Etruscan Temple of Jupiter in Rome

Episode 3 Who Founded Rome?

The Mysterious Etruscans

Dr Steven L Tuck (2016)

Film Review

In this lecture, Tuck lays out the case that the Etruscans most likely built the city of Rome.

During the 8th century BC when Rome was founded, Etruscans were city-bui;ders, while  the Latin-speaking people south of the Tiber were farmers living in mud huts.

Among other arguments, Tuck asserts

• The city of Rome was built on hills, which were walled-off individually, just like Etruscan cities.
• Rome is oriented on an east-west axis, just like Etruscan cities.
• Two of Rome’s famous hills were named for Etruscans – Calium and Vasces Tuscus (translated Etruscan quarter).
• According to the historian Tacitus, Rome allied with the Etruscans (prior to the 3rd century BC) instead of continually warring with them, as with their Greek and Phoenician rivals.
• The last three Roman kings were Etruscan.
• The Etruscans introduced the triumphal procession and the quaduingo (ceremonial four-horse chariot) to Rome.
• The last Estruscan king (Tarquin the Proud*) began construction of the Cloaca Maxima (translation “big drain”) and the Temple of Jupiter (where the senate met) on the Capitoline Hill.
• The Etruscan kings began the tradition of asking rich oligarchs to pay for important buildings (the senate, meeting halls, coliseum). They also built a number of sewers, water projects (draining surrounding swamps and enabling the city to expand into the lowlands)
• The Etruscans introduced the Tuscan column** to Rome.
• Between 509-493 BC most of Rome’s senate-appointed dictators were Etruscan.
• The augury used in laying out Roman cities was borrowed from the Etruscans.
• A grid-based road layout, associated with uniform square houses appeared around the same time in Rome as in Etruria.***

The conventional belief is that the Trojan Aeneas, son of the goddess Diana, founded Rome after the Greeks sacked Troy (in Asia minor). However there’s no evidence that any Asia Minor languages or customs took root in southern Italy a a result of this migration. The Latin language spoken in Rome originated in Latium, the region around the Tiber River.

According to Tuck, there is no reference to Troy in Roman literature until the 3rd century BC when Rome was preparing to launch a series of wars on its neighbors.

*Tarquin the Proud 534-509 BC

**Like the Doric column with smooth sides.

***Tuck associates this orthogonal approach to city planning with a wave of democratization and increased social equality that swept the Mediterranean in the sixth century BC.

Film can be viewed free with a library card on Kanopy.

https://www.kanopy.com/en/pukeariki/watch/video/239710/239615