Etruscan () was the language of the
Etruscan civilization
The Etruscan civilization () of covered a , at its greatest extent, of roughly what is now , western , and northern , as well as what are now the , , south-eastern , southern , and western .
The earliest evidence of a that is identifiably Etru ...
, in
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic ( it, Repubblica Italiana, links=no ), is a country consisting of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula delimited by the Alps and List of islands of Italy, several islands surrounding it, whose ...

, in the ancient region of
Etruria
Etruria () was a region of Central Italy
Central Italy ( it, Italia centrale or just ) is one of the five official statistical regions of Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic ( it, Repubblica Italiana, links=no ) ...

(modern
Tuscany
it, Toscano (man) it, Toscana (woman)
, population_note =
, population_blank1_title =
, population_blank1 =
, demographics_type1 = Citizenship
, demographics1_footnotes =
, demographics1_title1 = Italian
, demogra ...
, western
Umbria
Umbria ( , ) is a of central . It includes Lake and , and is crossed by the River . It is the only landlocked region on the . The regional capital is .
The region is characterized by hills, mountains, valleys and historical towns such as the un ...

, northern
Latium
Latium ( , ; ) is the region of central western Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic ( it, Repubblica Italiana, links=no ), is a country consisting of delimited by the and surrounding it, whose territory large ...
,
Emilia-Romagna
Emilia-Romagna (, , both also ; ; egl, Emégglia-Rumâgna or ''Emîlia-Rumâgna''; rgn, Emélia-Rumâgna) is one of the 20 Regions of Italy, administrative regions of Italy, situated in the north of the country, comprising the historical regions ...

,
Veneto
it, Veneto (man) it, Veneta (woman)
, population_note =
, population_blank1_title =
, population_blank1 =
, demographics_type1 =
, demographics1_footnotes =
, demographics1_title1 =
, demographics1_info1 = ...

,
Lombardy
Lombardy ( ; it, Lombardia ; lmo, Lombardia, , ) is one of the twenty administrative regions of Italy, in the Northwest Italy, northwest of the country, with an area of . About 10 million people live in Lombardy, forming more than one-sixth of It ...
and
Campania
it, Campano (man) it, Campana (woman)
, population_note =
, population_blank1_title =
, population_blank1 =
, demographics_type1 =
, demographics1_footnotes =
, demographics1_title1 =
, demographics1_info1 ...
). Etruscan influenced
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language
A classical language is a language
A language is a structured system of communication
Communication (from Latin ''communicare'', meaning "to share" or "to be in relation with") is "an appa ...

but was eventually completely superseded by it. The Etruscans left around 13,000
inscriptions that have been found so far, only a small minority of which are of significant length; some bilingual inscriptions with texts also in Latin,
Greek#REDIRECT Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece
Greece ( el, Ελλάδα, , ), officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country located in Southeast Europe. Its population is approximately 10.7 million as of ...
, or
Phoenician
Phoenician may refer to:
* Phoenicia, an ancient civilization
* Phoenician alphabet
* Phoenician language
* List of Phoenician cities
* Phoenix, Arizona
See also
* Phoenix (mythology)
* Phoenicia (disambiguation)
{{disambiguation
Language an ...
; and a few dozen
loanword
A loanword (also loan word or loan-word) is a word
In linguistics, a word of a spoken language can be defined as the smallest sequence of phonemes that can be uttered in isolation with semantic, objective or pragmatics, practical meaning ...
s. Attested from 700 BCE to 50 CE, the relation of Etruscan to other languages has been a source of long-running speculation and study, with its being referred to at times as an
isolate, one of the
Tyrsenian languages
Tyrsenian (also Tyrrhenian or Common Tyrrhenic), named after the Tyrrhenians
The Tyrrhenians (Attic Greek
Attic Greek is the Greek language, Greek dialect of the regions of ancient Greece, ancient region of Attica, including the ''polis'' of cl ...

, and a number of other less well-known theories.
The consensus among linguists and Etruscologists is that Etruscan was a
Pre–Indo-European, and a
Paleo-European language
The Paleo-European languages, or Old European languages, are the mostly unknown languages that were spoken in Europe
Europe is a continent
A continent is one of several large landmasses. Generally identified by convention (norm), con ...
and is closely related to the
Raetic language
Rhaetic or Raetic (), also known as Rhaetian, was a language spoken in the ancient region of Rhaetia in the Eastern Alps in pre-Roman and Roman times. It is documented by around 280 texts dated from the 5th up until the 1st century BC, which were ...
spoken in the
Alps
The Alps ; german: Alpen ; it, Alpi ; rm, Alps; sl, Alpe ) are the highest and most extensive mountain range
A mountain range is a series of mountains
ranged in a line and connected by high ground. A mountain system or mountain belt ...

,
[Schumacher, Stefan (1994) Studi Etruschi in Neufunde ‘raetischer’ Inschriften Vol. 59 pp. 307–320 (German)][Schumacher, Stefan (1994) Neue ‘raetische’ Inschriften aus dem Vinschgau in Der Schlern Vol. 68 pp. 295-298 (German)][Schumacher, Stefan (1999) Die Raetischen Inschriften: Gegenwärtiger Forschungsstand, spezifische Probleme und Zukunfstaussichten in I Reti / Die Räter, Atti del simposio 23–25 settembre 1993, Castello di Stenico, Trento, Archeologia delle Alpi, a cura di G. Ciurletti – F. Marzatico Archaoalp pp. 334–369 (German)][Schumacher, Stefan (2004) Die Raetischen Inschriften. Geschichte und heutiger Stand der Forschung Archaeolingua. Innsbrucker Beiträge zur Kulturwissenschaft. (German)][Norbert Oettinger, ''Seevölker und Etrusker'', 2010.] and to the
Lemnian language
The Lemnian language was spoken on the island of Lemnos
Lemnos or Limnos ( el, Λήμνος; grc, Λῆμνος) is a Greek island in the northern part of the Aegean Sea
The Aegean Sea ; tr, Ege Denizi is an elongated Bay, embayment ...
, attested in a few inscriptions on
Lemnos
Lemnos or Limnos ( el, Λήμνος; grc, Λῆμνος) is a Greece, Greek island in the northern part of the Aegean Sea. Administratively the island forms a separate municipality within the Lemnos (regional unit), Lemnos regional unit, whic ...

.
[de Simone Carlo (2009) ''La nuova iscrizione tirsenica di Efestia in Aglaia Archontidou'', Carlo de Simone, Emanuele Greco (Eds.), Gli scavi di Efestia e la nuova iscrizione ‘tirsenica’, Tripodes 11, 2009, pp. 3–58. (Italian)][Carlo de Simone, Simona Marchesini (Eds), ''La lamina di Demlfeld'' Mediterranea. Quaderni annuali dell'Istituto di Studi sulle Civiltà italiche e del Mediterraneo antico del Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche. Supplemento 8 Pisa – Roma: 2013. (Italian)]
Grammatically, the language is
agglutinating
An agglutinative language is a type of synthetic language with morphology that primarily uses agglutination. Words may contain different morphemes to determine their meanings, but all of these morphemes (including word stem, stems and affixes) rema ...
, with
noun
A noun () is a word
In linguistics, a word of a spoken language can be defined as the smallest sequence of phonemes that can be uttered in isolation with semantic, objective or pragmatics, practical meaning (linguistics), meaning. In many l ...

s and
verb
A verb () is a word (part of speech) that in syntax conveys an action (''bring'', ''read'', ''walk'', ''run'', ''learn''), an occurrence (''happen'', ''become''), or a state of being (''be'', ''exist'', ''stand''). In the usual description of E ...
s showing
suffix
In linguistics
Linguistics is the science, scientific study of language. It encompasses the analysis of every aspect of language, as well as the methods for studying and modeling them.
The traditional areas of linguistic analysis include ...
ed
inflection
In linguistic morphology
Morphology, from the Greek and meaning "study of shape", may refer to:
Disciplines
* Morphology (archaeology), study of the shapes or forms of artifacts
* Morphology (astronomy), study of the shape of astronomical ob ...
al endings and
gradation of vowels. Nouns show five
cases, singular and
plural numbers, with a
gender
Gender is the range of characteristics pertaining to, and differentiating between femininity
Femininity (also called womanliness or girlishness) is a set of attributes, behaviors, and roles generally associated with women
A woman is a ...
distinction between masculine and feminine in
pronouns
In linguistics
Linguistics is the science, scientific study of language. It encompasses the analysis of every aspect of language, as well as the methods for studying and modeling them.
The traditional areas of linguistic analysis include ...

