Palestrina,[1] the Egyptian glazed vases and scarabs found on more than one site.[2] All this goes to show that the Etruscans lacked in their earlier days skilful workers in the arts and crafts.
Habits and Customs.—The lack of literary remains of the Etruscans does not cramp our knowledge of their habits as much as might be supposed, owing to the numerous paintings that are left. These paintings are on the walls of the tombs at Veii, Corneto, Chiusi (Clusium), and elsewhere,[3] and give a varied picture of the dress, utensils and habits of the people. The evidence of many ancient authors cannot be questioned that as a race the Etruscans in historic times were much given to luxurious living. So much so in fact that Virgil (Georg. ii. 193) speaks of the pinguis Tyrrhenus (a trumpeter at the altar) and Catullus (xxxix. 11) of the obesus Etruscus. Diodorus (v. 40) gives a succinct account in which he says that “their country was so fertile they derived therefrom not only sufficient for their needs but enough to supply them with luxuries. Twice a day they partook of elaborate repasts at which the tables were decked with embroidered cloths and vessels of gold and silver. The servants were numerous and noticeable for the richness of their attire. The houses, too, were large and commodious. In fact, giving themselves up to sensuous enjoyments they had naturally lost the glorious reputation their ancestors had won in war.” This last remark shows that Diodorus recognized the important difference between the early Etruscans who built up the country and the later ones who merely enjoyed it. Naturally courtesans flourished in such a community. Timaeus and Theopompus tell how the women lived and ate and even exercised with the men (Athen. xii. 14; cf. iv. 38), habits which of course gave the Roman satirists many openings for attack (Plaut. Cist. ii. 3. 563; cf. Herod, i. 98; Strabo xi. 14). In dress they differed but little from the Romans, both wearing the toga and the tunic. Hats too, often of pointed form, were common (Serv. ad Aen. ii. 683), as the paintings show, but it was their shoes for which they were particularly famous. One author (Lydus, de Magistr. i. 17. 36) suggests that Romulus borrowed from Etruria the type of shoe he gave the senators, and this may well be true, though the form mentioned, the kampagus, is of late origin. At any rate σανδάλια Τυρρηνικά are frequently mentioned. From the pictures and remains we know that they had wooden soles strengthened with bronze, and that the uppers were of leather and bound with thongs.
Their occupations of trade and agriculture have been already mentioned. For their leisure hours they had athletic games including gladiatorial shows (Athen. iv. 153; cf. Livy ix. 40. 7; Strabo v. 250), hunting, music and dancing. All these are shown in the tomb pictures, and all, with the exception of the hunting, developed first as a part of religious service, and their importance is shown by the strictness of the rules that governed them (Cicero, De harusp. resp. ii. 23). Did a dancer lose step, or an attendant lift his hand from the chariot, the games lost their value as a religious service. An idea of the splendour of the triumphs that accompanied victorious generals and of the parades at the games is given by Appian (De reb. Punic. viii. 66) and Dionysius (vii. 92). The music that was an accompaniment of all their occupations, even of hunting (Aelian, De natur. anim. xii. 46), was mainly produced by the single or double flute, the mastery of which by the Etruscans was known to all the world. They also had small harps and trumpets.
For the regularization of all these duties and pleasures there was a calendar and time-division for the day. It is noteworthy that the beginning of the day was for them the moment when the sun was at the zenith (Serv. ad Aen. v. 738). In this they differed from the Greeks, who began their day with the sunset, and the Romans, who reckoned theirs from midnight. The weeks were of eight days, the first being market day and the day when the people could appeal to the king, and the months were lunar. The years were kept numbered by the annual driving of a nail into the walls of the temple of Nortia at Volsinii (Livy vii. 3. 7), a custom later adopted by the Romans, who used the Capitoline temple for the same purpose. In Rome this rite was performed on the Ides of September, and it is likely that it took place in Etruria on the same date, the natural end of the year among an agricultural folk. A still longer measure of time was the saeculum, which was supposed to be the length of the longest life of all those born in the year in which the preceding oldest inhabitant died (Censorinus, De die natali, 17. 5; cf. Zosimus ii. 1). According to later writers[4] the Etruscan race was to last ten saecula, and the emperor Augustus in his memoirs (Serv. ad. Bucol. ix. 47) says that the comet of the year 44 B.C. was said by the priests to betoken the beginning of the tenth saeculum. The earliest saecula had been, according to Varro, 100 years long. The later ones varied in length from 105 to 123 years. The round number 100 is obviously an ex post facto approximation, and the accuracy of the others is probably more apparent than real, but if we reckon back some 900 years from the date given by Augustus we arrive at just about the time when the archaeological evidence leads us to believe that the Etruscans in Italy were beginning to recognize their individuality.
