruria came into contact with Greek art, and this not so much because of the legend just quoted as because both Corinth and Etruria enjoyed the same high reputation in antiquity for unrivalled skill of working in terra-cotta and in bronze. But doubtless there were many different sources of contact.
As regards skill in the execution of artistic designs, it would seem as if all that the Etruscans ever attained in this direction had been learnt from the Greeks, and, it will be fair to suppose, from Greeks resident among them. But when we come to the subjects of these designs, it is clear that there is a difference between the early and late works in this respect, that, while in the latter the subjects as well as the style are almost always Greek, in the former there are certain obviously Oriental features. Under the circum-stances it could scarcely have been otherwise, since at least from the 4th century B.C. onwards the Greeks ruled supreme in matters of art, whereas in the early period of the 7th and 6th centuries, their artistic productions, though then also doubtless by far the best attainable, had yet to compete against those of the Phoenicians or their kinsmen the Carthaginians, who in fact had been longer in the market. The characteristic of Phoenician art was its mixture and blending of the two elements of design, originally peculiar to Assyria and Egypt, upon which was afterwards engrafted, when the Greek style had developed itself, a distinctly Greek element. That Phoenician productions of the earlier class were imported into Etruria is seen for example in the silver vases from the Begulini-Galassi tomb at Caere (Mus. Etruseo Vaticano, i., pi. 63-66), which, always suspected to have been Phoenician, were proved to be such from their identity of style with another silver vase found at Praeneste in 1875, and bearing a Phoenician inscription (Monumenti clelV hist. Arch, Rom., x., pi. 32, fig. 1). This again is artistically identical with the silver paterae from Cyprus, descriptions of which are collected by Helbig in the Annali dell' Inst. Arch., 1876, p. 199-204. Further evidence of Phoenician importations is to be found in the porcelain vases with hieroglyphics already mentioned, in the ostrich eggs ornamented with designs from a tomb at Vulci, and now in the British Museum, and in the richly engraved shell of the species Tridacna squamosa peculiar to the Bed Sea and Indian Ocean, also now in the British Museum. At the same time, even if this importation of works of art had been on a much greater scale than there is as yet reason to suppose it to have been, it is clear that all the artistic influence derivable in this way must have been small compared with that which would naturally have been exercised on the Etruscans by the Greek colonists of Italy, and still more by the Greek artists who had made Etruria their home, as may be inferred from the legend already quoted. (See Mommsen, History of Rome, Eng. Transl., i., p. 248, who says, " The Italians may have bought from the Phoenicians; they learned only from the Greeks;" and again, p. 247, " Italian art developed itself not under Phoenician but exclusively under Hellenic influence.") Besides, the Oriental features of which mention has been made in early Etruscan art were in point of fact common in a high degree to early Greek art also, and it may have been through this channel that they found their way, rather than by direct contact with the Phoenicians or Carthaginians. In dealing with the artistic remains of the Etruscans, it will be more convenient to take them in classes, according to their material or the purpose they served, than in groups of a historical sequence. Strictly speaking there appears to be no historical development in them. There are archaic works, there are very late works, and there are works of a middle stage, but there is no growth from one to the other. The process of change consists of a leap to the next new phase of art developed by the Greeks, who, so to speak, set the fashion. It happens also that certain classes of objects went out of use or came into use with particular periods of art, and with the aid of this circumstance it will be possible to observe something approaching a historical order. We begin with the scarabs.
