134 CARTER— EVOLUTION OF THE CITY OF ROME. [April 22. 



to accomplish their amalgamation and conquer the region afterwards 

 known as Etruria, they would come into contact with the Roman 

 stock in the plain of Latium about the beginning of the sixth 

 century.^'' 



The Etruscans, therefore, a sea-faring and so a city-loving folk, 

 conquered these hill towns and enclosed them all together with the 

 intervening valleys with one wall. But before building this wall, 

 they drew the plough about the space to be enclosed and thus 

 created the pomerium ritti Etrusco}'^ We do not know very much 

 about their wall but we do know about the pomerium, and as the 

 wall was surely inside of it,^^ we have a general idea of its position. 



the islands of the eastern Mediterranean, especially on Lemnos, where an 

 inscription practically Etruscan in character has been found. It is uncertain 

 exactly what we are to call these people before the " Etruscan " people were 

 brought into being by the amalgamation of this immigrant stock with the 

 Italic stock. It has been suggested with a reasonable degree of probability 

 that they were the Pelasgians. The date at which they entered Italy is a 

 matter of some considerable uncertainty. The date as given above (circa 

 800) depends upon the validity of the supposition that in the long series 

 of tombs which the cemeteries (especially near Bologna) show, the earlier 

 tombs are not of the Etruscans but only the later ones, the tombe-a-corridoio, 

 and the tombe-a-camera. However several scholars, who are in hearty 

 accord with the eastern origin, and the journey by sea, are not content 

 with so late a date as the eighth century, on the ground that it does not 

 allow sufficient time for the development of the Etruscans in the peninsula 

 of Italy. According to them the coming of the Etruscans should be placed 

 two or three centuries earlier. 



" This date corresponds with the tradition of the later kingdom. 

 Tarquinius Priscus reigned thirty-eight years, Servius Tullius forty-four 

 years, Tarquinius Superbus twenty-five years, a total of one hundred and 

 seven years, which added to B. C. 509, the supposed year of the founding 

 of the Republic, gives B. C. 616, as the beginning of the so-called Later 

 Kingdom. Such an agreement may be of absolutely no value, on the other 

 hand it may have a certain significance if the tradition represents the faint 

 reflection of the period of time when the new influence came. 



" Not only the Pomerium, but the whole idea of delimitation seems to 

 have come to Rome from Etruria. Much of the terminology of Roman 

 surveying bears the imprint of Etruria. Roman tradition recognized the 

 Etruscan origin of the Pomerium : cp. Varro, L. L. V., 143 : oppida condebant 

 in Latio Etrusco ritu multi, id est iunctis bobus, tauro et vacca, interiore 

 aratro circumagebant sulcum. 



" On the whole question of the pomerium and its relation to the city 

 wall, compare American Journal of Archceology, 1908, p. 177. 



