- chapter 19: Etruscan goods in the Mediterranean world –
By contrast, the situation in the north-western Mediterranean is completely different.
In truth, for the fi rst half of the sixth century especially, one fi nds in this zone the most
important concentrations of bucchero kantharoi and vases outside of Etruria, not only
at the principle sites but also along a ring of intermediary sites. We know of cases
of provincial regions adopting the forms and decorations of bucchero vases in local
productions: we have identifi ed as much at Marseille even for kantharoi in grey ware,
and likewise in the oppidum of Saint-Marcel for an oinochoe decorated with relief masks.
Far into the interior, we know of reproductions of kantharoi in the region of Lyons and
all the way to Burgundy. We can affi rm that, on the littoral of Provence, Languedoc, and
Catalonia, bucchero vases were commercialized with other trade goods, and that this
region of the Mediterranean is the furthest from Etruria where this phenomenon is clearly
attested. Moreover, certain shipwrecks carrying Etruscan amphorae contained a cargo of
kantharoi and other vases in bucchero. For example, the shipwreck at the Cap d’Antibes
was transporting a shipment of several dozen kantharoi and oinochoai.
To conclude, the Etruscans “as powerful on land as on sea,” according to Livy, benefi ted
on land from their location on the Po plain by promoting exchanges with the intermediary
populations in the direction of the Celtic world; indeed, colonies like Marzabotto were
founded, still within peninsular Italy of course, to facilitate manufacture, processing of
goods and their trade with burgeoning markets across the Alps (see Chapter 15). The
period when the distribution of Etruscan bronzes north of the Alps is at its strongest –
at the end of the sixth and during the fi fth centuries – coincides with the apogee of the
Etruscan cities in the plains of the Po River. Etruscan commercial enterprises very much
made use of the Alpine trade circuits and benefi ted from their role as active intermediaries
between the populations of the northern Adriatic and the Alpine valleys.
By sea, Etruscan enterprises conducted beyond the Tyrrhenian did not take the form
of proper colonial settlements. Rather, and this is beyond doubt, the Etruscans were the
fi rst people of western Europe to set up maritime cities from which to distribute and
market their products throughout the whole of the Mediterranean. The north-western
Mediterranean was the principal target of the Etruscan merchants, as is attested by the
considerable number of objects and commodities found in this region. Although we can
affi rm for southern Gaul – the region most concerned with the sale of wine and drinking
paraphernalia – that “there was no ‘Etruscan commerce’ itself creating an economic
network,”^167 we might envision another interpretation of the phenomenon: Etruscan
long-range ventures appear to have been based on a “non-colonial model” that adapted
to the demands and profi ted from the possibilities of the Greek and Phoenician colonial
networks. Enquiry is still ongoing on this matter, supporting the hypothesis of archaic
Etruscan “fonduks” (see Chapter 17), because these Etruscans who took so much from the
Orient and offered so much to the Occident have never ceased to amaze us.
NOTES1 See to this effect Chapter 17 on relations between Etruria Marittima, Carthage, Iberia and
Gaul.
2 von Hase 1969, 9, Fig. 1.8; id. 1981; Herrmann 1984; Catalogue Paris 1992a, 158.
3 Catalogue Paris 1992a, 158, 193, Fig. 254.
4 For Spain: Brandherm 2007, 1, n. 4. For Egypt: Bianco Peroni 1970, 113, n. 35, pl. 45; Naso
2011, Fig. 1.
5 Botto 2011; Naso 2011, 75.