VOLSCI, ancient Italian people who were prominent in the history of the first century of the Roman Republic. They then inhabited the partly hilly, partly marshy district of the S. of Latium, bounded by the Aurunci and Samnites on the S., the Hernici on the E., and stretching roughly from Norba and Cora in the N. to Antium in the S. They were among the most danger ous enemies of Rome, and frequently allied with the Aequi (q.v.). From the little town of Velitrae (Velletri) in the Volscian terri tory, the birthplace of Augustus, comes a very interesting though brief inscription dating probably from early in the 3rd century B.C. It is cut upon a small bronze plate (now in the Naples Mu seum), which must have once been fixed to some votive object.
The language of this inscription shows the very marked peculi arities which rank it close beside the language of the Iguvine Tables (see UMBRIAN). It shows on the one hand the labializa tion of the original velar q (Volscian pis=Latin quis), and on the other hand it palatalizes the guttural c before a following i (Volscian facia=Latin faciat). Like Umbrian also, it has de graded all the diphthongs into simple vowels.
The name Volsci belongs to the -CO- group of tribal names in the centre, and mainly on the west coast, of Italy, all of whom were subdued by the Romani before the end of the 4th century B.C. ; and many of whom were conquered by the Samnites about a century or more earlier. They are, from south to north, Osci, Aurunci, Hernici, Marruci, Falisci; with these were no doubt associated the original inhabitants of Aricia and of Sidici-num, of Vescia among the Aurunci, and of Labici close to Hernican terri tory. The same formative element appears in the adjective Mons Massicus, and the names Glanica and Marica belonging to the Auruncan district, with Graviscae in south Etruria, and a few other names in central Italy. With these names must clearly be judged the forms Tusci and Etrusci, the names given to the Etruscans by the folk among whom they settled. The Samnite and Roman conquerors tended to impose the form of their own group-name, namely the suffix -NO-, upon the tribes they con quered; hence the Marruci became the Marrucini, the Arici became Aricini. The conclusion suggested is that these -CO tribes occupied the centre and west coast of Italy at the time of the Etruscan invasion; whereas the -NO- tribes only reached this part of Italy, or at least only became dominant there, long after the Etruscans had settled in the Peninsula.
It remains, therefore, to ask whether any information can be had about the language of this primitive -CO- folk. If the con clusions suggested under SABINI may be accepted as sound we should expect to find the Volsci speaking a language similar to that of the Ligures, whose fondness for the suffix -sco- is marked, and identical with that spoken by the plebeians of Rome, and that this branch of Indo-European preserved the original Indo-Euro pean Velars from the labialization which befell them in the speech of the Samnites. The language of the inscription of Velitrae offers at first sight a difficulty from this point of view, in the conver sion which it shows of q to p; but the group-name of Velitrae is Veliternus, and the people are called on the inscription itself Velestrom (genitive plural) ; so that there is nothing to prevent our assuming that we have here a settlement of Sabines among the Volscian hills, with their language to some extent (e.g., in the matter of the diphthongs and palatals) corrupted by that of the people round about them.
In the name Volsci, the older form Vo/usci clearly contains the word meaning "marsh," since the change of velos- to volus- is phonetically regular in Latin. The name Marica ("goddess of the salt-marshes") among the Aurunci appears also both on the coast of Picenum and among the Ligurians ; Stephanus of Byzan tium identified the Osci with the Siculi, who, there is reason to suspect, were kinsmen of the Ligures. In many marshy places this -co- or -ca- suffix is used. Besides the Aurunci and the dea Marica and the internpestaeque Graviscae (Virg., Aen. x. we have the Ustica cubans of Horace (Odes i. 17, I I), the Hernici in the Trerus valley, Satricum and Glanica in the Pomptine marshes.