.
Etruscan appears to have had a cross-linguistically common
phonological
Phonology is a branch of that studies how languages or dialects systematically organize their sounds (or constituent parts of signs, in sign languages). The term also refers to the sound or sign system of any particular language variety. At on ...

system, with four
phonemic
In phonology
Phonology is a branch of linguistics that studies how languages or dialects systematically organize their sounds (or constituent parts of signs, in sign languages). The term also refers to the sound or sign system of any partic ...

vowels
A vowel is a syllabicSyllabic may refer to:
*Syllable, a unit of speech sound, considered the building block of words
**Syllabic consonant, a consonant that forms the nucleus of a syllable
*Syllabary, writing system using symbols for syllables
* ...

and an apparent contrast between
aspirated and unaspirated stops. The records of the language suggest that
phonetic change
A sound change, in historical linguistics
Historical linguistics, also termed diachronic linguistics, is the scientific study of language change over time. Principal concerns of historical linguistics include:
# to describe and account for ...
took place over time, with the loss and then re-establishment of word-internal vowels, possibly due to the effect of Etruscan's word-initial
stress.
Etruscan religion
Etruscan religion comprises a set of stories, beliefs, and religious
Religion is a social
Social organisms, including humans, live collectively in interacting populations. This interaction is considered social whether they are aware of it ...
influenced
that of the Romans, and many of the few surviving Etruscan language artifacts are of
votive
Bronze animal statuettes from Olympia, votive offerings, 8th–7th century BC.
A votive offering or votive deposit is one or more objects displayed or deposited, without the intention of recovery or use, in a sacred
Sacred describes some ...

or religious significance. Etruscan was written in
derived from the
Greek alphabet
The Greek alphabet has been used to write the Greek language since the late ninth or early eighth century BC. It is derived from the earlier Phoenician alphabet, and was the first alphabetic script in history to have distinct letters for vowels ...

; this alphabet was the source of the
Latin alphabet
The Latin alphabet or Roman alphabet is the collection of letters originally used by the ancient Romans
In historiography
Historiography is the study of the methods of historian
( 484– 425 BC) was a Greek historian who lived ...

. The Etruscan language is also believed to be the source of certain important cultural words of
Western Europe
Western Europe is the western region of Europe
Europe is a continent
A continent is any of several large landmasses. Generally identified by convention (norm), convention rather than any strict criteria, up to seven geographical r ...

such as 'military' and 'person', which do not have obvious
Indo-European
The Indo-European languages are a language family native to western and southern Eurasia. It comprises most of the languages of Europe together with those of the northern Indian subcontinent and the Iranian Plateau. Some European languages of ...
roots.
History of Etruscan literacy

Etruscan literacy was widespread over the
Mediterranean
The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western Europe, Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa ...
shores, as evidenced by about 13,000
inscriptions (dedications,
epitaph
An epitaph (; ) is a short text honoring a deceased person. Strictly speaking, it refers to text that is inscribed on a tombstone or plaque, but it may also be used in a figurative sense. Some epitaphs are specified by the person themselves be ...

s, etc.), most fairly short, but some of considerable length.
[Bonfante (1990), p. 12.] They date from about 700 BC.
The Etruscans had a rich literature, as noted by Latin authors.
Livy
Titus Livius (; 59 BC – AD 17), known in English as Livy ( ), was a Ancient Rome, Roman historian. He wrote a monumental history of Rome and the Roman people, titled , covering the period from the earliest legends of Rome before the traditiona ...
and
Cicero
Marcus Tullius Cicero ( ; ; 3 January 106 BC – 7 December 43 BC) was a Ancient Rome, Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher and Academic skepticism, Academic Skeptic, who tried to uphold optimate principles during crisis of ...

were both aware that highly specialized Etruscan religious rites were codified in several sets of books written in Etruscan under the generic Latin title ''Etrusca Disciplina''. The ''Libri Haruspicini'' dealt with
divination
Divination (from Latin ''divinare'', 'to foresee, to foretell, to predict, to prophesy') is the attempt to gain insight into a question or situation by way of an occult
The occult, in the broadest sense, is a category of supernatural
...

by
reading entrails from a sacrificed animal, while the ''Libri Fulgurales'' expounded the art of divination by observing
lightning
Lightning is a naturally occurring electrostatic discharge
Electrostatic discharge (ESD) is the sudden flow of electricity
Electricity is the set of physical phenomena associated with the presence and motion
Image:Leaving Yongsan ...

. A third set, the ''Libri Rituales'', might have provided a key to Etruscan civilization: its wider scope embraced Etruscan standards of social and political life, as well as ritual practices. According to the 4th century Latin writer
Maurus Servius Honoratus
Servius was a late fourth-century and early fifth-century grammarian
Grammarian may refer to:
* Alexandrine grammarians, philologists and textual scholars in Hellenistic Alexandria in the 3rd and 2nd centuries BCE
* Biblical grammarians, schola ...
, a fourth set of Etruscan books existed; dealing with animal gods, but it is unlikely that any scholar living in that era could have read Etruscan. However, only one book (as opposed to inscription), the ''
Liber Linteus
The ''Liber Linteus Zagrabiensis'' (Latin language, Latin for "Linen Book of Zagreb", also rarely known as ''Liber Agramensis'', "Book of History of Zagreb, Agram") is the longest Etruscan language, Etruscan text and the only extant linen book, d ...
'', survived, and only because the linen on which it was written was used as
mummy
A mummy is a dead human
Humans (''Homo sapiens'') are the most abundant and widespread species
In biology
Biology is the natural science that studies life and living organisms, including their anatomy, physical structure, B ...

wrappings.
In 30 BC,
Livy
Titus Livius (; 59 BC – AD 17), known in English as Livy ( ), was a Ancient Rome, Roman historian. He wrote a monumental history of Rome and the Roman people, titled , covering the period from the earliest legends of Rome before the traditiona ...
noted that Etruscan was once widely taught to Roman boys, but had since become replaced by the teaching of only Greek, while
Varro
Marcus Terentius Varro (; 116–27 BC) was a Roman polymath
A polymath ( el, πολυμαθής, , "having learned much"; la, homo universalis, "universal human") is an individual whose knowledge spans a substantial number of subjects, known ...
noted that works of theatre had once been composed in Etruscan.
Demise
The date of extinction for Etruscan is held by scholarship to have been either in the late first century BC, or the early first century AD. Freeman's analysis of inscriptional evidence would appear to imply that Etruscan was still flourishing in the 2nd century BC, still alive in the first century BC, and surviving in at least one location in the beginning of the first century AD;
[Freeman, Philip]
The Survival of Etruscan
p. 82 however, the replacement of Etruscan by Latin likely occurred earlier in southern regions closer to Rome.
[Freeman]
The Survival of Etruscan
pp. 79–80
In Southern
Etruria
Etruria () was a region of Central Italy
Central Italy ( it, Italia centrale or just ) is one of the five official statistical regions of Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic ( it, Repubblica Italiana, links=no ) ...

, the first Etruscan site to be
Latinized
Latinisation or Latinization can refer to:
* Latinisation of names, the practice of rendering a non-Latin name in a Latin style
* Latinisation in the Soviet Union, the campaign in the USSR during the 1920s and 1930s to replace traditional writing sy ...
was
Veii
Veii (also Veius; it, Veio) was an important ancient Etruscan civilization, Etruscan city situated on the southern limits of Etruria and only north-northwest of Rome, Italy. It now lies in Isola Farnese, in the Comuni of the Province of Rome, co ...

, when it was
destroyed and repopulated by Romans in 396 BC.
[ ]Caere
:
Caere (also Caisra and Cisra) is the Latin name given by the Romans
Roman or Romans usually refers to:
*Rome
, established_title = Founded
, established_date = 753 BC
, founder = King Romulus
, image_map = ...
(Cerveteri
Cerveteri () is a town and ''comune
The (; plural: ) is a of , roughly equivalent to a or .
Importance and function
The provides essential public services: of births and deaths, , and maintenance of local roads and public works.
It ...

), another southern Etruscan town on the coast 45 kilometers from Rome, appears to have shifted to Latin in the late 2nd century BC.[ In ]Tarquinia
Tarquinia (), formerly Corneto, is an old city in the province of Viterbo
Viterbo ( it, provincia di Viterbo) is a province
A province is almost always an administrative division
Administrative division, administrative unitArticle 3(1 ...
and Vulci
Vulci or Volci (Etruscan language, Etruscan: ''Velch'' or ''Velx'', depending on the romanization used) was a rich and important Etruscan civilization, Etruscan city.
As George Dennis (explorer), George Dennis wrote, "Vulci is a city whose very n ...

