The Etruscans (The Peoples of Europe) [Paperback]

Graeme Barker (Author), Tom Rasmussen (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0631220380 | ISBN-13: 978-0631220381 | Publication Date: May 26, 2000 | Edition: 1

The Etruscans were the creators of one of the most highly developed cultures of the pre-Roman Mediterranean.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Written with scholarly precision but without condescension The Etruscans deserves to be on the shelves of all those who want an up-to-date overview of the subject." History Today, Volume 48, Sept 98.

"As well as offering new approaches and interpretations the book presents the reader with concise summaries of, often highly contentious, recent debates." Vedia Izzet, Christ's College, Cambridge.

"In an impressively comprehensive book, they weave together material from a wealth of sources, classical literature, land surveys and excavation - their text providing a lesson in itself in how to recreate ancient history." History Today.

From the Back Cover

The Etruscans are one of history's extraordinary casualties. For many centuries they flourished exuberantly in central Italy, only to be completely absorbed into the growing Roman state. Their power, at its height, extended well beyond their borders: they were known and feared by Romans and Greeks alike. Their arresting visual culture was second to none in the peninsula, embracing complex funerary and domestic architecture, tomb-painting, narrative art, and jewellery of great luxury and refinement. Their cities grew to notable size and sophistication.

But they wrote no connected account of themselves that survives, and so this book focuses on three types of evidence for reconstructing Roman society: the extremely rich archaeological data, the accounts of Greek and Roman writers, and the inscriptions on Etruscan monuments.

Until recently there has been little effort to relate the Etruscans to ancient Mediterranean society as a whole or to the physical landscape that sustained them. This book attempts both. Included are some of the more recent findings from landscape archaeology which help to explain in what kinds of settlement the Etruscans lived, how densely the land was peopled, and how the landscape was organized for agriculture.

This approach is balanced by sections on material and visual culture, where the focus is on interpretation within the specific context and setting, and even here the landscape is never far from view. The landscape, ancient and modern, figures too in what is one of the book's unique features: a description of more than sixty sites and a listing of some thirty-five local museums in a format that is both analytical and practical.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 400 pages
• Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell; 1 edition (May 26, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0631220380
• ISBN-13: 978-0631220381
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #809,472 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

45 of 51 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Etruscans in a nutshell...., December 15, 2001

By 

Dianne Foster "Di" (USA) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: The Etruscans (The Peoples of Europe) (Paperback)

When I took a survey course on the history of Western Art, the instructor passed over the Etuscans in about 15 seconds. I belive he showed us one slide of the elaborate tomb of an Etruscan man who was reclined in death on the lid of his sarcophogus. In the instructor's mind, the Etruscans formed a brief interlude somewhere between the Greeks and the Romans.

My second encounter with the Etruscans came when I read D.H. Lawrence's book on his travels in Italy. In this book, Lawrence includes an extensive section on his visits to the Etruscan sites in Italy. Lawrence viewed the Etruscans with sympathy, and interestingly, THE ETRUSCANS takes off from Lawrence's book. Each section of this history is introduced by a passage from Lawrence who felt the Etruscans had been badly described by the Greeks and the Romans.

THE ETRUSCANS is a history book in the series on 'The Peoples of Europe' and the third in this series of synopses on various European ethnic groups that I have read. I intend to read more. I am not interested in becoming an expert on every group, but these books provide me with an overview that allows me to determine which distinct groups I might want to study futher.

Barker and Rasmussen have taken a wholistic approach in developing their text. They eschew the boundaries of traditional discplines without destroying the integrity of each of these various appoaches. They use all "sources, whether written records, inscriptions, monuments or excavated data..."

The book is laid out by topic, and the discussions in each section are drawn from the work of scientists and historians who have deciphered text (tomb inscriptions and other preserved written material including the "histories" of the Romans and the Greeks) and subtext (geological formations, pottery shards; bone fragments from slaughtered animals; flora including petrified seeds; remains of metal implements, tools, jewelry, etc.; remains of various structures including houses, boats, etc.; disturbances in the terrain resulting from the construction of canals, roads, walls, mines, farms, and necropolises).

The tale Barker and Rasmussen piece together is amazing. Scientists and historians know much more than they did about the Etruscans owing to recent advanced work involving forensics type investigation. The authors suggest much more can be known if additional steps are taken in the study of preshistoric Etruscan sites, i.e. researchers need to adapt the advanced techniques used in other places like Israel.

