The Etruscan World (Routledge Worlds)

• chapter 2: Massimo Pallottino’s “Origins” in perspective –

Italia centro-meridionale Regione etrusco-laziale Italia settentrionale

ENEOLITICO

II millennio

av.Cr.

1000-700

circa

ENEOLITICO

Rinaldone Chiozza, Remedello

ecc

APPENNINICO e

TERREMARE in Emilia.

Diffusione del rito della

cremazione.

Bologna S. Vitale,

Fontanella ecc.

VILLANOVIANO

in Emilia e inizio delle

CULTURE DEL FERRO

nell’ Italia settentrionale

VILLANOVIANO

EVELUTO in Emilia

(Benacci II, Arnoaldi);

CULTURE ATESTINA

E DI GOLASECCA

Penetrazione etrusca

nella pianura padana

(Certosa)

Parziale penetrazione

dell’APPENNINICO in Etruria

(Cetona)

VILLANOVIANO

in Etruria, manifestazioni

dette di transizione e

inizio della CULTURE DEL

FERRO LAZIALE.

VILLANOVIANO

EVOLUTO in Etruria

ENEOLITICO

APPENNINICO I

(Conelle)

APPENNINICO II

(Filottrano)

Diffusion sporadica della

eremazione

(Pianello, Timari ecc.).

Inizio della CULTURE DEL

FERRO MERIDIONALE

e colonizzazione greca.

Inizio delle CULTURE DEL

FERROR nell’ Italia centro-

adriatica

<< <<

<< <<

<< <<

<< <<

<< <<

ORIENTALIZZANTE

CIVILTÀ ETRUSCA ARCAICA

700-575

575-500

Figure 2.3 Sequence of the ancient cultures of the Italian Peninsula (Pallottino 1947, 96).

Summing up, as early as 1947 Massimo Pallottino considered the Etruscan nation to have
appeared in the historical scenario in the fi rst millennium bce: “...the Etruscan nation
and the Etruscan civilization have to be considered in no other way than a well defi ned
result of ethnic, political, economic, cultural factors that came to converge and develop in
central Italy at the beginning of the fi rst millennium bce.” (Pallottino 1947: 5.)
Afterwards a number of contributions were dedicated to the same subject, spanning
from chronological and historical issues to linguistics (Pallottino 1947–48; 1948–49;
1961; 1968; 1970; 1977; 1984; 1986), without ignoring the anthropological approach
to the question raised by the Ciba Foundation Symposium held in London in 1958.
His position was cautious, but nevertheless did not disregard the debate between
historical anthropology and genetics (Pallottino 1961) and was in some ways ahead
of the times (Bagnasco Gianni 2012). Nowadays we have the twofold opportunity to
ignore indications based on genetic data generated from aDNA (ancient DNA), claiming
closer relationships with Near Eastern than with modern Italian populations, or to meet
the challenge and discuss the problem with different, but punctual and collaborative
scientifi c approaches (Turfa 2006; Perkins 2009; Harari 2010).
In such a recent scenario it is worth noting that in 1985 Massimo Pallottino himself
introduced another novel approach to the discussion. During the Second International
Congress of Etruscan Studies he suggested that the Etruscan nation might have started
its formation very early in Central Italy, during the Eneolithic culture of Rinaldone (from
the third millennium to fi rst half of the second millennium bce) (Pallottino 1989: 61–
62). With this he combined the movements of people from the East, the characters of the
language shared with those of the island of Lemnos, already assessed since Della Seta’s