1849.1 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



143 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF NATURE AND ART.* 



(Concluded from page \V6.J 



Mr. Fergusson's Fourth Chapter is on Etruria, his views with 

 regard to which have already received some notice at our hands. 

 He was, he says, originally opposed to the Lydian origin of the 

 Etruscans, because almost every modern writer agrees in rejecting 

 it. On the other hand, he found that almost all the old historians 

 bear witness together for the Lydian origin. For it, we have 

 Herodotus, Strabo, Pliny, Seneca, Plutarch, Paterculus, Tacitus, 

 Appian, and Justin ; and against it only Dionysius of Halicarnas- 

 sus, and Hellanicus of Lesbos. Then, too, it is to be said, that 

 hardly any modern writers agree as to what the origin is. The 

 theory of Mr. Fergusson is the only one which is consistent with 

 the old writers and the artistic evidence, while there is every 

 appearance of likelihood in it. 



Having laid it down that the Etruscans were a branch of the 

 great Tartar race, and of the same blood as the Pelasgians, he is 

 able to follow this out by a comparison with the artistic remains, 

 which appear to support it. The Pelasgians in Greece so mi.\ed 

 with the Hellens, that the distinction was soon lost sight of, — but 

 not until a great influence had been brought to bear on Greek art. 

 The influence of Etruria on Rome was no less — perhaps more, for 

 the latter took half her arts and civilization from Etruria; but the 

 latter, until her fall, borrowed nothing from Rome. 



Some ivlio refuse the Lydian origin, assign an origin from 

 Egypt; but Mr. Fergusson truly says, that, great as is the likeness 

 between Etruscan and Egyptian works, they are not one and the 

 same; and there has not been found in all Etruria, one single 

 object of purely Egyptian character, or which would not raise 

 wonder and perplexity on the banks of the Nile. A few scarabsei 

 of the age of the Lagidae must, of course, have been imported. 

 That there is anything of the Egyptian spirit in Etruria our 

 writer thinks the less wonderful, as the Egyptians held Asia 

 Minor for Ave centuries before the presumed migration of the 

 Etruscans. 



The distinct shape of Mr. Fergusson's proposition is, that the 

 Etruscans were a people of Lydia, or at least of Asia Minor, who, 

 about a century after the time of the exode of the Jews from 

 Egypt, or about as long before the Trojan war, in about tlie age 

 of Ninus the Assyrian, and the year 8800 of the Decimal Era, 

 emigrated by sea from Smyrna, the only port of Lydia, and landed 

 and formally settled in Italy in the land of the Umbrians, between 

 the valleys of the Arno and the Tiber, where tliey built or took 

 twelve towns, in which they dwelt until the growth of people made 

 them send off' twelve bands of settlers to the northward, where 

 they seated themselves in towns of the valley of the Po, subject 

 to the old League. Afterwards, other twelve bands of settlers 

 were sent off' to tlie southward, who seated themselves in what was 

 aftervvards known as ]Magna Grfecia. 



As Mr. Fergusson says, this view solves at once one of the most 

 difficult problems of ancient history, inasmuch as it states that 

 both Greece and Italy received their civilization from the same 

 source; and accounts for the great likeness between the arts and 

 civilization of the two countries in the earlier ages of their being. 

 This, too, accounts for the alphabetic characters of eacli, being of 

 the same class, and not, as commonly assumed, by those of Etruria 

 being borrowed from Greece. Both received them in Lydia from 

 Phenicia. 



This Etrusco-Pelasgic fellowship is so strong in the earlier 

 times, that it is hardly possible to assign a distinct character to 

 each ; — so far from it, the works of either derive an illustration 

 from the other; and no better commentary on the «ords of Homer 

 and Hesiod can be found than the paintings from Ciere or Vulci. 

 If any one wants to see a contemporary illustration of the funeral 

 games held by Achilles on the death of Patroclus, nowhere will he 

 find a better than in the Etruscan room of the British Museum. 

 There have we the charioteers, the riders, runners, wrestlers, 

 boxers, and fencers; the hurlers of the quoit, and the darters of 

 the spear. There have we the booths, with the lookers-on, and all 

 the fashions of the high feast. 



Mr. Fergusson remarks in Pelasgic Italy and in Pelasgic Greece 

 the same want of temples; as too is to be noted in the motherland 

 of Asia Minor. There was a worship for the same oracles, and the 

 same love of soothsaying. In all these countries, the chief archi- 

 tectural remains are tombs; and these so like in make, as to be 

 almost the same. The people worshipped the same gods, under 



* " An Historical Inquiry into the True Principles of Beauty in Art, more especially with 

 refjreiue to Architecture." By JAMES FERGUSSON, Esq., Architect, authorof " An 

 Essay on the Ancient Topogrnphy of Jerusalem," " Picturesque Illustrations of Ancient 

 Architecture in Hiadostan," Fart the First. London : Longmans, m4d. 



almost the same names, and with the same rites; had the same 

 eddas or mythology, and the same half-gods and heroes, of whom 

 Hercules, the greatest, belongs almost as much to Lydia and Italy 

 as to Greece. 



