1909.] CARTER— EVOLUTION OF THE CITY OF ROME. 133 



This little group of towns is not as yet however the city of 

 Rome : it is possible that in the course of time it might have become 

 the city of Rome, either by the superior power of one oppidum 

 which would shortly have added the others to its territory, in some- 

 what the way in which the traditional account considers that Rome 

 was actually founded, — the Varronian scheme, which proceeds from 

 the presupposition of the primacy of the Palatine, — or by some sort 

 of reciprocity, resulting in union, of which we see the first traces 

 in the annual joint sacrifices of the Septimontium.^^ But either 

 one of these ways would have required a very long period of time, 

 and in either case the intellectual development of the people would 

 have been continuous so that the traces of barbarism even in the 

 conservative field of religion would have been much fewer in num- 

 ber. Every indication points to a rapid change and one which 

 affected the towns equally. Such a change could come only from 

 outside, and from a people superior to Rome in culture. When 

 we ask what this people w^as, the answer comes more clearly every 

 year, — the Etruscans. 



It seems fairly certain that the Etruscans as we know them 

 in the history of Italy were a composite people made up of a native 

 Italic stock combined with an invading stock, whose original home 

 was in Asia ]\Iinor.^* Further it seems probable that the invading 

 stock came by sea across the Mediterranean and landed on the west- 

 ern coast of Italy, and that their advent did not precede the begin- 

 ning of the eighth century.^' Allowing them about two centuries 



''On the Septimontium, compare Varro, L. L. 6, 24: dies Septimontium 

 nominatus ab his septem montibus, in quis sita urbs est, ferise non populi 

 sed montanorum modo, ut paganalia qui sunt alicuius pagi ; and the interest- 

 ing treatment by Wissowa in the Satura Viadrina-Gesammelte Abhandlungen, 

 p. 230 fif. Cp. also Platner : " Classical Philology," I., 1906, t)- 69. 



" The hypothesis of the East, more especially of Asia Minor, as the 

 original home of the Etruscans is at present pretty generally adopted. Their 

 acquaintance with the Babylonian haruspicina and with Greek mythology, 

 the general plan of their houses and the shape of their helmets all indicate 

 an eastern origin. For details see the admirable resume of the present 

 condition of the Etruscan problem by Korte in Pauly-Wissowa s. v. Etrusker. 



"Whether the Etruscans came by land or by sea is still a subject of dis- 

 cussion, though the hypothesis of the sea route seems to be gaining strength 

 at the expense of the other. There seem to be traces of their movement on 



