- chapter 15: Etruria on the Po and the Adriatic Sea –
MARZABOTTO (ELISABETTA GOVI)Located in the Reno Valley, which ever since the Villanovan period has been the main route
of communication between Tyrrhenian Etruria and Etruria Padana, the city of Marzabotto
is known for its urban layout that has been perfectly preserved (Fig. 15.14); behind
its regular and perfect astronomical orientation are the clearly identifi able traces and
structures of a foundation ritual attributed by ancient sources precisely to the Etruscans.
Established ex novo in the second half of the sixth century bc, the town assumed its
permanent and regular layout around the beginning of the fi fth century bc (Fig. 15.15).
Of this development, in the urban sense, there is perhaps testimony in the ancient name
of the city, which came to light recently in an inscription, Kainua, that may be traced
to the Greek kainon, meaning “new [city],” just like Neapolis in Magna Graecia. Urban
regularity on one side and a connection with the Etruscan ritual of a celestial templum
projected on the earth on the other, have always captured the attention of scholars since
the fi rst excavations in the nineteenth century. Today we are able to reconstruct the
foundation ritual that here fi nds an exact match in the famous passage of Festus, showing
the time and methods for the inauguratio, for which they needed two “seats,” ritually
linked according to a sort of stipulatio. In the auguraculum, placed on the acropolis and
thus in a dominant position, the augur, sitting on the tescum and facing east-south-east,
embracing a view of the entire inhabited area, could perform the spectio, an operation that
allowed the transposition of the axes of the celestial templum onto the earth. Below, at
the center of the projected templum is where the two main urban axes crossed and where
there was driven into the ground the stone with the crux (inscribed cross-hairs), in what
is considered the sedes inaugurationis, the auspice-taker stood, tasked with implementing
the instructions of the augur. The defi ning principle of the geometry of the city is the
observation of the sun in its annual cycle, given that the urban form corresponds exactly
to the fi gure that connects the endpoints of the sunrise and sunset at the summer and
winter solstices (Fig. 15.16). The plan of the city was then based on the two diagonals,
connecting these points that always crossed at the crux on the stone marker.
Figure 15.14 Aerial view of the city of Marzabotto (Soprintendenza per i Beni
Archeologici dell’Emilia Romagna).