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Section IV.

Private Collections, Especially The Villanova.

The Aria family, who will be noticed at Marzabotto, have collected for two generations the Etruscan antiquities found upon their property. But the most interesting, not only for its antiquity, but also because it has been described with so much learning and detail, [footnote 1: the first essay is entitled Di un Sepolcreto Etrusco scoperto presso Bologna and the rest (Bologna, Soc. tip. Bologn., 1855 ‑‑ a quarto with 8 plates). The second is a quarto with one plate: Intorno ad altre settantuna tombe and the rest (Bologna, tip. all' Ancora, 1856); and the last is La Nécropole de Villanova (Bologna: Fava et Garagnani, 1870). This learned volume was given to me by the author, and I owe the copies of its illustrations to the kindness of Mr. Micklewright, of Trieste. The conversion of metres into English figures is the work of Mr. E. W. Brocks, British Viceconsul, Trieste] is from Villanova, the property of Count Gozzadini. The village lies about eight kilometres eastsoutheast of Bologna, in the parish of Santa Maria di Casella, upon the banks of the Idice fiumara, of old a favourite site for tombs. The place, a mere métairie, was long known to the peasantry as the

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Camposanto, from the large bronze rings turned up by their ploughs. Circumstances, which will presently be alluded to, induce me to hold that the so called cemetery was part of a town, but there are now no means of discussing the question -- indeed, in these days the stranger will not visit the site, all the diggings having been filled up. On the other hand, the Count's cabinet is admirably arranged; and this unique collection, which may date from more than 3,000 years ago, is hospitably shown to the traveller. The first find, a pot full of bones and ashes, was excavated in May, 1853, and works were carried on regularly for two years, carefully superintended by the owner, aidé, as he says, by the Countess.

The area of excavation was an oblong, 74 metres east and west (= 242∙9 feet), by 27 (= 38∙7 feet) north and south; or 1,998 square metres (= 21,507 square feet). Of the tombs, some had been destroyed by the ditchdiggers, but a total of 193 were found unopened, in the same state as left after the AETERNVM VALE! Six, of the same material as, but of different and finer form than, the rest, and separated, as if for the dignity of a higher race, by a clear space, yielded peculiar

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articles, conjectured to denote an especial caste. The others were divided from one another by little more than a metre, but on the western edge, and circling towards the south, this interval increased and distances became irregular. Here was found a conical atone, about one foot broad at the base and nearly two feet high, rising above the tombs: possibly, it represented the Termes which consecrated the limits. The depth varied from 0∙30 metre (= 11∙81 inches) to 1∙40 metre (= 4 feet 7 inches) below the actual surface. Fourteen skeletons, with crania mostly brachycephalic, lay at length supine; with the feet turned eastward; with the hands crossed over the pelvis after the fashion of the ancient Egyptians, and, as usual, with all the funereal objects disposed on the left side, except the coin, which was grasped in the right hand. Some few were bent, like the mummies of Peru and the Brazil. The sepulchres represent four distinct shapes, in the following proportions: ‑‑

1. Those built with pebbles and kistvaens (slabs of grit) . 28

2. Those built with pebbles only . . . . 21

3. Those built with kistvaens only . . . . 21

4. Those built without kistvaens or pebbles . . . 123

-----

Total 193

On the walls of the collection apartment are

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drawings and illustrations of the first and most interesting class of tombs, nearly of the natural size. The following is a reduction.

Pebble Tombs At Villanova.

They were originally subtumular or subterranean, like all the sepulchres of the primitive Italians: the idea of sinking the sepulchre probably was that the dead polluted the face of Earth, Sun, and air, and should be relegated to the hypogaea