Scarabs.—These are gems consisting usually of carnelian Scaraos. or banded agate, cut in the form of beetles (scarabaei), and having a flat face on which a design is engraved in intaglio. They are pierced transversely, and were attached by swivels to rings either to be worn on the finger or to be hung on a chain round the neck. The form of the scarab suggests an origin in Egypt, where, in fact, they have been found in great numbers. But excepting the form there is singularly little in common betweeii the scarabs of Etruria and of Egypt. This is the more remarkable since the Carthaginians, from whom—or from the Phoenicians—it is naturally supposed the Etruscans had obtained the notion of this form of ornament, have left in Sardinia (at Tharros, Sulcis, and Cagliari) con-siderable numbers of scarabs, the designs of which are for the most part, though not purely Egyptian, yet obviously derived from that source. These Sardinian scarabs are cut in green jasper, the favourite material in Egypt, or occasionally in porcelain or glass, materials equally utilized in that country. Then also there is the fact that as yet only one or two scarabs have been found in Greece, and indeed very few engraved gems of any shape showing a fairly developed art comparable with that of the Etruscan scarabs, so that from both sides it would seem as if the Etruscans must have been dependent for models in this branch of their art on the Phoenicians or Carthaginians. On the other hand, there was a law of Solon's (Diog. Laert., i. 57) forbidding gem-engravers to keep casts or seals of rings engraved by them, and from this it is to be inferred that in his time the art was practised with the success then attending the other arts. This being admitted, the result obtained from an examination of the scarabs becomes clear. The designs, with few exceptions, are purely Greek, and as a rule they indicate the 7th and 6th centuries B.C. as the period of their origin; that is to say, the work-manship on them corresponds to the Greek workmanship of that period. So also the subjects represented. If, for instance, we take either the remains of Greek art or the existing descriptions of works executed at this time but now lost, e.g., the chest of Cypselus (Pausanias, v. 17), the throne of Apollo at Amyclae (Pausanias, iii. 18), and the paintings of Polygnotus at Delphi (Pausanias, x. 25-31), it will be seen that the chief delight of artists was then in rendering the exploits of heroes, and that figures of deities occur in comparison very rarely. Nor is this remarkable, since it was in this period that the Greeks carried the worship of their heroic but legendary ancestors to its highest point. The same result will be found Jin the Etruscan scarabs, if we take as fairly representative the collection in the British Museum, Out of 197 specimens, excluding those which are of too rude workmanship to be of interest in the question, 167 have subjects drawn entirely from Greek legends of heroes; of the remainder 10 represent Greek divinities, 18 such fabulous beings as centaurs, gorgons, satyrs, sirens, and harpies, all more or less connected with the heroic legends of Greece. Only two give native Etruscan deities or personifications. (See Contemporary Review, 1875, p. 729.) An entirely similar state of things will be found by reference to the lists of
Hcarabs published in the " Impronte Gemmarie" (Bullet, d. Inst. Arch. Rom., 1831, p. 105; 1834, p. 116; 1S39, p. 99). Of the Greek divinities in the Museum collection, two are represented by heads of Athene obviously copied from an early coin of Corinth, while the two heads of the gorgon in the list stand in the same relation to a series of silver coins till re cently ascribed to Athens, but now by some high authorities ascribed to Attica. Nor are these the only instances in which Greek coins have been used as models to imitate. Still, notwithstanding this, coupled also with the fact that the processes of die-sinking and gem-engraving were almost identical, it is clear in many cases that the Etruscans had not confined themselves to models from this class of objects, but had skill enough to adapt designs from other sources, and especially from statues or figures sculptured in the round as more suitable than reliefs, at least where the gem was translucent, and could be held up to the light to bo looked at as was frequently the case. A certain number of the designs are clearly treated as reliefs, but the majority exhibit a minuteness of anatomical detail and attitudes more appropriate to sculpture in the round, not necessarily, however, always to statues strictly so-called, since in many cases the attitude is such that the ficrure could not have stood unless in one or other of the various positions assigned to figures in the pediments of temples, as for instance among the sculptures from iEgina in Munich, where the same minuteness and exactness of anatomy will be seen in the perfection to which it had attained in Greece at the close of the 6th century B.C. That the Tuscan temples were also decorated with sculp-tures in the pediments is known, not, however, the extent to which the designs may have been derived from the Greeks, though from the analogy of the rest of Etruscan art the probability is that they were pretty closely copied; and when Pliny (xxxv. 154), on the authority of Varro, speaks of the sculptures in all the temples of Rome previous to 493 B.C. being "Tuscan," it is fair to suppose that his Tuscanica signa would correspond both in style and in subject to early Greek art of the period previous to this date. That view of the case would explain why so many of the scarabs come to have subjects best suited to the decoration of temple pediments, and to indicate further at what period this particular process of studying from Greek models took place ; it may be added that the oldest statue of a deity in Rome,—that of Diana in the temple on the Aventine, dedicated, according to tradition, between 577 and 534 B.C.—represented the type of the Ephesian Artemis familiar in early Greek and Etruscan art. On the scarabs, draped figures are in a great minority, the preference being, as in early Greek sculpture, for the nude, with a great display of physical structure. In a considerable number of cases the names of the personages represented are inscribed on the gems in Etruscan characters, a habit which prevailed also iu early Greek art. Some few scarabs have a figure en-graved in relief on the back. With comparatively rare exceptions, the intaglio is surrounded with a cable border, and when gems are found with this border but without being scarabs, it is usual to describe them as scarabs which have been cut down in more recent times for the sake of the stone, not always correctly so, since this border appears to have been occasionally adopted by Roman gem-engravers of later times. It is not impossible also that a number of the scarabs now existing, as to which generally there is little or no information concerning their provenance, may have been made in Rome about the time of Augustus, when a taste prevailed for the revival of archaic art. Otherwise the production of scarabs, to judge from their style, must have ceased before the beginning of the 5th century B.C. When it began is a question which depends on when Greek sculpture attained mastery in rendering the human form (probably from the 8th to the 6th centuries B.C), since it is at this stage of the art that the scarabs, so to speak, strike into it. They have none of those grotesquely conceived animals executed on steatite or other soft stones which abound on the earliest Greek gems. From the general considerations already stated, and from the likelihood that the Etruscan period of imitation would not be before the last stage of archaic art in Greece, the 6th century B.C. will be a reasonable terminus a quo for its start.
