Mark Odegard contributes:
>Etruscan, Etrurian, Tyrsen, Tyrrhenian -- all date from antiquity and all
point >to the same people and language group
and adds:
>If one accepts an Eastern Mediterranean origin for the Etruscans, you have
>to explain why Rhaetian is found in the Alps.
Rex responds:
For the first point I will get philosophical, then add some historical
summary.
On the second point..I will invite Livy to do most of the work. :-)
Antiquity is a deep place. It has layers. While most of what you say in
the first point is true, it is not complete. I was thinking of how best to
respond on the point I want to make here (without just copying tons of
references) and I recalled the following recent incident: A young Romanian
student and friend approached me with a question. He had the usual
assortment of books and papers occupying both hands. The question seemed
rather simple: What language is spoken by soldiers from Arizona? I took
off on a tirade about American regional dialects, but could not really
contribute any Arizona differences. He said..interrupting my
dialogue..."Well; I thought it would be Spanish, because I just learned in
my Spanish class that the State was originally named by the Spanish as a dry
area". Vaguely remembering my US history..I switched gears and gave him a
few explanatory paragraphs about The Conquistadors and English Colonies. He
seemed to accept my drift that: The Spanish name stuck, but most people
there speak English. I Added that some people moving into the area over the
last two hundred years or so do speak Spanish, but were only indirectly
related, if at all, to the folks who named the place. I continued to say:
Entry into military service pretty much assured that the man spoke English,
even if as a second language, if Spanish was the first. He put his books
down, took a paper out of one..and scribbled across the blank back side:
"Definitely English, but also possibly Spanish". He smiled, and held up the
paper, revealing on the other side..a copy of a photo of Geronimo and some
of his men. :-)
The confusion in the anecdote above comes from less than 500 years of
generally known recent history. Aegean Bronze Age to Roman dominance of
Italy is close to 3,000 years, beginning 5,000 years ago, with much of it in
the "dark" and stretched across a significant stretch of the North Med
coastal areas. As I see it, without many references to the area:
Tyrrhenian is a sea. It is an old name, and people engaged in seafaring on
that sea, living on the Italian coast: became Tyrrheni. Eventually, all
people there, and then the whole coast became:
Tyrrheni/Tyrrhenia/Tyrrhenian. Some would refer to all of what would become
Italy by this name in that and later periods, although the earlier Oscan
group of peoples were still distinct there until much later. Well before
the early bronze age in the Aegean, these people had used their nautical
advantage to make inroads to the west..into what is now Greece, overlaying
Oscans already there as well. (I am still unsure as to whether this
included any part of the western Anatolian coast, however, or if that issue
is a later name confusion, {see below}.) With the Pelasgi arrival and
dominance of Greece..to summarize a few thousand years and skip
Crete...nautical ability was added to better marketing. Greeks at many
points, and from many points of origin began to colonize the Tyrrhenian
coast..until it became known as "Magna Greacia" to include Sicily. A
complete reversal of the former situation. The area of Tuscan became known
during this period (or before). The Greek decline following the events of
c1200 to c1100, and the dark ages that followed left most of these colonies
to theie own devices for survival. Aegean names for places dot the coast
derived from Hera and Hercules, etc. Tuscans begin to appear in history,
and the degree of "Greekness" is unknown. Virgil has them associated at
Troy..They are fighting Attics later in time..but they are not yet Etruscan.
The people calling themselves "Rasenna" arrive in a separate wave and settle
in The Tuscan area. They live in Tuscan(y) and in Tyrrhenia. The Romans
later call them Etruscans, but refer to other Tuscans as distinct, allied
with or against the Etruscans in battles. Etruscans were Tuscans, but all
Tuscans, and certainly not all Tyrrhenians were Etruscan. It is important to
remember that cities sponsored colonies as other cities, singles or
multiples, and this could occur with out dominance of the new region. (Like
Ionian colonies in Lydia)
Diodorus then says that the Anatolians who sponsored this arrival, were
the same folks in Lemnos, and started calling themselves Tyrrhenian, after a
leader (and presumably? the new place?). In any case this provides some
support to Herodotus and the West coast Anatolian "Tyrrhenians"..and the
link to Lemnos. I still don't believe it is that simple..we have
colonization continuing..and a new Greek language in the mainland at this
time..and no certainty of the language of the earlier colonists..and its
similarity or lack thereof to the new "Rasenna" language..(or more
confusingly: "Anatolian Lydian Aegeans= Rasenna=Etruscans of Etruria in
Tuscan(y) on the Tyrrhenian coast of Italy.)
Im tired of typing..and offer Livy's view on the Rhaetian point: I add only
this thought: If the Rasenna did arrive from any point in the Aegean..they
could have found many "colonies" already in place with a similar pre-Greek
but Aegean (Pelasgic) language (!!) One reference (an English language
summary of arch sites) I read actually stated that Strabo insisted
Pelasgians were in Herculaneum, BUT the evidence was all early Greek.
(sigh..truth!:-)
Scattered from Livy; starting at "The History of Rome 10.30.
(parentheticals mine)
The remains of the Samnite army (in Tuscany, allied with Gauls and
Etruscans) attempted to escape through the Pelignian (!! Roman allies in
Tuscany) territory, but were intercepted by the native troops,
5.33
Nor were the Clusines the first Etruscans with whom the Gaulish armies came
into conflict; long before that they had fought many battles with the
Etruscans who dwelt between the Apennines and the Alps.
(cont'd)
They first settled on this side the Apennines by the western sea in twelve
cities, afterwards they founded twelve colonies beyond the Apennines,
corresponding to the number of the mother cities. These colonies held the
whole of the country beyond the Po as far as the Alps, with the exception of
the corner inhabited by the Veneti, who dwelt round an arm of the sea. The
Alpine tribes are undoubtedly of the same stock, especially the Raetii, who
had through the nature of their country become so uncivilised that they
retained no trace of their original condition except their language, and
even this was not free from corruption. ..end...Livy cuts.
La Revedere;
Rex H. McTyeire
Bucharest, Romania
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