Etruscans in Puglia?

[Jona Lendering]

Here's a link to an article that I do not understand: an Etruscan cemetery in Puglia. It may be an error, it may be an interesting novelty. Perhaps one of our Italian friends knows more.

[Paullus Scipio]

Well, it would not be out of the question. As well as the league of 12 cities centred in the Po valley, there was another Etruscan League, also apparently of 12 cities in Campania, next to Apulia/Puglia. The southern League went into decline after the Sicilian Greeks inflicted the naval defeat of Cumae in 474 BC, and came to an end with the fall of Etruscan Capua to the Samnite c.425 BC.....so a 4th C BC Etruscan necropolis in Puglia is a distinct possibility. D

[Epictetus]

That is interesting! I had never heard that the Etruscans were on the Adriatic side of Italy that far south of the Po Valley.

T.J. Cornell thinks that there was “a process of emigration by small groups from individual Etruscan cities, who established themselves, by force or persuasion, as a significant element of the ruling class in settlements that already existed as going concerns. In this way they gained control of autonomous communities and pursued their own interests, rather than acting as dependencies of a centralised Etruscan metropolis. That being the case, there was no need for a direct overland link to be maintained… (Beginnings of Rome).

He was speaking of Campania, but perhaps the same process could have occurred elsewhere?

He also mentions that Cato the Elder wrote that “almost all of Italy was once in the power of the Etruscans” (Origins I.13). That statement seems clearly implausible to me, but perhaps there was an underlying tradition of Etruscans being scattered throughout the peninsula at different times.

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

Well they were in conflict with quite a few other settlements in Italy, why would they just stick to the west!

[Dan Diffendale]

Etruscans in Puglia in the 4th c. BCE? Sounds fishy to me. This post mentions that there were 60 vases found whose technique recalls Etruscan technique. Maybe that got blown up?

There's a fuller description here: http://www.express-news.it/?p=6332
The photos included don't at first glance look out of place for 5th-4th century Daunia; I really don't think we're talking about "Etruscans" here...

Even better, this article in the Gazzetta del Mezzogiorno: http://www.lagazzettadelmezzogiorno.it/ ... ategoria=1
"A rich set of grave goods, including 'evidence' that could be stretched to an eventual Etruscan presence, but on this point the head of the regional Soprintendenza has asked to proceed with much caution..."

[Jona Lendering]

Etruscans in Puglia in the 4th c. BCE? Sounds fishy to me. This post mentions that there were 60 vases found whose technique recalls Etruscan technique. Maybe that got blown up?

Something of that sort may indeed have happened. Yesterday, I came across the same mechanism. An American article on the recent damage to the ruins of Babylon (this one) mentions the ancient city and says that it had many monuments, like the Hanging Gardens. It's just an explanation to the reader of what Babylon was. The Dutch article (this one), carelessly summarizes "the Hanging Gardens have been destroyed", but that's not the original claim. (As a matter of fact, the Hanging Gardens never existed outside Greek fantasy.)