Coins.—Considered as works of art, the coins may be Coins classed next to the scarabs, from the similarity of the pro-cesses by which they are made, and the limited field which they present for design. It has been already said that the silver coinage of Etruria was struck on the Attic standard as introduced by Solon in the beginning of the 6th century B.C. The gold coinage is according to the Miletus standard, which appears to have been the oldest gold standard in European Greece, including Athens, whence doubtless it was obtained by Etruria along with the silver standard (Mommsen, Rom. Miinzwesen, p. 28). The majority of the silver and gold, as well as the light copper coins belonging to the same system, are stamped only on one side, in accordance with the early custom, the types being essentially Greek, among them the head of the gorgon (fig. 2) similar to that referred to on the scarabs, and the cuttle-fish such as appears on Greek coins, and very frequently on the early pottery from Ialysus in Rhodes, and the ornaments from Mycenae and Spata in Attica. Whatever may be the date ultimately assigned to the antiquities just mentioned, it may be taken as certain Fia 2. — Coin of that the Etruscan coins in question do not Populonia. Brit, go back to an earlier time than that of Mus' Solon (about 590 B.C), and may be half a century later, or even much more in some instances. Others with different types are distinctly late.
Black Ware.—Connected in a measure with the en- Black graved gems is a series of black terra-cotta vases, many of ware, which are ornamented with bands of figures in low relief pressed out in the clay when it is soft by means of an engraved cylinder rolled round the vase in such a wa}r that the same design is constantly being repeated each time the cylinder completes a revolution. Frequently the designs are purely Oriental, either Egyptian or Assyrian, as if made directly from imported cylinders. In other case3 they consist of rows of animals, the lion, deer, sphinx, and panther, followed by a winged human figure moving at speed, and perhaps representing such a being as the gorgon, altogether presenting precisely the same appearance as those early painted vases found in Greek localities, and attributed to a period of prevailing Oriental influence very justly supposed to have been communicated to the Greeks by the Phoenicians, since on Phoenician silver vases, as that of Curium (Cesnola, Cyprus, p. 329), very similar bands of animals occur. The nearer we approach to the main centres of Phoenician industry, as for instance at Camirus in Rhodes, the more frequent are these designs of animals. Among the cases where the design is essentially of Hellenic origin may be mentioned a large circular dish in the British Museum, having the representation of a banquet scene with two couches, and attendants dancing and playing on the flute, constantly repeated in two rows round the lip. Subjects of this kind (see Plate VIII.) abound in early Etruscan art, and, so that there may be no doubt as to whence they were derived, on the early Greek vases found in Etruria. The date of this Greek pottery would then determine that of the Etruscan, and by means of the inscriptions not seldom occurring on the former, we arrive at a period not much if at all before 600 B.C., a result which again brings us to what has already appeared to have been the first great period of contact between the Etruscans and Greeks. It is to be observed also that the earlier system of vase decoration in Greece, by means of geometric patterns, is not found in Etruscan ware. Further, on the black vases in question are to be seen often figures modelled in the round which could not have been derived from Greece before 600 B.C., since it was not till then that sculpture in the round was fairly introduced there, and could not well have been derived from Assyria, since that country appears to have never developed this branch of art, while as regards Egypt it may be answered that the figures are in no way of an Egyptian type. This black ware seems to have been chiefly a local fabric of Clusium. Still at one time it may have been general in Etruria and also in Latium, which as at Albano has yielded from under the lava a series of very ancient vases of this same texture, but without the characteristic ornamentation, which, as has been said, limits the Etruscan pottery to a period not earlier than 600 B.C., and possibly in some cases to at least a century later than this. Jewel Jewellery.