On May 6, 2015, UC Berkeley’s ambitious plan to establish a Center for the Study of Ancient Italy was officially launched with a reception at the Italian Cultural Institute in San Francisco.
It was a well attended event with supporting remarks from Italy’s own representative, Mauro Battocchi, the Consul General of Italy.
Overseen by the Graduate Group in Ancient History and Mediterranean Archaeology, the Center will embrace an interdisciplinary approach to teaching and research. It will promote and advance the study of the many cultures of ancient Italy, with special emphasis on the Etruscans and Romans. It will organize conferences, sponsor lectures, workshops and exhibitions dedicated to the ancient art, history and archaeology of Italy.
The stated goals for the center are as follows:
•To provide excavation opportunities and funding for undergraduate and graduate students at major Etruscan and Roman sites in Italy (Iron Age, Etruscan, and Roman periods).
•To coordinate and encourage the publication of archaeological materials with partner institutions.
•To be a hub for scholarly exchange between the art and archaeology collections dedicated to Ancient Italy (The Phoebe Hearst Museum of Anthropology at UC Berkeley, the San Francisco Fine Arts Museums) and other museums and universities in the US and Italy.
Who are the people working to create this groundbreaking center? Recently, L’Italo Americano interviewed the Center’s Project Director,
Lisa Pieraccini, Ph.D (an archaeologist who teaches at UC Berkeley and specializes in the Etruscans and Early Romans). Through this interview we learn about the planned Center and also about the Etruscans. In the next issue of L’Italo Americano we will continue this story by featuring Dr. Pieraccini and the remarkable story of San Francisco born Mario A. Del Chiaro (Berkeley Ph.D.), the center’s visionary and first benefactor – not to mention the pioneer of Etruscan Studies in the US.
The Center aims to bring together Berkeley’s top scholars in the field of Ancient Italy, from Pre-Roman Italy to the Late Antique. It will offer to the undergraduate and graduate student a wide variety of research opportunities in Italy – from studying ancient Latin texts at the Vatican, to researching pottery at Pompeii, conducting research in the Roman provinces, to excavating Etruscan tombs. As for the Center itself, it offers a unique and broad view of ancient Italy and includes an important Etruscan component – a field of study seldom offered in the US universities today. Why are the Etruscans important? The answer may seem relatively simple and straight forward. They are the ancestors of Italians from central Italy and the civilization who passed to the Romans a heritage spanning from engineering skills and religious concepts to styles in art and architecture (just to name a few things).
Etruscans developed from the early Iron Age Villanovans (1,000 – 800 BCE). They lived in central Italy between the 8th and 2nd centuries BCE when the heart of Etruria was bounded by the Tiber and Arno rivers, the Apennines and the Tyrrhenian Sea. During that time, Etruscans built many of the ancient cities dotting the hills from the Tiber to the Arno, for example Veii, Cerveteri, Tarquinia, Vulci, Perugia, Orvieto, Chiusi, Volterra, etc. Each autonomous city, originally ruled by a powerful, wealthy chief/king, had a sacred boundary or pomerium.
The Etruscan economy was primarily based on agriculture and trade. By the 7th century BCE, they had created a broad network of commercial and artistic trade routes throughout the Mediterranean and they were avid importers of Greek and Near Eastern art. Their own artistic legacy lives on in their wall paintings, bronze and clay sculpture, vase paintings and gold jewelry.
Sophisticated and prosperous, Etruscans were major contributors to some of Western civilization’s greatest achievements, especially in architecture, engineering, and art. Their literature has not survived, but Etruscans leave us much of their past through their material culture, namely, tombs, temples, habitation sites, and more.
The Etruscans spent a good amount of time preparing for their death. In fact, we know more about their cemeteries (which in large part have survived) than we do about their cities (many of which are buried under ancient Roman cities which became Medieval, Baroque, then modern). The Etruscans exerted a heavy influence on early Rome, and, when studying this ancient civilization, it becomes clear they had an important impact on the history of ancient Rome.
Etruscans organized themselves into city-states to the north of Rome and the early 6th century BCE their cultural influence expanded down to Rome. At that time, the area of Rome was made up of simple structures to which the Etruscans introduced a form of what we would call urban planning. They drained the surrounding marshes and built underground sewers, built public works using the arch and vault, and laid out roads and bridges. They promoted trade, the development of metallurgy, and better agricultural practices.
The Etruscans adopted the Greek alphabet (in the Bay of Naples) and used it to write their non Indoeuropean language. Their prose, poetry and histories have not survived, but we know they wrote extensively. What has survived are over some 13,000 funerary inscriptions – hard to put back an entire language with list of names and dates.
As the small village (Rome) grew on the banks of the Tiber River into a substantial city, powerful Etruscan families moved down from Etruria and settled in. In fact the last three kings of Rome were Etruscan. They left an Etruscan veneer on the city and a legandery event accounted best by Livy in the 1st century BCE, describes how the Romans ousted the last king of Rome and victoriously established the Republic by 500 BCE.
Back to the present-day, over 2,500 years later, we find that 2015 has been declared “The Year of the Etruscans,” in Italy. During the year, Italy’s archeological heritage is being promoted throughout the region. Many museums are participating and the lead was taken by a major exhibit at Palazzo Strozzi in Florence from March 14 to June 21. It showcased some of the ancient world’s most important masterpieces from Italian and international museums.
In addition, the whole of Tuscany has been involved in the project called “The Etruscan Streets”, described as “Walking and driving to discover museums and other sites of archaeological interest.” 2015 is also the year in which we celebrate the anniversary of the Museum of Etruscan Academy and the city of Cortona.
With all these events taking place in Italy, how fitting it is that the Bay Area has launched its own center for the study of our ancient ancestors. This remarkable and long overdue Center can be best described as providing an interdisciplinary approach to research and teaching and is a boon to the Italian-focused academic community in the Bay Area and beyond.
In the next issue of L’Italo Americano we will continue with more on Dr. Lisa Pieraccini, the Center’s Project Director, and Professor Mario A. Del Chiaro, the Center’s first benefactor. He is Professor Emeritus of Greek, Roman and Etruscan Art at the University of California, Santa Barbara where he taught for over 35 years.
For more information regarding the Center, please contact Project Director, Lisa Pieraccini at lisap@ berkeley.edu.
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