Latin perfects and Fluent Etruscan in 30 days

[pagos at bigfoot.com]

Gentlemen,

I beg the Moderator's forgiveness in advance :-) for posting a topic which
is not related to Indo-European. Owing to the fact the thread is getting
long enough, I'd dare write a few words about the _vexata quaestio_ of the
origins of the Etruscans, in the hope they will be of help in clarifying
the ideas of some of the readers of this thread.

The origins of no other people of the antiquity were so debated by modern
historiography as in the case of the Etruscans. The reason of this
situation deserves some words of explanation. In the first place we have to
mention the interest awaked in ancient Greek historiographers by this
nation which, although hellenized,  remained so "different". In the second
place the undeniable ethnic, cultural and linguistic dissimilarity of the
Etruscans from the other Indoeuropean peoples of Iron Age Italy attracted
the attention of the historiographers in the early 19th century. Moreover,
the problem of the origins of this people often mingled with the problems
of classification and hermeneutics of their language. These are the reasons
that gave birth to the myth of the "Etruscan mistery", a sort of devil's
kitchen or magician's shop suited for testing all kinds of irrational
theories and hypotheses concerning history and linguistics. We have
therefore to clear the decks and go back to the real terms of the problem.

Classical historiography is unable to offer any evidence but the mention --
made by Varro -- of a work named _Tuscae Historiae_, that could have
offered a key for a better comprehension of the origins of this people.
Unfortunately the Etruscan literature, however great might its value have
been, went completely lost in the very moment when the Etruscan language
dwindled away and people terminated to copy and to hand down to posterity
the works written in a dead language.

According to the mentality of ancient Greeks, the origins of a _polis_ were
seen as the result of a _ktisis_ (= foundation) made by a mythic _ecizer_
(= colonizer) as in the case of Theseus for Athens or Cadmus for Thebes.
Much in the same way, they imagined that the origins of the single peoples
were due to the migration of an _archegétes_, i.e. a mythic chieftain.

According to Herodotus (I,94), the Etruscans migrated from Lydia under the
leadership of the eponymic king Thyrsenos or Thyrrenos:

"The Lydians have very nearly the same customs as the Greeks, with the
exception that these last do not bring up their girls in the same way. So
far as we have any knowledge, they were the first nation to introduce the
use of gold and silver coin, and the first who sold goods by retail. They
claim also the invention of all the games which are common to them with the
Greeks. These they declare that they invented about the time when they
colonised Tyrrhenia, an event of which they give the following account. In
the days of Atys, the son of Manes, there was great scarcity through the
whole land of Lydia. For some time the Lydians bore the affliction
patiently, but finding that it did not pass away, they set to work to
devise remedies for the evil. Various expedients were discovered by various
persons; dice, and huckle-bones, and ball, and all such games were
invented, except tables, the invention of which they do not claim as
theirs. The plan adopted against the famine was to engage in games one day
so entirely as not to feel any craving for food, and the next day to eat
and abstain from games. In this way they passed eighteen years. Still the
affliction continued and even became more grievous. So the king determined
to divide the nation in half, and to make the two portions draw lots, the
one to stay, the other to leave the land. He would continue to reign over
those whose lot it should be to remain behind; the emigrants should have
his son Tyrrhenus for their leader. The lot was cast, and they who had to
emigrate went down to Smyrna, and built themselves ships, in which, after
they had put on board all needful stores, they sailed away in search of new
homes and better sustenance. After sailing past many countries they came to
Umbria, where they built cities for themselves, and fixed their residence.
Their former name of Lydians they laid aside, and called themselves after
the name of the king's son, who led the colony, Tyrrhenians."

According to Hellanikos though (apud Dion. Hal. I,28) the Etrurian
Thyrrenoí should be identified with the Pelasgians, the mysterious
migrating people that, after wandering in the Aegean sea, settled in Etruria.

In the view of Anticlides (apud Strab. V, 2, 4) the Etruscans who arrived
in Italy under the leadership of Thyrrenos were Pelasgians and they
belonged to the same strain that colonized the Aegean isles of Lemnos and
Imbros as well as several sites on the Anatolic seaside. This thesis is
reported also in some Rhodian documents going back to the third century BC,
thus partially
supporting the assumption that the Etruscans might have been one of the
Peoples of the Sea (the TRSH) mentioned in the Egyptian sources.

As a matter of fact, the Egyptian inscriptions of Ramses III (1197-1165 BC)
relate of the so-called "Peoples of the Sea", i.e. a set of peoples who
came from land and sea to invade Egypt. Some of these peoples were known
under the same name a couple of centuries before, since they were mentioned
among the peoples that supplied mercenary troops to the Pharaoh during the
rule
of Amenophis III and Merneptah (1413-1220 BC). Some of the "Peoples of the
Sea" can be easily identified, as in the case of the Achaei -- called
Jqjwsh.w in the inscriptions -- or the Philistines -- called Prst.w. The
identification of other peoples is debated, as in the case of the Siculians
(Shqrsh.w) and the Sardinians (Shrdn.w). Other peoples can be identified
only in a
highly hypothetical way. Among the latter ones we find the Trsh.w, to be
possibly identified with the Thyrsenoi mentioned by later Greek sources.
These hypothetical identifications are questionable, and the question is
further complicated by the forms these names assumed in the Egyptian
language, thus making the identification even more complex.  For example,
the Egyptian
name of  the Siculians, i.e. Shqrsh.w, was formerly related both to the
Anatolian place-name of Sagalassos and to the name of a misterious
Palestinian people named Sikalayu. Even in the case of the ethnonym Trsh.w,
that is the would-be name of the Etruscans in the Egyptian sources, some
researchers related it to the Anatolian place-names of Tarsus and Torrebos.
As we see, in the Egyptian sources there is not much to go by.