—Their tombs have preserved ample evidence lery- of the passion of the Etruscans for rich dresses and personal ornaments, the former surviving in the wall-paintings, the latter in actual specimens of goldsmith's work, consisting of necklaces, ear-rings, wreaths, bracelets, finger-rings, and fibulae for fastening the dress. From a comparison of any large collection of these ornaments, such as that of the British Museum or of the Vatican Museum, with the same class of objects from Greece, it will be observed as a rule that where a pattern of any kind has to be produced, the Greek accomplished it skilfully and rapidly by means of fine gold wire soldered down into the required design,—that is, by filigree, as it is called ; while the Etruscan preferred to give it by sometimes innumerable and almost imperceptibly minute globules of gold, each separately made, and all soldered down in the necessary order—that is to say, by granulated work. But these characteristics, essentially cor-rect as they are, do not hold in all cases, since, on the one hand, there are numbers of Etruscan specimens where the granulated work is not employed, though it would be difficult to point to any one where the true filigree system takes its place, and since, on the other hand, granulated work is found on the early Greek ornaments from Camirus in Rhodes, now in the British Museum (for a specimen of these ornaments, see the article ARCHAEOLOGY, vol. ii. p. 350). The latter circumstance, exceptional though it is at present, may still serve to show how it may have been through the Greeks that this process of working in gold reached Etruria, in which case it must have happened at a period scarcely later than 600 B.C., the Camirus figures corresponding very markedly with the descriptions of certain figures on the chest of Cypselus. No doubt this process of working may equally well have been obtained through the Phoenicians, if we may judge by the specimens from their settlements in Sardinia, and to some degree in Cyprus, and on the whole it is likely that in this matter of personal ornament the Etruscans were more in sympathy with the Phoenicians and orientals than with the Greeks. The bracelets, armlets, necklaces, aud finger-rings worn by men on the Assyrian sculptures were precisely such as appealed to Etruscan tastes, and were not well to be had through the medium of the Greeks, unless perhaps the Greeks of
Cyprus, who worked side by side with the Phoenicians. The three gold necklaces engraved by Cesnola (Cyprus, pi. 22-24) might have been obtained from Etruscan tombs, instead of from a treasure chamber in Cyprus, so far as the workmanship is concerned. In any case the original in-vention of so toilsome a process as that of the granulated work, while it cannot fairly be ascribed to the Greeks, may well have been due to the Phoenicians, whose greatest fame in very early times was for their skill in metal work, and whose products of this nature—for example, the silver paterae of the Regulini-Galassi tomb at Caere—have been traced to Etruria as well as to Latium (Prseneste) and the coast of Italy (Salerno). From the fact that with the loss of their national independence there came rather an increase than otherwise of private wealth among the Etruscans, and a consequent continuation of the demand for jewellery, it happens that there is among their remains material for the study of this branch of their art or industry in its latest as well as its earliest stages. In the earliest specimens there is a preference for figures of animals in rows, as on the early vases, followed by winged figures of deities, the artistic ele-ment of form being always very rude and mechanical. In later times the human form is introducedfaithfully, true to the Greek type, and representing personages from Greek legend or mythology. Gold was the favourite material, and with it were employed amber, glass, precious stones, occasionally enamel, and seldom silver. The precious stones most in use, either for finger-rings or for necklaces, were the carnelian and agate, cut either as scarabs or as beads. Glass was made into beads. Amber served a variety of purposes, as beads, ornaments of fibulae, where it is employed with gold, and amulets, of which one specimen in the British Museum is in the form of an ape of a species peculiar to India (Macacus rhesus), whence the knowledge of it has been supposed to have been conveyed by the ships of Tarshish which brought apes and peacocks from that quarter. The amber itself was obtained first of all from about the mouth of the Bo, and afterwards from the Baltic as now; but whether, as has been lately maintained (Helbig, Real Accademia dei Lincei, Rome, 1876-7), the artistic remains in this material can be all grouped into one of two classes, representing a very early and a very late period with no intermediary stage, is a ques-tion on which perhaps more remains to be said before it is finally settled.