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belonging to the infernal Gods and MANES. The barrow, which consisted of the soil thrown up in excavation, showed, on removal, rough slabs of pliocene grit or sandstone from the Apennines, overlying and projecting beyond the cylinders or quasicylinders of water‑rolled stones, built wholly without mortar. Four were parallelograms of similar pebbles, measuring 2∙69 metres (= 8 feet 10 inches) each way; the walls rose perpendicularly to 1∙40 metre (= 4 feet 7 inches); and the top was not horizontal, but sloped obliquely, with a depression of 0∙76 metre (= 2 feet 6 inches) to a central line of

pebbles; they also contained many bronzes and broken pottery. The cylinders varied in height from 0∙76 metre to 1∙50 metre (= 4 feet 11 inches); the maximum diameter was 1∙42 metre (= 4 feet 8 inches); and the lateral walls, composed of either single or double strata of pebbles, averaged a metre. In some of then the funereal objects were stored without separation, others contained quadrangular kistvaens of six unworked slabs, four uprights, covered by a lid slightly concave at the top, and projecting on all sides. The flooring was either a flag or pebbles. The kistvaen also existed without the pebbles. Finally, of 193 in this sepolcreto, 179

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contained cremated, mixed up with 14 intact, skeletons. This proportion (100 : 7∙82) is rather Greek than Roman, and we find the system modified at the Certosa and the Marzabotto cemeteries. The former, out of 365, show 115 of adustion to 250 of inhumation (46 pyres to 100 tombs); and at the latter, again, the cremated were in excess. Here, then, we have a knotty point for study. Professor Conestabile (Revue Arch., October, 1874, page 253) makes the prehistoric peoples of Italy during the bronze age favour cremation, not only for hygienic purposes, but as a kind of sacrifice, and the Etruscans, during their national existence, to prefer inhumation. De Jorio, an experienced excavator (Metodo per rinvenire e frugare i sepolcri and the rest, page 154), tells us that the Hellenes of Magna Graecia burnt ten for one inhumed, and the Romans buried nine to one burnt. This, however, is a subject which begins with Homer, and its intricacy forbids all discussion.

Inside of each kistvaen was found one large single handed VRNA, CINERARIVM, or OSSARIVM (ΟΣΤΟΘΗΚΗ or ΟΣΤΟΔΟΧΕΙΟΝ); some few bore signs of a second handle, which had been removed. I cannot but regard this almost universal custom of confining the dead to ceramic vases as an attempt to restore them

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to the womb. All save three had the same shape, probably characteristic of, and made purposely for, the tomb; mostly they were black, and they varied in ornament and dimensions. The position ranged between vertical (67), quite horizontal (44), and inclined at an angle of 45° (17); this was intentional, as pebbles were placed for supports. They contained nothing but bones, veritable relics; whereas the Romans and other races stored both bones and ashes in the VRNA. The remains, which were not quite calcined, showing that the furnace had consumed about two thirds of the skeleton, formed a thin layer of some four inches. They were chiefly carbonised skull bones, fragments of vertebrae, diaphyses of the longer limbs, and but few teeth; although Pliny (N. H., VII, 15) assures us that these bones are the only part of the body which resist the action of fire, and are not consumed with the rest. As animal victims were also thrown upon the pyre, a bit of equine rib was found in one ossuary. Each receptacle was covered with a concavoconvex clay disk, or with a large, deep, single‑handled cup, not purposely made. These lids appeared to be tazze and PATERAE, possibly used for funereal libations, and for the aspersions of wine with

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which the pyre embers were extinguished. [Footnote 1: Vergil says (AEN., VI, 227): RELLIQVIAS VINO ET BIBVLAM LAVERE FAVILLAM, and Numa forbade wine to be used where water would suffice. The relations, after circumambulating the pyre with naked feet and ungirt waists, extinguished the fire, and the women nearest of kin gathered the bones bit by bit, sprinkled them with milk, wine, and balm, shook them in a linen cloth, and stored them in the ossuary.] The urns were planted about 0∙10 metre (= 4 inches) in the NIGRA FAVILLA, a stratum of ashes which averaged 0∙95 metre (= 3 feet 1 inch); it yielded no large fragments of charcoal, and only a few bone splints which had escaped the pious OSSILEGIVM. Here were gathered the MVNERA offered to the ghost; bronze and iron, glass and amber, bone and clay; together with the remnants of the grave clothes; of the rent raiment of friends, and bones of various beasts, the offals of the SILICERNIVM, which the Romans called OBBA. The shells of two eggs [footnote 2: Count Gozzadini quotes: --

SED TIBI DIMIDIO CONSTRICTVS CAMMARVS OVO

PONITVR, EXIGVA FERALIS COENA PATELLA. ‑‑ Juvenal, V, 84.

