$ 10. Preserve their national integrity in Etruria. It is easy to see why the Pelasgians retained their national integrity on the north-western coast so much more perfectly than in the south and east. It was because they entered Etruria in a body, and established there the bulk of their nation. All their other settlements were of the nature of colonies; and the density of the population, and its proportion to the number of the conquered mingled with it, varied, of course inversely, with the distance from the main body of the people. In Etruria the Pelasgians were most thickly settled, and next to Etruria in Latium. Consequently, while the Etruscans retained their conquest, and compelled the Sabines, the most vigorous of the dispossessed Umbrians, to direct their energies southwards, and while the Latins were only partially reconquered by the aboriginal tribes, the Pelasgians of the south resigned their national existence, and were merged in the concourse of Sabellian conquerors and Greek colonists. § 11. Meaning and extent of the name "TYRRHENIAN.” From the time of Herodotus1 there has been no doubt that the Pelasgians in Greece and Italy were the same race, and that 1 I. 57. The following is the substance of what Herodotus has told us respecting the Tyrrhenians and Pelasgians; and his information, though much compressed, is still very valuable. He seems tacitly to draw a distinction between the Pelasgians and the Tyrrhenians, whom he really identifies with one another. With regard to the latter he relates the Lydian story (I. 94: Paoì dè avroì Avdoí), that Atys, son of Manes king of the Mæonians, had two sons, Lydus and Tyrrhenus. Lydus remained at home, and gave to the Mæonians the name of Lydians; whereas Tyrrhenus sailed to Umbria with a part of the population, and there founded the Tyrrhenian people. In general, Herodotus, when he speaks of the Tyrrhenians, is to be understood as referring to the Pelasgo-Etruscans. Of the Pelasgians he says (I. 56, sqq.), that they formed one of the original elements of the population of Greece, the division into Dorians and Ionians corresponding to the opposition of Hellenes to Pelasgians. In the course of his travels he had met with pure Pelasgians in Placie and Scylace on the Hellespont, and also in Creston; and their language differed so far from the Greek that he did not scruple to call it barbarian (c. 57). At the same time he seems to have been convinced that the Hellenes owed their greatness to their coalition with these barbarous Pelasgians (c. 58). The text of Herodotus the so-called Tyrrheni or Tyrseni were the most civilised branch of that family. Herodotus, the great traveller of his time, was more entitled than any of his contemporaries to form a judgment on the subject, and he obviously identifies the Pelasgians with the Tyrrhenians on the coast of Asia Minor, in Greece, and in Italy. It is perhaps one of the many indications of the literary intercourse between Herodotus and Sophocles, which I have elsewhere established', that the latter, in a fragment of his Inachus, mentions the Tyrrheno-Pelasgians among the old inhabitants of Argos. Lepsius3 has fully shown that the name Tuppηvòs or is undoubtedly corrupt in this passage; but the meaning is clear from the context. He says, that "the Hellenes having been separated from the Pelasgians, being weak and starting from small beginnings, have increased in population, principally in consequence of the accession of the Pelasgians and many other barbarous tribes.” The reading αὔξηται ἐς πλῆθος τῶν ¿ovéwv Todŵr is manifestly wrong; not only because the position of the article is inadmissible, but also because ἄλλων ἐθνέων βαρβάρων συχνῶν immediately follows. I cannot doubt that we ought to read auέŋtai és πλῆθος, τῶν Πελασγών μάλιστα προσκεχωρηκότων αὐτῷ καὶ ἄλλων ἐθνέων βαρβάρων συχνῶν. The epithet πολλών has crept into the text from a marginal explanation of συχνών, and τῶν ἐθνέων πολλών has consequently taken the place of the abbreviation τῶν ΠΑΓῶν [ΠΑΛῶν] for τῶν Πελασγών. 