, Latin inscriptions coexisted with Etruscan inscriptions in wall paintings and grave markers for centuries, from the 3rd century BC until the early 1st century BC, after which Etruscan is replaced by exclusive use of Latin.[
In Northern Etruria, Etruscan inscriptions continue after they disappear in Southern Etruria. At ]Clusium
Clusium ( grc-gre, Κλύσιον, ''Klýsion'', or , ''Kloúsion''; Umbrian:''Camars'') was an ancient city in Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic ( it, Repubblica Italiana, links=no ), is a country consisting of a ...
(Chiusi
Chiusi (Etruscan__NOTOC__
Etruscan may refer to:
Ancient civilisation
*The Etruscan language, an extinct language in ancient Italy
*Something derived from or related to the Etruscan civilization
**Etruscan architecture
**Etruscan art
**Etrus ...
), tomb markings show mixed Latin and Etruscan in the first half of the 1st century BC, with cases where two subsequent generations are inscribed in Latin and then the third, youngest generation, surprisingly, is transcribed in Etruscan.[ At ]Perugia
Perugia (, , ; lat, Perusia) is the capital city of Umbria in central Italy, crossed by the River Tiber, and of the province of Perugia.
The city is located about north of Rome and southeast of Florence. It covers a high hilltop and part o ...

, monolingual monumental inscriptions in Etruscan are still seen in the first half of the 1st century BC, while the period of bilingual inscriptions appears to have stretched from the 3rd century to the late 1st century BC.[ The isolated last bilinguals are found at three northern sites. Inscriptions in ]Arezzo
Arezzo ( , , ; lat, Arretium) is a city and ''comune
The (; plural: ) is a Administrative division, local administrative division of Italy, roughly equivalent to a township or municipality.
Importance and function
The provides essent ...

include one dated to 40 BC followed by two with slightly later dates, while in Volterra
Volterra (; Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken in the area around Rome, known as Latium. Through the power of the Roman Rep ...

there is one dated to just after 40 BC and a final one dated to 10–20 AD; coins with written Etruscan near Saena have also been dated to 15 BC. Freeman notes that in rural areas the language may have survived a bit longer, and that a survival into the late 1st century AD and beyond "cannot wholly be dismissed", especially given the revelation of Oscan
Oscan is an extinct Indo-European language
The Indo-European languages are a language family native to western and southern Eurasia. It comprises most of the languages of Europe together with those of the northern Indian subcontinent and th ...
writing in Pompeii
Pompeii (, ) was an ancient city located in what is now the ''comune
The (; plural: ) is a of , roughly equivalent to a or .
Importance and function
The provides essential public services: of births and deaths, , and maintenan ...

's walls.
Despite the apparent extinction of Etruscan, it appears that Etruscan religious rites continued much later, continuing to use the Etruscan names of deities and possibly with some liturgical usage of the language. In late Republican
Republican can refer to:
Political ideology
* An advocate of a republic, a type of government that is not a monarchy or dictatorship, and is usually associated with the rule of law.
** Republicanism, the ideology in support of republics or against ...
and early times, various Latin sources including Cicero
Marcus Tullius Cicero ( ; ; 3 January 106 BC – 7 December 43 BC) was a Ancient Rome, Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher and Academic skepticism, Academic Skeptic, who tried to uphold optimate principles during crisis of ...

noted the esteemed reputation of Etruscan . An episode where lightning struck an inscription with the name Caesar, turning it into Aesar, was interpreted to have been a premonition of the deification of Caesar
Gaius Julius Caesar (; 12 July 100 BC – 15 March 44 BC) was a Roman people, Roman general and statesman. A member of the First Triumvirate, Caesar led the Roman armies in the Gallic Wars before defeating his political rival Pompey Caesar's C ...

because of the resemblance to Etruscan , meaning "gods", although this indicates knowledge of a single word and not the language. Centuries later and long after Etruscan is thought to have died out, Ammianus Marcellinus
Ammianus Marcellinus (born , died 400) was a Roman soldier
This is a list of Roman army units and bureaucrats.
*''Accensus'' – Light infantry men in the armies of the early Roman Republic, made up of the poorest men of the army.
*''Actuarius'' ...
reports that Julian the Apostate
Julian ( la, Flavius Claudius Julianus; grc-gre, Ἰουλιανός ; 331 – 26 June 363) was Roman emperor
The Roman emperor was the ruler of the Roman Empire
The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Rōmānum ; grc-gre, Βασιλε ...
, the last pagan Emperor, apparently had Etruscan soothsayers accompany him on his military campaigns with books on war, lightning and celestial events, but the language of these books is unknown. According to ZosimusZosimus, Zosimos, or Zosimas may refer to:
People
* John Zosimus (Ioane-Zosime), 10th-century Georgian monk and hymnist
* Pope Zosimus (died 418), born in Mesoraca, Calabria, who reigned from 417 to his death in 418
* Rufus and Zosimus (died 107) ...
, when Rome was faced with destruction by Alaric in 408 AD, the protection of nearby Etruscan towns was attributed to Etruscan pagan priests who claimed to have summoned a raging thunderstorm, and they offered their services "in the ancestral manner" to Rome as well, but the devout Christians of Rome refused the offer, preferring death to help by pagans. Freeman notes that these events may indicate that a limited theological knowledge of Etruscan may have survived among the priestly caste much longer. One 19th-century writer argued in 1892 that Etruscan deities retained an influence on early modern Tuscan folklore.
Around 180, the Latin author Aulus Gellius
Aulus Gellius (c. 125after 180 AD) was a Roman author and grammarian, who was probably born and certainly brought up in Rome
, established_title = Founded
, established_date = 753 BC
, founder = King Romulus
, image_map ...
mentions Etruscan alongside the Gaulish language
Gaulish was an ancient Celtic language
The Celtic languages ( , ) are a Language family, group of related languages descended from Proto-Celtic language, Proto-Celtic. They form a branch of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European langu ...
in an anecdote. Freeman notes that although Gaulish was clearly still alive during Gellius' time, his testimony may not indicate that Etruscan was still alive because the phrase could indicate a meaning of the sort of "it's all Greek (incomprehensible) to me".[Freeman. Survival of Etruscan. p. 78]
At the time of its extinction, only a few educated Romans with antiquarian interests, such as Marcus Terentius Varro
Marcus Terentius Varro (; 116–27 BC) was one of ancient Rome's greatest scholars and a prolific author. He is sometimes called Varro Reatinus to distinguish him from his younger contemporary Varro Atacinus.
Biography
Varro was born in or near ...
, could read Etruscan. The Roman emperor Claudius
Claudius ( ; Tiberius Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus; 1 August 10 BC – 13 October AD 54) was the fourth Roman emperor
The Roman emperor was the ruler of the Roman Empire during the History of the Roman Empire, imperial p ...

(10 BC – AD 54) is considered to have possibly been able to read Etruscan, and authored a treatise on Etruscan history
Etruscan history is the written record of Etruscan civilization compiled mainly by Greek and Roman authors. Apart from their inscriptions, from which information mainly of a sociological character can be extracted, the Etruscans left no surviving ...
; a separate dedication made by Claudius implies a knowledge from "diverse Etruscan sources", but it is unclear if any were fluent speakers of Etruscan. Plautia Urgulanilla
Plautia Urgulanilla was the first wife of the future Roman Emperor
The Roman Emperor was the ruler of the Roman Empire during the History of the Roman Empire, imperial period (starting in 27 BC). The emperors used a variety of different title ...

, the emperor's first wife, was Etruscan.
Etruscan had some influence on Latin, as a few dozen Etruscan words and names were borrowed by the Romans, some of which remain in modern languages, among which are possibly ''voltur'' "vulture", ''tuba'' "trumpet", ''vagina'' "sheath", ''populus'' "people".
Geographic distribution
Inscriptions have been found in northwest and west-central Italy, in the region that even now bears the name of the Etruscan civilization
The Etruscan civilization () of covered a , at its greatest extent, of roughly what is now , western , and northern , as well as what are now the , , south-eastern , southern , and western .
The earliest evidence of a that is identifiably Etru ...
, Tuscany
it, Toscano (man) it, Toscana (woman)
, population_note =
, population_blank1_title =
, population_blank1 =
, demographics_type1 = Citizenship
, demographics1_footnotes =
, demographics1_title1 = Italian
, demogra ...
(from Latin ''tuscī'' "Etruscans"), as well as in modern Latium
Latium ( , ; ) is the region of central western Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic ( it, Repubblica Italiana, links=no ), is a country consisting of delimited by the and surrounding it, whose territory large ...
north of Rome, in today's Umbria
Umbria ( , ) is a of central . It includes Lake and , and is crossed by the River . It is the only landlocked region on the . The regional capital is .
The region is characterized by hills, mountains, valleys and historical towns such as the un ...

west of the Tiber
The Tiber (; la, Tiberis; it, Tevere ) is the third-longest and the longest in Central Italy, rising in the in and flowing through , , and , where it is joined by the River , to the , between and . It estimated at . The river has achi ...