..... NISI CENTVM LVSTRAVERIT OVIS. ‑‑ Juvenal, VI, 517.

And Ovid (ARS AM., II, 329): ‑‑

ET VENIAT, QVAE LVSTRET ANVS LECTVMQVE, LOCVMQVE:

PRAEFERAT ET TREMVLA SVLPHVR ET OVA MANV.] were found; one near the ossuary, the other in a cup. Each receptacle was always girt by accessory pots, possibly those used at the supper. In the kistvaens they rarely exceeded eight; but they were more

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numerous in those tombs which were composed of pebbles and of earth. The richest showed a circular heap of pottery, about 0∙38 metre (= 1 foot 3 inches) high, by 1∙50 metre (= 4 feet 11 inches) broad, and some numbering forty distinguishable items. They had been entassés comme dans un panier, as Jorio said of the Magna Graecian sepulchres (page 154).

Of the ceramic remains at Villanova, Count Gozzadini (Di un Sepolcreto and the rest, tables II, III, and IV) gives 65 various designs, some of them wheelworked, and not a few elegantly turned, but all wanting paint, and confirming the theory that the Grecian art, imported with artificers by Demaratus of Corinth, [footnote 1: about BC 657. The well known painted jars are most common in central Etruria, especially to the maritime cities and certain important points like CLVSIVM (Chiusi), where they were first imported. Neither the port of Adria nor the land route supplied the Eastern Federation till a comparatively late day] was with the Etruscans an affair of imitation. The two great divisions are the black and the red; but it is still doubtful whether the former arises from the quality of the clay or from the burning process. The inside shows a paler line of natural colour, and the fragments heated in the furnace become ruddy. On the other hand, the

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red pottery contains a central black diaphragm, also unexplained; it is limited on either side by lines of brick‑colour with a smaller diameter.

The late Professor Sgarzi thus analysed specimens of the Villanova pottery (Boll. d. corr. arch., 1837, page 30): --

Count Gozzadini, aided in this casse‑tête by the ingenuity of his wife, pieced together the crushed fragments of funereal potteries, and found them to be of the same form with three exceptions, namely, red, unornamented DOLIA, surmounted by three protuberances about 34 centimetres (= 1 foot 1 inch) high, and apparently serving as ANSAE. Of a hundred only three had double handles, contrary to the custom of the Greeks; consequently, we should be careful in applying to them Hellenic names. Another

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curious form, previously found only in the Albano necropolis, is the double cone joined at the base ‑‑ of this more presently. The children's ossuaries averaged 19 centimetres (= 7∙48 inches); the adults' 39 centimetres (= 1 foot 3 inches). They are mostly black, though a few are red; the ANSAE are of many and various shapes ‑‑ semielliptic, twisted, rectilinear, and undulated. The surface is either plain or adorned; the characteristics are hollow impressions (graffiti) upon soft paste, by a tool with three, four, or even five equidistant points, raised in cameo, and thus making parallel lines. Other common decorations are simple and double pyramids and meanders, single, coupled, or interlaced. The most general are lines of disks, different in dimensions, with three concentric circles like some of the dice;

Double Cup.

Here The Instrument Has Been Turned To Make The Different Meanders.

then come dotted pyramidal and serpentine lines of peculiar shape; the latter, which are also found on bronzes, may denote the Genius of the Dead, or be emblems of mortality; whilst ducks and geese, living in air, in water, and on earth, show the several abodes of