1 Proceed. of the Phil. Soc. I. p. 161, sqq. 2 Apud Dion. Hal. I. 25: Ιναχε γεννᾶτορ παῖ κρηνῶν πατρὸς Ωκεανοῦ, μέγα πρεσβεύων See also Schol. Apoll. Rh. I. 580. Dr. 3 Ueber die Tyrrhenischen Pelasger in Etrurien. Leipsig, 1842. Lepsius maintains the identity of the Tyrrheno-Pelasgians with the Etruscans; and in the former edition I accepted his view, which was true as far as it went: but subsequent research has convinced me that we must recognise a Rætian element superinduced on the previously existing combination of Tyrrheno-Pelasgian and Umbrian ingredients. We are indebted to this scholar for some of the most important contributions which Italian philology has ever received. In his treatise on the Eugubine Tables, which he published in the year 1833, as an exercise for his degree, he evinced an extent of knowledge, an accuracy of scholarship, and a maturity of judgment, such as we rarely meet with in so young a man. His collection of Umbrian and Oscan inscriptions (Lipsia, 1841) has supplied the greatest want felt by those who are interested in the old languages of Italy; and some fruitful results have proceeded from those Τυρσηνὸς Tuponvos signifies "tower-builder," and that this term has been properly explained even by Dionysius', as referring to the Túpoes or cyclopean fortifications which every where attest the presence of Pelasgian tower-builders. The word τύῤῥις οι Túpois, which occurs in Pindar as the name of the great palace of the primeval god Saturn, is identical with the Latin turris; and the fact, that the Pelasgians derived their distinguishing epithet from this word, is remarkable, not only as showing the affinity between the Greek and Latin languages on the one hand, and the Pelasgian in Etruria on the other hand, but also because these colossal structures are always found wherever the Pelasgians make their appearance in Greece. Fortresses in Pelasgian countries received their designation as often from these TúpoeS as from the name Larissa, which seems to signify the abode of the lars or prince. Thus the old Pelasgian Argos had two citadels or aκporóλes, the one called the Larissa, the other To apyos, i. e. the arx3. In the neighbourhood, however, was the city Tiryns, which is still remarkable for its gigantic cyclopean remains, and in the name of which we may recognise the word rúppis1; not much farther on the other side was Thy inquiries into the Egyptian language and history in which he has long been engaged. Unless I am misinformed, Dr. Lepsius has to thank the Chevalier Bunsen for the advantages which he has enjoyed in Italy, in France, and in Egypt. 1 Ι. 26: ἀπὸ τῶν ἐρυμάτων, ἃ πρῶτοι τῶν τῇδε οἰκούντων κατεσκευάσαντο. τύρσεις γὰρ καὶ παρὰ Τυῤῥηνοῖς αἱ ἐντείχιοι καὶ στεγαναὶ οἰκήσεις ὀνομάζονται, ὥσπερ παρ' Ἕλλησιν. Tzetzes, ad Lycophr. 717: TúpσIS TO τεῖχος, ὅτι Τυρσηνοὶ πρῶτον ἔφευρον τὴν τειχοποιίαν. Comp. Εtym. Μ. s. v. τύραννος. 2 Ol. II. 70: ἔτειλαν Διὸς ὁδὸν παρὰ Κρόνου τύρσιν. See also Orph. Argon. 151: τύρσιν ἐρυμνῆς Μιλήτοιο. Suidas: τύρσος, τὸ ἐν ὕψει ᾠκοδομημένον. The word τύραννος contains the same root: comp. κοίρανος with kápa, and the other analogies pointed out in the New Cratylus, § 336. 3 Liv. XXXIV. 25 "Utrasque arces, nam duas habent Argi.” 4 According to Theophrastus (apud Plin. VII. 57), the inhabitants of Tiryns were the inventors of the rúpoets. As early as Homer's time the town was called reixióeσσa (I. II. 559), and its walls are described by Euripides (Electr. 1158. Iph. in Aul. 152, 1501. Troad. 1088) as κυκλώπεια οὐράνια τείχη. The mythological personage Tiryns is called "the son of Argos" (Paus. II. 25), who, according to Steph. Byz., derived his origin from Pelasgus, who civilized Arcadia (Pausan. VIII. 1), rea, which Pausanias connects with the fortified city Thyroon1, in the middle of Pelasgian Arcadia; and more to the south we have the Messenian Thuria, and Thyrides at the foot of Tænaron. Then again, in the northern abodes of the Pelasgians, we find Tyrrheum, a fortified place not far from the Pelasgian Dodona, and also a Tirida in Thrace2. At no great distance from the Thessalian Larissa and Argissa lay the Macedonian Tyrissa, a name which reminds us of the Spanish Turissa in agro Tarraconensis; and the Tyrrhenica Tarraco, with its massive walls, fully