and the date even of this is too high to be fixed[1]. But it is unreasonable to doubt that there were many other settlements unnoticed by historians; for the sea-coast had numerous Greek names[2] in Roman times, and various cities practised Greek religious ceremonies. Indeed, both in arts and in religion, southern Etruria seems to have been pervaded with Greek influences, to an extent scarcely possible without the intermixture of true Hellenic inhabitants; and similar phenomena will presently appear in the accounts of earliest Rome.
The Pelasgians are a very enigmatical people, who have occasioned controversies still unsettled. That there was in Italy a very sensible Pelasgian element, is attested too strongly to deny; but the admission of it is apt to be a barren truth. Dionysius reports numerous Pelasgian settlers in the interior and on the eastern coast, and appears to regard them to have set foot on Italy from that side: yet as they were in Greece a seafaring and scattered people, it would be unreasonable to limit their visits of their settlements to any one shore. The Roman poets used the
- ↑ Spalding acquiesces in B.C. 1030; p. 47. Clinton is silent.
- ↑ Servius ad Æn. x. 179, quotes a mysterious statement from the Origines of Cato, that the region of Pisa in Etruria, before the Etruscans occupied it, was held by "Teutones quidam, Græce loquentes." It is impossible to judge what allowance to make for Cato's credulity. Mr. Clinton's comment is curious; (F. H. vol. i. p. 97, 1848;) viz. that they were "doubtless some Pelasgic tribe." Indeed be adduces the passage in proof of the Pelasgians spoke Greek.