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the phantasm or ghost, which we will not call a spirit or a soul. Some have nude, archaic mannikins, disposed in lines around the vases; they are drawn as children draw, with big oval heads, double lines for bodies, and single lines for limbs ‑‑ perhaps they represent the MANES who watch over the sepulchre; and the same may be said of the serpents. The accessories of the ossuaries are mostly PATERAE and tazze, the five double cups before figured, shaped like dice boxes with the central diaphragm, standing 22 centimetres (= 8∙66 inches) high, and with an interior diameter of 16 centimetres (= 6∙30 inches): perhaps they represent the ΔΕΠΑΣ ΑΜΦΙΚΥΠΕΛΛΟΝ or the ΔΙΚΥΠΕΛΛΟΝ of Homer (Il., VI, 220), and of Aristotle (DE HIST. ANIMAL., IX, 40). A frequent ornament is the double line of crosses, some contained in circles: a subject treated by the learned Gabrielle de Mortillet, in Le Signe de la Croix avant le Christianisme, chapter 2. Finally, three ossuaries and one black PATERA (NVMAE NIGRVM CATINVM) have each a meander, not engraved, but made by a white band of superimposed paste unhardened in the fire. This, perhaps, is an approach to painting.

The so called clay spindles found at Villanova

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number 169, and of these only 3 bear makers' marks. [Footnote 1: Count Gozzadini (Di un Sepolcreto and the rest, page 20) published eighteen of these makers' marks, which are either upon the edges, the bellies, or the bottoms of the vases. Usually they are supposed to show the proprietor or the value of the article; they may be so on the two FIBVLAE of Villanova, but these valueless bits of clay would hardly deserve the honour.] As 7 were yielded by a single tomb, and an accessory vase contained 12, Count Gozzadini suggests that they were the GLANDVLAE attached to the robe, intended to preserve the graceful form; for instance, in the PALLIVM of Jupiter, the tunic of Minerva, the chlamys of the Augustan LARES, and the PEPLVM of Hope and of the tragedian. He assigns the same office to 24 bronze globes and spheroids, the CLAVI of Visconti, of which 8 were produced by one sepulchre; each was attached to a ring, and the whole weighed 24 to 33 grams (= 370∙37 to 509∙26 grains avoirdupois). He would thus explain that debated passage in Horace (Epist., I, 6, 50): ‑‑

MERCEMVR SERVVM QVI DICTET NOMINA, LAEVVM

QVI FODIAT LATVS, ET COGAT TRANS PONDERA DEXTRAM

PORRIGERE.

The metal articles were mostly bronze, with a few iron. Analysis of the former (FIBVLAE) gave copper 84∙26 parts, and 15∙74 of tin. Of the nine specimens of AES RVDE, irregularly shaped (7), and

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parallelopipedons (2), as if cut from an ingot; the smallest weighed 12∙52, and the largest 64∙18 grams (= 193∙21 to 989∙2 grains avoirdupois). Count Gozzadini, finding them only in four tombs out of 193, doubts their being Charon's fee ‑‑ the conclusion is against Villanova being purely Etruscan. Of the 675 FIBVLAE, 550 were bronze, offering at least 11 several types; many were in pairs, as if used double to fasten the plaid; and one tomb produced 30, several of them twisted and broken. The hollow heads were stuffed with a paste containing 65 percent of alum, oxide of iron, and carbonate of lime, 30 of silex, and the rest water and loss; the enamel, which was generally dark blue and sometimes bright yellow, was composed of lime, silex, and oxides of iron and copper. The shapes are simple, delicate, and elegant, with fine curves and clearly cast angles; the elongated forms explain why long, lean Junius was called FIBVLA FERREA (Quinctil., VI, 3); and the ornaments are as various as the modules. Here a bird of many coloured glass stands in relief; there the metal contains a bit of amber, which the old Etruscans appear to have valued as highly as the modern Somal. [Footnote 1: Professor Capellini (Congresso Internazionale ec. nel 1874. Bologna: Gamberini e Parmeggiani, 1874) discusses the Bolognese amber ‑‑ a red, not a polychroic, variety, which is still found at Scanello, and about Castel San Pietro; whilst the polychroic has recently been discovered in the Cesenate. Thus the Umbrians and the Etruscans had no need to seek the semimineral in Sicily or on the Baltic shores.] Others had chains, beads of

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blue glass, and similar materials, with pincers, and decorations, either pendent, or strung to the convex portion.

