Etruscan was the language of the Etruscan civilization in the ancient region of Etruria, in Etruria Padana and Etruria Campana in what is now Italy. Etruscan influenced Latin but was eventually completely superseded by it. The Etruscans left around 13,000 inscriptions that have been found so far, only a small minority of which are of significant length; some bilingual inscriptions with texts also in Latin, Greek, or Phoenician; and a few dozen purported loanwords. Attested from 700 BC to AD 50, the relation of Etruscan to other languages has been a source of long-running speculation and study, with it mostly being referred to as one of the Tyrsenian languages, at times as an isolate, and a number of other less well-known hypotheses.
Mauro Cristofani was a linguist and researcher in Etruscan studies.
Vetulonia, formerly called Vetulonium, was an ancient town of Etruria, Italy, the site of which is probably occupied by the modern village of Vetulonia, which up to 1887 bore the name of Colonnata and Colonna di Buriano: the site is currently a frazione of the comune of Castiglione della Pescaia, with some 400 inhabitants.
Giovanni Becatti was an Italian Classical art historian and archaeologist.
Mario Torelli was an Italian scholar of Italic archaeology and the culture of the Etruscans. He taught at the University of Perugia.
Massimo Pallottino was an Italian archaeologist specializing in Etruscan civilization and art.
Lammert Bouke van der Meer is a Dutch classicist and classical archaeologist specialized in Etruscology. He studied classics and archaeology at the University of Groningen, and received his Ph.D. from the same university in 1978 with a dissertation entitled Etruscan urns from Volterra. Studies on mythological representations, I-II. Van der Meer is retired associate professor of Classical Archaeology at Leiden University.
Larissa Bonfante was an Italian-American classicist, Professor of Classics emerita at New York University and an authority on Etruscan language and culture.
Nancy Thomson de Grummond is the M. Lynette Thompson Professor of Classics and Distinguished Research Professor at Florida State University. She specializes in Etruscan, Hellenistic and Roman archaeology. She serves as the director of archaeological excavations at Cetamura del Chianti in Tuscany, Italy. Her current research relates to Etruscan and Roman religion, myth and iconography.
In classical antiquity, several theses were elaborated on the origin of the Etruscans from the 5th century BC, when the Etruscan civilization had been already established for several centuries in its territories, that can be summarized into three main hypotheses. The first is the autochthonous development in situ out of the Villanovan culture, as claimed by the Greek historian Dionysius of Halicarnassus who described the Etruscans autochthonous people who had always lived in Etruria. The second is a migration from the Aegean Sea, as claimed by two Greek historians: Herodotus, who described them as a group of immigrants from Lydia in Anatolia, and Hellanicus of Lesbos who claimed that the Tyrrhenians were the Pelasgians originally from Thessaly, Greece, who entered Italy at the head of the Adriatic Sea in Northern Italy. The third hypothesis was reported by Livy and Pliny the Elder, and puts the Etruscans in the context of the Rhaetian people to the north and other populations living in the Alps.
Christopher John Smith, FRSE, FSA, FRHistS, is a British academic and classicist specialising in early Ancient Rome.
Rofalco was a fortified late-Etruscan settlement, located about twenty km north of Vulci, at the edge of the Selva del Lamone volcanic plateau. The site controlled the important natural route formed by the valley of the Olpeta stream and contributed to the defense and the organization of the southeastern portion of the ancient territory of Vulci.
Luisa Banti was an Italian archaeologist, art historian, and educator specializing in the Etruscan and Minoan civilizations. Her best known work is Il mondo degli Etruschi. First published in 1960 and translated into several languages, it influenced scholarly opinion for many years and became a classic text.
Judith Swaddling is a British classical archaeologist and the Senior Curator of Etruscan and pre-Roman Italy in the Department of Greece and Rome at the British Museum. She is particularly known for her work on the Etruscans, and the ancient Olympic Games.
Maria Bonghi Jovino is an Italian archaeologist. Bonghi Jovino was Professor of Etruscology and Italic Archaeology at the University of Milan.
Carlo De Simone was an Italian linguist, specialising in Ancient Greek and Latin texts and Etruscan epigraphs. He is best known for his research into Etruscan, Lemnian and Rhaetian languages.
Jean MacIntosh Turfa is an American archaeologist and authority on the Etruscan civilization.
Guglielmo Maetzke was an Italian archaeologist and etruscologist. A pupil of the Etruscologist Massimo Pallottino, he directed important excavation campaigns in Tuscany, Lazio, Campania and Sardinia.
