Organization
From the 6th century bce onward, territorial organization and political and economic initiative were concentrated in a limited number of large city-states in Etruria itself. These city-states, similar to the Greek poleis, consisted of an urban centre and a territory of fluctuating size. Numerous sources refer to a league of the “Twelve Peoples” of Etruria, formed for religious purposes but evidently having some political functions; it met annually at the chief sanctuary of the Etruscans, the Fanum Voltumnae, or shrine of Voltumna, near Volsinii. The precise location of the shrine is unknown, though it may have been in an area near modern Orvieto (believed by many to be the ancient Volsinii). As for the Twelve Peoples, no firm list of these has survived (indeed, they seem to have varied through the years), but they are likely to have come from the following major sites: Caere, Tarquinii, Vulci, Rusellae, Vetulonia, Populonia—all near the coast—and Veii, Volsinii, Clusium, Perusia (Perugia), Cortona, Arretium (Arezzo), Faesulae (Fiesole), and Volaterrae (Volterra)—all inland. There also are reports of corresponding Etruscan leagues in Campania and in northern Italy, but it is far more difficult to generate a list of Etruscan colonies or Etruscanized cities that would be likely candidates for these.
The names of some magistracies both in the league and in individual cities—such as lauchme, zilath, maru, and purth—are known, though there is little certainty as to their precise duties. Lauchme (Latin lucumo) was the Etruscan word for “king.” The title of zilath…rasnal, translated into Latin as praetor Etruriae and meaning something like the “justice of Etruria,” was evidently applied to the individual who presided over the league.
The men holding such magistracies belonged to the aristocracy, which derived its status from the continuity of the family. Onomastic formulas show that persons of free birth normally had two names. First came an individual name, or praenomen (relatively few of these are known: for men, Larth, Avle, Arnth, and Vel were frequent; for women, Larthia, Thanchvil, Ramtha, and Thana); it was followed by a family name, or nomen, derived from a personal name or perhaps the name of a god or a place. This system was in use by the second half of the 7th century, replacing the use of a single name (as in “Romulus” and “Remus”) and reflecting the new complexity of relationships developing with urbanization. The Etruscans rarely used the cognomen (family nickname) employed by the Romans, but often inscriptions include the name of both the father (patronymic) and the mother (matronymic).
Etruscan women enjoyed an elevated status and a degree of liberation unknown to their counterparts in Rome and, especially, in Greece. They were allowed to own and openly display objects and clothing of a luxurious nature; they participated freely in public life, attending parties and theatrical performances; and—shocking to Greeks and Romans—they danced, drank, and rested in close physical contact with their husbands on the banqueting couches. Etruscan ladies were often literate, as one may deduce from the inscriptions on their mirrors, and even learned, if Livy’s portrayal of Tanaquil as skilled in augury may be trusted. Their prominence in the family was a consistent feature of Etruscan aristocratic society and seems to have played a role in its stability and durability.
Crisis and decline
The end of the 6th century and the beginning of the 5th was a turning point for Etruscan civilization. Several crises occurred at this time, from which the Etruscans never fully recovered and which in fact turned out to be only the first of numerous reverses they were to suffer in the ensuing centuries. The expulsion of the Tarquins from Rome (509 bce) deprived them of control over this strategic spot on the Tiber and also cut off their land route to Campania. Soon afterward, their naval supremacy also collapsed when the ships of the ambitious Hieron I of Syracuse inflicted a devastating loss on their fleet off Cumae in 474 bce. Completely out of touch with the Etruscan cities of Campania, they were unable to prevent a takeover of this area by restless Umbro-Sabellian tribes moving from the interior toward the coast.
All these reverses led to economic depression and a sharp interruption of trade for the cities on the coast and in the south and caused a redirection of commerce toward the Adriatic harbour of Spina. The situation in the south deteriorated even further as Veii experienced periodic conflict with Rome, its close neighbour, and became the first Etruscan state to fall to this growing power in central Italy (396 bce).
A measure of prosperity had come to the Po valley and the Adriatic towns, but even this Etruscan vitality in the north was short-lived. The progressive infiltration and pressure of the Celts, who had penetrated and settled in the plain of the Po, eventually suffocated and overpowered the flourishing Etruscan urban communities, almost completely destroying their civilization by the mid-4th century bce and thus returning a large part of northern Italy to a protohistoric stage of culture. Meanwhile, the Gallic Senones firmly occupied the Picenum district on the Adriatic Sea, and Celtic incursions reached on the one hand Tyrrhenian Etruria and Rome (captured and burned about 390 bce) and on the other as far as Puglia.
In the 4th century bce ancient Italy had become profoundly transformed. The eastern Italic people of Umbro-Sabellian stock diffused over most of the peninsula; the Syracusan empire and lastly the growing power of Rome had replaced the Etruscans (and the Greek colonies of southern Italy) as the dominant force. The Etruscan world had been reduced to a circumscribed, regional sphere, secluded in its traditional values; this situation determined its progressive passage into the political system of Rome.
Within this context, Etruria experienced an economic recovery and a rebounding of the aristocracy. Tomb groups once again contain riches, and the sequence of painted tombs at Tarquinii, interrupted during the 5th century, resumes. All the same, there is a new atmosphere in these tombs; now one finds images of a grim afterlife, represented as an underworld replete with demons and overhung by dark clouds.
Renewed resistance to the power on the Tiber proved futile. Roman history is filled with records of victories and triumphs over Etruscan cities, especially in the south. Tarquinii sued for peace in 351 bce, and Caere was granted a truce in 353; there were triumphs over Rusellae in 302 and over Volaterrae in 298, with the final defeat of Rusellae coming in 294. Volsinii also was attacked in this year, and its fields devastated. During this same bleak period, Etruscan society was wracked with class struggles that eventually led to the development of a substantial freedman class, especially in northern Etruria, where numerous small rural settlements sprang up in the hills. In some cities, the aristocracy looked to Rome for assistance against the restless slave class. The noble Cilnii family at Arretium called for help with a revolt of the lower classes in 302 bce, while at Volsinii the situation deteriorated so badly that the Romans marched in and razed the city (265 bce), resettling its inhabitants in Volsinii Novi (probably Bolsena).
By the mid-3rd century all Etruria appears to have been pacified and firmly subjected to Roman hegemony. In most cases, the Etruscan cities and their territories preserved a formal autonomy as independent states with their own magistrates, thus passing an uneventful period in the 2nd century bce, when the sources are largely silent about Etruria.
But the saddest chapter of all remained to be written in the 1st century bce. In 90 bce Rome granted citizenship to all Italic peoples, an act that in effect created total political unification of the Italic-Roman state and eliminated the last pretenses of autonomy in the Etruscan city-states. Northern Etruria, in addition, underwent a final devastation as it became the battleground for the opposing forces of the civil war of Marius and Sulla. Many Etruscan cities sided with Marius and were sacked and punished with all the vengeance the victorious Sulla could muster (80–79 bce). At Faesulae, Arretium, Volaterrae, and Clusium, the dictator confiscated and distributed territorial lands to soldiers from his 23 victorious legions. The new colonists brutally abused the old inhabitants and at the same time squandered their military rewards, sinking hopelessly into debt. Revolts and reprisals followed, but the agonizing process of Romanization was not actually completed until the reign of Augustus (31 bce–14 ce) brought new economic stability and reconciliation. By this time Latin had almost completely replaced the Etruscan language.