The hairpins numbered 53, besides the many which crumbled to pieces, and 6 were found in a single tomb. The large, hollow heads were stuffed, like the FIBVLAE, with siliceous paste, and the blade was long enough to be used by Fulvia, Herodias, or the Trasteverian virago. Some of these served to retain the hair in position, and others are the DISCRIMINALES ‑‑ so called from the frontal DISCRIMEN (parting) which, in the days of Tertullian, distinguished the matron from the maiden. Many of the shapes are still preserved by the peasantry of Polesina, and other parts of Italy. There were also bundles of rings, 29 items in one sepulchre, which, perhaps, were also used for supporting the hair. We find in Martial (II, 66): --

VNVS DE TOTO PECCAVERAT ORBE COMARVM

ANNVLVS, INCERTA NON BENE FIXVS ACV.

The TVTVLVS, a pyramidal or conical Etruscan cap, more or less acute, which represented the

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modern chignon, also required some such support [footnote 1: TOT PREMIT ORDINIBVS, TOT ADHVC COMPAGIBVS ALTVM AEDIFICAT CAPVT (Juvenal, VI, 502), is painfully true in 1875. The TVTVLVS, or lofty conical cap of the priest, is worn by women in the Grotta delle Bighe (Dennis, I, 330 and 341)] besides the TAENIAE (fillets) and the bronze plates, 17 millimetres broad, which resembled the ΑΜΠΥΚΕΣ of the Greek belles. There were rings of other sorts, especially groups of fives passing through a large circle which bore a peduncle. The average diameter was 8 millimetres (= 3∙15 inches); a single ossuary yielded 46 bunches, besides 578 scattered specimens; they were, probably, the decorations of a dress consumed on the ROGVS, and, though cumbrous, they are not more so than the jets still in fashion.

The small number (26) of bracelets, large and massive, thin and cylindrical, straight and twisted, shows that these articles were not of universal use, as the might expect to find amongst a people coming from the east. Some are ΠΕΡΙΚΑΡΠΙΑ (wristlets), others bracelets proper, worn by both sexes upon the upper arm (ΠΕΡΙΒΡΑΧΙΟΝΙΑ); a single skeleton had an iron specimen, probably valuable in those times. One is marked with the broad arrow ↓; it also appears on the pottery, on a

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bronze hatchet from Villanova, on a cyst found near Bologna, and on a carved ivory in the Vulci necropolis. Some are bent and broken, evidently by a heavy instrument.

The CLAVI, or buttons, 8 millimetres (= 3∙15 inches) in breadth, and 199 in number, might have been applied to the PEPLVM or tunic. The ossuary used also to be similarly draped in very ancient times; and our modern churchyards still show its descendant in the shape of a veiled urn ‑‑ a meaningless article until we again begin to cremate. The other buttons were, possibly, rather ornaments than intended for buttoning. [Footnote 1: I have never been able to arrive at any conclusion concerning the date when the button hole originated. The oldest form, preserved by the peoples of the nearer east, is the loop which encircles the button. In Professor Nicolucci's Age de la pierre dans les Provinces Napolitaines, published by the Congrès, he remarks of (page 32) five almond shaped stones: J' ignore à quoi les instruments pouvaient servir, mais on peut penser ou que ce sont des poinçons à double pointe ..... ou un bouton à fermoir pour vêtements, parceque, étroitement serrés au milieu avec un fil sur une peau ou sur du drap, ils pouvaient être commodément introduits dans un œillet, et tenir les pièces de vêtement solidement serrées.]

The warlike weapons were two thick and heavy lance heads, with tangs to fit into the shaft ‑‑ the lance is believed, despite Herodotus, to be of Etruscan origin. Of the Paalstab or hatchets (?) two were of iron and three of bronze. One of the

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latter, found broken into four twisted fragments, is remarkable for the disposition of its wings and for the length, 9 centimetres (= 3∙54 inches), being exactly half the breadth. The other, measuring 17 centimetres (= 6∙69 inches) long, and 16½ (= 6∙5 inches) broad, has the wings or lateral points curved; and the unusually thin blade is only 1 millimetre (= 0∙04 of an inch) thick; it might have been used in religious ceremonies or as a votive offering, like the large bronzes from the Danish turbaries described by Worsaae. There are five smaller articles (axes?), between 8 and 11 centimetres (= 3∙15 to 4∙33 inches) long, by 5 (= 1∙97 inch) broad; and five have sockets instead of grooves. One shows an iron edge set in the bronze, which would suggest the baser metal to have been still valuable; yet 18 are wholly iron; and another bears the wedge V. Two little archaic horses probably belonged to the bridlebit, offerings made when the steed was slain to carry the ghost into what Dahome calls Kutome, or Dead Man's Land.

