The Early Inhabitants of Italy

I. Geography

The geography of peninsular Italy is in the first instance defined by the mountain ranges of the Alps and the Apennines. The Apennines run down the peninsular of Italy dividing it into east and west sections. Neither coastline has good natural harbors. On the western side there are three regions of good agricultural land — Tuscany, Latium and Campania. The soils are volcanic and are very fertile. On the Adriatic side there are no such readily identifiable areas and a long coastal strip extends from Ancona to Foggia. The region was known as Picenum to the Romans Towards the heel of Italy are the regions of Apulia and Calabria, but these are not exceptionally fertile and form pastoral country.

II. The Paleolithic and Neolithic Ages

Man first appeared in Italy some 200,000 years ago. A settlement has been discovered near Rome to the west at Torrimpetra. Neanderthal type skulls have been discovered at Saccospastore very near the gates of Rome and at Monte Circeo. After c.10,000 BC men of the Upper Paleolithic age inhabited the region, and skulls of the Cro-Magnon type have been discovered in the Fucino area. However, in comparison to France and Spain, the population of Italy at this time was very sparse. After c. 5000 BC Neolithic farmers probably from across the Adriatic started to replace Upper Paleolithic hunters. The people were of Mediterranean type and buried their dead in a crouched position. The Neolithic farmers cleared forests and cultivated fields. They had a distinctive pottery, lived in villages and kept domestic animals. They started to make contact with other European cultures. Around 3,500 BC they learnt spinning and weaving, possibly as a result of contact with outside influences.

One of the oldest peoples of Italy were the Ligurians who occupied the Maritime Alps. One theory is that they derived from Sicily or North Africa. However, they spoke an Indo-European language. The mountain areas between Italy and the French Rivieras continued to be inhabited by these Neolithic Ligures until historical times.

III. The Copper and Bronze Ages

With the dawning of the copper age warrior immigrants, with the distinctive round heads of Alpine Man, entered Italy; three main areas of this culture have been identified in the Po valley, in Tuscany and in Salerno. However, stone continued to be used as copper was rare. Around 1800 BC the Copper Age in Italy progressed into the Bronze Age. North of the Apennines a Bronze Age culture developed. One important site is Lagozza near Brescia; the culture is sometimes called Polada from a settlement on Lake Garda. Later “Terramara” (meaning “black earth” and relating to the soil) settlements along the Po are related to it. Their settlements were regular in design; however, the theory that they moved south and settled at Rome is no longer fashionable. They lived in villages and built huts on raised terraces or piles surrounded by a ditch filled with water. They incinerated their dead in urns and buried the ashes in urns in cemeteries. Principally they farmed but they hunted as well. They used carts and horses for draught. They probably spoke an Indo-European language.

Another bronze age culture from c 1500 BC onwards is called the Apennine Culture, located along the Apennines from Bologna to Apulia. They were semi-nomadic pastoralists who alternated between winter settlements on lower ground and often in caves and summer pastures in the mountains. They were descendants of the neolithic population but possibly with the addition of warriors, speaking an Indo-European language, who moved to Italy from the Aegean arriving in Apulia. They maintained peaceful relations with the Terramara peoples north of the Apennines and may have founded villages near the mouth of the Po. They two cultures appear to assimilate to each other from c. 1200 — 1150 BC.

IV. The Villanovan culture

At some point the culture of Italy coalesced into a single culture, known as the Villanovan culture after an important site discovered in 1853 at Villanova near Bologna. This Bronze Age culture appears to coincide with the Mycenaean III A and B period of c. 1400 — 1200 BC.

The habit of burying the dead in “urn-fields” probably came from central Europe and came across the Alps from Illyria around c. 1200 BC, and also across the Adriatic. Around 1000 BC greater skill in metallurgy was acquired both in bronze and the new metal, iron. The most distinctive common feature of the Vaillnovan culture was the use of biconical cinerary urns, which in Etruria were often covered with inverted pottery bowls or bronze helmets. The urns were buried in holes in the ground surrounded by stones and accompanied by ornaments such as brooches, bracelets and razors, but not usually weapons. Villanova became a manufacturing centre, but there does not appear to have been a distinctive warrior class.

The Mycenean culture was probably influential in Italy. Mycenean influence has been confirmed in Sicily and the Aeolian Islands (Lipari) from before 1400 BC and the Mycenaeans probably conducted extensive trade in the Western Mediterranean. Lipari (the Aeoliae Insulae) were important; however, around 1250 BC the settlement on the acropolis of Lipari was destroyed by fire. Diodorus records the legend that Liparus, son of the king of the Ausonians of central-southern Italy, founded a city on Lipari. The culture on Lipari has consequently been called Ausonian and fourished until c. 850 BC. The people of this culture cremated their dead and buried them in urns — as did the 'urn-field' culture of northern Italy (Terramara).

In comparison to Greece and the Middle East, Italy was a cultural backwater around 850 BC. Whilst the settlements of Italy previously had trade links to Crete and Mycenaean Greece, there is no monument in Italy equivalent to, for example, Stonehenge in Britain. The Bronze Age culture of Sardinia was the most advanced culture of the region during the second millennium BC.

Elsewhere the culture of the tribes of Italy is labeled Villanovan, after the most famous site at Villanova, near Bologna. However, many languages, albeit related, were spoken and although there was some cultural unity, there was no ethnic unity.

IV. At the dawn of Iron Age in Italy

The Villanovan Iron Age began c. 750 BC around the time of Greek colonization in Italy at Ischia and Cumae. Subsequently, the Villanovan culture died out, and it is not known precisely what happened to it. However, it is likely the Villanovan peoples were absorbed into Etruscan culture in Tuscany and morphed into the Latin culture in Latium. It is likely that the Villanovan culture was taken over by the Etruscan culture as it advanced northwards over the Apennines. Originally there was a southern Villanovan culture — in Tuscany and northern Latium. By the C7th BC the peoples of this culture adopted inhumation, which was the custom of the Etruscans, and the dead were laid in chamber-tombs cut into rock. Villages coalesced into small and wealthy cities. Greek pottery was imported. So it is likely that this southern culture was assimilated into the Etruscan culture.

Two other cultures in northern Italy from the early Iron Age are the Golaseccans around Lake Maggiore and the Comacines around Lake Como. Also the Atestines (the Romans called them the Veneti) settled around Este in Venetia. The Golaseccans had a warrior class and some chieftains were buried burred with chariots and weapons.

Another ancient race, possibly of Illyrian origin, were the Atestines, called the Veneti by the Romans, that occupied what is now Venetia. The Atestines are thought to have come to Italy from Illyria but do not appear to have had a distinctive warrior class. Inscriptions have been found dedicated to a goddess called Reitia, and they spoke an Indo-European language. Their culture was subsequently dominated by the Celts from the fourth century onwards.

The Picenes lived around Ancona in the Marche and were a warlike Iron-Age peoples who practised inhumation. Another culture that practised inhumation occupied Apulia. The three tribes of this region were known as the Daunians, Peucetians and the Messapians; they probably originated from Illyria. Their language is not known for certain, but is likely to have been Indo-European.

In the central Apennines the Osco-Umbrian or Umbrian-Sabellic dialects wee spoken, which are forms of Latin. Oscan was the language of the Samnites.

All these Indo-European dialects in Italy probably originated from a single source but it is not known whether there was a sudden migration or a gradual influx of people. However, as there is no archaeological evidence to support the view that hordes of Italic peoples descended through Italy the theory of gradual migration seems preferable.