The Etruscans inside and outside Etruria

The Etruscans were a population with well-defined language and cultural characteristics which developed in Italy over the period between the 11th and 1st centuries B.C., and which it is possible to reconstruct today to a large extent, thanks to epigraphic, archaeological and historical sources. Called Tyrrhenoi or Tyrsenoi by the Greeks, Etrusci or Tusci by the Romans, Turskus in the Umbrian language, but in their own language: Rasenna, from the beginnings of their development they play a role of notable importance, not only in the culture of Italy during the Iron Age, but also in the complex network of relationships which linked the Mediterranean world with Central Europe.

The Etruscans: origins and development

The origins of this population have been and are widely debated. Ancient sources (for example Herodotos and Ellanico) and some modern scholars hypothesise that it was a population from other lands, in particular from the Lydia (Western Anatoly), probably under the guidance of a chief and in search of new lands to colonise. Others (Dionigi di Alicarnasso) rather maintain their origins as being native. The most convincing and likely argument, however, bring into focus not the question of the origins as the process of formation of a new population, breeding from the development of indigenous ethnic and cultural components, and finally also from the force of external cultural factors. The territory in which this civilisation flourished, Etruria itself, could be considered equivalent to the seventh region of the administrative division operated by Augustus in 7 B.C., or rather the territory which present day Tuscany, western Umbria and northern Lazio cover, amongst which the Tyrrhenian coast to the West, the flow of the River Arno and the first reliefs of the Tuscan-Emilian Apennines to the North and the flow of the Tiber to the South and East were included.

The cultural development of the Etruscans started with a formative phase of proto-historic character, that is defined as Villanovian (from the name of the site on the neighbourhood of Bologna where the first cemetery with such distinctive elements was discovered). In Etruria itself, this phase continued on with the final aspects of the previous culture of the Bronze Age. The following periods which spelt the complex history of this civilisation, however, were strongly influenced by contacts with the Greek and Oriental worlds: from the first bonds with Eubea to the introduction of writing, from the diffusion of Oriental fashion, which spread over a large part of the Mediterranean to the trading with Corinthians and Phocaei, to the birth of the first cities. From around 6th century B.C., furthermore, interaction with the city of Rome began. The last three Roman kings were of Etruscan origin and there was much contact and numerous clashes between the Etruscan cities and Rome. From the 5th and 4th centuries B.C., finally, the Etruscan cities, tired of the battles waged on the sea with the Syracusaean fleet and on land against the growing power of Rome, quite apart from the raids by the first groups of Celts who invaded Italy in 388 B.C., started a slow decline which turned into submission to Rome. The Romanising process culminated after numerous skirmishes and after the foundation of the first Roman colonies on Etruscan land, in the first century B.C., when a law ratified the legal equality of the Italics with Roman citizens, with full rights.
Literary and historiographic sources, not without a certain amount of exaggeration, speak of a proper Etruscan empire, which stretched from the Alps to the Straits of Messina. Even though this was not the true situation, it has, however, been archaeologically proved, that at varying times and in different ways, the Etruscans infiltrated other areas of the peninsula too: Campania, the Po Valley, the area around Rimini with the important centre of Verucchio, the Marche with that of Fermo.

From Etruria to the Forcello

In this wide historic picture characterised by the movement of merchants and whole groups of people, simultaneously spreading products and handicraft objects, but above all their culture and traditions, we can set the foundation of the Etruscan town of the Forcello. This, with its orthogonal urban plan, sign of a new foundation, rose with the merging of two important trading routes: the land route which leaving the cities in Etruria, crossed over the Apennines and through the towns of Marzabotto and Bologna; the Adriatic sea route, which from the Greece and the Aegean sea reached the delta of the Po river and the eastern Po plain, tooking advantage of the ports of Adria and Spina, to then continue along the river routes to the heart of the Po Valley. Finally, besides the Forcello, there are numerous other evidences of the Etruscan presence, above all in the area around Mantova and in particular, the city of Mantova itself, however, the relationship with this centre still remains difficult to understand.