The CVLTRI number 10 iron to 18 bronze, which may almost be called copper, as the percentage of tin is only 3∙93. The very thin handles of wood or bone were rivetted by short screws. The most

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peculiar, but by no means, as has been stated, peculiarly characteristic of FELSINA, are a dozen FERRAMENTA LVNATA (Columella, DE R. R., XII, 56), with edges only in the convex parts of the crescents. These have been found in the islands of the Greek Archipelago, in Attica, Boeotia, in many parts of Etruria, and even north of the Alps. The fineness of the blade suggests the razor, which India preserves in the hatchet shape.

The Novacula.

Thus we find in Martial (II, 58),

SED FVERIT CVRVA CVM TVTA NOVACVLA THECA

FRANGAM TONSORI CRVRA MANVSQVE SIMVL;

[footnote 1: Varro (DE R. R., II, chapter 11) tells us that the Romans began to shave about the fifth century VRBIS CONDITAE. But the learned Professor Rocchi has shown that this was a custom of the Etruscans long before that period. The cemetery of Alba Longa and the oldest Italic tombs have not yielded razors. Professor Lignana (Bullet. dell' Inst. Arch. Rom., Jan.‑Feb., 1875), considering the words Ksurá (Rig‑Veda), ΞΥΡΟΝ (Iliad, X, 173, ΕΠΙ ΞΥΡΟΥ ‛ΙΣΤΑΤΑΙ ΑΚΜΗΣ), the German Scheere (= shears), holds that the shaving implement was known to the Indoeuropean race before its separation]

and Pliny (N. H., XXXII, 5), terms a fish NOVACVLA

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SEV ORBIS. Ten large and heavy iron knives, some with handles of the same metal, are the CLVNACVLA, used to cut up the victims, and there are a few shovel shaped articles, with ornamental hilts and bevelled edges, which may have served as bistouries to inspect the entrails.

The Bistourie.

Six bronzes, composed of two concentric circles united by five rays, may be PHALERAE, or horse frontlets; but no other museum possesses anything like them.

The PHALERAE.

Equally mysterious are the hatchet shaped bronzes, with large rings for handles, and in some cases profusely ornamented on both sides. They

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are associated with small elongated rods of bronze capped at either end, and this suggested that the plate is a TRIGONVM or deltaton; in fact, a gong sounded with the VIRGVLA. Real TINTINNABVLA were known to the Etruscans, but that would not hinder them from using an article so common

throughout the east. On the other hand, when struck they yield no sound; they are evidently unfit for cutting, and the bronze nails always found near them suggest that they were mounted on staves and were carried in procession ‑‑ the pelekys, or axe, being an amulet against fascination. The Canadian,

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or rather Catholic, superstition of church bells frightening away evil spirits is found in Ovid (FAST., V, 4, 23).

TEMESAEAQVE CONCREPAT AERA

ET ROGAT VT TECTIS EXEAT VMBRA SVIS.

On which Gierig remarks: AERIS AVTEM TINNITVM APTVM ESSE HABITVM AD SPECTRA EIICIENDA DOCET NEAPOLIS [Jeff Hill's footnote: And Neapolis says that the ringing of brass is considered to be suitable for the expelling of ghosts]; and the Scholiast of Theocritus teaches us that the sound of brass was used in the most sacred rites by reason of its purity, and because it expelled abominations. Hence the bells was adopted by Christianity and rejected by El Islâm.