, in Campania
it, Campano (man) it, Campana (woman)
, population_note =
, population_blank1_title =
, population_blank1 =
, demographics_type1 =
, demographics1_footnotes =
, demographics1_title1 =
, demographics1_info1 ...
and in the Po Valley
The Po Valley, Po Plain, Plain of the Po, or Padan Plain ( it, Pianura Padana , or ''Val Padana'') is a major geographical feature of Northern Italy
Northern Italy ( it, Italia settentrionale, it, Nord Italia, label=none, it, Alta Italia, ...
to the north of Etruria. This range may indicate a maximum Italian homeland where the language was at one time spoken.
Outside Italy, inscriptions have been found in Corsica
Corsica (, Upper , Southern , ; french: link=no, Corse ; lij, link=no, Còrsega) is an island in the Mediterranean Sea
The Mediterranean Sea is a connected to the , surrounded by the and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north ...

, Gallia Narbonensis
Gallia Narbonensis (Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language
A classical language is a language
A language is a structured system of communication
Communication (from Latin ''communicare'', meaning "to share" or "to be ...
, Greece
Greece ( el, Ελλάδα, Elláda, ), officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country located in Southeastern Europe
Southeast Europe or Southeastern Europe () is a geographical subregion
A subregion is a part of a larger region
In geogr ...

, the Balkans
The Balkans ( ), also known as the Balkan Peninsula, are a geographic area in southeastern Europe
Europe is a continent
A continent is any of several large landmasses. Generally identified by convention (norm), convention rathe ...

. But by far, the greatest concentration is in Italy.
Classification
Tyrsenian family hypothesis
In 1998, Helmut Rix
Helmut Rix (4 July 1926, in Amberg
Amberg () is a town
A town is a human settlement. Towns are generally larger than villages and smaller than city, cities, though the criteria to distinguish between them vary considerably in di ...
put forward the view that Etruscan is related to other members of what he called the " Tyrsenian language family". Rix's Tyrsenian family of languages—composed of Raetic
Rhaetic or Raetic (), also known as Rhaetian, was a language spoken in the ancient region of Rhaetia
File:REmpire Rhetia.png, 250px, Province of Raetia highlighted.
Raetia ( ; ; also spelled Rhaetia) was a Roman province, province of the Rom ...
, spoken in ancient times in the eastern Alps
Eastern Alps is the name given to the eastern half of the Alps
The Alps ; german: Alpen ; it, Alpi ; rm, Alps; sl, Alpe ) are the highest and most extensive mountain range
A mountain range is a series of mountains
ranged in a line ...
, and Lemnian, together with Etruscan—has gained acceptance among scholars. Rix's Tyrsenian family has been confirmed by Stefan Schumacher,[ Norbert Oettinger,][ ]Carlo De Simone
Carlo De Simone (4 March 1885 – 1951) was an officer in the Italian Army during World War II. Biography
During most of the East African Campaign (World War II), East African Campaign, Lieutenant-General De Simone commanded Italian forces in s ...
,[ and Simona Marchesini.][ Common features between Etruscan, Raetic, and Lemnian have been found in ]morphology
Morphology, from the Greek and meaning "study of shape", may refer to:
Disciplines
*Morphology (archaeology)
In archaeology, morphology is the study of the shape of Artifact (archaeology), artefacts and ecofacts.
Morphology is a major consid ...
, phonology
Phonology is a branch of linguistics
Linguistics is the scientific study of language, meaning that it is a comprehensive, systematic, objective, and precise study of language. Linguistics encompasses the analysis of every aspect of lan ...

, and syntax
In linguistics
Linguistics is the scientific study of language, meaning that it is a comprehensive, systematic, objective, and precise study of language. Linguistics encompasses the analysis of every aspect of language, as well as the ...

. On the other hand, few lexical correspondences are documented, at least partly due to the scant number of Raetic and Lemnian texts. The Tyrsenian family, or Common Tyrrhenic, in this case is often considered to be Paleo-European and to predate the arrival of Indo-European languages in southern Europe.[Mellaart, James (1975), "The Neolithic of the Near East" (Thames and Hudson)][ Several scholars believe that the ]Lemnian language
The Lemnian language was spoken on the island of Lemnos
Lemnos or Limnos ( el, Λήμνος; grc, Λῆμνος) is a Greek island in the northern part of the Aegean Sea
The Aegean Sea ; tr, Ege Denizi is an elongated Bay, embayment ...
could have arrived in the Aegean Sea
The Aegean Sea ; tr, Ege Denizi is an elongated Bay, embayment of the Mediterranean Sea located between Europe's Geography of Europe, Balkan peninsula and Asia's Anatolia peninsula. The sea has an area of some 215,000 square kilometres. In ...

during the Late Bronze Age
The Bronze Age is a prehistoric Periodization, period that was characterized by the use of bronze, in some areas proto-writing, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second principal period of the Three-age sys ...
, when Mycenaean rulers recruited groups of mercenaries from Sicily
(man) it, Siciliana (woman)
, population_note =
, population_blank1_title =
, population_blank1 =
, demographics_type1 = Ethnicity
, demographics1_footnotes =
, demographi ...

, Sardinia
Sardinia ( ; it, Sardegna ; sc, Sardigna or ) is the second-largest island in the Mediterranean Sea
The Mediterranean Sea is a connected to the , surrounded by the and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by and and , ...

and various parts of the Italian peninsula. Scholars such as Norbert Oettinger, Michel Gras and Carlo De Simone think that Lemnian is the testimony of an Etruscan commercial settlement on the island that took place before 700 BC, not related to the Sea Peoples.[
Some scholars think that the ]Camunic language
The Camunic language is an extinct language that was spoken in the 1st millennium BC in the Valcamonica and the Valtellina in Northern Italy, both of the Central Alps. The language is sparsely attested to an extent that makes any classification att ...
, an extinct language spoken in the Central Alps
The Alps
The Alps ; german: Alpen ; it, Alpi ; rm, Alps; sl, Alpe ) are the highest and most extensive mountain range
A mountain range is a series of mountains
ranged in a line and connected by high ground. A mountain system or moun ...
of Northern Italy
Northern Italy ( it, Italia settentrionale, it, Nord Italia, label=none, it, Alta Italia, label=none or just it, Nord, label=none) is a geographical and cultural region
In geography, regions are areas that are broadly divided by physical cha ...
, may be also related to Etruscan and to Raetic
Rhaetic or Raetic (), also known as Rhaetian, was a language spoken in the ancient region of Rhaetia
File:REmpire Rhetia.png, 250px, Province of Raetia highlighted.
Raetia ( ; ; also spelled Rhaetia) was a Roman province, province of the Rom ...
.
Superseded theories and fringe scholarship
Over the centuries many hypotheses on the Etruscan language have been developed, many of which have not been accepted or have been considered highly speculative. The interest in Etruscan antiquities and the Etruscan language found its modern origin in a book by a Renaissance Dominican friar, Annio da Viterbo
Annius of Viterbo ( la, Joannes Annius Viterb(i)ensis; 13 November 1502) was an Italian Dominican friar
The Order of Preachers, whose members are known as Dominicans, ( la, Ordo Praedicatorum, postnominal abbreviation
An abbreviation (f ...

, a and orientalist
Orientalist may refer to:
*A scholar of Oriental studies
*A person or thing relating to the Western intellectual or artistic paradigm known as Orientalism (as in 'an Orientalist painting' or '-painter')
*''The Orientalist'', a biography of author L ...
now remembered mainly for literary forgeries. In 1498, Annio published his antiquarian miscellany titled ''Antiquitatum variarum'' (in 17 volumes) where he put together a theory in which both the Hebrew
Hebrew (, , or ) is a Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is regarded as one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-survivi ...
and Etruscan languages were said to originate from a single source, the "Aramaic" spoken by Noah
In the traditions of Abrahamic religions, Noah ''Nukh''; am, ኖህ, ''Noḥ''; ar, نُوح '; grc, Νῶε ''Nôe'' ()
features as the tenth and last of the Antediluvian , pre-Flood Patriarchs (Bible), patriarchs. His story appears in the ...

and his descendants, founders of the Etruscan city Viterbo
Viterbo (; Viterbese: ; lat-med, Viterbium) is an ancient city and '' comune'' in the Lazio region of central Italy, the capital of the province of Viterbo.
It conquered and absorbed the neighboring town of Ferento (see Ferentium) in its ea ...

.
The 19th century saw numerous attempts to reclassify Etruscan. Ideas of Semitic
Semitic most commonly refers to the Semitic languages, a name used since the 1770s to refer to the language family currently present in West Asia, North and East Africa, and Malta.
Semitic may also refer to:
Religions
* Abrahamic religions
** ...

origins found supporters until this time. In 1858, the last attempt was made by Johann Gustav Stickel
Johann Gustav Stickel (7 July 1805 – 21 January 1896) was a German theologian, orientalist and numismatist at Jena University
The University of Jena, officially the Friedrich Schiller University Jena (german: Friedrich-Schiller-Universit ...

