- chapter 17: Etruria Marittima –
Vieux Port, confi rms the presence at the end of the sixth century of a literate Etruscan
and suggests the celebration of diplomatic ceremonies at which he participated. The
majority of the graffi ti on the bucchero and impasto vases from Marseille, Saint-Blaise and
Lattes are understood as marks of ownership and the particularly exalted status conferred
upon those using the script. The bowls from Lattes marked with women’s names are
of exceptional interest and appear to confi rm the presence of Etruscan or Etruscanized
women and the practice of mixed marriages. An analogous conclusion emerges from
certain non-epigraphic documents from Carthage, specifi cally the perfume vessels in
bucchero or Etrusco-Corinthian wares and the votive statuette from Dar-Seniat.
Southern Gaul has also furnished certain inscriptions that suggest a heretofore
unsuspected cultural transfer of Etruscan origin. One is the graffi to from Saint-Blaise
upon the base of an Attic cup, in Greek characters but in Etruscan language and with a
dedication to the goddess Uni: this reading was proposed by G. Colonna and suggests
the cultural miscegenation of a presumably local person of high status.^121 The other
inscription, which also appears to reveal an analogous result, is the graffi to of Ensérune:
J. de Hoz proposes to read the name of an indigene, of Celtic extraction, transcribed into
Etruscan characters.^122
FUNERARY STRUCTURES AND CONSTRUCTIONS
WHICH CAN BE TRACED BACK TO AN
ETRUSCAN PRESENCEUntil now the tombs and architectural remains the farthest from Etruria yet still tied to
an Etruscan presence were those of Aleria on Corsica. Carthage has certainly furnished
proof positive of the tomb of the Etruscan from Caere, marked by the aforementioned
cippus, although unfortunately disassociated with its original locus. Near Lattes we
noted a tomb with Etruscan goods and the oldest strigil found in Gaul, suggesting a
deceased foreigner, possibly Etruscan. In one of the tombs of Ampurias, the exceptional
discovery of an Etruscan mirror appears to indicate the high status of an Etruscan lady, or
at least an Etruscanized one. A distant parallel might be the burial (in tomb 25) at Ras el
Bassit (Syria) of an infant with a bucchero kantharos.^123 Other than in a few remarkable
cases, imported objects present in distant necropoleis are diffi cult to interpret vis-à-
vis matters of ethnicity or community. Effectively, tomb goods are in no way suffi cient
for determining with certainty the identity of the deceased. However, this restriction
does not impede scientifi cally grounded avenues of research or the formation of new
hypotheses. At Carthage, for example, one might suggest the attribution of certain tombs
to “assimilated foreigners.”^124 The dossier is complicated but merits further examination.
Concerning structures built in the settlements, the data are sparse and diffi cult to
interpret, given the lack of extensive excavation contemporary with the levels of the
Etruscan imports. For the north-western Mediterranean, in spite of such designations as
“Etruscan house” for a construction at the building site of Îlot rue Cathédrale at Marseille,
and for several rooms in a quarter at Lattes, no complete architectural ensemble is
identifi able with certainty as an Etruscan residence or storeroom. However, the earliest
levels of Lattes do appear to attest to a new style of architecture introduced into the local,
indigenous context; likewise the apparition in southern France of stone statuary, manifest
in the sculpture of a kneeling archer which was part of a commemorative monument of
the fi fth century, later reused in fi ll.^125