Bronzes.—Among the articles still pertaining to personal Bronzes, use is the series of bronze mirrors the extent of wdiich may be conceived from the fact that a considerable number have been found since the publication of Gerhard's work (Etruskische Spiegel, 1843-1867), with 430 plates, many of which give from four to six examples. These mirrors are polished on one side, and on the other have a design engraved on the bronze, taken in the majority of cases from Greek legend or mythology, and no less from an artistic point of view founded on Greek models (see fig. 3). But while this is obvious enough, it is remarkable that as yet probably not more than six engraved mirrors have been discovered in Greece itself, and except in one case even these cannot be said to bear any analogy of design to the Etruscan mirrors. Perhaps it deserves to be considered that these few speci-mens come from Corinth, whence, as tradition said, Greek art was introduced into Etruria. But it is not enough to sup-pose the first impulse towards work of this kind to have come from Greece. It is necessary to find, if not mirrors, some other classes of objects which could have supplied the Etruscans with the multitude of entirely Greek designs which they have reproduced. No doubt the painted vases were largely drawn up, especially the shallow paterae, with designs on a circular space in the centre, as may be seen, for example, in the three mirrors in Gerhard (pi. 159, 160), where the group of Peleus carrying off Thetis, familiar on vases, is reproduced with the difference that the attributes of Heracles (bow and club) are given to Peleus. In the
3.—Bronze Mirror: Maenad. From Gerhard, pi.
mirrors just mentioned the figures are rendered in low, flat relief, but this is very exceptional. In other cases also the groups appear to be taken from the centres of pediment sculptures on temples, the figures, diminishing in scale towards each side, being made to fit into the narrowing circle of the mirror. Artistically they may be arranged in three classes. The first is an archaic style, in which the subjects, drapery, and general treatment of the figures have much of a local Etruscan character, though still on the model of early Greek work; the second a free style, where everything seems Greek of about the 4th century B.C., except the names of the persons inscribed in Etruscan. Mirrors of this style have been found in Latium at Prseneste, along with bronze cistae similarly decorated with engraved designs; occasionally both on the cistse and the mirrors are inscriptions in early Latin. The finest example of these utensils is that known as the Ficoroni cista, which, but for its bearing the name of a Latin artist, might be regarded as an excellent example of Greek art in the 4th century B.C., at which period it appears to have been largely spread in Latium as well as Etruria (Müller, Denkmäler, No. 309, and Bronsted, Den Ficoroniske Cista, Copenhagen, 1847). Thethird is a late and barbarous native style. The range of subjects is wide. Still it will be noticed that the almost exclusive use of mirrors by women has rendered subjects otherwise familiar, such as scenes of war, inappropriate. The labours of Heracles were much admired, as were incidents in the story of Helen, yet neither of them occur so frequently as scenes between satyrs and maenads, or the common representation of ladies at their toilet. In great numbers, but always on small or poor ex-amples, appear certain figures which have been identified as the Cabin, and in any case seem to have been household genii. A small number of circular mirror-cases have been found, ornamented with reliefs, of which both the subjects and the execution are in the majority of instances purely Greek, of a comparatively late period.
Of skill in bronze casting there is little evidence among the Etruscan remains. Tn one specimen in the British Museum from Sessa on the Volturno (see COSTUME, vol. vi. p, 455, fig. 6), a core of iron has been employed, which by ex-panding has burst the figure down the side; and again in another specimen in the national collection a female bust from the Polledrara tomb (Grotta of Isis) at Vulci, it will be seen that the art of casting was unknown when it was executed. It is made of a number of thin pieces of bronze plate beaten out into the form of parts of the bust, and all fastened together, sometimes with fine nails, but apparently also in places with some sort of solder. On the other hand, to judge from the vases found in this tomb, which are made of pieces rivetted together with nails, it would seem as if solder could hardly have been known. The same process of uniting parts together occurs in the very ancient silver relief from Perugia (Millingen, lined. Mem., pt. ii, pi. 14). The bust from Vulci, and the vases and other antiquities discovered with it, are engraved in Micali (Mon. Ined., pi. vi.-viii.) It will be seen from the porcelain vases and scarabs among them bear-ing hieroglyphics, and from the ostrich eggs with designs resem-bling those of the early Corin-thian vases, that the origin of the contents of this tomb properly belongs, not only to a period of intercourse with Egypt, but to a period when that intercourse was conducted by the Phoeni-cians, who alone knew how to adapt designs from the Greeks on the one hand, as well as from the Egyptians on the other. In-deed, one of the scarabs bears the cartouche of Psammetichus, whose date is 6G6 B.C. ; and FIG. 4.