, Jena University
The University of Jena, officially the Friedrich Schiller University Jena (german: Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, abbreviated FSU, shortened form ''Uni Jena'') is a public research university
A research university is a university
A ...
in his ''Das Etruskische ..als semitische Sprache erwiesen''. A reviewer concluded that Stickel brought forward every possible argument which would speak for that hypothesis, but he proved the opposite of what he had attempted to do. In 1861, Robert Ellis proposed that Etruscan was related to Armenian
Armenian may refer to:
* Something of, from, or related to Armenia, a country in the South Caucasus region of Eurasia
* Armenians, the national people of Armenia, or people of Armenian descent
** Armenian language, the Indo-European language spoken ...
, which is nowadays acknowledged as an Indo-European
The Indo-European languages are a language family native to western and southern Eurasia. It comprises most of the languages of Europe together with those of the northern Indian subcontinent and the Iranian Plateau. Some European languages of ...
language. Exactly 100 years later, a relationship with Albanian
Albanian may refer to:
*Pertaining to Albania in Southeast Europe; in particular:
**Albanians, an ethnic group native to the Balkans
**Albanian language
**Albanian culture
**Demographics of Albania, includes other ethnic groups within the country
...

was to be advanced by Zecharia Mayani, but Albanian is also known to be an Indo-European language.
Several theories from the late 19th and early 20th centuries connected Etruscan to Uralic languages, Uralic or even Altaic languages. In 1874, the British scholar Isaac Taylor (priest), Isaac Taylor brought up the idea of a genetic relationship between Etruscan and Hungarian Language, Hungarian, of which also Jules Martha would approve in his exhaustive study ''La langue étrusque'' (1913). In 1911, the French orientalist Baron Carra de Vaux suggested a connection between Etruscan and the Altaic languages. The Hungarian connection was revived by Mario Alinei, Emeritus Professor of Italian Languages at the University of Utrecht. Alinei's proposal has been rejected by Etruscan experts such as Giulio M. Facchetti, Finno-Ugric experts such as Angela Marcantonio, and by Hungarian historical linguists such as Bela Brogyanyi.
The idea of a relation between the language of the Minoan civilization, Minoan Linear A scripts was taken into consideration as the main hypothesis by Michael Ventris before he discovered that, in fact, the language behind the later Linear B script was Mycenean Greek, Mycenean, a Ancient Greek dialects, Greek dialect. It has been proposed to possibly be part of a wider Paleo-European "Aegean" language family, which would also include Minoan language, Minoan, Eteocretan language, Eteocretan (possibly descended from Minoan) and Eteocypriot language, Eteocypriot. This has been proposed by Giulio Mauro Facchetti, a researcher who has dealt with both Etruscan and Minoan, and supported by S. Yatsemirsky, referring to some similarities between Etruscan and Lemnian on one hand, and Linear A, Minoan and Eteocretan on the other. It has also been proposed that this language family is related to the pre-Indo-European languages of Anatolia, based upon place name analysis.
Others have suggested that Tyrsenian languages may yet be distantly related to early Indo-European languages, such as those of the Anatolian languages, Anatolian branch. More recently, Robert S. P. Beekes argued in 2002 that the people later known as the Lydians and Etruscans had originally lived in northwest Anatolia, with a coastline to the Sea of Marmara, whence they were driven by the Phrygians ''circa'' 1200 BC, leaving a remnant known in antiquity as the Tiras, Tyrsenoi. A segment of this people moved south-west to Lydia, becoming known as the Lydian language, Lydians, while others sailed away to take refuge in Italy, where they became known as Etruscans. This account draws on the well-known story by Herodotus (I, 94) of the Lydian origin of the Etruscans or Tyrrhenians, famously rejected by Dionysius of Halicarnassus (book I), partly on the authority of Xanthus, a Lydian historian, who had no knowledge of the story, and partly on what he judged to be the different languages, laws, and religions of the two peoples. In 2006, Frederik Woudhuizen went further on Herodotus' traces, suggesting that Etruscan belongs to the Anatolian languages, Anatolian branch of the Indo-European family, specifically to Luwian. Woudhuizen revived a Etruscan origins#Allochthonous origin, conjecture to the effect that the Tyrsenians came from Anatolia, including Lydia, whence they were driven by the Cimmerians in the early Iron Age, 750–675 BC, leaving some colonists on Lemnos
Lemnos or Limnos ( el, Λήμνος; grc, Λῆμνος) is a Greece, Greek island in the northern part of the Aegean Sea. Administratively the island forms a separate municipality within the Lemnos (regional unit), Lemnos regional unit, whic ...

. He makes a number of comparisons of Etruscan to Luwian and asserts that Etruscan is modified Luwian. He accounts for the non-Luwian features as a Mysian influence: "deviations from Luwian ..may plausibly be ascribed to the dialect of the indigenous population of Mysia." According to Woudhuizen, the Etruscans were initially colonizing the Latins, bringing the alphabet from Anatolia. For both archaeological and linguistic reasons, a relationship between Etruscan and the Anatolian languages (Lydian or Luwian) and the idea that Etruscans were initially colonizing the Latins, bringing the alphabet from Anatolia, have not been accepted, just as the story of the Lydian origin reported by Herodotus is no longer considered trustworthy.[
Another proposal, pursued mainly by a few linguists from the former Soviet Union, suggested a relationship with Northeast Caucasian (or Nakh-Daghestanian) languages.]
Writing system
Alphabet
The Latin script owes its existence to the Etruscan alphabet, which was adapted for Latin in the form of the Old Italic script. The Etruscan alphabet employs a Euboean variant[Bonfante (1990) chapter 2.] of the Greek alphabet
The Greek alphabet has been used to write the Greek language since the late ninth or early eighth century BC. It is derived from the earlier Phoenician alphabet, and was the first alphabetic script in history to have distinct letters for vowels ...

using the letter digamma and was in all probability transmitted through Ischia, Pithecusae and Cumae, two Euboean settlements in southern Italy. This system is ultimately derived from history of the alphabet, West Semitic scripts.
The Etruscans recognized a 26-letter alphabet, which makes an early appearance incised for decoration on a small bucchero terracotta lidded vase in the shape of a cockerel at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, ca 650–600 BC. The full complement of 26 has been termed the model alphabet. The Etruscans did not use four letters of it, mainly because Etruscan did not have the voiced stops ''b'', ''d'' and ''g''; the ''o'' was also not used. They innovated one letter for ''f'' ().
Text
Writing was from right to left except in archaic inscriptions, which occasionally used boustrophedon. An example found at Cerveteri
Cerveteri () is a town and ''comune
The (; plural: ) is a of , roughly equivalent to a or .
Importance and function
The provides essential public services: of births and deaths, , and maintenance of local roads and public works.
It ...

used left to right. In the earliest inscriptions, the words are continuous. From the sixth century BC, they are separated by a dot or a colon, which symbol might also be used to separate syllables. Writing was phonetic; the letters represented the sounds and not conventional spellings. On the other hand, many inscriptions are highly abbreviated and often casually formed, so the identification of individual letters is sometimes difficult. Spelling might vary from city to city, probably reflecting differences of pronunciation.
Complex consonant clusters
Speech featured a heavy stress on the first syllable of a word, causing Syncope (phonetics), syncopation by weakening of the remaining vowels, which then were not represented in writing: ''Alcsntre'' for ''Alexandros'', ''Rasna'' for ''Rasena''. This speech habit is one explanation of the Etruscan "impossible" consonant clusters. Some of the consonants, especially Sonorant, resonants, however, may have been syllabic, accounting for some of the clusters (see below under #Consonants, Consonants). In other cases, the scribe sometimes inserted a vowel: Greek ''Hēraklēs'' became ''Hercle'' by syncopation and then was expanded to ''Herecele''. Pallottino regarded this variation in vowels as "instability in the quality of vowels" and accounted for the second phase (e.g. ''Herecele'') as "vowel harmony, i.e., of the assimilation of vowels in neighboring syllables".
Phases
The writing system had two historical phases: the archaic from the seventh to fifth centuries BC, which used the early Greek alphabet, and the later from the fourth to first centuries BC, which modified some of the letters. In the later period, syncopation increased.
The alphabet went on in modified form after the language disappeared. In addition to being the source of the Roman alphabet, it has been suggested that it passed northward into Veneto
it, Veneto (man) it, Veneta (woman)
, population_note =
, population_blank1_title =
, population_blank1 =
, demographics_type1 =
, demographics1_footnotes =
, demographics1_title1 =
, demographics1_info1 = ...