Three bronzes, whose long, broad handles and rounded heads represent CAPEDINES or cup ladles for drawing wine during the sacrifices have also been found; one in a clay pot, probably the VRNVLA FICTILIS serving for the same object; while a second was taken from one of the six distinguished tombs. The latter also yielded an inverted cone, with two moveable handles, to prevent the liquor being spilt, and a cover with the apical knob: this was probably the AMVLA or ACQVIMINARIVM for the lustration water, not the SITVLA for sacrificial wine. Here were nails of sorts, one bearing on its broad head the cross, interlaced with the five circles of the mystic die. It

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is suggested that the latter may have been used either for the coffin, or as an offering to Charon, in case his barque required repair. Less intelligible are the seven hollow fusiform rods with raised circles and hatted heads which so frequently occur. Some antiquaries have seen in them spindles, or wharrow spindles ‑‑ those used when walking. But the practical fileuse declared that they are of no account for her trade.

It is a proof of high antiquity that only one idol or human figure for worship was found. Better proportioned than are most archaic specimens, it appears, judging from the bosom, to be a woman; and there are signs of her having been placed upon a pedestal. The head bears the symbolic circle, with two reversed birds, whilst another pair of volatiles perches upon the haunches; and her arms appear to be holding two spherical bodies. All who are familiar with modern art in Egypt, Syria, and Persia will recognise these bird ornaments. The other figures are those on pottery and the archaic horses before mentioned.

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Amongst minor matters are a small bronze sphere with two projecting points; a bronze ring with the mystic Tau; a little bronze handle richly adorned; four VOLSELLAE (tweezers); an AVRISCVLPIVM (ear pick); five needles, and nine bronze brooches. The bone implements are FIBVLAE, a cylinder (a handle?), and other articles of less importance.

As regards the tomb people, Count Gozzadini, judging from the phase of art and from the presence of the AES RVDE ‑‑ a coin unknown to the days of Romulus [footnote 1: with great satisfaction I see Mr. J. H. Parker, C.B., in his Archaeology Of Rome (2 volumes: Murray, 1874), sturdily preserving these time honoured names, and thus protesting against the vague, nebulous, wunderbar myth theories with which Germany during the last generation has infected the exact, practical, and matter of fact English mind. Perizonius, Pouilly, and Beaufort began the heresy, but left no school. As usual, it was adopted by the Germans, who carry out, but who do not invent; and Niebuhr ‑‑ so great as a historian, so small as a topographer, geographer, and archaeologist ‑‑ took it up as an especial hobby. It has now tyrannised over the English mind for thirty seven years, and the period (1825‑1862) was unhappily that when political and other matters introduced a kind of Teutonomania into our island. The reaction began with M. J. J. Ampère's Histoire Romaine à Rome (1862); and lately M. F. Max Müller's himself has successfully been proved a solar myth ‑‑ with a tendency, I might add, towards the Earth's satellite] ‑‑ determines Villanova to be not Umbrian, but Etruscan, of the earliest iron age, whose apogee of civilisation preceded the foundation of Rome. He utterly rejects the Gauls both

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here and at Marzabotto. [Footnote 1: L' élément étrusque de Marzabotto est sans mélange avec l' élément gaulois (Extrait des matériaux pour l' histoire primitive de l' homme: Toulouse, 1873).] He is joined by Henzen, who, with a host of others, first judged the sepulchres, chiefly from their shape, to be Keltic; by Doctor Forchhammer; by Mr. Minervini and Mr. Fabretti (the great Etruscologue); and by Professor Carl Vogt, [footnote 2: in Anthropophagie et Sacrifices humains (Congrès, pages 295‑328) man is successively insectivorous, frugivorous, and carnivorous, or rather anthropophagous (page 296). Cannibalism denotes a relatively advanced civilisation (page 298). Every religion is, without exception, l' enfant de la peur et de l' ignorance (page 300); the Deity is unknown, and religion is the worship of the inconnu (page 300); Dieu est un superlatif, dont le positif est l' homme (page 300); les furieux couronnés de l' ancien Testament (page 308); human sacrifice amongst the ancient Israelites (page 321); and a few other vigorous assertions of the kind, must have been somewhat shokin' to the sons of that terre predestinée, who combine easy incuriousness with a strong prepossession in favour of leaving things alone] whose outspoken theories upon the subject of faith, for example, L' Être Supérieur est un produit de l' ignorance et de la peur, and upon the friendship between Mr. Calvert and King Cakombau (page 307), must have somewhat startled the respectables of the Bologna Congress. The late Professor Orioli, writing anonymously in the Arcadia paper (T. 412‑414, page 58), offered the three following objections: ‑‑

1. The tombs were neither rockhewn, nor of

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OPVS QVADRATVM, nor barrow covered, after Rasennic fashion.