Bronze Statuette.
though it might have been made Brit. Mus. From Micali, considerably after this time, it pl-xiii. fig. 1. obviously could not have come into existence before. On the whole, 600 B.C. may be set down as probably the date of these antiquities. As regards the mass of exist-ing statuettes cast in the round, they bear generally, except in the matter of dress, distinct evidence of Greek origin, not only in the style and execution, but also in the subjects (see fig. 4). Still it is noticeable, especially among the later specimens, that a very marked spirit of realism is blended with the original idealism of the Greek prototypes. This realism of the Etruscans comes out very strikingly in the portrait sculpture of their sarcophagi, and probably was a phase of artistic capacity which they shared with the Bomans. The purpose of these bronze statuettes was to surmount vases and candelabra, or to serve as handles of mirrors.
Terra-coltas.—The skilful modelling of terra-cotta, for Terra-which the Etruscans were celebrated, was, it appears, chiefly cottas. directed to the production of ornamental tiles, sarcophagi, ™£ and statues, rather than those small and mostly graceful statuettes which are found in large numbers in Greek localities. The statues which were placed on the pediments of temples have naturally perished. Specimens of the tiles and a large number of sarcophagi, however, remain, the latter being for the most part of a late period, and executed under the influence of a completely developed Greek art. Fortunately two sarcophagi of the greatest interest for the study of the early art "of Etruria have been found at Caere. The one, now in the Louvre (engraved, Mon. d. Inst.
female figure of about life sire reclining on the lid. The other (for engraving of which see Plate VIII.) is now in the British Museum, and while having a similar group of figures of about life size on the lid, is besides richly decorated with bas-reliefs round the four sides. In both sarcophagi colours are freely employed, which originally must have been slightly staring, and increase the effect of realism, which in the figures on the lids is all the more conspicuous by comparison with the reliefs, where the true early Greek spirit, as seen on the vases, is strictly maintained. The reason of this difference may partly lie in the fact that Greek models for the reliefs were easily enough obtained, while on the other hand Greek figures approaching in re-semblance those on the lid here must at least have been very scarce. At the same time it is also to be remembered that owing to the impossibility of counting on the places where the terra-cotta might shrink, or to what extent this might go, no other treatment would be suitable except that of a bold, rough realism, the effect of which could not easily be destroyed. With the reliefs there was no such danger. The type of face shown in these figures is not to be taken as that of the early Etruscans, for this reason that their essential peculiarities, the sloping forehead, and eyes and the corners of the mouth turned upwards, are obviously mannered exaggerations of the early Greek style of render-ing these features, for which undoubtedly there may have been some small grounds in the actual features of the people. Besides on the reliefs there is very little of this exaggeration. The attitude of the figures on the lid is that of a man and wife at a banquet scene, probably here intended to indicate the eternal banquet which appears to have been considered the lot of the happy in the next world. The sarcophagus, to judge from the inscription painted on it, was that of a lady named Thania Velai Matinai Unata. Another inscription painted along the lid reads Mi vela vesnas me vepe tursi kipa, which, according to the interpretation of Corssen (i. p. 784), is the dedication of the monument. From the character of the letters it has been thought that this sarco-phagus need not be earlier than the end of the 6th century B.C., a period which would not be unsuitable to the work-manship, if we allow that it may have retained many traditions from an earlier time, which in Greece generally had by then been abandoned. The relief on the front represents a combat of two armed men, of whom the one has received a mortal blow and is falling. From the wound his soul has escaped, and is seen in the shape of a winged figure bounding away on the extreme right. The soul of the victorious warrior comes tripping in on the extreme left. This manner of representing the soul recalls in some degree the sepulchral vases of the Athenians, where it appears as a