Religion.—To retrace the religious development of the Etruscans from its mystic beginnings is beyond our power, and it is unlikely that any future discoveries will help us much. We are, however, able to draw a clear, if not a detailed, picture of the worship paid to the various divinities, partly from the direct information we have concerning them and partly from the analogies which may safely be drawn between them and the Romans.
The frequency of sacrifice among them and their belief in the short duration of the race[5] show clearly their belief in a good and a bad principle, and the latter seems to have been predominant in their minds. Storms, earthquakes, the birth of deformities, all gave evidence of evil powers, which could be appeased sometimes only by human sacrifice. We miss here the Greek joy in human life and the beauties of earth. The gods (aesar) were divided into two main groups, the Dii Consentes and a vaguer set of powers, the Dii Involuti (Seneca, Quaest. Nat. ii. 41), to whom even Jupiter bowed. They all dwelt in various parts of the heavens (Martianus Capella, De nupt. Phil. i. 41 ff.). Of the Dii Consentes the most important group consisted of Jupiter (Tinia), Juno (Uni) and Minerva (Menrva). In some towns, such as Veii and Falerii, Juno was the chief deity, and at Perusia she was worshipped like the Greek Aphrodite in conjunction with Vulcan (the Greek Hephaestus). This shows that though in exterior form the Etruscan gods were influenced by the Greeks, still their character and powers betoken different beliefs. An interesting point to note about Minerva (Menrva) is that she was the goddess of the music of flutes and horns. The myth of Athena and Marsyas probably originated in Asia Minor, and a Pelasgian Tyrrhenian founded in Argos the temple of Athena Salpinx (Paus. ii. 21. 3). The evident connexion between Asia Minor and Etruria in these facts cannot be overlooked. Besides these deities there were Venus (Turan), Bacchus (Fufluns), Mercury (Turms), Vulcan (Sethlans). Of these, Sethlans is in a way the most important, for he shows a connexion in prehistoric times between Etruria and the East.[6] Other deities of Greek origin there were—Ares, Apollo, Heracles, the Dioscuri; in fact, as the centuries passed, the Greek divinities were adopted almost without exception. Besides these there were also many gods of Latin or Sabine origin, of whom little is known but their names; these may often be local appellations for the same god. Among these were Voltumna at Volsinii and Vertumnus at Rome, Janus, Nortia, goddess of Fortuna, Fēronia, whose temple was at a town of the same name at the foot of Soracte,[7] Mantus, Pales, Vejovis, Eileithyia and Ceres.
- ↑ Monumenti dell’ Inst. Arch. Rom. x. pl. 31; Museo Etrusco Vaticano, i. pl. 63-69; cf. Annali dell’ Inst. Arch., 1896, p. 199 ff.
- ↑ Vase with hieroglyphs found at Santa Marinella, Bollettino dell’ Inst. Arch., 1841, p. 111; Mon. antichi, viii. p. 88.
- ↑ G. Dennis, Cities and Cemeteries of Etruria.
- ↑ Varro ap. Serv. ad Aen. viii. 526; see Helbig, Bull. dell’ Inst. Arch. (1876), 227.
- ↑ Censorinus, De Die Nat. 17.
- ↑ See Preller, Röm. Myth. s.v. “Volcanus.” Opposed to this see Wissowa, Religion u. Kultus der Römer, who seems to misinterpret the evidence.
- ↑ Strabo v. 2. 39; cf. Livy i. 30; Dion. Hal. iii. 32.
