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The
origins of the Etruscans - indeed almost everything about them -
remains mysterious. It is even unclear when they first arrived in
the Italian peninsula and whether an entire people migrated or
only what became a ruling caste. Recent genetic studies of both
Etruscan human remains and local oxen provide some evidence that a
connection with eastern Anatolia is not purely cultural.
Roman authors record that the Etruscans had a rich literature, but
only one book (now unreadable) has survived. By AD 100, Etruscan had been replaced by Latin.
Only a few scholarly Romans with antiquarian interests, such as Varro, could read
Etruscan and last person known to have been able to read it was the Roman emperor Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), who
is said to have compiled an Etruscan dictionary by interviewing the last few elderly rustics who still spoke the language.
Thus the Etruscan language is now known almost solely from some
13,000 mainly brief inscriptions and has yet to be fully
interpreted. It was evidently a language isolate that can be grouped with
Raetic, a language spoken in antiquity in the province of Raetia, in the Eastern Alps, to the north and west of Venetic.
Etruscan and Raetic are grouped with Lemnian, an extinct Aegean
language, to form the Tyrsenian language family which is an isolate family not demonstrably related to any other known language family.
In other words, Etruscan was not an Indo-European language.
The Romans owed a great deal to the Etruscans, their accomplished predecessors and former enemies on the Italian
peninsula. They were known as Rasenna, and Tusci or Etrusci by Romans, whose historians
did not give their accomplishments due credit. However, over the
past two hundred years, archaeologists and art historians have
shown that the Etruscans occupied much of north-central Italy in the first millennium B.C.
and traded widely in the Mediterranean. Their prosperity and taste for luxury
connected them to trade routes that extended as far north as the Baltic Sea
from which they imported amber. Even now, much of what we know of
the Etruscans is derived from their rich tomb furnishings which
fill museums world-wide. One of the most comprehensive and best
organised Etruscan collections is in the Guarnacci
Museum in Volterra.
The Etruscans were second only to the Greeks themselves as a
medium for the introduction of Greek culture and its Pantheon of Gods to the Romans. The Etruscans
also developed a version of the Greek alphabet, that influenced Roman
script. They built the first cities in Italy and their influence shows up in
the later Roman architecture and engineering. The ruins of settlements and cities, especially in the
Maremma
have revealed a great deal about Etruscan material culture, from huts
through houses to palaces. At locations around Grosseto,
Roselle,
Pitigliano,
Vetulonia,
Populonia
etc. excavators
have uncovered remains of fortification walls, artisans' workshops and kilns, temples and grids of streets. Some cities were laid out
with separate zones for residences, industry and public buildings. Roads had ruts paved with stone, like
tram tracks, to provide a smoother ride in springless carriages and chariots. Etruscan settlements began evolving from collections of thatched huts to
tiled-roof, rectangular houses on stone foundations, then to real cities as early as the seventh century B.C. in which an Etruscan society, with wealthy elite, controlled a large population of slaves and serfs.
Etruscan power and grip on the Italian peninsula began to decline in the fifth and fourth centuries B.C. |
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Etruscan Dodecapoli league of twelve cities
The
Etruscan cities most often included (with their more familiar Latin and Italian equivalents) are:
• Arretium (modern Arezzo)
• Caisra, Cisra (Caere or modern Cerveteri, and its frazione
Ceri)
• Clevsin, (Clusium or modern Chiusi)
• Curtun (modern Cortona)
• Perusna (Perugia)
• Pupluna, Fufluna (Populonia)
• Veia (Veii or modern Veio)
• Tarch(u)na (Tarquinii or modern Tarquinia-Corneto)
• Vetluna, Vetluna (Vetulonia)
• Felathri (Volaterrae or modern Volterra)
• Velzna (Volsinii, presumed modern Orvieto)
• Velch, Velc(a)l (Vulci or modern Volci).
Other Etruscan cities, not members of the Dodecapoli:
• Vi(p)sul (Faesulae or modern Fiesole)
• Adria
• Spina
• Felsina (Bononia, modern Bologna)
• Mutna (Mutina, modern Modena)
• Parma
• Rusellae, near modern Roselle Terme
• Alalia in Corsica (Roman and modern Aleria)
• Capeva (Capua)
• Manthva (Mantua)
• Inarime(?) (Pitecusa (Greek Pithekoussai) or modern Ischia)
Click
here
for a list of Etruscan gods, goddesses and mythological figures
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