small winged figure, and recalls also the psychostasia of very early times, in which the souls of two combatants were supposed to be placed in a balance and weighed against each other while the fight was pro-ceeding. It will be seen also that the wounded warrior is already being devoured by the dog of the battle field, thus giving an instance of what is called prolepsis, and is not unfamiliar in early art. That is to say, the artist has attempted to realize two separate moments of the action,— first the actual wounding, and secondly the consequence of it, viz.,—that the body of the vanquished is left to be devoured by dogs and kites, a fate which the heroes of the Iliad often promise their opponents in battle. That the com-batants here are Achilles and Memnon is not improbable, and in this case the principal female figures will be respectively their mothers Thetis andEos, each with an attendant; the male attendant on each side perhaps was attached to the warriors themselves. The stoiy begins on one of the ends of the sarcophagus with the two warriors parting for battle; in the front is the combat; on the other end the mourning, and on the back the eternal banquet. The feet are formed by four sirens in their capacity as daughters of the earth sent by Persephone to assist mourners to wail for the dead (Euri-pides, Helena, 167). In other cases the sirens were thought of as carrying away the souls of the dead, as on the Harpy monument from Xanthus in Lycia. The later urns and sarcophagi will be found collected in Brunn's Rilievi delle Urne Etrusche, Borne, 1870,
Vase Painting.—It has been proved that the great mass Vases, of painted vases found in Etruria, and familiarly called Etruscan, are productions of Greek workmen. The subjects, the style, and the inscriptions are all Greek. But side by side with them are certain undoubtedly Etruscan vases, the very small number of which would suggest that in this direction at least the Greek models defied imitation if in-deed the attempts in question did not clearly show this. At the same time it must be admitted that between the early Corinthian vases of about the 7th century B.C., dis-covered in Etruria, and the probably contemporary speci-mens of native work there is no very great difference. It was the later development which the Etruscans could not follow. Specimens of early imitation found at Caere will be seen engraved in the Monunienti d. Inst. Arch. Rom., vi. pis. 14, 15, 33, 36 ; vi.-vii., pi. 73, the peculiarities of which, such as in costume, type of face, disproportion between figures of men and of animals, are pointed out in detail by Helbig, Annali d. Inst. Arch. Rom., xxxv., p. 210, fol. The style of the originals, including the correct degree of subordination in the design to the vase which it adorns, is lost, and in its place stands out a certain gross reality in conflict with the form of the vase. It does not follow that these imitations were made contemporary with the originals (about the end of the 7th century B.C.), but a strong argument in favour of such a view might be found in a vase from the Polledrara tomb at Vulci, the antiquities of which have been shown to belong to this period. The vase in question like the others has a design purely Greek in its subject and general treatment—Theseus struggling with the Minotaur, while Ariadne holds the clue, a chorus, chariots, and centaurs with human forelegs. But it differs in this respect, that the outlines of the figures are drawn with a crude red colour upon the varnished surface of the vase, not as in other cases on spaces left unvarnished. From that circumstance, and from the general effect of these Caeretan vases as compared with the reliefs on the large sarcophagus, just described, from the same locality, it will be seen that the skilled workman of Etruria turned more readily to modelling in terra-cotta than to the complicated and difficult process of vase-painting. As regards the few attempts made in late times it may be said that they also fail in the direction of grossness. See, for example, the vase in the British Museum with Ajax falling on his sword and Actaeon defending himself from his hounds. Mention, however, should be made of one specimen in the Museum collection where all the technical skill of a Greek potter is displayed, and its Etruscan origin revealed only by the subject and by certain details familiar in the mirrors. The composition of the scenes is in some respects like that of a picture with perspective, which, while it is not a feature of Greek vases, can neither be called Etruscan on the ground of any known analogy.