The Etruscans apparently weren't great artists like the Greeks but they made a number of material advances the Romans simply incorporated and claimed as their own inventions. For example, recent archeological research shows the Etruscans were engineers who invented the means of moving water via canals and irrigation channels long before the Romans built their aquaducts.

The Etruscans created a civilization that lasted longer than many others formed in Western Europe (800 B.C. to 300 B.C) and even after they were "incorporated" by the Romans they continued to make substantial contributions to the surrounding economy.

Apparently, the Etruscans were an archaic people, native to the part of Italy where their remains can be found. Although their language seems to be unlike that of most other historic Europeans the discovery of a Phoenician/Etruscan rosetta stone has allowed researchers to untangle a number of words, including the names of many of those laid to rest in the ornate tombs I was shown so long ago.

25 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A full and engaging overview of the Etruscan culture, February 9, 2001

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Etruscans (The Peoples of Europe) (Paperback)

On of Blackwell Publishers' outstanding "The Peoples of Europe" series, Grame Barker and Tom Rasmussen's The Etruscans is a complete and superbly presented history of the Etruscan peoples, a society and culture that flourished on the Italian peninsula before the founding of Rome. The city states of the Etruscan civilization were based in west-central Italy around the area of modern Tuscany. Etruscans were sophisticated and innovative, and dominated the region from the eight century to the fourth century BC, when they were conquered and absorbed by the emergent Roman Republic. Shortly after the Roman conquest, an understanding of the Etruscan language and writings were lost and not to be recovered until the second half of the twentieth century. Very highly recommended and accessible reading, The Etruscans incorporates the findings of extensive archaeological investigations which, combined with a clearer understanding of Etruscan inscriptions, has now made possible a full and engaging overview of the Etruscan economy, society, culture, and history.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The other Etruscans, August 15, 2011

By 

G. Simon (London, England) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Etruscans (The Peoples of Europe) (Paperback)

Having just read Eckstein's Mediterranean Anarchy, Interstate War, and the Rise of Rome (Hellenistic Culture and Society), I thought I'd read up on the Etruscans, the inveterate enemies of Rome, with whom, for centuries, they were locked in a life-or-death struggle; the Etruscans, who would behead hundreds of prisoners in the centre of their cities, in front of their whole population as a celebration of victory; the Etruscans, who's art was so gory and violent that one of their artists is known as the `carnage painter'. So, what do we find in this book?
"The Romans were enabled to carry out their settlement of Etruria as a result of their relentless military successes, which began with the defeat of Veii only 15km from Rome. Down to 400 BC, Etruria remained strong and intact, and in the fifth century Veii even notched up some victories in skirmishes against the Romans. But that is the last we hear of Etruscan superiority in the field." Hmmm... I need to do some more research I think.

The chapters are -
P001: Introduction
P010: The Landscape
P043: Origins
P085: Sources and Society
P117: Settlement and Territory
P141: Subsistence and Economy
P216: Life, Cult and Afterlife
P262: Romanization
P297: Appendix - Etruscan Places - a rough guide
P329-379: Bibliography: Selected Reading; Index
117 illustrations

This is a volume in the series `Peoples of Europe', and as you can see from the contents, it does cover a lot of ground, and therefore is not necessarily interested in the detailed military aspects of the culture. There is discussion of arms and armour - "the evidence relating to warfare requires careful weighing. In early iron age graves, the importance of fighting can be gauged by the numerous finds of round shields, spear-heads and crested helmets, all of bronze. The problems proliferate in the seventh century, when armour becomes both subject to influences from abroad, especially from Greece, and also scarcer in the archaeological record. Greek hoplite armour was introduced into Italy at this time - round shield held at the rim, helmet covering the sides of the face and neck, bronze corselet and greaves, long spear - but not to the exclusion of pre-existing forms." And there is discussion of the nature of Etruscan warfare, and there is campaigning against the Greeks, but warfare with Rome is not gone into.

This is a good introduction to current views on the Etruscans, and I would recommend it as a starting point (even though I wanted more on the violent aspects of the culture!). It might be that an earlier generation of writers would have been more influenced by their contemporary culture and focussed more on the military side of things. Many modern writers are influenced by their contemporary culture and downplay the role of violence in society - see Eckstein, referred to above.