establishes the connexion of this latter place with the Tyrrhenians3. § 12. The ETRUSCANS-the author's theory respecting their origin. The fact that the distinctive name Tuppyvos admits of a Greek interpretation is sufficient to show that the Tyrrhenians were not exclusively Italian, and therefore were wrongly identified by the ancient writers with the singular and unaffiliated nation of the Etruscans. To determine the origin of this people and the nature of their language has been considered for many years as the most difficult problem in Philology. And while and was the father of Larissa (Id. VII. 17), and grandfather of Thessalus (Dionys. I. 17). It was built by Thyraus the grandson of Pelasgus (Paus. VIII. 35). 2 Plin. N. H. IV. 18: "Oppidum quondam Diomedis equorum stabulis dirum." 3 Anton. Itin. 4 Müller, Etrusker, I. p. 291. Auson. Ep. 24, 88. 5 Lepsius suggests also, that the Turres on the coast near Care and Alsium may have been a Roman translation of the name Tuppers. With regard to the city of Tyrrha in Lydia, and the district of Torrhebia, to which the Tyrrhenians referred their origin, it is worthy of remark that the civilized Toltecs, who introduced architecture, agriculture, and the useful arts into Mexico, and whose capital was Tula, hore a name which passed into a synonym for architect. See Prescott, Conquest of Mexico, I. p. 12; Sahagun, Hist. de nueva España, lib. X. c. 29; Torquemado, Monarch. Ind. lib. I. c. 14. The Toltecs were in general very like the Tyrrhenians, and the Etruscans, by their gorgeous luxury and their skill in cookery, &c., remind one very much of the united race of Aztecs and Toltecs which Cortes found in Mexico. Bonarota, in his supplement to Dempster1, carnestly exhorts the learned, and especially orientalists, to labour at the discovery of this lost language, suggesting the hope of ultimate success, if a carefully edited collection of inscriptions can be procured to furnish materials for the work, Niebuhr remarks, in his lectures on Ancient Geography 2: "People feel an extraordinary curiosity to discover the Etruscan language; and who would not entertain this sentiment? I would give a considerable part of my worldly means as a prize, if it were discovered; for an entirely new light would then be spread over the ethnography of ancient Italy. But however desirable it may be, it does not follow that the thing is attainable." And he proceeds to point out the inherent faultiness of some previous investigations. Whatever may be the value of the discovery, I cannot allow myself to doubt that the true theory is that which I have had the honour of submitting to the British Association3. It has always appeared to me a very great reproach to modern philology that while we can read the hieroglyphic literature of Egypt, and interpret the cuneiform inscriptions of Persia and Assyria, we should profess ourselves unable to deal scientifically with the remains of a language which flourished in the midst of Roman civilization. So far from regarding the problem as involved in hopeless difficulty, I have always felt that its solution was, sooner or later, inevitable; and as the present state of our ethnographic knowledge enables us to classify and discriminate all the different elements in the population of Europe, the identification of the ancient Etruscans must reduce itself to the alternative of exclusion, from which there is no escape. Sir Thomas More came to the conviction that his unknown visitor 66 p. 106: hortari postremo fas mihi sit, doctos præcipue linguis Orientalibus viros, ut animi vires intendant, ad illustrandam veterem Etruscam linguam, tot jam seculis deperditam. Et quis vetat sperare, quod temporum decursu emergat aliquis, qui difficilem et inaccessam viam aperiat et penetralia linguæ hujus reseret; si præcipue cives et incolæ urbium et locorum ubi inscriptiones Etruscæ reperiuntur sedulo et diligenter excipi et delineari curent monumenta, &c." 2 Vorträge über alte Länder-und Völkerkunde. Berl. 1851. p. 531. 3 "On two unsolved problems in Indo-German, Philology," in the Report of the Brit. Assoc. for the Advancement of Science for 1851, pp. 138-159. |