PLATE XCV ETRUSCAN WRITING. PREVIOUS TO THE CHRISTIAN ERA. ETRUSCAN INSCRIPTION ON A CIPPUS AT PERUGIA. OUR readers will probably feel no surprize in being presented with an illustration of Etruscan writing copied from a lapidary inscription; the nation which bears this name having so long ceased to exist, and no care taken to preserve any of its manuscript documents. Under the name of Etruscans, are generally understood the people who under that name, and those of the Sabines, Volscians, Oscans, and Samnites, first opposed, and first fell beneath the Roman power. The history of these nations is not less ancient than that of Rome itself; in fact many of their cities flourished before the time of Romulus, and if at this distant epoch one independant state obtained by conquest a supremacy over another, the advantage gained by Rome was that of being the latest to rise to the supremacy, and render the rest submissive to her authority. Modern historians dwell but slightly on their history, but their monuments supply the omission; the ruins of their ancient cities abound with coins, and edifices, statues in stone and bronze, bas-reliefs, painted vases, and marbles bearing inscriptions are frequently brought to light, whilst from the tombs of their kings recently discovered have been drawn admirable works of art, composed of massive gold. Latin historians have admitted the obligations which the infant state of Rome was under to the civilization of Etruria, from which she borrowed her gods, her religion, her agriculture, her calendar, her mode of computation of time for the national annals, etc.; and although the Etruscan subsequently became mingled with the Greek, the debt due to the Italiote people was constantly acknowledged. Moreover, their proximity produced a great analogy in their respective institutions. The usage of writing existed among the Etruscans at the period assigned to the foundation of Rome; and fable attributes its introduction into Italy to Evander and his colony of Arcadians, at an epoch nearly contemporary with the ruin of Troy, whilst other traditions (not, however, more trustworthy) give it to the Pelasgi. The country of Magna Græcia, (Calabria, Naples, etc.,) peopled with Greeks, in consequence of their early communications with the Etruscans, must have imparted to them a knowledge of writing, supposing they were ignorant of it. It is certain, that the ancient Greek, Roman, and Etruscan alphabets are perfectly analogous, both in respect to the number, form, and expression of the letters. All three at first possessed but sixteen letters; the Greek alphabet was subsequently increased to twenty and twenty-four; the Latin alphabet received also additions in process of time; but the Etruscan alphabet perished with its people, previous to such additions being made. We find, in fact, only sixteen letters in the inscription. before us; the letters B, D, J, K, O, Q, U, Y, Z, are wanting; their existence, indeed, presupposes a delicacy of perfection in the pronunciation of a language, since they are only phonic modifications of P, T, I, C, A, and other short vowels, whilst Y and Z are of Greek origin. With these analogies existing between the Etruscan, Greek, and Latin alphabets, we find certain anomalies not less remarkable in their use. 1. The Etruscan writing is read from right to left, like that of the people of the Levant; the Greeks, it is true, wrote alternately from right to left, and from left to right, but no monument exists of Greek writing from right to left throughout, whilst every known Latin monument is written from left to right. 2. In the Etruscan writing, the vowels are often suppressed. by 3. The words are often separated by one or two dots, or a diagonal stroke. 4. We are entirely ignorant to which family of languages the Etruscan language belongs. The languages of the east and those of the north of Europe have been tried in vain; and up to the present time the system of the Abbé Lanzi is the least discredited, consisting in the explanation of the Etruscan words by those in Greek or Latin, which come the nearest to them in sound; but this plan does not satisfy all writers. Etruscan palæography has yet to be decyphered*. The inscribed stone represented in the Plate was discovered near Perugia in 1822. A learned Italian, M. Vermiglioli, considers that it is written in the Oscan language, and that it relates to rural laws, the boundaries of estates, etc. He reads the top line, from right to left, as follows, EVLAT TANNA LAREXVL AMEFACHAR, etc. In the Plate the words are more separated than in the original, the date of which ascends to a period antecedent to the Christian era. * Since this was written, an attempt has been made by Sir William Betham to explain the Etruscan inscriptions by the aid of the Irish language, but with what success is still a matter of dispute. See his Etruria Celtica, 2 vols. 8vo., 1842-ED. PLATE XCVI. CURSIVE ROMAN WRITING. IIND (?) CENTURY. TABLETS OF WAX, SUPPOSED TO BE ROMAN. THE existence of a cursive, rapid, ordinary style of writing, amongst the Romans during the period of the Empire, and probably at an earlier era, has been the subject of much controversy in modern times. It is certain, however, that the civilization and social state of the Romans were founded, like that of modern society, upon such principles of civil and judicial administration, as necessarily to require the general practice of writing among the citizens. The scribes termed tachygraphers, were, in fact, the practisers of this cursive rapid writing, in which the conjunction of the letters rendered unnecessary the raising of the hand, which in majuscule writing occupies so much time. Eusebius, in speaking of Origen, distinguishes clearly between the tachygraphers and calligraphers, and Quintilian blames well-educated men for neglecting the practice of writing well and quickly, "cura bene et velociter scribendi." The authority of such passages would lead us therefore to infer with certainty the existence of this cursive writing at Rome and throughout the Empire. We have also the authority of monuments, which are equally decisive on the subject. The manuscript on Egyptian papyrus, preserved at Milan, which contains a Latin translation, by Rufinus, of the Jewish Antiquities of Josephus, which is as early as the reign of the Emperor Theodosius, (the second half of the fourth century,) is written in a cursive, con joined hand, very difficult to decypher. No other example can be cited anterior to the fifth or sixth century, especially if we attempt to distinguish with too much precision between. the minusculo-cursive, and the pure cursive. The latter was not used in manuscripts (properly so called), and the detached pieces relative to ordinary affairs or official business have perished, together with so many other of the more important documents of ancient history. The testamentary charter of Ravenna therefore, of which a fac-simile will be given thereafter*, will present the most ancient authentic model known up to the present time, of the cursive Roman-Latin writing. A singular palæographical discovery has lately been made known, namely, that in the year 1790 certain tablets of wax, whereon was inscribed a Latin Act, dated in the third Consulate of Lucius Verus, were discovered in one of the gold mines of Hungary, which having long lain neglected, were exhibited by their possessor in 1835 to M. Massmann, of Munich, who published them at Leipsic in 1840, under the title of Libellus aurarius, sive tabulae ceratae et antiquissimae et unicae Romanae, in a 4to volume, containing the history and literal interpretation, together with a fac-simile of these tablets. Hence, as the date assigned to these tablets reached so far back as A.D. 167, they have been placed at the head of the existing specimens of the common cursive minuscule writing; but unfortunately an examination of M. Massmann's fac-similes has caused the tablets to be rejected as fictitious, and unworthy of being received among monuments intitled to confidence+. * MM. Champollion refer to this fac-simile as following immediately after the present; but it was subsequently placed at the head of the writings of Italy subsequent to the year 500 (No. cxxxv. in the present series of Plates). Its date is A.d. 552.—Ed. + It is very surprising, that after such an opinion, M. Silvestre should have thought it worth while to give a Plate of no value whatever (being merely a copy of an acknowledged forgery), or that MM. Champollion should have wasted more words on the subject.-ED. |