2. They contained articles of small value.

3. They had few weapons ‑‑ he might have added, they lacked inscriptions.

He therefore determined the tenants to be of barbarous strain, aborigines, Pelasgi, Umbrians ‑‑ a theory also supported by the distinguished Professor G. Nicolucci ‑‑ or even the Boii Gauls, who ended the Etruscan rule in the fourth century of Rome. M. de Mortillet assigned them to the interval between the bronze age and the Etruscan occupation, and, pour ne rien préjuger sous le rapport historique, he prudently indicated the epoch as that of early Rome, First Iron. Professor Calori reminds us of Polybius (II, 17), who declares that the adjacent Gauls trafficked with the Etruscans, and that the only art or science known to the former was agriculture. This assertion, however, is somewhat modified in the matter of metal by Livy (XXXVI, 40); in ornamentation by Diodorus Siculus (V, 27‑30); and, finally, by modern investigation. That distinguished authority, however, is positive that l' antica necropoli alla Certosa è Etrusca, etruschissima. Finally, Professor Count J. Conestabile (pages 74‑84, Monumenti

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e Annali di Corr. Arch., 1856), comparing Villanova with Stadler in the Trentine, draws from the architectonic forms and the interior disposition of the sepulchres the two following conclusions: --

1. The Etruscans everywhere varied their structures to conform with material means and with local customs.

2. The northern Etruscans did not display in their cemeteries scattered near the Po and about its Campagna the wealth and luxury of Middle Etruria. The latter has ever been the great centre, the chief, the most evident, and the most durable image of the civilisation and power of the race ‑‑ a development which, we may add, resulted from commerce with Greece and the nearer east.

Despite this weight of authority, I must still withhold judgment. The late Count Giovanni da Schio (Sulle Iscrizioni ed altri monumenti Reto‑Euganei. Padova: Angelo Sicca, 1853, page 15 and others) seems to have shown satisfactorily enough that, in the Vicentine, Gallic are freely mixed with Etruscan local names. But a stronger reason is the similarity of the catacombs in Guernsey, not to mention other places, with these so called Etruscan remains. The former we know to be Keltic from such names as Pouquelaye (Pwca = fairy, and lles, a lay or place), Les Rocques

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Brayes (in Breton, Roc'h Braz, les grosses pierres); and L' autel du Tus (or Thus), pronounced l' autel du Déhus ‑‑ evidently the Dus or Dusius of the Gauls. In Guernsey we have the hougue or caírn; the kistvaen (Chambre des Fées) containing human ashes, pottery, celts, and arrowheads; protected by cap stones or ledgers, and floored with irregular slabs and round, smooth pebbles (for instance, at La Creux des Fées); in which were deposited (History Of Guernsey by Jonathan Duncan. London: Longmans, 1841) the bones, urns, and other vessels, with such offerings as the zeal or affection of the friends of the deceased was disposed to leave with them.

I would not strain the resemblance. The kistvaen was found by Capt. Congreve, and, since his day (1845), by many explorers in India and other parts of Asia. But the slab and pebble floorings, which argue that the dead would pollute the sacred face of Earth, are highly suspicious features, suggesting identity of race. On the other hand, we shall find the huts parquetted with this rudest of mosaic which still forms the pavement in the streets of northern Italian towns, and the long home in Etruria is often a palpable copy of the home. And,

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again, I have shown (page 51, ANTHROPOLOGIA, Number 1, October, 1873) that the Tupi Brazilians buried water‑rolled pebbles as well as stone implements with their dead.