562 Colonel Tod's Observatimis on a Gold Ring found at Mo7ilrose. 



tal of the minor temple of Isis at Pompei, are precisely those before the 

 reader; and in the terra colla 'Penates of the same divinity, four thousand of 

 which were excavated from the precincts of her fane at Pffistum, the goddess 

 iiolds in her right hand this same symbol, emblematic perhaps of that grand 

 catastrophe, the flood, alluded to in the Egyptian fable of Isis and Osiris ; 

 and the preservation of the species from Typhon, the destructive power, 

 typified in the serpent. When I detected these symbols at Cortona, at 

 Pompei, and Pa?stum, those ancient cities founded by the first colonists of 

 Italy, I was gratified in finding the mythological chain which connected the 

 Isis of the Ganges and the Nile extended to the Tiber and the Arno, It 

 was by the Celto-Etruscan tribes that the worship of Isis was introduced, long 

 before the "eternal city "existed: the Romans had no occasion to import 

 her rites from Egypt. Her name is the same, and bears the same significa- 

 tion in Celtic as in Greek ; and- Suetonius, the historian, incidentally lets us 

 know that the imperial epithet Cesar, deprived of its initial letter, means 

 dominus in the old Tuscan. Thus the Esar and Es-es of the Etrusci are the 

 Esivara and Esa of the Hindus. But there are many proofs besides this 

 isolated example of the Indo-Scythic origin of the ancient Etrusci : they 

 had the division of castes,* t7~. 



1st. The Larthes, or Tyrant, or lords. 



2d. The Tusci, or priesthood. 



3d. The Rasena',\ or warriors. 



4th. The Mass, or " caste populaire." 

 The Etruscans had also this remarkable feature : their sacred books, like 

 those of the Hindus, laid down architectural rules for their cities and 

 edifices ;$ those vast monuments so analogous to the most antique fortresses 

 of India, which evince both races to have been far advanced in the mecha- 

 nical arts. The sculpture in the Tuscan cities has a decidedly Oriental 

 character.§ Some of tliemost celebrated names both of ancient and modern 

 days maintain the Indo-Scythic origin of this branch of the Pelasgii, and 

 locate their cradle between the Euxine and Caspian ;|| but I presume to 

 surmise that this was but an intermediate place of halt from a more eastern 

 abode, that of Transoxiana, the land of the Turshkd invaders of India, 



* Malte-Brun, Precis de Geographie, torn. vi. p. 106. 



t The third caste, or warriors, is good Sanscrit : Sena, the army — of the state, Rrij. 



X ISIicali, " ritahe avant la domination des Romains," Ed. R. Rochette, torn, i, ch. x. 



} See riates to Micah. |1 Micali, torn, i, p. 85, Volney. 



