Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume I Part 2.djvu/120

 £TRURIA« ments, of Greiek writen cspeciallyi attert tfiat flio TjirfaeniaQS vera a bold and hardj race of nxn- gatora; thej are repeatedly mentioned bb fitting oat great fleets ibr naval wuikre, and exercising an almost undisputed supremacy over the sea which derived from them the name of the Tyrrhenian; while their expeditions on a smaller scale had earned ibr them a disgracefnl repataUon as piiutes and cor- sairs. It is probable that these habits were princi- pally confined to the soathem Etmrians: the circnm- stance that Popaloniam was the only maritime dty further north renders it evident that the inhabitsnts of Central and Northern Etruria were not a sea- faring people; and there is great reason to suppose that these maritime enterprises originated with the Pelssgian population of the south, and continued to be carried on almost exclusively by them, not only after they had fidlen under the dominion of the Ba- sena, but even after their subjection to the power of Borne. The circumstsnce that these piratiod habits were common to the Tyrriieno-Pelasgians of the islands and shores of the Aegaesn Sea is an argument in favour of this hypothesis; we find also the in- habitants of Antinm, who appear to have been of Tyrrhenian or Pelasgic origin, and closely connected with the people of Soutltem Etruria [Antium], following the same course, and addicted both to navigatiim and piracy. (Strab. y. p. 23S.) The few chronological data we possess prove the naval power of the Etruscans to have extended over a poriod of considerable duration. The first distinct mention of it that occurs in history is in b. c. 538, on occasion of the Phocaean settlement at Alalia in Corsica, when the Tyrrhenians and Carthaginians combined their fleets to expel the new colonists, each nation furnishing 60 ships of war; and though de- feated in the sea-fight that ensued, they attained their object of compelling the Phocaeans to quit the ishmd. (Herod. L 166, 167.) Their piratical expeditions must, however, date from a much earlier period. We find them engaged in maritime hostilities with the Greek colonists of Lipara soon after its foundation (Died. v. 9; Stiab. vL p. 275; Pans. x. 11. 1 3, 16. § 4); and Ephorus even represented the fear of the Tyrriienian pirates as one of the causes which long prevented the Greeks from establishing colonies in Sidly (Ephor. ap, Sirab. vi. p. 410). At a Uter period we find Anaxilas, despot of Rhe« gium (b. c. 494—476), fortifying the ScyUaean rock for the purpose of preventing the Tjrrrhenian pirates from passing the Straits of Messana. (Stnb. vi. p. S57.) Shortly after this, the maritime power ef the Etruscans sustained a severe blow by the great defeat of their fleet, combined with that of the Carthaginians, by Hieron of Syracuse, who had been called in by the Cumaeans to thdr assistance, B.C. 474. (Diod. xi. 51 ; Pind. iyA. i. 136— 146.) The union on this occasion, as well as in the expedition against Alalia, of the Etruscan and Carthaginian fle^ seems to show that these people were iu general on friendly terms, and we learn from an incidental notice that they had concluded treaties regulating thdr respective navigation and ttanaaem in the Mediterranesn (Arist PoL iiL 5), while they evidently regarded the Greeks as inter- lopers and common enemies. But after the great battle of Cnmae, we hear no more of any direct enterprises on ^e part of the Etruscans against the, Greek cities : the growing power of those of Sicily in particular enabled them, on the contrsry, to as- wmie the ofibnsivey and in b^c* 453 the Syrscnsan STBTTSI^t set commanden Phayllus and Apelles^ tent ont t<» punish the Tyrrhenian piracies, nvagid the coasts of Etruria, together vrith those of Coraica and Aethalia (Ilva), with a fleet of 60 ships, and even made themselves masters of the latter island, from which they carried off a great booty. (Diod. xi. 88.) Hence it was evidently the hostile feeling of the Tyrrhenians against Syracuse which led them to send an auxiliary fbice to the sup|Kvt of th» Athenians in Sicily, b. c. 414. (Thuc vL 89, 105,. vii. 53.) Thirty years later, b. cl 384, Dionysin* of Syracuse made an expedition in person to the coast of Etruria, where he landed in the territory of Caere, and plundered the wealthy temple of PyrgL (Diod. xv. 14 ; Pseud.-Arist. OeeommL ii 21.) By this time it is dear that the great power of Uie Etruscans wss much broken : the Gauls had expelled them from the fertile plains on the banka of the Padus ; the Samoites had conquered their Campanian settlements; and the dties of Central Etruria were engaged in an arduous struggle against the Gauls in the N., and .the Boroans in the & The capture of Veii by the latter, which took placd in the same year with the Mi of Mdpnm, N. of tlie Apennines, b. c 396, may be regarded as tho tuming-pdnt of Etruscan histoiy. The Tyrrheniana ana, however, still mentioned by Greek historian* as sending auxiliaries or mercenaries, sometimes t» the assistance of the Carthaginians, at others t^ that of Agathodes, as late as b. c. 307. (Diod» xix. 106, XX. 61, 64.) During the period of the naval greatness of th» Etruscans, they appear to have founded colonies m the island of Corsica, and exerdsed a kind of so- vereignty over it : this was probably established after the expulsion of the Phocaean cdonists, and we find the island still mentioned near a century later, b. a 453, as in a state of dependence on tha Etruscans. (Diod. xL 88.) With the decline of their naval power it appears to have passed into tho hands of the Carthaginians. The evidences of their having extended similar settlements to Sardinia, aie &r from satisfactory. (Mfiller, Eirtuker, vol. L p. 183.) Strabo, indeed, speaks distinctly of that island having been occupied by Tjp * vh m i a M» prior to the arrival of lolaua and the sons of Herculea (Strab. y. y, 225) ; but it is very doubtftil whether any historical value csn be attached to a statement referring to so mythical a period, and we have n» account of Etruscsn or Tyrriienian colonies, pro- perly so called, in the ishind. The attempts that have been made to prove the existence of an Etrus« can population in Sardinia from the works of art discoYered there, espedally the curious architectural monuments called Nuragke, will be considered elsa« where. [Sardimu.] 2. WarB amd rdaHont o/ Etruria ioitk JSosml — The histoiy which has been preserved to us of Etruria in its relations to Bome, has much mora appearsnce of a chronological and authentic cha^ racter than the scattered notices above referred to : but, unfortunately, a critical examination proves it to be almost equally fragmentaiy and uncertain, for the three first centuries after the foundation of the dty. The Boman traditions concur in repra* senting the Etruscan state (i.e. the twdve dtiea of Etruria Proper) as already constituted and pow- erful at the period of the foundation of Bome; nor ia there any reason to question this &ct, though there appear good grounds fin* supposing that it did not attain to its greatest power tiU a latsc