and from there through Raetia into the Germanic languages, Germanic lands, where it became the Elder Futhark alphabet, the oldest form of the runes.
Corpus
The Etruscan corpus is edited in the ''Corpus Inscriptionum Etruscarum'' (CIE) and ''Thesaurus Linguae Etruscae'' (TLE).
Bilingual text
The Pyrgi Tablets are a bilingual text in Etruscan and Phoenician
Phoenician may refer to:
* Phoenicia, an ancient civilization
* Phoenician alphabet
* Phoenician language
* List of Phoenician cities
* Phoenix, Arizona
See also
* Phoenix (mythology)
* Phoenicia (disambiguation)
{{disambiguation
Language an ...
engraved on three gold leaves, one for the Phoenician and two for the Etruscan. The Etruscan language portion has 16 lines and 37 words. The date is roughly 500 BC.[The Bonfantes (2002) p. 58.]
The tablets were found in 1964 by Massimo Pallottino during an excavation at the ancient Etruscan port of Pyrgi, now Santa Severa. The only new Etruscan word that could be extracted from close analysis of the tablets was the word for "three", ''ci''.
Longer texts
According to Rix and his collaborators, only two unified (though fragmentary) texts are available in Etruscan:
* The ''Liber Linteus Zagrabiensis'', which was later used for mummy wrappings in Egypt. Roughly 1,200 words of readable text, mainly repetitious prayers, yielded about 50 lexical items.
* The ''Tabula Capuana'' (the inscribed tile from Capua) has about 300 readable words in 62 lines, dating to the fifth century BC.
Some additional longer texts are:
* The lead foils of Punta della Vipera have about 40 legible words having to do with ritual formulae. It is dated to about 500 BC.
* The Cippus Perusinus, a stone slab (cippus) found at Perugia
Perugia (, , ; lat, Perusia) is the capital city of Umbria in central Italy, crossed by the River Tiber, and of the province of Perugia.
The city is located about north of Rome and southeast of Florence. It covers a high hilltop and part o ...

, contains 46 lines and 130 words.
* The Piacenza Liver, a bronze model of a sheep's liver representing the sky, has the engraved names of the gods ruling different sections.
* The Tabula Cortonensis, a bronze tablet from Cortona, is believed to record a legal contract, with about 200 words. Discovered in 1992, this new tablet contributed the word for "lake", ''tisś'', but not much else.
* A stele, from a Sanctuary at Poggio Colla, believed to be connected with the cult of the goddess Uni (mythology), Uni, with about 70 letters. Only discovered in 2016, it is still in the process of being deciphered.
Inscriptions on monuments
The main material repository of Etruscan civilization
The Etruscan civilization () of covered a , at its greatest extent, of roughly what is now , western , and northern , as well as what are now the , , south-eastern , southern , and western .
The earliest evidence of a that is identifiably Etru ...
, from the modern perspective, is its tombs. All other public and private buildings having been dismantled and the stone reused centuries ago. The tombs are the main source of Etruscan portables, provenance unknown, in collections throughout the world. Their incalculable value has created a brisk black market in Etruscan ''objets d'art'' – and equally brisk law enforcement effort, as it is illegal to remove any objects from Etruscan tombs without authorization from the Italian government.
The magnitude of the task involved in cataloguing them means that the total number of tombs is unknown. They are of many types. Especially plentiful are the hypogeum, hypogeal or "underground" chambers or system of chambers cut into tuff and covered by a tumulus. The interior of these tombs represents a habitation of the living stocked with furniture and favorite objects. The walls may display painted murals, the predecessor of wallpaper. Tombs identified as Etruscan date from the Villanovan period to about 100 BC, when presumably the cemeteries were abandoned in favor of Roman ones. Some of the major cemeteries are as follows:
*Caere
:
Caere (also Caisra and Cisra) is the Latin name given by the Romans
Roman or Romans usually refers to:
*Rome
, established_title = Founded
, established_date = 753 BC
, founder = King Romulus
, image_map = ...
or Cerveteri
Cerveteri () is a town and ''comune
The (; plural: ) is a of , roughly equivalent to a or .
Importance and function
The provides essential public services: of births and deaths, , and maintenance of local roads and public works.
It ...

, a UNESCO site.[Refer t]
Etruscan Necropoleis of Cerveteri and Tarquinia
a World Heritage site. Three complete necropoleis with streets and squares. Many hypogeum, hypogea are concealed beneath tumulus, tumuli retained by walls; others are cut into cliffs. The Banditaccia necropolis contains more than 1,000 tumuli. Access is through a door.
*Tarquinia
Tarquinia (), formerly Corneto, is an old city in the province of Viterbo
Viterbo ( it, provincia di Viterbo) is a province
A province is almost always an administrative division
Administrative division, administrative unitArticle 3(1 ...
, Tarquinii or Corneto, a UNESCO site: Approximately 6,000 graves dating from the Villanovan (ninth and eighth centuries BC) distributed in ''necropoleis'', the main one being the Monterozzi hypogeum, hypogea of the sixth–fourth centuries BC. About 200 painted tombs display murals of various scenes with call-outs and descriptions in Etruscan. Elaborately carved sarcophagi of marble, alabaster, and nenfro include identificatory and achievemental inscriptions. The Tomb of Orcus at the Scatolini necropolis depicts scenes of the Spurinna family with call-outs.
* Inner walls and doors of tombs and sarcophagi
* Engraved steles (tombstones)
* Ossuary, ossuaries
Inscriptions on portable objects
Votives
''See'' votive offering, Votive gifts.
Specula
A Speculum (medical), speculum is a circular or oval hand-mirror used predominantly by Etruscan women. ''Speculum'' is Latin; the Etruscan word is or . Specula were cast in bronze as one piece or with a tang into which a wooden, bone, or ivory handle fitted. The reflecting surface was created by polishing the flat side. A higher percentage of tin in the mirror improved its ability to reflect. The other side was convex and featured Intaglio (jewellery), intaglio or cameo (carving), cameo scenes from mythology. The piece was generally ornate.
About 2,300 specula are known from collections all over the world. As they were popular plunderables, the provenance of only a minority is known. An estimated time window is 530–100 BC. Most probably came from tombs.
Many bear inscriptions naming the persons depicted in the scenes, so they are often called picture bilinguals. In 1979, Massimo Pallottino, then president of the ''Istituto di Studi Etruschi ed Italici'' initiated the Committee of the ''Corpus Speculorum Etruscanorum'', which resolved to publish all the specula and set editorial standards for doing so.
Since then, the committee has grown, acquiring local committees and representatives from most institutions owning Etruscan mirror collections. Each collection is published in its own fascicle by diverse Etruscan scholars.
Cistae
A cista is a bronze container of circular, ovoid, or more rarely rectangular shape used by women for the storage of sundries. They are ornate, often with feet and lids to which figurines may be attached. The internal and external surfaces bear carefully crafted scenes usually from mythology, usually intaglio, or rarely part intaglio, part cameo (carving), cameo.
Cistae date from the Roman Republic of the fourth and third centuries BC in Etruscan contexts. They may bear various short inscriptions concerning the manufacturer or owner or subject matter. The writing may be Latin, Etruscan, or both. Excavations at Palestrina, Praeneste, an Etruscan city which became Roman, turned up about 118 cistae, one of which has been termed "the Praeneste cista" or "the Ficoroni cista" by art analysts, with special reference to the one manufactured by Novios Plutius and given by Dindia Macolnia to her daughter, as the archaic Latin inscription says. All of them are more accurately termed "the Praenestine cistae".
Rings and ringstones
Among the most plunderable portables from the Etruscan tombs of Etruria
Etruria () was a region of Central Italy
Central Italy ( it, Italia centrale or just ) is one of the five official statistical regions of Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic ( it, Repubblica Italiana, links=no ) ...

are the finely engraved gemstones set in patterned gold to form circular or ovoid pieces intended to go on finger rings. Around one centimeter in size, they are dated to the Etruscan apogee from the second half of the sixth to the first centuries BC. The two main theories of manufacture are native Etruscan and Greek. The materials are mainly dark red carnelian, with agate and sard entering usage from the third to the first centuries BC, along with purely gold finger rings with a hollow engraved bezel setting. The engravings, mainly cameo, but sometimes intaglio, depict Dung beetle, scarabs at first and then scenes from Greek mythology, often with heroic personages called out in Etruscan. The gold setting of the bezel bears a border design, such as cabling.
Coins
Etruscan-minted coins can be dated between 5th and 3rd centuries BC. Use of the 'Chalcidian' standard, based on the silver unit of 5.8 grams, indicates that this custom, like the alphabet, came from Greece. Roman coinage later supplanted Etruscan, but the basic Roman coin, the ''sesterce'', is believed to have been based on the 2.5-denomination Etruscan coin. Etruscan coins have turned up in caches or individually in tombs and in excavations seemingly at random, and concentrated, of course, in Etruria
Etruria () was a region of Central Italy
Central Italy ( it, Italia centrale or just ) is one of the five official statistical regions of Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic ( it, Repubblica Italiana, links=no ) ...

