1854.] 



THE EARLY HISTORY OF ROME. 



221 



reject it — to class it among other national claims to an illustrious 

 progeny, placing it in the same category with the claim of the 

 Jews to the colonization of America,* or with the rival claim of 

 the ancient Welch to a discoverer and colonizer of the New 

 World in the person of their fabulous Prince Madoc. 



3. The change of language is equally explicable on either 

 theory. Whatever were the respective languages of the original 

 inhabitants of the country and of its later conquerors, it is very 

 probable that both underwent considerable modification, so that 

 we can easily account for the appearance of a new composite 

 tongue, equally distinct from Pelasgian and from pure Etrurian. 

 Thus much we may say here, in anticipation of what will fall 

 into its place more properly when we come to consider the Lan- 

 guages of Ancient Italy. 



These considerations appear to my mind feasible enough to 

 incline us to agree with Niebuhr rather than with Dennis, to 

 look for the Etruscans rather to the north of the Italian Penin- 

 sula than to the east. So far we agree with Dennis that in 

 Etruria are found many traces of the influence of Eastern cus- 

 toms and religion; but we hesitate to make the introduction of 

 these customs contemporary with the incursion of the Rasena or 

 pure Etruscans. The monuments discovered in Etruria only 

 increase our difficulty. Not only do they present us with an 

 unintelligible language, but they further perplex us by the strange 

 medley of religions which appears in them. As Michelet describes 

 them: — "These men, with large arms and large heads, remind 

 one of the statues found in the Mexican ruins of Palanque. * * 

 * * * * This eagle-horse carries me to Persia; these person- 

 ages who cover their mouths as they address a superior seem to 

 have been detached from the bas-reliefs at Persepolis. At their 

 side I see the man-wolf of Egypt, the Scandinavian dwarfs, and 

 perhaps the mallet of Thor." Without following out all the 

 fanciful resemblances perceived by this author, we yet clearly 

 perceive enough uncertainty to forbid our basing upon these 

 remains any very important theory. 



How, then, are we to explain the history of Etruria ? 



I. We must remember that there was existing in the country 

 from the earliest times of which any record remains, a population 

 which may be described as Tyrrheno-Pelasgian, composed of a 

 mixture of the distinguishing Italian with the Greek element. 

 This race perhaps supplanted an old Umbrian population, pro- 

 bably existed side by side with it. At all events, it is found in 

 Etruria in the middle of the sixth ceutury B.C., at which time 

 Agylla is mentioned by Herodotus as a town consulting the 

 oracle at Delphi, in which temple it had a chapel or store- 

 room — an evidence of Pelasaian oriain. 



* The question of the probable locality of the Jews of the Dispersion 

 has excited much curiosity since the time that Alexander the Great, 

 followed by birds who spoke Greek, attempted to find the Rechabites 

 in the dark mountains. Perm, we know, fancied he had discovered 

 the Jews in America, and supposed them to have passed over from 

 the eastern extremity of Asia to the western extremity of America. 

 Others have discovered them beyond the Corderillas, have even traced 

 the route by which the tribe of Reuben reached the West Indies, or 

 have bridged over Behring's Straits to make the migration more pro- 

 bable. Nay, we are told that Noah spent the last 350 years of his life 

 in colonizing various parts of the earth. Others have traced the Ameri- 

 cans from the Canaanites who fled before Joshua, from the Cartha- 

 ginians, or from the nations who would not embrace Christianity. The 

 migration of Madoc is placed A.D. 1170, and has been made the theme 

 of poets and historians. We may spare ourselves the trouble of refut- 

 ing these opinions, for they refute each other. They are brought for- 

 ward here as an instance of the contradiction and difficulty which attends 

 these national traditions, and of the large share which national pride 

 or religious bias may have in their construction. 



II. Against this nation (a peaceful industrial population, as 

 we have noticed above) there came from their fastnesses in the 

 Rhretian Alps the warlike Rasena, known to the Romans by 

 the name of Etrusci. Livy (v. 35.) considers the Etruscans to 

 have been Rhretians; although, as he observes, their language 

 had been greatly modified by the circumstances of their local 

 position. However this may be, yet we have every reason to 

 conceive that the race which now infested Italy was neither 

 Umbrian, nor Lydian or Pelasgic, but Gothic; that they swept 

 from the Alps, like their successors the Gauls, in an overwhelming 

 torrent, conquered Lombardy, and thence, passing down the 

 western side of the Appeninnes and forcing, perhaps the Um- 

 brians who still inhabited Northern Etruria, to cross the moun- 

 tains and confine themselves to the Eastern coast, they spread 

 down from Lake Trasimenus along the valley of the Tiber, and 

 flooding the country to the sea coast, established within those 

 limits the empire of the Rasena. 



This period may be marked by the date 523 B. C, at the 

 latest: for we know that between that date and 533 B. C, 

 Agylla (afterwards Care) was still a Pelasgo-Tyrrhenian town 

 in communication with Delphi. From that date to about 470 

 B. C. is the probable period of Etruscan conquest: and during 

 this half century they must have overrun Central Italy and 

 received the submission of Latium, and, among the Latin towns, 

 of Rome herself.* In the year 470 they are said to have 

 founded Capua; and were about that time at the height of 

 their power. Hiero broke their naval power at the battle of 

 Cuma, and about the same time, in all probability, a rising 

 of Latium took place, when they were beaten back with loss 

 from under the walls of Aricia. From that period their power 

 declined. The Romans, after shaking off their temporary yoke, 

 rose steadily. The Etruscans were henceforth confined within 

 the Tiber as their southern border. About the middle of the 

 4th century of Rome the Gauls deprived them of their possessions 

 in Lombardy. In B. C. 280, they are admitted to terms of 

 lasting friendship with Rome ; and continue the faithful allies of 

 Rome for two centuries till in the year 88, they, together with 

 the Umbrians, received the Roman franchise. 



More has been said of this branch of Italian ethnology than 

 would have been necessary, and more perhaps than may seem 

 compatible with the restricted limits of this paper, because I 

 found it necessary to disagree with the views put forth by Pro- 

 fessor Newman, and was unwilling to do so without assigning 

 my reasons more at length. We may pass on more briefly to a 

 notice of the remaining nations who may be classed among the 

 early inhabitants of Italy. 



The Unibrians and Oscans seem to have occupied large por- 

 tions of Italy to the north and south of Latium. Under this 

 class of nations were included the hardiest and most warlike of 

 Italian nations. The hardy Samnites, who maintained many 

 bloody wars against the power of Rome and Latium ; the 

 Volscians, those eternal enemies of the Roman name; the Sa- 

 bellians, the mountain shepherds, distinguished from the less 

 hardy Osci, who cultivated the plains. The former worshipping 

 Mavus, Mamers, or Mars, adored under the form of a lance ; the 

 same deity, whose name was derived from the Sabine quiris, a 

 spear, and worshipped as Quiruius in early Rome. The latter 

 worshipping a kind of Hercules, known by the names Sabus, 

 Semo, Sancus, Fidius, the same deity whose name, we know, 

 inscribed " Semoni Sanco " on a stone found on the island in the 



* This fact, though disguised by Livy, as he followed the old poetical 

 story, is expressly admitted by Tacitus, (Hist. III. 72.) and proved at 

 large by Niebuhr. (Hist., Vol. I., p. 541-551, &c, Eng. Tr.) 