Mural painting.-—The mural paintings of the Etruscans Mural are known only from their tombs, the inner walls of which painting, it was not unusual to decorate in this manner, the work being executed on a prepared ground of white stucco, and with, a considerable variety of colours, red, brown yellow, carnation, blue, green, and black, to indicate flesh, hair, dress, armour, and other adjuncts. The principal localities in which these paintings have been discovered are Veii, Chiusi, Vulci, Caere, and Tarquinii. The most important of them will be found engraved in the Monumenti d. Inst. Arch. Rom., those of Tarquinii in vol. i., pis. 32-3; vi., pi. 79; viii., pi. 36, and ix., pis. 13-15e; from Caere, vi., pi. 30; from Vulci vi., pis. 31-2 ; from Chiusi, v., pis. 16, 17, 33, 34; from Veii, Micali, Mon. Ined., pi. 58, figs. 1-3. For the state of opinion concerning the antiquity of this art in Etruria, see Helbig in the Annali d. Inst. Arch. Rom., 1863, p. 336, and again Annali, 1870, p. 5-74, in reply to Brunn who had criticised his theory in the meantime in the Annali, 1866, p. 442. Both wrote from personal in-spection, and from an acquaintance with Etruscan remains such as no other writers possess. If they differ as to whether this or that painting is older than another, they yet appear to be agreed on the main points that, taken altogether, these paintings represent three successive stages of the art, the oldest stage being characterized as Tuscan and as exhibiting little of Greek influence, the second as strongly marked by the features of Greek painting in the phase in which it was left by Polygnotus, and the third as completely under the domination of Greek art as it existed in the Hellen-istic age. It is not meant that this oldest or Tuscan school was an original creation, but only that with perhaps no better models thanGreek vases, the Etruscans thendeveloped a system of mural painting which may be called their own, the more so since its spirit of localizing its subjects by giv-ing the figures native dress and types of face is seen at times surviving in the later stage. The tomb at Veii is assigned by Helbig to the first period, and in any case it must be ranked as early, since that town was destroyed in 396 B.C. Obviously very early are also the pictures from Caere (Monumenti, vi., pi. 30), where a female is being brought to an altar to be sacrificed. In the scene is an ancient statue (xoanon), a curious figure of a soul in the air, two warriors and two figures sitting face to face. It is, however, in the paintings of the second period, especially those of Tarquinii (see fig. 5), that the Etruscan show to the best advantage, as having the delicacy and refinement of drawing combined with nobility of figure ascribed by tradition to Polygnotus, and still traceable on the earlier examples of the Greek vases with red figures, wearing thin transparent draperies which do not conceal the forms and movements of the limbs. Here the Etruscan artist has a complete command of skill, and is obviously conscious of it from the precision with which he carries out his finest lines. The types of his figures are of pure Greek beauty, and their movement such as that on the best vases. No doubt these particular paintings are exceptional among those that remain now, but in what relation they had stood to the general run at the time when they were executed is another question. The others sin more or less in the direction already pointed out as characteristic of the Etruscans, a certain gross realism under which there probably lay artistic strength of some kind. As regards the latest stage it has little to distinguish it from Greek work except the occasional presence of peculiarly Etruscan daemons, Etruscan inscriptions explaining the subjects, and again frequently the native realism carried sometimes to the extent of being nearly grotesque. In the early specimens the subjects consist mostly of banquet scenes attended by dances to music apparently in groves, perhaps those of Elysium and games such as accompanied funeral obsequies in Greece and probably also in Etruria. Doubtless these representations in the interiors of tombs were intended to realize the future life of the deceased. (A. S. M.)
Footnotes
Compare the tomb of Alyattes, still existing, and described by Herodotus (i. 93), with that of Cucumella at Vulei. Tradition said that the Lydian trumpet and the Phrygian double flute had been introduced into Rome from Etruria ; that the prostexta or official robes, the eagle as a standard, and the game of dice had been brought from Lydia to Etruria. Livy (iv. 17) tells how Lars Tofumnius determined, by means of dice, the fate of the Roman ambassadors who were sent to him at Veii (cf. Plutarch, Vit. Pom., xxxiii.); and Festus (s. v. '' Sardi") mentions the custom according to which, on occasions of sacrifice for victory at Rome, an old man, dressed in purple, was led to the Capitol, attended by a herald, who proclaimed " Sardians to be sold;" and they explain this custom as having survived from the sale of prisoners after the capture of Veii, which prisoners were Sardians, since Etruria had been colonized by Sardians. This custom, however, seems rather to have originated after the taking of Sardinia by Tib. Sempronius Gracchus.
A similar instance of prolepsis is when Perseus is figured cutting off the head of Medusa, and already holds at his side Pegasus, the winged horse, which did not spring from her until her head was entirely off.