.
Etruscan coins were in gold, silver, and bronze, the gold and silver usually having been struck on one side only. The coins often bore a denomination, sometimes a minting authority name, and a cameo motif. Gold denominations were in units of silver; silver, in units of bronze. Full or abbreviated names are mainly Pupluna (Populonia), Vatl or Veltuna (Vetulonia), Velathri (Volaterrae), Velzu or Velznani (Volsinii) and Cha for Chamars (Camars). Insignia are mainly heads of mythological characters or depictions of mythological beasts arranged in a symbolic motif: Apollo, Zeus, Culsans, Athena, Hermes, griffin, gorgon, male sphinx, hippocamp, bull, snake, eagle, or other creatures which had symbolic significance.
Phonology
In the tables below, conventional letters used for transliterating Etruscan are accompanied by likely pronunciation in help:IPA, IPA symbols within the square brackets, followed by examples of the early Etruscan alphabet which would have corresponded to these sounds:
Vowels
The Etruscan vowel, vowel system consisted of four distinct vowels. Vowels "o" and "u" appear to have not been phonetically distinguished based on the nature of the writing system, as only one symbol is used to cover both in loans from Greek (e.g. Greek > Etruscan "pitcher").
Before the Front vowel, front vowels is used, while and are used before respectively unrounded and rounded back vowels.
Consonants
Table of consonants
Etruscan also might have had consonants ʧ and ʧʰ, as they might be represented in the writing by using two letters, like in the word prumaθś (great-nephew or great-grandson). However, this theory is not widely accepted.
Absence of voiced stops
The Etruscan consonant system primarily distinguished between aspirated and non-aspirated stops. There were no voiced stops. When words from foreign languages were borrowed into Etruscan, voiced stops typically became unvoiced stops; one example is Greek ''thriambos'', which became Etruscan ''triumpus'' and Latin ''triumphus''. Such a lack of voiced stops is not particularly unusual; it is found e.g. in modern Icelandic language, Icelandic, in some southern accents of German language, German, and in most Chinese languages. Even in English, aspiration is often more important than voice in the distinction of fortis-lenis pairs.
Syllabic theory
Based on standard spellings by Etruscan scribes of words without vowels or with unlikely consonant clusters (e.g. ''cl'' 'of this (gen.)' and 'freeman'), it is likely that were sometimes syllabic sonorants (cf. English "little", "button"). Thus ''cl'' and .
Rix postulates several syllabic consonants, namely and palatal as well as a labiovelar spirant , and some scholars such as Mauro Cristofani also view the aspirates as palatal rather than aspirated but these views are not shared by most Etruscologists. Rix supports his theories by means of variant spellings such as amφare/amφiare, larθal/larθial, aranθ/aranθiia.
Morphology
Etruscan was Inflected language, inflected, varying the endings of nouns, pronouns and verbs. It also had adjectives, adverbs, and conjunctions, which were uninflected.
Nouns
Etruscan substantives had five cases—Nominative case, nominative, accusative case, accusative, genitive case, genitive, dative case, dative, and locative case, locative—and two numbers: singular and a plural. Not all five cases are attested for every word. Nouns merge the nominative and accusative; pronouns do not generally merge these. Gender appears in personal names (masculine and feminine) and in pronouns (animate and inanimate); otherwise, it is not marked.[Bonfante (1990), p. 20.]
Unlike the Indo-European languages, Etruscan noun endings were more agglutinative, with some nouns bearing two or three agglutinated suffixes. For example, where Latin would have distinct nominative plural and dative plural endings, Etruscan would suffix the case ending to a plural marker: Latin nominative singular ''fili-us'', "son", plural ''fili-i'', dative plural ''fili-is'', but Etruscan ''clan, clen-ar'' and ''clen-ar-aśi''. Moreover, Etruscan nouns could bear multiple suffixes from the case paradigm alone: that is, Etruscan exhibited ''Suffixaufnahme''. Pallottino calls this phenomenon "morphological redetermination", which he defines as "the typical tendency ... to redetermine the syntactical function of the form by the superposition of suffixes." His example is'' Uni-al-θi'', "in the sanctuary of Juno", where'' -al'' is a genitive ending and ''-θi'' a locative.
Steinbauer says of Etruscan, "there can be more than one marker ... to design a case, and ... the same marker can occur for more than one case."
; Nominative case, Nominative/accusative case : No distinction is made between nominative and accusative of nouns. Common nouns use the unmarked root. Names of males may end in ''-e'': ''Hercle'' (Hercules), ''Achle'' (Achilles), ''Tite'' (Titus); of females, in -i, -a, or -u: ''Uni'' (Juno), ''Menrva'' (Minerva), or ''Zipu''. Names of gods may end in -s: ''Fufluns, Tins''; or they may be the unmarked stem ending in a vowel or consonant: ''Aplu'' (Apollo), ''Paχa'' (Bacchus), or ''Turan''.
; Genitive case : Pallottino defines two declensions based on whether the genitive ends in -s/-ś or -l. In the -s group are most noun stems ending in a vowel or a consonant: ''fler/fler-ś, ramtha/ramtha-ś''. In the second are names of females ending in i and names of males that end s, th or n: ''ati/ati-al, Laris/Laris-al, Arnθ/Arnθ-al''. After l or r -us instead of -s appears: ''Vel/Vel-us''. Otherwise, a vowel might be placed before the ending: ''Arnθ-al'' instead of ''Arnθ-l''.
: There is a patronymic ending: -sa or -isa, "son of", but the ordinary genitive might serve that purpose. In the genitive case, morphological redetermination becomes elaborate. Given two male names, ''Vel'' and ''Avle'', ''Vel Avleś'' means "Vel son of Avle." This expression in the genitive become ''Vel-uś Avles-la''. Pallottino's example of a three-suffix form is ''Arnθ-al-iśa-la''.
; Dative case : The dative ending is -si: ''Tita/Tita-si''.
; Locative case : The locative ending is -θi: ''Tarχna/Tarχna-l-θi''.
; Plural number : In one case, a plural is given for ''clan'', "son", as , "sons". This shows both I-mutation, umlaut and an ending ''-ar''. Plurals for cases other than nominative are made by agglutinating the case ending on .
Pronouns
Personal pronouns refer to persons; demonstrative pronouns point out: English this, that, there.
Personal
The first-person personal pronoun has a nominative ''mi'' ("I") and an accusative ''mini'' ("me"). The third person has a personal form ''an'' ("he" or "she") and an inanimate ''in'' ("it"). The second person is uncertain, but some, like the Bonfantes, have claimed a dative singular ''une'' ("to thee") and an accusative singular ''un'' ("thee").
Demonstrative
The demonstratives, ''ca'' and ''ta'', are used without distinction. The nominative–accusative singular forms are: ''ica, eca, ca, ita, ta''; the plural: ''cei, tei''. There is a genitive singular: ''cla, tla, cal'' and plural ''clal''. The accusative singular: ''can, cen, cn, ecn, etan, tn''; plural ''cnl''. Locative singular: ; plural .
Adjectives
Though uninflected, adjectives fall into a number of types formed from nouns with a suffix:
* quality, -u, -iu or -c:'' ais/ais-iu'', "god/divine"; ''zamaθi/zamθi-c'', "gold/golden"
* possession or reference, -na, -ne, -ni: ''paχa/paχa-na'', "Bacchus, Bacchic"; ''laut/laut-ni'', "family/familiar" (in the sense of servant)
* collective, -cva, -chva, -cve, -χve, -ia: ''sren/sren-cva'': "figure/figured"; ''etera/etera-ia'', "slave/servile"
Adverbs
Adverbs are unmarked: ''etnam'', "again"; ''θui'', "now"; ''θuni'', "at first." Most Indo-European
The Indo-European languages are a language family native to western and southern Eurasia. It comprises most of the languages of Europe together with those of the northern Indian subcontinent and the Iranian Plateau. Some European languages of ...
adverbs are formed from the oblique cases, which become unproductive and descend to fixed forms. Cases such as the ablative are therefore called "adverbial". If there is any such system in Etruscan, it is not obvious from the relatively few surviving adverbs.
Verbs
Verbs had an indicative mood and an imperative mood. Tenses were Present tense, present and Past tense, past. The past tense had an active voice and a grammatical voice, passive voice.
Present active
Etruscan used a verbal root with a zero suffix or -a without distinction to number or person: ''ar, ar-a'', "he, she, we, you, they make".
Past or preterite active
Adding the suffix to the verb root produces a third-person singular active, which has been called variously a "past", a "preterite", a "perfect" or an "aorist". In contrast to Indo-European, this form is not marked for Grammatical person, person. Examples: ''tur/tur-ce'', "gives/gave"; ''sval/sval-ce'', "lives/lived."
Past passive
The third-person past passive is formed with -che: ''mena/mena-ce/mena-che'', "offers/offered/was offered".
Vocabulary
Borrowings from Etruscan
Only a few hundred words of the Etruscan vocabulary are understood with some certainty. The exact count depends on whether the different forms and the expressions are included. Below is a table of some of the words grouped by topic.
Some words with corresponding Latin or other Indo-European forms are likely loanword
A loanword (also loan word or loan-word) is a word
In linguistics, a word of a spoken language can be defined as the smallest sequence of phonemes that can be uttered in isolation with semantic, objective or pragmatics, practical meaning ...
s to or from Etruscan. For example, ''neftś'' "nephew", is probably from Latin (Latin ''nepōs, nepōtis''; this is a cognate of German ''Neffe'', Old Norse ''nefi''). A number of wikt:Latin terms derived from Etruscan, words and names for which Etruscan origin has been proposed survive in Latin.
At least one Etruscan word has an apparent Semitic/Aramaic origin: ''talitha'' "girl", that could have been transmitted by Phoenicians or by the Greeks (Greek: ταλιθα). The word ''pera'' "house" is a false cognate to the Coptic language, Coptic ''per'' "house".
In addition to words believed to have been borrowed into Etruscan from Indo-European or elsewhere, there is a corpus of words such as ''familia'' which seem to have been borrowed into Latin from the older Etruscan civilization as a linguistic superstratum, superstrate influence. Some of these words still have widespread currency in English language, English and Latin, Latin-influenced languages. Other words believed to have a possible Etruscan origin include:
; arena : from ''arēna'' "arena" < ''harēna'', "arena, sand" < archaic ''hasēna'' < Sabine ''fasēna'', unknown Etruscan word as the basis for ''fas-'' with Etruscan ending ''-ēna''.
; belt (clothing), belt : from ''balteus'', "sword belt"; the sole connection between this word and Etruscan is a statement by Marcus Terentius Varro
Marcus Terentius Varro (; 116–27 BC) was one of ancient Rome's greatest scholars and a prolific author. He is sometimes called Varro Reatinus to distinguish him from his younger contemporary Varro Atacinus.
Biography
Varro was born in or near ...
that it was of Etruscan origin. All else is speculation.
; Market (economics), market : from Latin ''mercātus'', of obscure origin, perhaps Etruscan.
; military : from Latin ''milēs'' "soldier"; either from Etruscan or related to Greek , "assembled crowd" (compare ''homily'').
; person : from Middle English ''persone'', from Old French ''persone'', from Latin ''persona'', "mask", probably from Etruscan , "mask".
; satellite (disambiguation), satellite : from Latin ''satelles'', meaning "bodyguard, attendant", perhaps from Etruscan .
Etruscan vocabulary
Numerals
Much debate has been carried out about a possible Proto-Indo-European numerals, Indo-European origin of the Etruscan cardinals. In the words of Larissa Bonfante (1990), "What these numerals show, beyond any shadow of a doubt, is the non-Indo-European nature of the Etruscan language". Conversely, other scholars, including Francisco Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco R. Adrados, Albert Carnoy, Marcello Durante, Vladimir Georgiev, Alessandro Morandi and Massimo Pittau, have proposed a close phonetic proximity of the first ten Etruscan numerals to the corresponding numerals in other Indo-European languages. [Pittau, M., "I numerali Etruschi", ''Atti del Sodalizio Glottologico Milanese'', vol. XXXV–XXXVI, 1994/1995 (1996), pp. 95–105.]
The lower Etruscan numerals are (G. Bonfante 2002:96):
#''θu''
#''zal''
#''ci''
#''śa / huθ''
#''maχ''
#''huθ / śa''
#''semφ''
#''cezp''
#''nurφ''
#''śar''
It is unclear which of ''śa'' and ''huθ'' meant "four" and "six". ''Śar'' may also mean "twelve", with ''halχ'' for "ten".
Core vocabulary
See also
* Combinatorial method (linguistics)
* ''Corpus Inscriptionum Etruscarum''
* Etruscan alphabet
* Etruscan civilization
The Etruscan civilization () of covered a , at its greatest extent, of roughly what is now , western , and northern , as well as what are now the , , south-eastern , southern , and western .
The earliest evidence of a that is identifiably Etru ...
* Etruscan documents
** ''Liber Linteus
The ''Liber Linteus Zagrabiensis'' (Latin language, Latin for "Linen Book of Zagreb", also rarely known as ''Liber Agramensis'', "Book of History of Zagreb, Agram") is the longest Etruscan language, Etruscan text and the only extant linen book, d ...
'' – An Etruscan linen book that ended as mummy wraps in Egypt.
** ''Tabula Cortonensis'' – An Etruscan inscription.
** ''Cippus perusinus'' – An Etruscan inscription.
** ''Pyrgi Tablets'' – Bilingual Etruscan-Phoenician
Phoenician may refer to:
* Phoenicia, an ancient civilization
* Phoenician alphabet
* Phoenician language
* List of Phoenician cities
* Phoenix, Arizona
See also
* Phoenix (mythology)
* Phoenicia (disambiguation)
{{disambiguation
Language an ...
golden leaves.
* Etruscan mythology
* Etruscan numerals
* Lemnian language
The Lemnian language was spoken on the island of Lemnos
Lemnos or Limnos ( el, Λήμνος; grc, Λῆμνος) is a Greek island in the northern part of the Aegean Sea
The Aegean Sea ; tr, Ege Denizi is an elongated Bay, embayment ...
* List of English words of Etruscan origin
* Raetic language
Rhaetic or Raetic (), also known as Rhaetian, was a language spoken in the ancient region of Rhaetia in the Eastern Alps in pre-Roman and Roman times. It is documented by around 280 texts dated from the 5th up until the 1st century BC, which were ...
* Helmut Rix
Helmut Rix (4 July 1926, in Amberg
Amberg () is a town
A town is a human settlement. Towns are generally larger than villages and smaller than city, cities, though the criteria to distinguish between them vary considerably in di ...
* Tyrsenian languages
Tyrsenian (also Tyrrhenian or Common Tyrrhenic), named after the Tyrrhenians
The Tyrrhenians (Attic Greek
Attic Greek is the Greek language, Greek dialect of the regions of ancient Greece, ancient region of Attica, including the ''polis'' of cl ...