Our writer having taken up the Lydian origin of the Etruscans, 

 is willing to believe in the visits of Evander and Eneas to Italy. 

 This tale has likelihood, but no good witness for it. 



We think Mr. Fergusson decidedly wrong in the importance he 

 attaches to the political form of the federation of the twelve 

 towns. Republicanism is no more the characteristic of the Ibero- 

 Pelasgic race, than kingship of the Indo-Europeans. The pages 

 of Tacitus, and the early history of the English, will show that 

 the Germani were essentially republican in their institutions; and 

 whatever importance our writer may attach to those of the Iberi- 

 Pelasgi, as influencing the freedom of Greece and Rome, the free- 

 dom of the world in this day springs from no such birth, — but from 

 the laws of our forefathers in the marshes of Jutland. 



Some time is given in the work before us to restoring what 

 Vitruvius calls an Etruscan temple, but which is rather to be set 

 down as Roman work. The suggestions of the writer are in- 

 genious. 



Of the tombs, we are told that they embrace a very wide period 

 of time, and are well deserving of further investigation than 

 they have received. The tumuli or barrows are a characteristic 

 of the Etruscans, as of tlie whole race; and Mr. Fergusson gives 

 many interesting illustrations of the Regulini-Galassi and other 

 tombs, with an interesting restoration of the tomb of Porsenna, 

 from the text of Pliny. This work was +00, perhaps 450, feet 

 high, so that it was one of the most remarkable buildings in the 

 ancient world. In this restoration Mr. Fergusson has introduced 

 a roof, hat, or umbrella, to represent the petasus of Pliny. 



Mr. Fergusson says that we shall never extract any new ideas of 

 grand or monumental art from the remains of the Etruscans. In 

 Greece, the temple and the theatre, with their accessories, supplied 

 the focus to which the Grecian mind bent all its strength; in 

 Egypt, the palace-temple served the same end: but in Etruria 

 there were neitiier temples nor public buildings, other than tombs, 

 for the development of art; and our writer thinks that tombs 

 never are nor can be truly national monuments. He objects, that 

 tliey were and must be the offspring of individual vanity or of in- 

 dividual superstition; and no nation ever was remarkable for 

 tombs, when it was the custom to leave them either to successors 

 or to national gratitude. Tliat in Egypt, Etruria, and India, .all 

 the mausolea were raised by tlie great themselves in their lifetime, 

 as their last resting-place. AV'e cannot, nevertheless, agree that 

 we, or the other Indo-European races, have a peculiar fear of 

 death, but the contrary. The faith of AVoden, even more strongly 

 than that of Christ, held forth to the English greater joys to be 

 had after death; and the fear of death is rather a characteristic of 

 the Jews, than of Indo-Europeans. Still, it is the fact that the 

 Indo-Europeans are not a tomb-building race: but that perhaps 

 the rather because they have always attached more importance to 

 the life hereafter than to the life of this world, and have not 

 thought the latter wanted any remembrancer. 



The chief development of the Etruscans was in the more useful 

 arts, which the Greeks almost let alone. The roads and bridges of 

 the Etruscans are still monuments of industry and constructive 

 skill; their sewers and tunnels, after twenty-flve hundred year»' 

 wear, are still unsurpassed by the gi'eat works of the Romans; ami 

 their town walls and castles are yet in being. They drained lakes 

 and marshes, and tilled plains almost barren ; so that they must 

 have done much to bring Italy into a high state of civilization, — 

 from which Mr. Fergusson thinks the Romans profited; and that 

 they took the civilization of the Etruscans as their own, quoting 

 '■'•Sic vos non votns": but if the Romans were in a state of barba- 

 rism on the fall of Etruria, the latter would be brought to the 

 standard of barbarism — not the former to the standard of civiliza- 

 tion. 



In their engineering works, the Etruscans used several modifica- 

 tions of the arch, including the true arch, of which illustrations 

 are given among the engravings. 



If the Etruscans did not succeed in high ai't, in many of the 

 lower arts they were most accomplished. Their jewellery, chains, 

 bracelets, rings, earrings, &c., show an elegance which is even now 

 unsurpassed. Their candelabra were sold in Athens in the proud 

 days of Greek ai't. Their cabinet work of bronze and ivory 

 reached a high degree of perfection. 



From a review of the wliole, Mr. Fergusson thinks we ought to 

 assign a higher rank to the commercial people of Etruria than is 

 commonly awarded to them. Their character essentially diff'ers 

 from that of the Egyptians in all its leading features, while Mr. 



