O'Reilly — Milesian Colonization relative to Gold-mining. 47 



and ninth each an average of 120, Tve ohtain the year 1044 b.c. as the 

 heginning of Etruscan chronology — a date which curiously corresponds 

 with that tisuaJhj assigned to those great movements of races in Greece 

 with which the Etruscan traditions loere associated. The really impor- 

 tant point, however, in these figures, as Helhig (' Ann all dell. Instit. 

 Arch.,' 1876, p. 230) has lately shovni, is the circumstance that the 

 first four periods are given in round numhers, and thus justify the 

 inference that the keeping of regular records had not begun imtil the 

 fifth period, commencing B.C. 644." 



On the other hand, in Burton's "Etruscan Bologna" (London, 

 1876), p. 173, the author says : — " They (the Etruscans) are generally 

 heKeved to have fii'st founded the Tp-rhenian Federation of the Tvest, 

 '■ JEtriiria Madre,'' and to have crossed the Apennines, and occupied 

 the circumpadan regions, ' Etruria nova^ as far as the Alps (Herod. 

 Clio. 94), and lastly, '■Etruria Campania^ or Orpicia, in the twelfth, 

 or perhaps the thii'teenth, century b.c. This would be about the date 

 of the Trojan War (popularly B.C. 1184) (Is^'ote)— Mebuhi' (I. 138), 

 also carries back the first Etruscan Sfficulum to b.c. 1188, or 434 

 years A.r.c." 



The citations abeady given from Egyptian history and inscriptions, 

 not merely afford evidence of invasions by foreign tribes and people 

 under the pressure of famine, which in the latitudes of the IMediter- 

 ranean would mainly result from severe droughts (as in India at 

 present), but also fuiTiish proofs of the activity and extent of the 

 commercial navigation of the times considered, thus Eamses II. says 

 in an inscription : — 



" I dedicate to thee, ships with their freight on the great sea," 

 " The merchants caiTy on their commerce with their wares, and their 

 productions of gold and silver and bronze." 



They further furnish proofs of the great stimulus given by the 

 vast enterprises of the Pharaohs, to the quest and production of the 

 precious metals, and of copper and iron. They show us how the 

 mining works were conducted under the superintendence of a " 7;^r- 

 j^?'^," or " overseer of the foreign people." Lastly, they show us that 

 the Delta and its ports were the great emporiums for the co m merce of 

 east and west, and that bands of adventurers settled iu the Delta 

 coming from Colchis, from the Caucasus and from Crete, and suggest 

 to a certain point a parallel between them and the Milesian colony, 

 who are mentioned as starting from the district of the Tanais ia 

 Scythia as having been in Crete, as having served in Egypt, and as 

 haviag spent some time in Gsetulia (?) and with the Amazons. 