Notes
Bibliography
* Available for preview on Google Books.
*
* Bellelli, Vincenzo & Enrico Benelli (2018). ''Gli Etruschi. La scrittura, la lingua, la società''. Rome: Carrocci Editore, 2018.
* Preview available on Google Books.
* Preview available at Google Books.
*
*
*
*
* Maras, Daniele (2013). “Numbers and reckoning: A whole civilization founded upon divisions”, in ''The Etruscan World''. Ed. Jean MacIntosh Turfa. Abingdon: Routledge, pp. 478–91.
* Translated from the Italian by J. Cremona.
* Penney, John H. (2009). “The Etruscan language and its Italic context”, in ''Etruscan by Definition''. Eds. Judith Swaddling & Philip Perkins. London: British Museum, pp. 88–93.
* 2 vols.
* Rix, Helmut (1998). ''Rätisch und Etruskisch''. Innsbruck: Institut für Sprachwissenschaft.
* Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco (2005). “El etrusco como indoeuropeo anatolio: viejos y nuevos argumentos”. ''Emerita'', 73 (1): 45-56.
*
*
* Wallace, Rex E. (2016). “Language, Alphabet, and Linguistic Affiliation”, in ''A Companion to the Etruscans''. Eds. Sinclair Bell & Alexandra A. Carpino. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell.
Further reading
* Carnoy, Albert. La langue étrusque et ses origines. In: L'antiquité classique, Tome 21, fasc. 2, 1952. pp. 289-331.
External links
General
Etruscan News Online
the Newsletter of the American Section of the Institute for Etruscan and Italic Studies.
Etruscan News back issues
Center for Ancient Studies at New York University.
the website of Dr. Dieter H. Steinbauer, in English. Covers origins, vocabulary, grammar and place names.
* .
The Etruscan Language
the linguistlist.org site. Links to many other Etruscan language sites.
Inscriptions
TM Texts Etruscan
A list of all texts in Trismegistos.
ETP: Etruscan Texts Project
A searchable database of Etruscan texts.
*
Etruscan Inscriptions in the Royal Ontario Museum
', article by Rex Wallace displayed at the umass.edu site.
Lexical items
a vocabulary organized by topic by Dieter H. Steinbauer, in English.
* . A short, one-page glossary with numerals as well.
* . An extensive lexicon compiled from other lexicon sites. Links to the major Etruscan glossaries on the Internet are included.
A searchable Etruscan-to-English dictionary applet and a summary of Etruscan grammar.
Font
Etruscan font download site
with unicode information
Etruscan and Early Italic Fonts by James F. Patterson
{{Authority control
Etruscan language,
Languages of ancient Italy
Pre-Indo-Europeans
Tyrsenian languages
Languages attested from the 7th century BC
Languages extinct in the 1st century BC
Language isolates of Europe