Common consensus of the ancient historiographers had it that the Etruscans
migrated from the Orient, the only disagreement being in the connection
with the Lydians or Pelasgians. Dionysius of Halicarnassus represented an
exception. He came to Rome in 30 BC and remained there to study the ancient
Roman history for twenty-two years. We learn from him that the
self-denomination of the Etruscans was Rasenna (cfr. the cippus of Cortona,
where this name appears as Rashna). This confirms that the denomination by
which the Etruscans are known in the Greek sources, that is Thyrsenoí ~
Thyrsanoí or Thyrrhenoi ~ Thyrranoí, is either a translated ethnonym or a
name invented by the Greeks. The suffix -eno- is a typical ethnic suffix of
the Aegean-Anatolic area.  Dionysius, after examining the opinions
expressed by other writers (Dion. Hal. I, 25-30), concludes by stating that
the Etruscans are an autochthonous people of Italy. According to Dionysius,
this is what the Etruscans themselves told him.

The opinions expresses by the ancient historiographers influenced modern
commentators. The ones base their theories on alleged "migratory waves",
the others on the "autochthony" of the Etruscans.

The supporters of the eastern origins suppose that the Etruscans came from
east in connection with the "oriental" phase of their culture (VII century
BC). This hypothesis is untenable from an archaeological point of view,
owing to the fact that the "oriental" cultural influx affected both Greece
and Etruria in the seventh century. The transition was gradual and
diversified from area to area, thus excluding the process of sudden change
that would be expected in the case of a migration. Moreover, all the
ancient sources univocally confirm that the Etruscans lived in Italy before
the historical age.

Another migrationist hypothesis assumes that the Etruscans arrived from the
north; this is mainly based on the fact reported by Livius (V, 33, 11),
according to whom the Rhaetic population in central and eastern Alps are
the relict of an Etruscan people. Yet, Livius talks of a non-migratory
relict and namely he mentions the fact that the Rhaetians were separated
from the Etruscans as a consequence of the arrival of the Celts.  The
archaeological sources, although showing a strict connection between the
Etrurian iron culture and Central Europe, do not legitimate the theory of a
migration from the north from the very point of view that other Italic and
Mediterranean cultures entertained a more or less strict cultural
relationship with Central Europe during the Iron Age.

The old autochthonous hypothesis of Dionysius finds an echo in the modern
theories of those scholars who think that the Etruscans are a relict of a
neolitic Mediterranean people that lived in peace up to the Bronze Age,
while the Italic peoples --- who spoke an Indo-European language and used
cremation --- should be identified with the proto-Villanova and Villanova
culture. This cannot be true though, since the area where the Villanova
culture developed overlaps almost perfectly the historical borders of Etruria.

In contradiction with so many theories, there are very few facts.
Archaeology shows that there was a cultural continuity from the Bronze Age
to the Iron Age. The sudden and spectacular changes that could mark the
arrival of a migrating people are lacking. On the other hand, the most
ancient literary sources -- as in the case of Dionysius --  do stress the
peculiar relationship tying the Etruscans together with Aegean peoples (=
Pelasgians) or Anatolian peoples (= Lydians) and relate them to the
prae-Greek inhabitants of Lemnos and Imbros. The inscriptions of Lemnos,
going back to the period antecedent the Athenian conquest (510 BC) seem to
confirm that Lemnian is very similar to Etruscan.

The Lemnian inscriptions raised once again the entire problem of Etruscan
origins. One of the best represented tendencies in Etruscan research is to
adopt the most economical thesis: the Etruscans were a non-Indo-European
people native to Italy who adopted many items and styles of east
Mediterranean provenience by way of trade. Yet, the similarity between
Etruscan and the
Lemnian inscriptions must be acknowledged and is admittedly difficult to
explain. As a consequence of this, another thesis sees both Etruscan and
Lemnian as remnants of a continuum of non-Indo-European "Mediterranean"
languages which spanned the eastern and central Mediterranean before the
intrusion of Indo-European speakers.

There is no easy solution since evidence is extremely self-contradictory.
In my eyes, though, the similarity between Etruscan and Lemnian is too
great to be explained by anything else but a more direct and immediate
historical connection. It follows from this that Etruscan shouldn't be
considered an "isolated" language in the Mediterranean.

As concerning the basic vocabulary of Etruscan, IMHO many words are
"understandable" only because they are the results of areal
contacts/borrowings that took place in the Mediterranean (and beyond). The
bulk of the Etruscan words -- the meaning of which is known -- can be found
in Indo-European languages NOT because Etruscan is an Indo-European
language BUT because it it much easier to identify those words existing in
other languages spoken in the concerned area.

Once again I make amends for this long, off-topic digression.

Paolo Agostini