Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 8.djvu/657

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.
ELM—ELM

E T 11 E T K 033 has lately been beautified and decorated, and a number of stained-glass windows have been introduced. The library contains a curious and valuable collection of books, a collec tion of Oriental and Egyptian manuscripts, and some beautifully illuminated missals. There is also a large library for the use of the boys. From the foundation of Eton College the college chapel was used as the parish church until 1854, when a handsome chapel-of-ease was erected at the cost of 8000. With the secularization of the college, the parish of Eton was in 1875 erected into an independent vicarage with the former chapel-of-ease as its parish church. In 1871 the population of the local board district of Eton (exclusive of the Eton boys) was 2806; of the parish, 3261. See Memoirs of Eminent Etonians, with Notices of the Early History of the College, by E. S. Creasy (1850); Sketches of Eton (1873); History of Eton College from 144(Ho 1875, by H.C.M. Lyte, M. A. (1875) ; Memoirs of Celebrated Etonians, by J. Heneage Jesse (1875); and The Eton Portrait Gallery, by a Barrister of the Inner Temple (1875). ETRURIA. When or by what road the Rasena (Etrusci) reached their permanent seats in Etruria proper is by no means certain, though from the fact of their principal towns being well inland, from the tradition of their having been previously settled in Umbria, from the survival of their peculiar language down to late times among a people of the llluetian Alps, and from the discovery of works of art in this district corresponding with the earliest Etruscan rwttumrriun. Chart of Etruria. remains, there would seem to be considerable probability in the theory of their first settlement in Italy having been about the mouth of the Po, whence their progress would be through Umbria and across the Apennines. At the same time, it is to be remembered that, though "Rasena" was the national name of this people, yet there is strong evidence for supposing that the nationality, a.s we know it under the classical names of Etrusci or Tyrrheni (Tvpprjvot, Tvpo-qvoi), included another race which, if not nearly allied to the Greeks, had a singularly similar disposition towards the arts, such as it is hardly possible the original Rasena could have brought with them directly from the north. It would account for this other race, if we could accept the tradition (Herodotus, i. 94, Strabo, v. 220) of a body of Lydians having landed in Umbria and colonized Etruria, naming it after their leader Tyrsenus. This Lydian origin was accepted by the Etruscans themselves in late times (Tacitus, Ann. iv. 55), and many have seen a confirma tion of it in the similarity of the tombs and tiimuli exist ing in both countries, and in the records of a singular community between them in such matters as music, games, and costume. 1 Yet a native historian of Lydia (Xanthus) said nothing of the emigration from that country, and Dionysius, who cites him, maintained that the language spoken HI Etruria had nothing in com mon with that of Lydia. The legend of Herodotus is an attempt to explain the name of " Tyrrhenia " as applied by the Greeks to Etruria, owing, doubtless, to its being largely inhabitated by members of that same Tyr rhenian race which was found on the coast of Asia Minor and in Thrace, which people Thucydides (iv. 109) identifies with the Pelasgians, while Herodotus himself (i. 57) speaks of the Tyrrhenian town of Creston, by which he means Cortona in Etruria according to Dionysius, as Pelasgic. Another tradition asserted that Pelasgians from Thessaly had en tered Italy from the Adriatic at Spina and founded Cortoua. While then the Tyrrhenians and Pelasgians were practi cally the same people, it will be sufficient to use the former name to designate the apparently foreign element in the nationality of the Rasena. In historical times the chief seat of the Tyrrhenians outside of Etruria was in Thrace, where they worked the rich silver mines, and to judge from their coins (e.g., those of the Edones and Bisaltae) were gifted with much the same disposition towards fine art which is observed in Etruria. From this position in a northern region, and from the traditions of members of the same race having entered Italy from the north-east, it is not unreasonable to suppose that they may have gradually made their way round by land, and may, in fact, have joined the Rasena while they were yet in their settlements at the mouth of the Po. So complete a blending of two races a appears in the Etrusci could scarcely take place unless the original contact had been during a primitive stage of civilization. No doubt there were other Tyr rhenians besides those of Thrace. There were those who were known chiefly as pirates, or as successful in seafaring, and from the circumstance of Cture, which previously had the Tyrrhenian name of Agylla, having been near the coast, it would seem as if part at least of the Tyrrhenians had entered Etruria by sea on the west coast. It is common enough to find mention of the twelve cities Citi. of Etruria, but nowhere are their respective names recorded. 1 Compare the tomb of Alyattes, still existing, anil described by Herodotus (i. 93), with that of Cucuniella at Vulci. Tradition said that the Lydian trumpet and the Phrygian double Hute had been introduced into Home from Etruria ; that the prcetexta or oflicial robes, the eagle as a standard, and the game of dice had been brought from Lydia to Etruria. Livy (iv. 17) tells how Lars Tolumnius determined, by means of dice, the fate of the Roman ambassadors who were sent to him at Veii (cf. Plutarch, Vit. Ram,, xxxiii.); and Festus (s. v. "Sardi") mentions the custom according to which, on occasions of sacrifice for victory at Rome, an old man, dressed in purple, was led to the Capitol, attended by a herald, who proclaimed " Sardians to be sold ;" and they explain this custom as having sur vived from the sale of prisoners after the capture of Veii, which prisoners were Sardians, since Etruria had been colonized by Sardians.. This custom, however, seems rather to have originated after the taking of Sardinia by Tib. Seiiipronius Gracchus.

vrn. so